After a rather low-key event last year we'd decided to go out on a limb and risk drastic trunkating of our regular liturgy, and various family-friendly tweaks (which ought to be the norm each week, but hey, Rome wasn’t built in a day!). I was then left in a state of frantic anxiety in case no families actually appeared, and the regular congregation felt they’d been diddled out of their normal diet for no good reason.
This morning, the normal vestry nerves were intensified…
Would all the bits hold together? What if everyone voted with their feet and stayed at home? (specially given the unkind twist of the clocks going forward last night)...Had I done enough to include those for whom the day is peculiarly painful?
But it was WONDERFUL
The 1000+ invitations we’d delivered to our baptism families, schools, Brownies, Beavers, Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all had clearly had some impact, as there were a good range of families, familiar and unknown, among the congregation as we processed in. The cuts in the liturgy left no gaping voids. The two mothers we interviewed as the prologue to the talk rose to the occasion like troupers and the thoughts that followed seemed to go down well too. Using Hosea 11, I talked about the huge gap between the tv image of mothering and the grisly reality of domestic life at the Curate’s house…I talked about the ways in which God mothers us through other people, and our responsibility to pass on the love we receive, and above all about the reality of unconditional love available all the time. EVERYONE received flowers and simnel cake, and a fair few chose to light candles for missing mothers or children at the station I’d made by the statue of Our Lady.
It was all lovely, honestly. A fair few tears at Communion, but that felt good too…
And after the service, my totally mad and rather delightful children went the length and breadth of Charlton Kings giving stray flowers to all and sundry, sticking them on car windscreens or entwining them through gates. Goodness knows what people will make of that, but perhaps it will raise a smile.
Meanwhile,I'm off to eat chocolate...there seems to be rather alot of it about the place, mostly with my name on it. Have a lovely afternoon, everyone, and feel loved and celebrated.
The Good in Parts offspring were here....can you spot the daffodil?
6 comments:
it sounds really lovely. We kept Lent 4 but gave potplants - they've always done it. But people are moved in interesting ways and by strange things - so maybe there's room for a pot plant or two.
Thankyou for this - it sounds totally wonderful - can I come to your church sometime?
Just love the flower idea too - you and your family sound so inspired
Happy Mothering Sunday xx
Kathryn, happy Mother's Day! It sounds wonderful. Excellent idea to send out invites to the baptisees, scouts, and all. And it's lovely that everyone got flowers and cake (and that your kids spread the love outside the church).
Flowers everywhere - how lovely!
We've always given flowers - first to our own mothers, and then rushing around giving them to all the ladies who didn't have them. I remember being so keen as a Brownie to make sure NO woman felt left out, and how happy it made some of the older ladies! Today, however, I feel old, as after my brother and I had given flowers to Mum, one of the Guides gave flowers to me!!!
I hope you had a most wonderful Mother's Day - it's too easy to take our mothers for granted, so I hope you were spoilt and appreciated all day. And I'm sure it is only your children who would go doing that with flowers.... :-)
Great to discover your blog. I'll be back. My cousin was (now retired)curate at Saint Mary's at Primrose Hill.
I'll be back to read regularly.
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