Too Much Information

Karen at Kinesis wants to know about the contents of my bedside table...not something I am specially proud of, but in the interests of integrity and transatlantic frienship, I'm prepared to play!
The table itself is rather sweet...came from my parents-in-law when they sold huge country house for retirment flat...it's antique, fairly pale wood with fine inlay, and opens like an old-fashioned school desk. Apparently it would have had compartments inside for sewing materials in its hay day..but has now fallen on hard times (and I never dare keep anything inside it, as I've soo much junk on top I could never open it anyway).

Atop this unsuspecting table there stands, in no order whatsoever...

1) a lamp....Woolworth's cheapest ceramic, cream coloured..

2) alarm clock: very small, digital...cast off from middle son, on whom such things are wasted, as even the Last Trump has no effect if he needs to sleep

3) too many books, including elderly copy of The Practice of the Presence of God, which I bought at a booksale at my vicar-school; Michael Ramsey The Christian Priest Today; L.William Countryman Living on the Borders of the Holy; Rowan Williams Silence and Honey Cakes Richard Holloway Dancing on the Edge; Sue Monk-Kidd The Mermaid Chair

4) an invitation to Osca's Summer Soiree (Osca is a cat,- offspring of my daughter's Chloe, and sister to my own handsome Tallis)

5) Affirming Catholicism News and Views

6) yesterday's earrings (silver stars with amethyst centres) which I've not got round to putting away

7) handcream

8) mug "Jesus is coming, look busy" from this morning's wake-up cup of tea. This is sitting on

9) ceramic tile, with geometric pattern in sludgy green, produced by youngest son in art lessons: he even stuck a piece of green baize on the base, so that it wouldn't scratch the table, bless him

10) 2 biros (neither of which will be there next time I need to take a phone message)

11) phone (green...rather larger than is right for the table, but hey...I never have time to notice these things)

12) very special icon of the Nativity, brought back by L. from a school trip to Russia last year...it is small (3"x4"), old and very dark...so much so that indoors it can be hard to make out what is happening....but I took it on ordination retreat with me, and in the sunny gardens of the retreat house it was suddenly beautifully clear. Parable, anyone?

13) print off of a specially encouraging email from a friend, just before I went on retreat

14) post card from wonderful Bishop, telling me he was praying for me and hoping I was still on
a high from the ordination (answer in the affirmative!)

15) hair elastic (not even mine....but they never seem to find their way home to my daughter's room)

So now you know...the unvarnished truth of the domestic chaos of the Curate's House. Maggi, Serena, are you still sure you can face staying here??

An unnamed dream.

Both my regular readers will be aware that accessible, family-friendly worship is not currently a strong point of St M's...Each morning, when I cycle up to church to say the Office, I find myself living a parable, as I go against a huge tide of parents and children heading towards the primary school. I've never lived anywhere with so many young families, nor, sadly, been part of a church where so few of them appear. Given that on an average Sunday we have around 180 communicants, this is horribly significant: at Gt Rissington, where the whole congregation numbered 25 on a good day, my 3 children and a friend or 2 made an appreciable difference,-but not here. Since my original call to ministry emerged through involvement in children's work, the hope of addressing this was very much part of what drew me to a curacy in this place. I've spent a year trying to build relationships, spending alot of time in our 3 junior schools (none of them are church schools, but all are happy to welcome us, which is a huge bonus) and asking the parents whom I do encounter what, if anything, might encourage them to bring their children to church. Some of the Sunday morning congregation cherish the hope that dozens of scrubbed, silent children will start filing through our doors, en route to Junior Church...but my vision is a wee bit different, and I may face a few battles on that front too.
However, in the autumn, we're following the lead of many another parish, and hoping to grow a new congregation via a Sunday tea-time slot, aimed at children too old for our "Little Fishes" pre-school church, but still too young for even the junior youth group (which starts at 9). The hope is for about 30 minutes of informal worship and teaching followed, very crucially, by TEA and biccies.
We'll start monthly, as that feels achievable..and I would love your help, all of you, on two counts.

Most obviously, your prayers as we plan and prepare,- that I've heard the community properly, and that this is part of God's vision for Charlton Kings, that a few more people will want to be involved, as a team of 3 feels a bit thin to start something like this, and that the core congregation will understand that this is not meant to compete with but to complement to existing worship.

Finally, or perhaps to start with, I'd be very glad of any suggestions as to what we might actually call it...I have a feeling this might be important, but so far nothing has seemed quite right. CK Praise? Family Praise? Time to Celebrate?? I just don't know...what do you think?

A very brief postscript

In the previous post, I mentioned St David's Day 1991, when Rev Eleanor was preaching at Great Rissington. I should maybe have added that she was the first ordained woman I had encountered...and at the end of her sermon, I heard a voice, so clear that I looked around to see who had spoken, saying "You could do that for me."
It took a long long time for me to understand and obey...but I guess I got here in the end, thanks be to God!

An answer for Anna

I'm very aware that I've indulged myself hugely in rejoicings over the wonder of my Ordination/First Eucharist weekend, and was not planning to trouble readers with any more. However Anna, in an attempt to humour me, was rash enough to ask what music I had for my first Eucharist,- and thus prompted musings on the huge role music has had in my journey. In my teens and twenties it took me into God's house at times when I would otherwise have stayed away, made me hear His word in the perfect diction of Kings College Choir as they worked through the psalter during a term's worth of Evensongs, gave me unexpected promises where I'd never looked for them.
After university I spent much of my time singing my way round various London churches, (you don't earn much as a bookseller) and was a kind of liturgical groupie who would go anywhere for a good High Mass, preferably with added orchestra!
God did bring me up short, though, when he introduced me to the church of St John the Divine in Kennington, where aspirations to musical excellence were balanced by incredible volumes of hard work from congregation and clergy alike, as they strove to transform their inner-city community. Suddenly the connection between life and worship began to make sense for me, and my theology of Eucharist (as of so much else) was formed by what I experienced there.
I was still adamant, though, that only the glories of Palestrina, Byrd or Mozart were in any way an adequate offering in worship,- interesting, that, when I'd grasped the wonder of being invited to bring our messy selves as well.

It was only when my children arrived and I realised the impossibility of worshipping like that while attempting to restrain their wriggling, restless curiosity, that I began to consider the possibility that other styles of worship might be remotely helpful. This coincided with a move to the Cotswolds, where Palestrina Masses were thin on the ground....but suddenly I didn't miss them. As my children grew, I learned more and more from them, and my tastes broadened hugely. One memorable St David's day in the village church, the visiting preacher had invited the children to forage for crosses all round the builing, reminding them that each cross was an expression of how much God loved them. When one child returned bearing a kneeler on which a Celtic cross was embroidered, Revd. E asked if anyone had any idea why the circle was there.
After the briefest silence a child's voice began singing "God's love is like a circle..." and we all sat there, transfixed. For that moment, hers was the voice of heaven and I was awe-struck when I realised the singer was my 4 year old daughter...
So...lots more growth in all directions, so many new experiences , especially as the process of training on a regional course inevitably involves a huge range of cross-traditional worship.
I awoke to music that I would once have dismissed unheard, realised that I can pray as readily via U2 as Stanford in G,- but when the time came to choose the music for my first Eucharist, it felt right to return to my roots.
St Mary's, after all, is a very traditional church! And I know at first hand the part a lively church choir can have in shaping teenage faith, so I was anxious for the choristers to feel really involved, without the service becoming a holy concert. So, in final answer to Anna's question,
we sang the same setting of the Eucharist that we use week by week (the shock of a woman celebrating was likely to be sufficient in itself, without too many additional new experiences for the congregation)...the hymns were chosen for their words, and for their connection to people and places that have shaped my vocation
"All my hope on God is founded"
"Eternal Ruler of the Ceaseless Round"
"O thou who camest from above"
"I the Lord of Sea and Sky"
"And Can it Be?"
As for the anthem, - Bruckner "Locus Iste"...one of the first things I remember singing with a four part choir, my daughter's favourite of all her A level set works....and the words aren't bad either. "This place was made by God, a priceless Sacrament". The runner-up anthem would have been Wesley's "Lead me, Lord"...and, wonder of wonders, that was included in the ordination service in the Cathedral the day before :-)
The organ voluntary was the rousing Karg Elert's Nun Danket alle Gott

Having learned so much along the way, this may look a bit pedestrian; I know many of my friends would have hated every minute of it, but it worked for me, and for the congregation in that place. Of course, if Maggi hadn't been otherwise engaged overseeing graduations left right and centre, she might have been willing to sing for me...and then the whole thing would have looked rather different :-) Another time, maybe...she really ought to do some more singing soon.

Light from the Bruderhof

I do bless the Bruderhof, whose small nugget of wisdom is often the very thing I need when I open my emails first thing each day. This morning's Daily Dig was just right for my current situation...

Only Then...Hasidic

A rabbi asked his students, "When is it at dawn that one
can tell the light from the darkness?"

One student replied, "When I can tell a goat from a donkey?"

"No," answered the rabbi.

Another said, "When I can tell a palm tree from a fig?"

"No," answered the rabbi again.

"Well, then what is the answer?" his students pressed him.

"Only when you look into the face of every man and every woman
and see your brother and your sister," said the rabbi.
Only then have you seen the light. All else is still darkness."

Hard of hearing??

Any of you who've ever preached will be familiar with the disconcerting transformation that can occurr as your words leave your mouth and make their way to the ears of your listeners. The throwaway line that felt as if it was only there for good measure turns out to be the crux of your message for one , and of course, the illustration, particularly if it aspires to be humerous, will be remembered long after the point of the sermon is lost. Sometimes this metamorphosis is a wonderful thing, as people find words helpful beyond your wildest hopes, but occasionally...yes..well...
I do hope that not too many others will have shared my experience of yesterday morning. Realising that I'd nothing inspired to say about the parable of the sower, and was terrified of attempting Romans 8 (Paul often has that effect on me ;-) ) I abandoned the Lectionary in favour of a response to the London bombs.
Much of what I said was derived from the insights of other bloggers, and from on-line discussions which had shaped my own journey to make sense of the horror.
The primary school cross hung from the front of the pulpit, where everyone would see it as they waited to go up for Communion...and by the time I'd finished writing I was sure that I could stand by every word, and that God was in the message.
It was one of those occasions when God seemed very close as I spoke and in the profound silence that followed I knew that it had been "right" for that day and those people.
Except for one.
After the vestry prayer at the end of the Eucharist, I was accosted by someone whose experience had been very different. In my assertion of our common humanity with the terrorists and in my comparison of devotion with fanaticism (which others found entirely helpful, Dr Moose, never fear) she had somehow heard me justify the unjustifiable. Despite my actually having said "Nothing justifies this appalling violence" she'd heard the reverse....and to claim that the terrorists were anything other than totally inhuman clearly outraged her.
Dialogue proved impossible then; truth to tell, it's been hard with her for a while now, so I guess my only course is to pray that we may both truly hear each other. I'm sure there was something about that in the Lancelot Andrewes prayer...

Thank God for children

This afternoon was the final session of the after-school club I’ve been leading in the primary school for the last couple of terms. The teacher who normally runs it had been on sick-leave, and it’s been a real delight for me to spend time with the kids. My vocation to ministry originally expressed itself in children’s work, and I’d been missing regular doses of Primary common-sense since it took a back-seat when I started at vicar-school. For me, the snappily titled “Christian Club” has felt just like coming home.
For our last afternoon together, I’d planned an time of fun and games, till events intervened. Instead I took in a bundle of to-day’s papers, assorted magazines and a large cardboard cross that the Youth Group had used in a recent drama. We talked together about the horror in London, and then I suggested that the children might cut out some pictures and stick them on the cross, reminding them (and myself) that the cross proclaims that there is nothing so sad, so lost or broken that God cannot redeem it.
The children set to with enthusiasm. Very early on, H. showed me a picture she’d found…
“Jesus is here in this…” she said “ Look, the woman who’s helping that wounded man has a cross around her neck”
And so she did.
Then, one by one, the children started showing me other pictures of Jesus in the situation…of firemen and medics, of victims holding and supporting each other.
They asked to use the computer, and wrote one word prayers “Peace” “Light” “Forgiveness” and stuck those on the cross as well.
By the time the hour was up, they had made a beautiful statement of trust in redemption…and we'd found time to make our own "hope" pebbles, too, to counter any fears the pictures might have awakened. What a good thing I can't manage alt. worship without bags of stones.

I'm taking the finished cross up to church this evening, and will probably use it as the basis of my sermon for Sunday

Goodness is stronger than evil;
love is stronger than hate;
light is stronger than darkness;
hope is stronger than despair.

Not an apologia but the only sense I can find tonight....

From "Peter Abelard: a novel"
By Helen Waddell

From somewhere near them in the words a cry rose, a thin cry, of such intolerable anguish that Abelard turned dizzy on his feet, and caught at the wall of the hut. "It's a child's voice," he said.
Thibault had gone outside. The cry came again. "A rabbit," said Thibault. He listened. "It'll be in a trap. Hugh told me he was putting them down."
"O God," Abelard muttered. "Let it die quickly."
But the cry came yet again. He plunged through a thicket of hornbeam. "Watch out," said Thibault, thrusting past him. "The trap might take the hand off you."

The rabbit stopped shrieking when they stooped over it, either from exhaustion, or in some last extremity of fear. Thibault held the teeth of the trap apart, and Abelard gathered up the little creature in his hands. It lay for a moment breathing quickly, then in some blind recognition of the kindness that had met it at the last, the small head thrust and nestled against his arm, and it died.
It was that last confiding thrust that broke Abelard's heart. He looked down at the little draggled body, his mouth shaking. "Thibault," he said, "do you think there is a God at all? Whatever has come to me, I earned it. But what did this one do?"
Thibault nodded.
"I know," he said. "Only, I think God is in it too."
Abelard looked up sharply.
"In it? Do you mean that it makes him suffer, the way it does us?"
Again Thibault nodded.
"Then why doesn't he stop it?"
"I don't know," said Thibault. "Unless it's like the prodigal son. I suppose the father could have kept him at home against his will. But what would have been the use? All this," he stroked the limp body, "is because of us. But all the time God suffers. More than we do."
Abelard looked at him, perplexed. "Thibault, do you mean Calvary?"
Thibault shook his head. "That was only a piece of it--the piece that we saw--in time. Like that." He pointed to a fallen tree beside them, sawn through the middle. "That dark ring there, it goes up and down the whole length of the tree. But you only see it where it is cut across. That is what Christ's life was; the bit of God that we saw. And we think God is like that, because Christ was like that, kind, and forgiving sins and healing people. We think God is like that forever, because it happened once, with Christ. But not the pain. Not the agony at the last. We think that stopped."
Abelard looked at him, the blunt nose and the wide mouth, the honest troubled eyes. He could have knelt before him.
"Then, Thibault," he said slowly, "you think that all this," he looked down at the little quiet body in his arms, "all the pain of the world, was Christ's cross?"
"God's cross," said Thibault. "And it goes on."

Broken

An ordinary morning....School Assembly, Communion for the Old People's Home (my first opportunity to be able to offer them unconditional absolution and blessing), Toddler Church. As the mums were going home, the vicar came in to ask if anyone knew what was happening in London. Suddenly it was no longer an ordinary day. We were catapulted into a different world, one of fear and anxiety, where failure to reach friends might simply mean problems with mobile networks or ....
Many will be weeping tonight.
We know that Jesus weeps with them.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

We lay our broken world
In sorrow at your feet
Haunted by hunger, war and fear
Oppressed by power and hate.

Here human life seems less
Than profit, might and pride,
though to unite us all in you
You lived and loved and died.

Before the wonder fades...

I’ll try and say something about the amazing journey of the past week.
Despite my gloomy prognostications about the impossibility of retreating successfully when I could virtually see home from the retreat house gardens (Glenfall is actually in my very own parish), I managed to disengage from all that was happening here and settle into God without too much drama.Lovely to be there with many of those I'd trained alongside, and to make new connections too. I'm going to enjoy having finker as my neighbour, I know.
The preparation time was made infinitely easier by the way our Bishop had planned the worship. Having a serious liturgist as your diocesan is undoubtedly a nightmare if you're preparing for a deanery confirmation, but in this context it was a real blessing. Things happened just when you felt you needed them most. My first experience of a formal liturgy of healing/anointing was awesome: God moved some fairly huge loads of rubbish I’d been carrying round for far too long, leaving me feeling so much lighter and cleaner, if a little raw at first.
Foot washing was rather powerful too…+ M is not one for token gestures. Both feet were washed…not just dripped over, but definitely washed…with great care and gentleness. The Bish managed to be with us for most of the retreat, which, together with the care of our new DDO/CME officer made us feel very safe. Some very important relationship-building went on, I’m sure of that.

Then, to the Cathedral.
Words are inadequate, really, but I loved every minute in an awe-struck, "who-am-I-in-all-this?" sort of way. There is an incredible sense of gift about it all, and I'm overwhelmed with the utter joy of it. After the laying on of hands, + M anointed our hands, which felt like the most powerful thing that's been done for me, ever. It has somehow turned them into a sacramental sign in themselves, in that whatever I do, I use them and am reminded of my priesthood, a non-negotiable part of the person I now am. It meant that on Sunday, when I stood at the altar saying those HUGE things, I could look at my hands and remember the Grace that had been prayed down on me. It operated in a fairly major way, I have to say. During pre-ordination walk throughs of the service, I completely failed to articulate the words of absolution,-just couldn’t get them out at all,- and even after I’d sought help with this during the retreat, could only manage a feeble whisper. I wondered whether this proof of inadequacy would provide all the evidence needed for those who already doubted the validity of my orders,-but on the day God turned up and said them for me, loud and clear, so I was included in the experience, pardoned and delivered.
Nothing had prepared me for the weight of the words, nor for their absolute reality. What’s more, those wonderful Sacramental things that I did for the first time on Sunday are now in a mysterious way, part of what I am for. At the end of the service we sang “And can it be?” and I thought the whole church might take off. So many friends, living and departed were involved in that singing….and in the whole journey to this weekend. Throughout the Eucharist I carried in my pocket a small and infinitely precious “pebble” engraved with a dove and the word"Hope", an ordination gift from a friend who has probably done more to shape my vocation than anyone else on the planet.
Thank you for being there, all of you…those who made it to the Cathedral (Stu, you are a hero), those who made it to St Mary’s, those who sent love and prayed where they were.
Any day now, I expect harsh reality will intervene and this sense of bliss will diminish…but... I’ll still have my hands.

Overwhelmed...

there is so much I could say about the Ordination service, the Retreat that preceded it and about my First Eucharist this morning...I might try to put some of it into words in the next few days, but for now I wanted to share a prayer I found on Friday, when I was keeping my own vigil. The words were perfect for where I was, and the authorship was an added bonus. Long years ago, I wrote a dissertation on the sermons of Lancelot Andrewes for Part 1 of my English degree...Since he was one of the translators of the Authorised Version, this involved a fair bit of Bible reading. I suspect a seed was sown.

Anyway...this is the prayer...

Lord Jesus, I give you my hands to do your work.
I give you my feet to go your way.
I give you my eyes, to see as you see.
I give you my tongue to speak your words.
I give you my mind that you may think in me.
I give you my spirit, that you may pray in me.
Above all, I give you my heart, that you may love in me your Father and all humankind.
I give you my whole self, that you may grow in me, so that it is you, Lord Jesus, who live and work and pray in me.
I hand over to your care, Lord, my soul and body, my prayers and my hopes, my health and my work, my life and my death, my parents and my family, my friends, my neighbours, my country and all people, Today and always.


Thank you to all who have been praying for me over the past few days and weeks. I was carried on a tide of prayer through the most amazing process...You'll perhaps be less surprised than I was to hear that the combination of prayers and Sacraments seem to have worked. Things are different. And tonight I'm simply lost in wonder, love and praise.

That was the week, that was

There's a lot too much going on on far too many fronts this week.

GCSEs are over for older son, but A levels grind on for my daughter, who is not the boldest exam candidate ever.
The parish is cranking itself up for the Ordination/First Eucharist with emotions at both ends of the spectrum from joy to despair. Some people will see my priesting as the end of the church they have loved, and that has to be acknowledged and lamented.
Meanwhile, my vicar's well intentioned attempt to give me a gentle week before ordination retreat begins has been thwarted by a sudden influx of funerals and an overwhelming glut of meetings. Of these, the most depressing was the Clergy Chapter day on Monday. We're supposed to be evolving a meaningful mission strategy for the deanery, which will involve redeployment of some clergy and almost certainly some church closures...we've 24 Anglican churches within the borough, which even an ardent devotee of the parish system can see might be rather alot. The atmosphere was really quite good,- there's definitely a sense of friendly collegiality about the place, which is hugely encouraging,- but this can't disguise the fact that some clergy feel depressed, distressed and undermined by even the most creative of suggestions. Oh dear...
Probably the best bit of the week was last Sunday's training day, when we met our new Officer for Ministry/DDO who looks to be a thoroughly Good Thing. He's written a book which might have made all the difference to my first year in ministry, if only he'd published it sooner! His induction on Monday evening was one of those occasions when you actually feel glad to be Anglican, and particularly Anglican in this diocese...great worship, and friendly bun fight afterwards.
Meanwhile, the wonderful man who has shepherded us through our diaconal year preached a cracking sermon for us curates on Sunday. He quoted Herbert McCabe
"Jesus was the first human being who had no fear of love at all, the first to have no fear of being human" and went on to say
"Our God took flesh and became a human being..not any human being; he is the human being. The man who stood before Pialte, the man nailed to the cross, is what humanity really looks like."
"Suffering is inevitable, and I think we have to be clearer that is part of the Christian vocaction.To live as Christ lived is to invite suffering...Less of the makeover...more of a humanity that hurts."
I guess that's what I need to hang onto this week. Plain sailing isn't part of the deal. Hanging on might just be...
No idea if I'll manage another blog before the retreat starts on Wednesday....but in 7 days time it will have happened, please God.
I think I just want time to be with Him now, really.

Divided loyalties

while the rest of the country (and a good few of my friends and acquaintances) are planning to head up to Scotland for the Make Poverty History rally in Edinburgh, I'll be confronting my Bishop in a crowded Cathedral and affirming that "as far as I know my own heart" I believe that God has called me to be a priest in his Church.
Some of those who won't be in the Cathedral asked me what they should do...my ordination or the MPH event? Clearly, there isn't a choice: they can pray for me as they march, if they are so minded, and I'll know they would have been with me if they could..but if they came to Gloucester, the impact would be rather different.
But it does make me feel a bit out of step with my own life, as it were. I would love to be going to Edinburgh, but at least I could join our Churches Together MPH march last Saturday, an amiable of about 300 souls straggling through the shopping precinct, amid shoppers dawdling in the sunshine. Cheltenham town centre is definitely on the affluent side of OK, and it really brought it home to me how very much work there is still to do, in making Third World issues real to a huge part of society. Most of those we passed just didn't give a flying fig....for all our chants and whistle blowing, despite even the African drums, we might as well not have been there. We just didn't figure on their radar at all...Salutory, if uncomfortable.
I was encouraged, though, by the number of people who did turn up to march, by the press interest and (purely personal this) by the fact that my church-hating son and I were able to do something together for the Kingdom. He even led the procession. Attempts to produce photographic evidence failed in the face of the quality of the newsprint...but at least I know he was there :-)

Another one of those meme things!

This one courtesy of Urban Army concerns one of my great passions....books.

Number of books I own….substantially fewer than this time last year, when we disposed of 14 boxes, with much wailing and gnashing of teeth, before decamping from rambling Fleming house to compact and tidy Curatage. Despite this ruthless purge, the removal firm still complained that they’d never moved so manybooks before. We now have 2 bookcases full of children’s books lurking in the bedroom over A's workshop at our old house, most of my English Lit type reading (multiple boxes again) awaiting L’s departure to uni, in a safe corner of the loft, and the remainder, mostly fiction, poetry and, inevitably, theology, lining about 120 feet of shelving and sprawling on most other flat surfaces around the place.
And, guess what, I was given a £25 book token only on Saturday!! :-)

Last Book I bought: The Mermaid Chair: Sue Monk Kidd (everyone else seems to be reading and recommending it….but I’m saving it for the family holiday)

Last Book I read:
Living on the Borders of the Holy: L William Countryman

Books that mean a lot to me: oh, how to choose what to tell you about?

Palgrave’s Golden Treasury…from which my parents used to read me a bedtime poem when I was very young

The Chronicles of Narnia

Vincent Donovan: Christianity Rediscovered

The English Poems of George Herbert

The Donkey’s Tale: Margaret Gray

The Showings of Julian of Norwich

Linnets and Valerians : Elizabeth Goudge

Persuasion: Jane Austen…
and of course the list could go on and on and on…varying with times and seasons.

Tag 5 others…

Who’d like to play, then?? How about you 5
One Pedestrian
Hopeful Amphibian
Liz
Maggi (yes, I know you haven’t really got time: look on it as end of term therapy)
Mary ?
You know you'd enjoy it really. Alternatively, draw yourselves up to your full height and announce righteously that you don't do chain letters, and I'll probably retire crushed ;-)

Do you know this church??

On Thursday, I went along to Deanery Synod. As you might imagine, this was not the most exciting way of spending an evening, but could probably have been far worse.
It was the first session after elections, and so the agenda was planned to allow each parish 3 minutes to talk about their joys and sorrows in the present, and their dreams and nightmares for the future. A good idea for a large deanery, which is currently divided into 3 mini-chapters, so that not even the clergy know each other particularly well.
The St M’s spokesman went first, and I listened with some surprise. Was he describing the same church that I knew and served? Certainly there were features in common, but the emphases were all “wrong” as far as I was concerned. The projects I’m engaged with for children and families was there on the list of joys,- but the parish’s dream seemed to be that they would all file nicely in through the doors, to become part of the main congregation,- and for me that would be something close to nightmare! I don’t want to see those hesitant, exploring souls lose their independence, the freshness of their engagement with God. I’d hate to see them constrained or alienated by those same liturgies that are precious and helpful to others. This doesn't mean that either group is right or wrong… but their needs are so very different, and just now it feels right for me to be engaging more with those on the fringes,- but not as part of a concerted effort to lure them inside.
Another surprise was the discovery that the excitement we, as clergy, feel about a growing habit of prayer among our congregation just doesn’t impact anyone else. Since the beginning of the month, my vicar and I have only twice said the Office alone: this in a church which has in the not-too- distant past seen the priestly role as doing all the “God-stuff” on behalf of the laity. During Lent, our Bishop’s Prayer Initiative encouraged some people to join us morning and evening…the new CW Daily Prayer was the catalyst for others to come along and you can really feel the difference that this is having across the board.Except, perhaps, if you are busy writing reports for Deanery Synod.
Two views of the same parish. I don’t know what the synod made of our 3 minute slot, but the vicar and I both found it informative.

For two men named John, with my love and thanks.

My father John died 27 years ago today. I was 18. He had been ill with cancer for some 9 months, but we'd become a family of ostriches, refusing to accept that he was growing steadily weaker, until he became too sick to stay at home. Then my mother and I began to acknowledge reality, though we still couldn't speak about it directly. This meant that I had no timeframe set before me. I was a busy, successful 6th former, in love for the first time, about to sit my A levels,- it suited us all to pretend that we'd lots of time.
In fact, my father died on a Saturday morning, and I sat my first exam on the Monday. I was in the school library when my housemaster came in to tell me the news. Then he sent my best friend to find me and we walked round and round the school playing-field trying to make sense of it all. She too had lost her father, with hideous suddenness, just 3 years before. Looking back now, I appreciate (as I totally failed to in my self-centred teenaged world) how much it must have cost her to be there in my grief with me. It's some years since we met, but thank you Sue. You were a true friend to me, not just that day but in the weeks and months that followed.
Morning school ended and I had to face the train journey home, knowing that I would have to meet my mother and engage with a world changed horribly forever. I dreaded journey's end, but as a model student I carried on revising. It seemed the best thing to do. It was English that day...the metaphysical poets....and I found myself re-reading John Donne's A Hymne to God the Father
Somewhere in between Pevensey Bay and Cooden Beach, the last verse became true for me. God met me there in that rather grubby railway carriage and hugged me and held me, and the knowledge of that love has stayed with me through everything that has happened to me, ever since.

I have a sinne of feare, that when I have spunne
My last thred, I shall perish on the shore;
But sweare by thy selfe, that at my death thy sonne
Shall shine as he shines now, and heretofore;
And, having done that, Thou hast done,
I feare no more.

Wisdom from Henri Nouwen

I've been getting a daily reflection from the Henri Nouwen Society for a few weeks now, and it's often well worth reading. Today's, though, was postively overwheleming. See what you think...

Doing Love
Often we speak about love as if it is a feeling. But if we
wait for a feeling of love before loving, we may never learn
to love well. The feeling of love is beautiful and
life-giving, but our loving cannot be based in that feeling.
To love is to think, speak, and act according to the
spiritual knowledge that we are infinitely loved by God and
called to make that love visible in this world.
Mostly we know what the loving thing to do is. When
we "do" love, even if others are not able to respond with
love, we will discover that our feelings catch up with our
acts.

This spoke loud and clear into my current context....If they'd trawled through every last word of his hunting for something labelled "f.a.o. K Fleming" they could not have done better. So I guess that's my cue to go and practise, I suppose!

"Unaccommodated man"

Yesterday it was my turn to take the worship at the home for "confused" old people down the road. Because we share ministry there with our Baptist neighbours, and there's a team of willing volunteers, I only seem to be on duty every 3 months or so. I'm never sure if this is a relief or a pity. I really struggle to find suitable material (the majority only want to sing their favourite hymns, but this seems a rather meagre diet for the one or two who are more switched on). I struggle too with the actual mechanics of leading worship in the dining room, where most of the congregation are scattered about the room, at individual tables, so there's no sort of focal point, - and at least some of those gathered are only there because nobody has managed to take them elsewhere after tea. I'd be less than truthful if I said that I looked forward to my slots there with anything other than several buckets of apprehension, but part of me feels that I ought actually to go there more often, so that I have some hope of making a relationship with those for whom this is still a possibility. As it is, it feels as if I'm delivering hit and run worship, which doesn't quite connect with anyone.
Yesterday was a case in point.The service is supposed to start at 5.30, which is just about manageable if you are doing a 6.30 Evensong. When I arrived, at 5.25 they had barely started serving tea,- and many of the residents need spoon feeding, so this is quite a lengthy procedure. However, shortly before 6.00 I finally began the service, mentally making cuts all over the place as I was due to preach at Evensong, so wasn't exactly optional there either. There was a good response to using tried and trusted collects and they loved singing "He who would valiant be" and "Lead us heavenly Father". I was trying to talk about pilgrimages, and the idea of being taken somewhere without really wanting to make the journey,(something which seemed to speak loud and clear to their context) so I used retelling of the Abram story from Sarai's viewpoint,which worked really well. But I did feel so much that I was a kind of ministerial equivalent of meals on wheels...rushing in, delivering what I had in stock and departing without pausing to pass the time of day or see if the food was to their taste.
As I was setting up, one lady, in great distress, cried out "Nobody cares at all" and I knew what I should do was take the time to be with her and hold her hand and just reassure her that she is still a human being, despite the wreckage of mind and body. She seemed to be very sure that she didn't want to be left in the dining room for worship, but the carers told her (not unkindly) "You don't really mean that" and to me "She used to be a nun, you know". This was apparently sufficient reason to ignore her pleas to be put to bed, and to leave her wheelchair parked firmly in the dining room, - .so now I had an added dilemma of whether or not to force-feed her with worship, as it were. In the end, I had to proceed, and, startlingly, she suddenly calmed down and joined in the Lord's Prayer with apparent equinimity, if not enthusiasm. But she haunted my dreams last night..nailed to her cross, if you like, with the well intentioned hymn singing enveloping her in an unwanted embrace from which there was no escape.

Dare to dream...

A while ago there was a bit of discussion on various blogs of our dreams for the church, and I was driven quietly mad by my inability to remember or track down a hymn I'd once sung which expressed my own dreams rather well. Hunting for last minute resources for my "favourite" spot (the monthly worship at the home for rather absent elderly people) I discovered it lurking . So, here it is. It's by Kate Compston
(from Dare to Dream ed Geoffrey Duncan) and is sung to The Streets of Laredo.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's laughing
as she rocks in her rapture, enjoying her art:
she's glad of her world, in its risking and growing:
'tis the child she has borne and holds close to her heart.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's weeping
as she crouches, weighed down by the sorrow she sees:
she cries for the hostile, the cold and no-hoping,
for she bears in herself our despair and dis-ease.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's dancing
as she moves like the wind and the wave and the fire:
a church that can pick up its skirts, pirouetting,
with-the steps that can signal God's deepest desire.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's loving
as she bends to embrace the unlovely and lost,
a church that can free, by its sharing and daring,
the imprisoned and poor, and then shoulder the cost.

God, make us a church that joins in with your living,
as you cherish and challenge, rein in and release,
a church that is winsome, impassioned, inspiring;
lioness of your justice and lamb of your peace.

Well, I knew I liked him.........

You scored as Jürgen Moltmann. The problem of evil is central to your thought, and only a crucified God can show that God is not indifferent to human suffering. Christian discipleship means identifying with suffering but also anticipating the new creation of all things that God will bring about.

Jürgen Moltmann60%
Anselm60%
Martin Luther60%
Paul Tillich60%
Augustine60%
Charles Finney60%
John Calvin53%
Friedrich Schleiermacher53%
Karl Barth53%
Jonathan Edwards13%

Which theologian are you?
created with QuizFarm.com


What intrigued me was that Moltmann emerged as the result of a tie-breaker, in which I had to choose one statement as the most important. Frankly, none of them were totally essential, but I plumped for the one that would involve me in the fewest "Yes, buts....." I guess I'll have to re read The Crucified God now! I'm also slightly embarassed to discover I am 60% Charles Finney without knowingly reading a word he's written. Should somebody tell the Bishop??
I'm keeping quiet about my results on the other quiz currently doing the rounds...Rhys, Dylan and Tony can all lead you there but thanks to a disturbing 14% score in a particular area, I'm saying nowt. Except that I must understand emergent more than I thought, as it appears I am one :-)

A week for pilgrimage

After our holiday cum trek round Norfolk churches, Saturday saw a more significant pilgrimage for the Flemings. My youngest son was confirmed in Gloucester Cathedral, in a service that made use of the whole of that wonderful building to reflect what was happening for the 33 candidates. Bishop Michael met and welcomed them at the west end and asked what they sought from the church, then made their way up to the font, where 4 candidates (3 from our parish) were baptised, and the rest of us liberally sprinkled in remembrance of our baptisms. Next, with suitable singing along the way, we travelled to the head of the nave, where the confirmation itself took place...J's sister acted as his sponsor (though 3 godparents had managed to join us, choosing which to ask for this role was a diplomatic impossibility!), and she stood behind him with her hand on his shoulder, which was rather lovely. At this point I realised The clergy were behind candidates and sponsors, in a large semi-circle which seemed to underline our role as faciltators, who had in a small way helped to launch the candidates on this stage of their journey. At this point I discovered why clergy are probably best advised not to marry their offspring, as I was decidedly weepy...in this context it didn't matter in the least, but if I'd had to say or do anything more than stand there it might have been awkward.
Once confirmed, the next stop was through to the chancel, where we all received Communion,and finally the newly confirmed, carrying lighted candles, led us all out into the world to live and work to God's praise and glory.
The age range of confirmands was terrific:a couple who were definitely elderly and one small girl who surely couldn't have been the minimum recommended age, 10, plus a good overall balance of adults and teens: it almost looked as if the church might be getting something right for once, which was encouraging.
The Bishop, God bless him, pointed out to me afterwards that the next time we met int the Cathedral looked likely to be my priesting on 2nd July...suddenly it feels very real.
With that in mind, I've spent the first part of this week on a pilgrimage of my very own, at the retreat house at Llan in the Shropshire hills. Space. Silence. Infinite care from the wonderful Andrew and Jill, who mediate so many tangible experiences of God's love...
Add to that, perfect weather and alot of very positive spiritual spring-cleaning, and I've come home a gently smiley curate.

I found this prayer in the church of St Bartholmew, Trunch, and its words resonated with my own feeling about why these buildings still matter. Apparently it originates in St David's, and appears in Roy Simpson's Celtic Daily Light

O God, although you do not live in manmade temples
You choose to work through them.
Pour down your blessing on this place and upon all who minister here,
That it may be a strength to all who have oversight,
A joy and an inspiration to all faithful Christians,
A home of prayer and devotion
Setting forth to the world a pattern of true holiness and worship.

Busman's Holiday

Home yesterday from 3 days in East Anglia, indulging in a little gentle church crawling. Sad, I know, but that's life! Actually, armed as we were with Simon Jenkin’s 1000 Best Churches, and with 50% of the party determined that we shouldn’t miss any 4 star treat within reach, it wasn’t so much gentle as, well, gruelling, really.
I’d wanted to look at angel ceilings, so angel ceilings we looked at, and looked at and looked……….there were very few within range of our Kings Lynn base that we didn’t visit and enjoy, but sadly the effect of so many in a short space of time was to blur the details. My favourite, though, had to be Upwell, where a Georgian gallery means that you find yourself nose to nose with those fantastic beings, carved a good 600 years ago…close enough to touch.
It was the first time I'd been on a serious church-crawl since ordination, and I was intrigued to discover how much my perspective had changed; now these were not simply beautiful and historic places to meet God, but potential worship spaces. My critical faculty never kicked in in quite this way even at the height of my short lived career as an Eng Lit academic...I could still read trashy detective fiction with huge pleasure, but now I seem to consider church buildings in terms of some ideal Eucharistic celebration...and many of these didn't quite work for me. Sad.
There were other worries, too, though. With so much to marvel at and celebrate, so many of the churches needed massive repairs and were clearly losing the battle to fight decay. Thanks to those ambitious wool merchants, these mini cathedrals serve tiny villages, which would never have supported a building of such size and grandeur even in the heyday of Christendom. Trunch, for example, has one of those “the fundraising so far” boards outside the church, and alarming cracks and harbingers of doom about the place. It also has a stunning font, some choir desks with inkwells (left over from a period when the village school met in the chancel) and such a sense of the presence of God that I felt as if I’d slipped out of time and into eternity.
So…how do you square the circle?
These buildings are beautiful, precious, and speak volumes about the presence of God in those places.
They are also huge, rotting, and largely unsuitable for most main- stream Anglican worship.
Do we pull them all down?
Sign them over to English heritage without delay (always assuming they would take them)?
Or allow congregations and clergy to spend their days in endless cycles of fundraising and anxiety about the next big thing to go wrong?
I loved those churches but I came home praying that I’d never find myself vicar of most of them.
The shining exceptions were Blakeney (which had the added attractions of free coffee facilities for visitors, and a lovely display of work from the local primary school) and St Margaret’s King’s Lynn…which was, amazingly, open well into the evening and was so inspiring I felt tempted to begin an academic study of Margery Kempe (probably the most famous former worshipper there) on the spot. I'm not sure she'd be an altogether helpful example, though, as she is noted for her extravagant emotions...and I suspect I do those quite well enough anyway!

Belated thanks...

to everyone who prayed for me this week. Assorted issues still loom large in various directions, but the whole thing feels infinitely more manageable and I'm reminded again what an amazing gift of God friends can be, especially friends who pray.
What with major exams for both my older offspring and priestly ordination a mere 5 weeks away, I'd be very happy if you felt able to keep it up. Bless you all.

S.D.S.

or "Server Dependency Syndrome" is something which affects clergy of a certain churchmanship, and can strike at any time. It is the result of being surrounded by so great a cloud of acolytes, crucifers, thurifers and the aforementioned servers that you become incapable of doing anything for yourself.
Symptoms: can range from inability to pour wine from flagon into chalice (taking the lid off the former would have helped, but I was so busy focusing on not pouring too much, as I'd be drinking the left-overs, I didn't notice for a minute the obstructive lid...) to total paralysis when the marker in the Gospels is in the wrong place. A Curate I know spent what felt like 25 minutes staring blankly at what was clearly not the Gospel for Corpus Christi (it was actually the Collect for some other feast altogether) because she was so certain that if the book had been prepared by our Sacristan, the marker must be in the right place if she only looked at it hard enough.
In fact, it was one page on. Had she known the 1928 Altar Book well enough, she might have had the nous to turn over and lo, all would have been revealed (though even when the vicar came to the rescue, the lurking Gospel was not immediately obvious).
Cure: while continuing to enjoy the freedom from time-consuming details provided by the goodly company of servers, the sufferer should ensure that s/he knows how to do things herself, and where to find things at all times.
I'm sure that hole into which embarrassed curates can vanish must be somewhere in church: I know, I'll ask a server...

Really random

Last night I watched the BBC 2 series Compulsion, the story of Jonny, a young man with drink, drug and gambling addictions. He was the oldest child of an Anglican priest, and his father's parents had died while he, the father, was still young. As a soon-to-be Anglican priest whose parents died when I was 18, this did worry me slightly for my beautiful daughter...but the fact that she kept floating in to stand in front of the tv and offer Jonny hugs and understanding made me feel marginally better .

A shopping trip with One Pedestrian yesterday, from which I brought home some really cool lights. They are basically thin plastic tubes, filled at regular intervals with small bulbs in assorted colours ...can't find a picture anywhere on the net, but I reckon they'll be very handy for alt.worship and meanwhile, I've popped them in a vase and they cheer up the study no end.
What's more, their packaging entertains as well as educates, as it reads "bulbs not replaceable" and "If you have any problems obtaining replacement bulbs please phone the 24 hour premierbulb hotline....."

Which brings me to a poster, the work of the Sunday School, which I encountered in a church hall near here (no, not ours). It read, loud and clear
"Our God RESIGNS"
So there you have it. Have a good day!

What price the diocesan arsonist?

Thanks all of you for your comments. Obviously the Bishop was quite right, and it's well worth blogging even those books you're not sure about: the quality of the debate justifies the time spent reading :-)
Ron wondered what there was about buildings to justify the time and trouble spent on them...I feel quite strongly about the need for an available sacred space in each community, and have covered most of my reasons in an earlier post, "Blessings or millstones". However, I would certainly be in favour of whittling down the ridiculous number of churches there are about the place. Here, we sit neatly in the middle of the old "village" area of Charlton Kings, and the church is literally on the way to many places, so people do drop in for a quiet prayer at odd moments in the day. Equally, in my last parish there was just the one church, open daily, often visited. If I found myself in a situation where there were 2 or 3 Anglican churches within a short walk, not to mention other denominations, then I'm sure I'd see things differently. An ecumenically shared building would be much more appropriate in that context, but it has has HAS to be open. The hospitality of Christian homes is great for those who know about it...but what about the person who just wakes up one morning feeling sad, or prayerful? I'm sure there are ways to ensure they don't slip through the net, but I'd need to know what they are. The much-trumpeted upsurge in numbers of people attending worship in Cathedrals suggests that there are many out there who are ready to risk an encounter with God in anonymous safety. Ringing the doorbell of the man down the road, who hosts a Christian cell in his home, is a very different matter.

Secular Lives, Sacred Hearts

In response to my rash promise to my Bishop, here’s the first of my attempts to reflect on recent reading. Secular Lives, Sacred Hearts works from the premise that
“The traditional sociological view of secular Britain is misleading. The Church would understand its contemporary minsitry and mission better,…if it thought of the nation as “culturally Christian”.”
Hmmmn…..I finished the book a week ago now, and the more I think about it, the more it feels to me as if its main purpose is to make clergy feel better about our failure to evangelise the nation. Alan Billings' message seemed to be “Go with the flow” and, if I understood him properly, this felt to me something more than simply trying to meet people where they are and inviting them to an encounter with God. It was rather suggesting that our concept of God encounters needed revision, so that we softened our boundaries to include much that would otherwise have been labelled “folk religion” and ceased forthwith from making demands of any kind on those outside our regular congregations.
Much of what Billings writes about the contemporary context resonated loudly with me, and he has a lot of helpful ideas about reaching out into the community. What about inviting a local school to provide a series of Advent Stations, for example? That's one that could really work here. I loved, too, his suggested definition of ministry
“Making real for people the grace of God at particular moments in their (increasingly secular) lives”.
But I was worried by his implicit message that if we were failing in the task of mission, it was time to change the nature of the task rather than our approach to fulfilling it. He concludes the book with what he calls 3 “tendencies of the contemporary church”, against which he sets his 3 preferred “Principles for the contemporary church”. Perhaps I’ve been too thoroughly indoctrinated by the system, but my gut feeling was that in following his principles we would be in danger of losing track of the Gospel in an ambient spiritual mush.
They read as follows….
First tendency of the contemporary Church: Make a clear line of demarcation between “the Church” and “the world” and see the over riding task of the Church as evangelism.
First counteracting principle for the contemporary Church: Recognise that not all Christians are members of the Church and see the Church, including its occasional offices,as a spiritual resource for members and non members alike”
(This might sound fine….very much in keeping with “Mission shaped” ideas of allowing people to be church where they are…but a closer reading reveals that he is not expecting these “cultural Christians” to do anything very much as a result of their faith…there is no sense that they will want to gather together, to learn or to pray…no idea that they might benefit from being Church, in whatever expression)

Second tendency: Assume that God wants everyone to become a member of the Church
Second principle: See Church membership as the particular vocation of some Christians for the sake of others

Third tendency: to see buildings as of secondary importance or even of no importance at all in sustaining the spiritual life
Third principle: recognise the vital role played by sacred buildings in sustaining the spiritual life of members and non- members.
(OK…as you may have gathered, I quite like this one! The value of a sacred space at the centre of a community is something I blah on and on about….and I like Billings concept of building as sacrament..the visible sign of God’s presence with his people, though I do worry about those who only expect to meet him there)

Fourth tendency: move away from the parish church towards the gathered congregation
Fourth principle: value and support the concept of the parish church.

This last is, he contends, his underlying principle throughout the book. The church should be there for everyone so that we avoid a situation in which “Ministry is assimilated to mission and those who do not attend but think of themselves as Christians will ask the Church for bread and receive none”

Of course, my reaction to that last scenario is “God forbid”…but while I believe with every fibre of my being that the church exists to serve God in all his children, I believe too that an encounter with God should elicit some response in us, and that it is not unreasonable to expect that response to be articulated within some sort of Christian community. What I'm wondering now,though, is whether it is either significant or alarming that I seem to be less woolly in my liberalism as the months in full time ministry whizz past. Have I bought into the system, or are elements of the system still "right" however startling this realisation may be?

If necessary, use words...

Spent the morning at a supervision with my vicar. Gloucester curates have the benefit of a training manual, "The First Four Years", which aims to help us join the dots between what we are doing in our parishes and the way that this should equip us for future ministry. At the end of the book there's a sort of profiling exercise, which looks at the main areas of ministry, divided into subsections, and invites you to grade them according to competence. The theory is that this happens at the beginning of each year, areas for action are highlighted, and the whole thing is revisited at the start of the next year. However, life being real and earnest, things haven't actually worked out quite like that, so we're still working our way through these rather substantial topics, and today it was "Mission and Evangelism".
This has been something that has become very immediate and real for me in the past year, as I realise the full implications of the new context in which we live and work. To state the obvious, things are quite different in a suburban parish with a large proportion of young families, as opposed to a small Cotswold village with a settled population, most of whom you know fairly well. M. and I had a helpful and ( I hope) productive discussion, and identified some points for the future. However we foundered when we came to the question about "ability to present the Gospel to those of little or no church background".
We both agreed that relationship was very important...we felt that we had to earn the right to share the Gospel, if we wanted it to be received positively. Neither of us felt really confident that we were ready "constantly to give an account of the hope that is in us", though when pressed, we could each see that we were able to use our own faith stories to encourage others to encounter God. St Francis's words "Preach the Gospel. If necessary use words" seemed far more in keeping with our preferred styles, though we agreed that there was a danger that this would be a cop-out. After all, the Anglican Church has often tended to engage optimistically in social action and community work without proclaiming the Gospel, in the hopes that people might somehow work out the motivation from the action. History suggests that this is not entirely successful....I just wish I'd read ron's post on the subject earlier. As part of our efforts to convince the congregation that ministry is something we all do together, and not a peculiar habit of consenting adult clergy, I've been preaching about the universal Christian calling to be God-bearers to the world...and now he has tied up the ends beautifully for me. Listen to this bit, and then make sure you go and read the rest.
"The early disciples had little ritual but a mighty realization. They went out not remembering Christ, but experiencing him. He was not a mere fair and beautiful story to remember with gratitude - he was a living, redemptive, actual presence then and there. They went out with the joyous and grateful cry, "Christ lives in me!" The Jesus of history had become the Christ of experience.
Some have suggested that the early Christians conquered the pagan world because they out-thought, out-lived and out-died the pagans. But that was not enough: they out-experienced them. Without that they would have lacked the vital glow.
We cannot merely talk about Christ - we must bring him. He must be a living vital reality - closer than breathing and nearer than hands and feet. We must be "God-bearers."

As for me, I came home to the sort of email that makes me realise that if I'm a walking book at all, then it's definitely not so much gospel as rather bad news. I've managed to upset a friend even as I tried to help, so I would really value prayers as I try to put things right.

Our duty and our joy

This was the title of an excellent CME presentation yesterday dealing with the Church’s attitudes to disability, which Mark has already covered on his blog. I came worrying that it would be all ramps and loop systems (which, though excellent in themselves are unlikely to be anything over which I have huge control, specially in my current context) but my fears were groundless. Unsurprisingly, I couldn’t get One Pedestrian out of my mind as I know that many of our well-intentioned thoughts and fumblings towards a theology of disability would probably seem deeply unsatisfactory from her perspective. On my own doorstep, I was disturbed by the realisation that our church, while not bad at the physical practicalities of access, was probably not yet ready to welcome anyone who fails to conform to perceived norms of appropriate behaviour during worship. Heck, they find it hard enough when the Curate forgets that they prefer to kneel for the Eucharistic Prayer! By the end of the day, I found myself praying that God would, at top speed, send us a family with learning disabilities to challenge us to move beyond our comfort zone.

I was inspired , too, to revisit the work of John Hull, who had spoken to us during ordination training. He has much to say about the negative images of blindness prevalent in the Bible, and startled us with his announcement that he neither expected nor longed to recover his sight in heaven. His website is full of challenging stuff…I wanted to weep when I read
When I studied the New Testament as a sighted person, it did not occur to me that you, Jesus, were yourself sighted. We were in the same world, but it did not occur to me that being sighted was a world. I thought that things were just like that. When I became blind, then I realised that blindness is a world, and that the sighted condition also generates a distinctive experience and can be called a world. Now I find, Jesus, that I am in one world and you are in another.
(John Hull: Open Letter from a blind disciple to a sighted Saviour)
By inhabiting a specific culture, Jesus seems to have become trapped by its particular constraints. Hull contrasts his attitude to the blind (and, by extension, to others with disabilities) with his attitude to women (not among the 12, but nonetheless affirmed and given the joyous task of witnessing the resurrection) and other outsiders…tax collectors and sinners. The blind, deaf and lame are the recipients of ministry but not included among the disciples until they are healed. It seems almost as if Jesus had bought into the medical model of response, which sees disability as a problem to be fixed, rather than an essential part of the identity of the blind or deaf person….
So the blind disciple comments
On an individual basis you are sensitive and tactful towards blind people, and while acknowledging their condition of economic deprivation, you insist upon their inclusion. Nevertheless, you did not include a blind person in your closest circle. In your presence blind people felt the hope and discovered the reality of the restoration of sight but you did not offer to blind people courage and acceptance in their blindness. You would have led me by the hand out of blindness but you would not have been my companion during my blindness.
(Hull: source above)

I'm left wondering if there are disabilities and degrees of damage so extreme that it is only through healing that the person can truly be freed to be themselves? I cannot presume to answer that...Hull arrives at a resolution when he understands that Jesus too experienced blindness in his last hours. Blindfolded by the soldiers who whipped him, plunged into the great darkness that filled his time on the cross, he shared even this element of the human condition. Meanwhile, Urban Army quotes Mother Teresa, anxious that we should avoid giving
“people a broken Christ, a lame Christ, a crooked Christ deformed by you”. In the light of Hull's views, this could open a whole new chapter in the discussions....

Building Dreams.

One way and another, architecture has featured quite heavily in my thoughts this week. Tuesday revealed a huge gap between clergy and PCC understandings of what our church building says about our theology...or perhaps it's more a question of the gap looming between our theology and theirs. Then rhys aired the topic , inspiring some rather good thoughts about butresses and the ways in which pillars may not always be totally supportive. Our church, you see, has so many pillars, both literal and metaphorical, that it's impossible to tell which ones are useful to hold the roof up and which simply block your view! Dave had some entertaining insights too, after attending a training day on the future shape of the Anglican parish. Clearly, there is something in the air...
Thursday saw me visiting our link parish of St John's, Ladywood in Birmingham, where re-ordering has certainly said some pretty radical things about being church in that community. When the current incumbent arrived there, the church was under threat of closure and he and his curate of 15 years have done some amazing work in creating an arts and community centre in the body of the church. When we visited on Thursday the place was buzzing with primary school children visiting an exhibition of World War 2 memorabilia "Ladywood at War", and there is no doubt of its value as a community space. My only reservation (which feels rather churlish under the circumstances) would be that though the church is open when there are exhibitions running, it's not possible to leave it open as a place of prayer at other times, and when there are events, finding peace and space to pray would be distinctly challenging. So in some ways it remains a "Sundays only" church, as far as connecting with God directly is concerned.
In contrast, yesterday saw me in Hereford, where the St Mary's Choir were singing Evensong at the Cathedral. We arrived in time to explore, and I was treated to a delicious lunch at the cafe@allsaints, which occupies the rear of the medieval church of All Saints. Thanks to clever use of split levels, the "church" element of this project had far more integrity...The cafe part is raised (with an additional gallery for extra tables) so that you can sit with your salad and look into the church...but though this might sound odd it really works, and there was no feeling of embarrassment or compromise in pausing for prayer after lunch. I loved it...definitely on my short-list of dream churches, though I know precisely nothing about any other feature of parish life!
Maggi had good things to say about reordering at Michaelhouse, Cambridge too...so after all that, when presented with Isaiah 6 as the text to preach from tonight, how could I resist discussing the relationship between the Old Testament vision of God, awe-inspiring and remote, and His architectural seclusion in the holy of holies? I took a deep breath and suggested that much of our architecture and our style of worship here presented the same image, of an inaccessible deity, with whom no connection is actually possible. He is honoured in beautiful liturgy, but kept safely behind the altar rails, to be approached by only a few of those who come to worship.
"But", I went on,
"something happens for Isaiah that speaks of something amazing for us too. That burning coal which the seraph brings to him from the altar symbolises so much, because it represents God’s willingness to engage with us, despite all our inadequacy. It is a sign not only of our cleansing but of our commissioning.
Suddenly we are in a new kind of relationship for God has reached out to us and made us fit for his purpose.
“Your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out”
The whole Bible is full of this kind of divine initiative, realised supremely, of course, in the coming of Jesus. We remain dust and ashes, yes, but we are dust and ashes so precious in God’s sight that he sends his Son to transform us, to remove our guilt and blot out our sin.
We remember that when Jesus died, the veil in the Temple split in two, as a sign that God was no longer “in light inaccessible, hid from our eyes”. The God we know in Jesus is both eternal and unchanging, and also a God who suffers with and for the world he loves so much, a God constantly at work bringing about its transformation."

Though it felt quite brave, speaking these thoughts aloud, they were not accompanied by any noticeable earthquake....So it would appear that the building is destined to remain standing for tbe moment at least, and I'll go back to seeing visions and dreaming dreams.

Tidying the study

On Wednesday, the Bishop compared the rather cluttered altars he often meets around the diocese with "the study on a bad day".
Just now I walked into my study and realised it bore an uncanny and depressing resemblance to the high altar at St M's at the Sunday Eucharist.
So I guess I can postpone sermon prep yet again by settling down to clear the decks. Maybe.

Another day, another Bishop!

Yesterday was supposed to be my day off, but instead I found myself departing at top speed (essential if like me you never leave for anywhere until you’re actually supposed to arrive) for our diocesan Bishop’s home. He’d invited our cohort* of deacons for a training morning on celebrating the Eucharist, beginning with the service itself, in his chapel. Note to anyone listening: when I grow up, I want a worship space exactly like that...but without the job, please.

Since he's definitely no slouch where liturgy is concerned (or in any other area, from what I can deduce) this was a real treat and a fantastic antidote to a week in which my vicar and I encountered some rather difficult attitudes to the conduct of worship here. It also reminded me how very much I love being taught by an enthusiast who is so generous with his knowledge. Indeed, when I whinged to him about some of our liturgical issues, he even suggested that he might come and give the parish a teaching day on the Eucharist before we’re too much older. Good, eh? I’m soo so glad to be ordained in this diocese at this time. :-)

To compensate for rather a churchy day off (the afternoon was taken up with a Social Responsiblity session on Asylum Seekers, an issue that needs a post of its own), I met up with a girl friend for a Thai meal at Siam Smile last night. Despite living only a few miles apart, we'd not seen each other for months so this was just the job, and the food was fab, with "one chilli" rating on a good variety of dishes for wimps such as I. Excellent day and happy Curate.

*Collective noun, anyone?? There must be something, surely...

Comments on Comments

Seem almost to deserve a post in themselves...though perhaps I'm just being daft?
Anyway, in response to your comments on A Rash Undertaking and in no particular order...

It's OK, Caroline . It's not the drugs! I promise nobody would ever accuse you of making sensible comments, honestly :-)

re paranoia (Tony and Mark)...quite enough has been happening to one blog friend as a result of unexpected visitors from work to her blog to make me ultra cautious for a while at least. But I'd already come clean about the blog in my essay to the Bishops, in the hope that this would prevent my lapsing into indiscretion. Friendly policing very welcome, though.
Ooh...and Mark, +J did say he would ask my vicar about my joining all ye fresh expressions types:I'm really hoping that happens.

As to the other Caroline and her sensible comment...yes, I think you're right, though I'm not sure that the current book is inspiring me to do anything different. This is a nightmare week, though, so I'm unlikely to get much chance to find out. No time, no time...so here I am, blogging. Ah well, will keep you posted.

Pentecost - too late to grid.

The alarm went early yesterday, but I didn’t much mind as it was the most beautiful morning….periwinkle blue sky, chestnut candles blazing all over Charlton Kings and birds doing their best to wake the long departed in the churchyard as I made my way up to the 8.00 Eucharist. It was a morning full of possibilities.
Rather belatedly, we’d decided that I should learn how to set the Table for the Eucharist. With such a noble army of servers at St Mary’s, it’s not a regular part of the job here, but I’m well aware that it’s now or never for learning these basic skills of vicaring. It gave me an interesting new perspective on the service and underlined how very anxious some of our servers are. Very sad. With some surprise, I found myself praying my socks off for the Holy Spirit to arrive in force and sweep the whole lot of us off our feet. I’ve never experienced charismatic worship, but even I with my full crop of catholic prejudices know that there are times when it would do us all a power of good to have a Power of Good arrive.

Sadly, this wasn’t a day for obvious answers to prayer, though, but rather an ecclesiastical assault-course. I survived a full Sung Eucharist with Procession, a Youth Group lunch for Christian Aid, a Churches Together Pentecost Party and even Choral Evensong (for which I did indeed complete the sermon in the very nick of time) with a growing sense of deflation. Rather grumpily I blacked out the parish centre for my session with the youth group, wobbling precariously on a table to reach the velux windows and wondering why I was bothering.

Then two things happened.
First, Chris, of the late lamented know:follow blog just happened to drop in as he was passing…reminding me that not only is there a whole world out there beyond Charlton Kings but that God has introduced me to all sorts of wonderful people in it.
Next, the youth group session actually worked. I’d not tried a guided meditation with them before, but they seemed receptive as they sat in the dark, around my Pentecost fire*, and let me lead them through the events of that memorable day in Jerusalem. Later, I gave them space, and some cut out "flames" and invited them to dream their dreams and God’s dreams for the world.
I ran the session four times, for groups of six, and all of them were different, and all valuable. Our older youth group is currently split between those who come largely for the football and those (mainly choristers and their friends) who are more willing to engage in discussion, take part in community projects, and generally challenge the image of the Yoof of Today. But, as I learned through Into the Wilderness and the Maundy Watch, I can’t make any assumptions about which kids will more readily become still before God.
My short term dream for the group, is a trip to Taize next year. I suspect my family will see this as “work”, but for me the time spent with the young people last night was a badly needed restorative and their company in the silence a real gift from God.


*btw, in case you’re interested, (and with deep gratitude for all your suggestions) , I finally opted for the no-tech variation approach to the flames of the Spirit…lots of tea lights in a sand-filled glass bowl, which I wrapped round with a sort of crown of orange crepe paper. It sounds naff, I know, but actually looked remarkably effective, since the flames flickered constantly. It would have been even better if I’d remembered that a black-out might present me with problems when it came to reading my script…but heck, if I don’t know the story of the coming of the Spirit by now I’m definitely in the wrong job ;-)

WANTED!

A simple, non techie means of creating a flame or flame effect, for a brief "talk spot" for the youth group tomorrow night...Maggi's experiences have convinced me that a last minute flash of brilliance is unlikely (though of course a literal "flash of brilliance" is almost exactly what I'm after) but I would be very glad of any ideas for some sort of visual focus. The plan is to take the kids through a guided visualisation of the coming of the Holy Spirit, including Peter's use of the Joel passage, give them time to reflect (in the dark, looking at the flames?) and then hope for a discussion or creative response to what God's dreams for the world and the Church might be. I know I ought to have planned this years ago, but I have procrastination down to the finest of arts, and still have a sermon or two to complete as well. Actually, "complete" is a euphemism. Make that "write". Which is of course why I am blogging. The sermon I should write, I do not write, while the blog I should avoid, I visit constantly. Who said that?

A rash undertaking

I saw the Bishop yesterday for my pre-priesting interview. Since the last major conversation I'd had with him (before my first selection conference, back in the mists of time) had been so gruelling that I'd needed to lie down for the rest of the day, I approached this with a fair degree of trepidation. In fact, the whole experience was entirely benign. My vicar, bless him, had written a very smiley report and since +John is interested in "fresh expressions" he was keen on my continuing to dabble gently and happy to talk about the stuff that excites me. All good, then.
But we did talk a bit about my ENFP lack of focus...the seventeen books on the go at any one time...the piles of half finished projects (I once did the Belbin test, and my score as a "completer/finisher" was a large negative number) and the way this can add to sense of panic that I'm achieving nothing. We agreed that it might be a good discipline to try and write something about each book I finish, and that this 'ere blog was probably the best place for it. So, since I've promised + John, I guess I'd better try. I just hope it doesn't make both reading and blogging feel like joyless, dutiful exercises...Watch this space. I can guarantee not to make this solely a book review blog, though, that's for sure.
Oh, and if anyone wanted to know, I got the distinct impression that he's happy for me to be priested :-) :-)

Another Planet (well, Cambridgeshire, anyway)

Back home again after my East Anglian jaunt...and I had such a lovely time. Maggi is a wonderful hostess (no surprises there, then...but I'm glad to report that chocolate with chillies is infinitely more pleasurable than it sounds), who gave me a lovely spoily evening. So good to chat without worrying about the impact on our phone bills. The worship she'd put together for the On Another Planet day was splendid too. Perhaps if we ask her very nicely, she'll post it on her blog :-). It was based on Elijah's interlude in the wilderness, - time out to eat, drink and sleep,and to be loved by God. Maggi has a splendid giant wineglass, which holds a full bottle...and we were invited to drink from it, and to help ourselves to brioche and to share with others. I loved that glass...it said so much about God's extravagent generosity, in contrast to our inhibited tendency to only accept sad little wizened fragments of his grace.

She, Jonny, Paul and Nick (who doesn't seem to have a webpage to call his own, unless you count his high powered job for the Diocese of London) gave us lots to think about...Thanks to the many hours I've spent trawling the blogosphere, I was comfortably familiar with much of the info being shared, though I'd guess there was a wide range of experience among the audience, including a proportion who would indeed have seen emerging (or fresh?) expressions of church as life on another planet. Nick's "Post modernity for duffers" session was extremely entertaining; I may yet get the hang of it.There was some good discussion about appropriate leadership for emerging congregations, and the training such leaders might require and a range of responses to the question of what makes church to be church. Now all I need is a bit of time to process what I heard, and maybe to read some of my acquisitions from the 10% off bookstall. I've bought soo many books in the past few months, it really is getting slightly scary. (Not sure I'm too impressed by the current one Secular Lives, Sacred Hearts but I'll plough through to the end before subjecting it to the withering judgement of the curate :-))

From Cambridge, I drove to the second loveliest city in East Anglia, where one of my very favourite godsons and his family welcomed me with open arms. His mum and I have been friends since we were 13 and time apart never seems to interrupt our friendship. We've done first boyfriends, births, marriages and deaths together and there are no corners of my life I wouldn't welcome her into. Had another happy evening, giggling over old memories (A. is one of my few close friends who really knew my parents) and comparing notes on the trials of the UCAS system and our worries about A levels, Gap years and the like...One way and another, it felt as if our conversations hadn't moved on that much over the years!

Rapturous welcome from the offspring when I reached school this afternoon, and it's clearly my week to be pampered, as L. has just summoned me to eat the supper she's prepared. I could get to like this....

Time well spent

Do you remember when weekends were a time you spent doing things just for you and/or your family? It seems ages since that has been part of life for us...before ordination, there was Readering, and the children have always had busy busy lives, so the idea of time out hasn't really applied for at least the last 10 years. This weekend, though, there seemed to be rather more opportunities just to do happy things, and I did enjoy it.
My good friend Humble Secretary was staying here on Friday night, which was an excuse for a wonderfully lazy and pleasing Saturday. If you find yourself in Winchcombe, then The Plaisterer's Arms do a very good line in baguettes, and some brilliant banter in the bar too, and the drive back through piercingly green Cotswold valleys was pretty breathtaking too.
Then today I was sent on a research mission to Kids Praise at Thornbury
This was a blissful experience: a service which did what it said on the can, in that it was stuffed with under 9s all having the time of their lives singing, and dancing and praising God. I took that hardened cynic, my older son with me, and he too came out positively smiley: the enthusiasm of those children reminded me of just how wonderful worship can be, even in the parish church.
From Thornbury, we headed south to Bristol to spend time with our favourite non- pedestrian, Caroline. She and G have a splendidly subversive relationship, which involves frequent wind ups of the neurotic Kathryn...but we all know our roles and play along beautifully...and we even got to watch Dr Who this time as well.
Excellent to manage a sustained conversation with G on the way there and back, as well: the trouble with a house full of articulate and opinionated people is that it's too easy never to hear each other at all. I guess the infant J may have a point.
Safely home, I realised that tomorrow is finally 9th May...which has had a smiley red ring round it in the diary for a while, as I'm off to Cambridge to see Maggi and sit at her feet, plus those of Jonny and one or two others who are running a Praxis day "On Another Planet"..Very excited. Full details on my return, but too busy smiling for now :-)

Silly signs

from my day off
"No unauthorised elvering...."

and

"This centre will be closed on Thursday 5th May due to the General Election and Table Tennis Tournament"

So now we know...all this back and forth exchange of insults is in fact because they think they are playing ping-pong.
Explains alot.

Great Expectations?

Alot of things have come together in the past week or so to focus my thoughts on aspirations versus reality...For one thing, I had that wretched essay to write for the Bishop "Reflections on the Diaconal Year and Expectations of Priesthood"...It's that "E" word, isn't it? Here in this parish there is quite a high view of priesthood, such that I can almost see the pedestal under construction as some members of the congregation view my approaching priesting (others, of course, are busy building the bonfire which heretics deserve ;-) ). I hate to disappoint them, but there's no way that I will become the work of finished holiness that some seem to anticipate, this side of eternity,however much Grace is poured upon me on 2nd July!
But I wouldn't be here at all if I didn't have certain aspirations, would I?
To be an effective (oh no...now what does that word mean?) faithful minister of the Gospel in this place...to try to live, however falteringly, as a "walking Sacrament"...oh, I've plenty of aspirations, as well as a pretty good sense of the rather messy reality.
Now Preacher Mom is considering her life as a series of "let's pretend" games, in which she dons a series of masks, and manages to live up to her appointed roles, despite feeling rather different inside. And I know that I do that too...
Does this make me dishonest or brave? Is it hypocrisy to try to live up to one's aspirations, while knowing that the inner reality is still very different. I've tended to cling to some words which I read a long long time ago. I think they may be Augustine, but nobody has ever been able to confirm this
"Not what thou art, nor what thou hast been, but what thou would'st be, beholdest God in his mercy"
That feels like permission to aspire to much, and to try to hold together that sense of huge hopes and chaotic reality. In quite another context, someone quoted Catherine of Siena to me last week
"You are not called to perfection, but to infinite desire..."
I like that. It means I can go on dreaming...

Blogging as therapy?

Recently there's been a bit of discussion about the purpose of blogging (always an issue for those like myself who are very aware that we've nothing of startling novelty or brilliance to share). Both Gordon and Caroline R had got me thinking, so when I finally got round to reading last week's stuff from the Henri Nouwen Society I was rather excited to read this. Oddly enough, if I'd been up to speed, I should have read this last Tuesday...which, you may remember, was remarkable for rather alot of different events. In the spirit of Nouwen, I can report that I did find the whole muddly experience far more meaningful having blogged about it than I did while living it...

Writing to Save the Day

Writing can be a true spiritual discipline. Writing can help
us to concentrate, to get in touch with the deeper stirrings
of our hearts, to clarify our minds, to process confusing
emotions, to reflect on our experiences, to give artistic
expression to what we are living, and to store significant
events in our memories. Writing can also be good for others
who might read what we write.

Quite often a difficult, painful, or frustrating day can be
"redeemed" by writing about it. By writing we can claim what
we have lived and thus integrate it more fully into our
journeys. Then writing can become lifesaving for us and
sometimes for others too.


Well, reading that made me feel better anyway. Perhaps it's not purely self-indulgence :-)