Improving mobility

Well, at least I can now reach my feet to wash them, pull on my socks, and tie my own shoelaces! (Have you ever tried putting on a sock with one hand? It's not easy!)

Proper 9 - Year C

This is not a Sunday for congregants of a delicate nature.

They have to cope with Isaiah's "consoling breast" and "glorious bosom", and bodies flourishing like the grass.

And then Paul delights in talking about "corruption from the flesh" and "circumcision" and "uncircumcision" at some length.

It's enough to make a maiden aunt blush!

1000 words

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so instead of writing another 985 words, here's the picture ....
... and it's been that way since last Thursday.

Which made an interment of ashes on Friday quite interesting. Since it was a "no funeral director" event, I had to ask one of mourners to put the casket into the hole. They didn't look happy at doing it, but it was that, or watch me throw it in from 6 foot above. They chose the more dignified option.

And the doctor's advice? .... "Lie flat on the bed and get your leg over."

I don't think the Bishop would approve somehow .... Or am I misunderstanding the directions?

Separating memories

I wonder why certain words, sights, sounds or smells trigger memories, especially when there seems no connection. There I was, officiating at the altar, and I caught the edge of the paten as I picked up the chalice. The paten tipped and brown bread flirted across the corporal. For some unknown reason, into my mind came an image of a bottle of Seager's Egg Flip. I lost concentration and started to administer the wine with the words, "The body of our Lord Jesus Christ ...."

I ought to explain the significance of the product.

In the 1970's I worked in a small independant Off-licence in Brighton. A staple of the shelves was "Egg Flip" - a poor man's advocaat. It looked fine, but unless the bottle was shaken every couple of weeks it started to separate into a yellow mass at the bottom and a thinnish grey liquid at the top. It stood next to a very slow seller - three bottles of Sloe Gin that never moved in the 11 years I worked there. We had just one regular customer for the Egg Flip who had a bottle every couple of weeks. Unfortunately, they became irregular, and we received a telephone call: "Could we cancel our order for the wife's Egg Flip? It's binding her up!"

Golden evening

The one thing about stormy weather is that it produces some glorious sunsets ...

We've had it easy

It's been a bit darn wet across the Midlands the last couple of days, and more rain is forecast, but here in NW Suffolk we've got off lightly. Heavy showers and quite a few of them thundery, but nothing like the torrential rain that's flooded Sheffield and other places.

Since the ditch next to the Old Post Office was filled in, the rain has nowhere to go, and consequently there's always a "pond" on the corner of the access to Church Farm in wet weather, (and I'm tempted to float a little yellow plastic duck in it), but the hefty rain we've had has made it expand a bit ....

Flaming June ?

It's also been a bit wet here the last couple of days. More is forecast.


(and I can't claim I took this picture, even though I wish I had ... )

Photo credit: Pat Wong

The "studying blues"

"I have learned more from my mistakes than from my successes."

So said the inventor of the Miner's Safety Lamp, Sir Humphry Davy (1778 - 1829). Right from childhood we're taught that success is good and failure is bad. At school, prizes went to those who gave the correct answers, or won the Sports Day events. For those who gave the wrong answers or came last in the race, there was sarcasm and dismissal.

I still recall being put into the "1 Mile Race" at the Grammar School Sports. Four laps of the circuit, and I came in last, huffing and puffing, to the jeers of the other members of Pelham House. I wasn't a runner then, and I've never been a runner. I'm not built for it. I can walk - long distances if I have to, and I can swim, over 120 lengths in one session about 6 years ago when I was fit, but I can't run.

Then there was French. At school I was useless at it. I even scored the legendary 1% in the end of year exam and was thrown out of the class. I then did German for a term until they threw me out of that as well. (It was the same teacher!) I ended up doing triple art periods, plus triple Private Sudy periods for my last year. You were only ever supposed to have double of one or the other. I was labelled an academic failure, though looking back on it I have now reversed that opinion and consider that the school failed me. I now get by in French reasonably well, and when I holiday in the Lot-et-Garonne I can make myself understood, and understand the replies. No lengthy conversations, but I have a basic competance.

And so here I am struggling with a short 12-week Open University course and considering that I might not actually complete it. There are various reasons.

Firstly, the workload of ministry leaves little time for private study, even though I have tried to keep various afternoons free of meetings. I haven't touched the course this last week, mainly because there has been the monthly Parish magazine to compile and get off to the printers. (It went in the post this morning!)

Secondly, I think that the amount of course work one is expected to get through in this short time is excessive. The Introductory Notes say that I can expect to spend 6 hours per week on the course. This is a laughable estimate. It's more like double. And there's a major 5,000 word essay at the end. All this for no qualification but 10 points on the OU scale that can be put towardas a degree (300 points).

Thirdly, I'm finding that I'm not really in step with the academic nature of the questions. I read the material and I look at the questions and I think, "What the hell are they asking?" I then look at the specimin answers and say, "Well, I know that, but how is that an answer to the question?"

So I am asking myself, "Why am I doing this?" I said in an earlier Blog that it was because I wanted to study something outside of ministry and church. That's still the case, but maybe, for me, this is not the right way of doing it.

I'm not giving up yet, but if I do, then I shall have to come to terms with my failure to complete it. It rankles a bit, especially since I know I'm not stupid. I passed the Mensa entrance test some years ago and became a member. Well, I was a member for two years until I worked out that I was being asked to pay a subscription of £25 a year for absolutely nothing. I wasn't that daft, and they'd proved it.

I know ...

... it's time I posted some more amazing deep thoughts. However, it's a Sunday night and the Chinese take-away is about to arrive, so my concerns at present are warming the plates and wondering why my desk light is starting to flicker ....

Maybe tomorrow ....

Cross country travel

A drive across several counties tomorrow as I travel over to Milton Keynes to visit my mother a few days after her 94th birthday. Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire. People say that you either love M.K. or loathe it. I'm one of those who love it, concrete cows and all. I like the grid pattern of main roads that allow you to get around or across the city quickly. I like the way that all footpaths and cycle paths are separated from the roads so that there are no pedestrians running under your wheels or cyclists blithely riding two abreast in front of you. (Whatever happened to the Highway Code instruction that they should ride in single file? Try telling that to the lycra-clad sweating red-faced cyclists that speed around our narrow lanes training for the next event down the main A-road). I like the way each suburb is clustered around a village centre with small shops and sometimes a pub. I like the main shopping Mall with its long parallel corridors of bargain and temptation. And then there's the new IKEA store right near where my mother is in Bletchley. Always good for an hour or so of browsing, wondering how you've ever managed without a rubber spatula or green plastic mincing machine. I'm still looking for two matching single bed-heads, and know exactly what I want, but can't recall where I saw them. I also just laugh at the prices! There's no way I'm spending £150 or so just to replace the mis-matched ones I have in the spare room at present.

So, it will be "tea" with Mother, after she comes back from one of her outings to the Red Cross Day centre. No doubt the TV will be on as she won't want to miss her daily shows, even if I'm there. God save me from becoming that dependant on the illuminated box when I age that I prefer it to real people. Even now I toy with the idea of getting rid of the TV altogether. I could manage with a DVD player and screen without a tuner, and then I could sit back and watch film after film. With radio for the news and weather and selected plays and programmes, I think I could adjust quite quickly. One of these days ....

The calm after the storm

Early morning, with a clear blue sky and sunshine stroking the tops of the trees that line the hill at the back of my friends' house. A big change from yesterday when the wind was gusting and the rain falling. It was a typical "wet Whitsun" Bank Holiday Monday.

The local Sainsbury's in Newhaven was heaving yesterday morning when I went in for essential supplies - Tarte au Citron, roast vegetable crisps, and a bottle of Raspberry and Wild Lavender presse - queues at the Checkouts 6 deep, and very narrow spaces in the car park outside. But I had to go, since even though I had been told that I didn't need to take anything to the lunch we were going to, one can't arrive empty-handed.

Needless to say, we didn't sit out in the garden and eat under the gazebo that was threatening to take to the skies and fly away over the South Downs. Instead we sat in the conservatory and nattered and ate and drank, though not neccessarily in that order. I probably had about three glasses of red wine too many, but they did complement the rather fine and ancient Brie and fragrant Dolcelatte.

So later on this morning I shall leave the salt air and rolling Downs and head back to the flat farmland of the Waveney river. I shall not drive down to Newhaven docks and jump on a Transmanche Ferry for France. (I didn't bring my passport with me!) I shan't even go into Brighton and ferret through the local postcards in the main Collector's shop. (The last time I looked my collection was better than theirs!) Instead I shall drive through the Cuilfail Tunnel into Lewes, head up to Royal Tunbridge Wells, and then onto the dreaded M25 for the Dartford Crossing. Once north of the Thames it's the long slog north-east through Essex and into Suffolk, and I usually take a break at Ipswich at the large Tesco's at Copdock. (Average coffee but the opportunity to buy supplies for supper.) Another hour after that and I should be back in "The Saints".

It's a busy mobile world. There are still a few people in the 11 Saintly parishes who have never travelled out of the area in which they were born. Perhaps it would do us who travel without much thought good to stop and look with new eyes where we actually are once in a while. We might hear that "still small voice" that speaks in the silence.

Listen to the pouring rain

One of my favourite songs from the great Jose Feliciano, and it always comes to mind when I sit, as I am tonight, listening to heavy rain thundering on the roof. I'm not at home tonight, but staying a couple of days with friends down on the south coast, and it's pouring, monsoon-like.

Growing up in Brighton I loved the south-westerly gales that would sweep in, the howling wind funneling up the sea-front streets making it difficult to stay upright, and the driving salt-tainted rain running down the windows of my flat, situated on the top floor of a three-storey terraced house overlooking the playing fields of Brighton College.

I just like extremes of weather, which is why I'm a Thunderstorm Observer for TORRO, and why climate change interests me. I will sit outside under the shelter of a porch and watch lightning. I will gaze out of the window watching the growing flood over the gravelled area in front of the village church that we've nicknamed "Brighton Beach". I will watch the clouds for evidence of tornado formation, and have seen the embryonic swirling that has about 20 minutes later produced a waterspout off Lowestoft.

So the rain continues to hammer on the roof tonight and gurgle loudly in the overflowing gutters ... just the sort of lullaby I like.

Study

Back in the early 1970’s, when I was at Teacher Training College in Northumberland, I had a poster on my wall that was very popular at the time.

The more I learn the more I know
The more I know the more I forget
The more I forget the less I know
So why learn??

It seemed then, and to an extent still seems now, to capture something of the dilemma of learning. Why do we continually push ourselves to learn more, be it about a specific subject in a formal setting, or just in the realms of life experience, such as travelling and seeing new sights? Clearly something in our nature is inquisitive. Something in our make-up wants to know the answer to, as Douglas Adams put it, “Life, the universe, and everything.”

Of course, if you’re a reader of “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” you’ll know that the answer is 42. I always found it rather interesting that in the 1980 Alternative Service Book, paragraph 42 was The Lord’s Prayer. The answer to everything? The New Testament would have us believe so.

Yet away from the more esoteric questioning, some of us are periodically driven to study for learning’s sake. Two years ago I did a home-study course on Interior Design, and gained the equivalent of another “A Level”. Now I’ve embarked on a 12-week OU course on “Writing Family History”. The time required is more intense than that asked for by the Design course, but it’s just as rewarding. Currently I’m working through how to interpret the bare bones of Census Records and Birth, Marriage and Death certificates. To a certain extent I know what the certificates contain since I complete Marriage documentation several times each year, and I’ve seen enough of the other two types to know what to look for. When it comes to the Census records though I’ve learnt about the different methods that were used to record the information since the first one was taken at the start of the 19th century, and what you can deduce from entries and omissions. It’s really quite interesting, and a bit challenging. And although this isn’t going to get me a qualification at the end, apart from 10 points towards a Degree, the reason I signed up for it, and paid the fee, was that I felt I needed a bit of a challenge that was outside of my sphere of work. I suppose it’s the equivalent of getting in the car and going out for a long drive to pastures new. And with three holiday days this week, I’ve been able to get down to it in a systematic fashion.

Whether I still feel like this when my first Assignment is due in a couple of weeks, we’ll see.

Must go - the sausage casserole is ready.

A time for meetings and a time for life

Some weeks since I posted to this Blog, and no excuse except that I’ve been busy. Post-Easter should be a time when things get easier, but with all the Annual Meetings to be held before the close of April, I was rarely at home in the evenings for the last fortnight of the month. Now these are all over for another 12 months, the pressure is off slightly, which is just as well as I have just begun a 12-week Open University course on “Writing Family History”. This is the first time I have studied with the OU, and I thought that a short course such as this would be a good introduction to their way of doing things and the commitment involved. I’ve managed to install the software required, have “logged on” to the OU course site, and made sure that I am able to successfully send my Assignments electronically. I’ve also looked in on the “Forum” as there are 5 “on-line” Tutorials that I should interact with, one every fortnight. I’m working my way through Block 1 of the material and am finding it quite interesting. If I complete it successfully I don’t get anything other than 10 points towards a Degree and the personal satisfaction of having kick-started my brain into studying mode again.

On the Benefice front, one of our churches is currently the target for thieves who are systematically stripping the lead from the nave roof. They have already paid us two visits and I suspect they will return again to this “soft target” which is somewhat isolated and with no over-looking neighbours. Not a lot we can do about this except leave it in the hands of the Lord and the local constabulary. Even if they are not brought to justice in the here and now, they will have to account for their actions at a later and final date. For us, it’s just a reminder that our buildings are but the outward visible sign of the invisible true church.

For a short time in the late 1970’s I attended a gathering known as “The Invisible Church” that met in Earl’s Court, London. At first sight it seemed a standard evangelical “free” church, and I enjoyed the worship times I managed to get to, but that little warning bells began to ring as the longer-term members started to talk about their pastor, Nelson. In conversation it was “Nelson says this”, and “Nelson says that we should…” Rarely were the phrases “The Gospel says …” or “Jesus told us that …” used. It became clear that Nelson was the final arbiter of what was said and thought for the members of this church, and so I left.

At the time I was working in Kilburn and commuting up and down from my flat in Brighton every day. I usually caught the 5.50 p.m. train from Victoria, but on the Tuesday evenings when I went across to the Invisible Church in Earl’s Court, I got the later train at around, as far as my memory serves, 10.15 p.m. This particular night in mid-December I was caught in conversation at the close of the church meeting, and consequently I was late arriving at Victoria. I ran onto the concourse to see my train just pulling out of the station, and I had to wait for the next one at just after 11.00 p.m. I got onto it and we set off down to the coast. About half-way through the hour-long journey the train stopped, and we sat there for about half-an-hour wondering what was causing the delay. Then the guard came through the compartments telling us that there had been an “incident” on the line ahead of us and that we would have to take an alternative route into Brighton. This extended journey took us to Lewes where we arrived at half-past midnight, to find a platform full of stranded travellers. They boarded our train and we got into Brighton station at about 1.10 a.m.

The next morning I woke to the news that a train from London had crashed at the Clayton tunnel, and there had been several fatalities in the front coaches. I realised that this was the train I had run for at Victoria, and missed. I usually sat in the front section of the train so that the walk down Brighton platform was shorter, and if I had caught that train I would have been involved in the accident.
Everything has its reason, and I look back on my fleeting involvement with the Invisible church with mixed feelings. If I hadn’t been going there in the first place, I would not have been catching the later train. But having gone, I could see there was a reason why I was delayed that particular evening. What this has done is not only give me a sense of the leading and provision of God’s care for us, but also it has taught me not to accept without question the underlying practices of any church, peripheral or mainstream.

Currently I am suspicious of the recent consecrations of hundreds of bishops in Nigeria, and the intention of that church to send 120 bishops to the next Lambeth conference. This will mean that their particular take on scriptural interpretation and human sexuality will be out of proportion to the voices of those who accept human difference as part and parcel of what it means to be human.

We’ll wait and see.

Back to normality

The frenzy of Holy Week and Easter Day is now over and done, and now it's time for a more considered appraisal of how it all went. I think that clergy view such major celebrations differently from how congregations perceive them. From my point of view I attempt to provide a sequence of services throughout the week that culminate in the traditional liturgies, but for those in the parishes who tend not to move out of their own parochial settings, they see them as simply "we have such and such a service this week". So there is minimal attendance at most of the Holy Week liturgies since they are "not held in our church". The numbers at the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday Compline services can be counted on one hand. Just the officiant and a churchwarden at one church. The Maundy Thursday evening communion - a major feast - saw just 7 people. Good Friday was variable - 7 at the Stations of the Cross, but reasonable numbers at the second and third services, a "free hour" and BCP Evensong respectively. The Easter Ceremonies on Holy Saturday saw about a dozen for the new fire, paschal candle and renewal of baptismal vows liturgies. Yet today, Easter Sunday, saw 40+ at the BCP Holy Communion, and 30+ at the Common Worship Eucharist. This evening's first trial of a "Stations of the Resurrection" attracted just 6 to walk the "Via Lucis".

So over this next week I shall reflect on all this and consider what it is that people want from their Holy Week experience, and what I believe that I, as the parish priest, should be offering.

Calling or Climbing?

The clocks leap forward an hour tonight and we enter British Summer Time. Note that the Empire is alive and well in our time-keeping. No "Daylight Saving Time" for Britannia, but good old BRITISH Summer Time. Pity our poor Colonial cousins with their bland Eastern Standard Time and the like.

And "in the good ol' summer time" I can step back a bit from the rant. So what if the pension plans are changing? I never started out on this ministerial path seeking financial security in work or retirement. If that had been my goal I would have stayed in secular employment. It was my choice to follow the Call as I perceived it, and as the Church ratified it. I could have walked away.

Some years ago, when seeking a move to a new post, I applied for a Team Vicar vacancy down on the north Devon coast. It was a superbly beautiful area, and the churches and people were very pleasant. Having waited for two hours whilst the Interviewing panel made their deliberations the Rector came out and told me that I had been unsuccessful. The reason given was that the panel did not think that becoming a Team Vicar after I had been “caretaking” an urban Team during a vacancy for the past two years was enough of a “step up the ladder”. They had failed to grasp that I have never sought to ascend any “ladder” of preferment. In contrast to some I trained with, who clearly had their sights set on reaching higher levels (one from my own Tutor Group is now an Archdeacon), I see myself as working in a parish setting until I retire. And then enjoying some freedom of offering assistance to a church without all the administration. Maybe one result of the pension changes is that since I no longer have to work to 69 to gain full entitlement, I am freed to retire earlier if I so wish.

That’s if I live that long, since that may not be in the plan …..

Oh yes, it's Spring ....

.... and everything in the garden's lovely.



Well, it is, actually.

So perhaps I ought to live in the garden .....

as a gnome ...

A job for life? (Hysterical laughter)

When I started my theological training I remember my Director of Ordinands saying to me, "You'll have a job for life, and the church will look after you to the end." This was just before they shafted me over the loss of my home. I was asked if I could find accommodation for the holidays whilst I was studying, and I said that I could go back to my parents. The deal was, if you give up securing your own future to work in the church, the church will provide for your future. Consequently I moved out of my little, comfortable, flat, put my belongings into storage, and for the next two years lived a nomadic lifestyle either in College "digs" or back in the parental nest. It wasn't until a couple of years later that I learnt that if I had said "No" to the question about holiday accommodation, the church would have paid the rental on my flat whilst I was in training. It still rankles.

Then as my second licensed post came to an end in 1996 I found myself still in the process of making applications for a new one. The Bishop refused to extend my licence, and I ended up down at the Employment Exchange drawing the "dole". They didn't have a category for an Anglican clergyman, so I had to be registered as a "Methodist minister". Well, I'm all for ecumenicalism. But so much for the promise of "a job for life!".

Now there's a revision of pension arrangements underway. From the time of my ordination in 1984 I have been aware that the church required 37 years of service to get the full pension. I knew that if I worked to the age of 69 I would just scrape in under the 70 years obligatory retirement level and get my full pension. But things are changing. The proposals are going forward that 40 years of service are required for a full pension. So I'm cut out of it. I shall never get the full entitlement as the goal posts have been moved. And what rubs salt into the wound is that the letter that accompanied this bit of news came with a response sheet since they wished to "consult" all the clergy before it went to General Synod. "Consult" be buggered. Their minds are made up, and this is nothing more than a political move so that they can say that we have been asked about the changes, and I said so on my reply form. What a waste of time, energy, effort and paper.

And then there's the lack of having any sort of stake in the housing market ....

Time for a very large Bacardi and coke.

Early spring

The last few days have been absolutely glorious! Warm sunshine, trees bursting into blossom, primroses, crocus and daffodils all coming out, and the windows open to let the fresh air of 2007 blow through the house.



And now all is set to change this coming week, with weather predictions of cold arctic gusts and wintry showers. It will be a shock to nature and to us, and just as I put away my thermals!

Revelation 6: 12 (b)

Well, you try taking a picture of the moon with a normal camera .... but tonight's total lunar eclipse has been quite a sight.