A Skinny Fairtrade Latte in the Food Court of Life

Before I vanish again - way too much happening around here, so much that I've lost my booked-and-paid-for Advent Quiet Day tomorrow (2 funerals) - here are a couple of online spaces for a short Advent reflection each day:

Hopeful Imagination - a group blog (may miss the odd day)

Northern Baptist College - 10-15 min liturgy.

Experience.  Enjoy.

And as I'll be there too - share!

Updated: if you want to travel through Advent with a URC minister, Craig has some reflections and links worth a look here

In a little over a week's time I have been invited to attend a service where my new Anglican colleague will be 'collated and installed.'  Does that amount to 'sorting her out' then 'plugging her in'?  Glad we just get inducted!

Last night I was bemoaning the number of requests I've been getting to conduct funerals - I *could* have been (am not) doing four this week.  I said to the person, 'I wish all these people would stop dying.'

Her reply? 'Well, have a word with your boss then!'

Hmmm.

Next Wednesday I will be conducting a funeral for one of the local Baptist lay-preachers. Nothing especially odd about that, except that he was 101 years old and only last year conducted his own wife's funeral!

This man was born the same year as one of my grandmothers, and I have to try to think into her story to try to connect with his.

I am promised a full church (D+1) and a congregation where I'll almost undoubtedly be the youngest by a couple of decades.  It is certainly a strange mixture of privilege and challenge, and I am grateful for various press cuttings and copies of family writings to inform the eulogy.

One thing I've learned from this experience is the odd blend of help and hindrance that letters stating requirements for funerals are!  This person had left a letter dictating that an early morning private cremation should be followed by an afternoon celebration service - including exact times and venues!  It is not possible to meet these exacting requirements (for logistical reasons) and the real pastoral needs of surviving relative who will have travelled considerable distances to attend have to trump what was stated.  So, after a fairly traditional service, I will accompany the coffin to the crematorium, freeing the relatives to meet and mingle with those who knew, so much better than they, this old lay preacher.  Maybe I'm odd, but whilst my theology says what I'm accompanying is a dead body, my heart won't let me let him go to this last 'appointment' alone - the commendation words will be spoken in church, echoed at the crematorium, and I will, in faith, commit the mortal remains to the elements in 'sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life in Christ our Lord.'

And then, of which I think he'd approve, I will dash off to lunch club to play 'Father Christmas' (mother?  elf?) to our wrinklies.

I have recently been given a sum of money in my capacity as 'Baptist 'Vicar' of Dibley' (as distinct from to me as a person, even though the reality is that it is mine to use as I see fit, no questions asked).  I'd like to use some of it to purchase some Biblical commentaries to augment my woefully inadequate library.  The tempation is to opt for buying several from one of the popular series, so that I could get a little closer to the aim of one day having a commentary on every book of the Bible (beyond the couple of one volume things I already have).  I already have three or four commentaries on each of the gospels, so am not really looking for these.  But, if you could recommend one, reasonably priced (up to about £25) commentary that's fairly middle of the road theologically and suitable for use by preacher with a smattering of Greek vocabulary and no Hebrew, what might it be?  I'm after the kind that cover a single book of the Bible or at most a small inter-related set.  I'd rather buy less, better, commentaries than a 'bumper fun book of the Bible.'

This morning I was at a  funeral, supporting one of my church members whose mother-in-law died a week a go.  Because I was there in my official capacity I was 'vicared up.'  What I hadn't anticipated was people's ignorance of ecclesiastical issues...

I arrived at the church and met a piper who was there to play a lament as the family entered the church (the deceased originated in Ayrshire and had held fast to her roots).  He asked me if I knew what was happening, and I explained it wasn't my church, so I was sorry, I couldn't help him.

I walked around the building looking for an entrance and met someone else who said, 'can you tell me where to go in.'  Same explanation.

Having got inside a third person came and asked me if I had the key for the toilets which were, evidently, locked.  Once more I explained that this wasn't my church, so I couldn't help.

You might be thinking this is all my own fault for looking like a 'vicar' when it's not a funeral I'm taking - but the crazy part is that this was a Roman Catholic church.

So, you may now all address me as Mother Catriona, if it helps... or not.

Not having been at a funeral Mass since my RC placement days, I'd forgotten the jack-in-the-box way that priests appear and disappear from the side door of the church, and was struck by how 'wrong' it felt that there was no one to greet the mourners as they arrived and lead them into church (excepting the undertakers of course).  The coffin had been brought in the night before (RC tradition in some places) and if seemed really weird to watch everything going on around it as people arrived.

Managing to speak to my church member fleetingly after the service before I dashed back for lunch time prayers, she said she was glad I was there to sing - as hardly anyone else did!

I struggle with requiem masses whereby the mourners are excluded from communion because they don't 'tick the boxes' whilst total strangers file past them to receive.  I struggled with the noise of a woman loudly telling her rosary before the service began - not because I have a problem with telling rosaries (in principal I don't, even if I wouldn't say the 'hail Mary's') but because it felt a bit of a 'show.'  Above all it made me think once more about the funerals I take and how they might 'feel' to non-Baptists, never mind non-Christians.

The priest seemed a kindly and caring man, and I'm sure he offered the very best he could.  When I conduct my first RC funeral mass it will be very different!!! ;-)

Now I just have to handle some very naughty undertakers who have committed me to take a funeral without even consulting me to see if I'm free.  It is only pastoral sensitivity that means I'm going to do it - I don't see why the families should suffer - but it's not on.

This post is really for those kind, loyal readers who drop by regularly to read about life in Dibley, my attempts at research and other random writings.  Regrettably, I feel I need to take a break from blogging - not because I'm bored with it, au contraire, as the saying goes, but because in my crazy world something has to give, and this, whilst fun, is the only thing on my burgeoning to-do list that is not an 'overwhelming A' in terms of priority.

Church life is incredibly busy, with pastoral issues arising daily - we are still getting regular deaths (mostly at one remove, granted) and serious illnesses, and it now takes me seven hours to get round the four people who are in three hospitals from Staffordshire to Leicester (I do them all on one day otherwise it's three days gone).  My five deacons are all dealing with significant 'stuff' and I think there is only one family in the church for whom nothing major is going on - though I hesitate to say that lest something arises!  On top of that, plans are in hand for Christmas outreach - which is looking good, but has already had to be cut down due to lack of bods to do the work.

Research work is going nowhere fast.  On Saturday I'd set aside the morning to do some reading, and managed a chapter introducing Gadamer before the phone rang with the latest pastoral crisis.  The upshot is that if I am to get any reading or thinking done then - and justify spending  ~10% of my net income on university fees - then I can't also spend time typing this stuff.

So, unless I get a sudden urge to post a bit of liturgy, uncover an earth shattering insight in Baptist history/historiography, experience something incredibly funny or tragic, or discover how to squeeze 25 hours into 24 it will be quiet in this corner of blogland for a while.  I will, along with many others, be posting at Hopeful Imagination during Advent, and will still check out (and maybe comment on) other's stuff from time to time.

In the (in)famous words 'I'll be back' but until then take care, Shalom and other suitably holy hugs.

For various reasons, I am only leading one service during Advent that is not a Christmas service (if that makes sense!) and I want it to be somewhere I can sing song of the wonderful Advent hymns/carols that express the mystery of waiting.  So I will almost undoutbedly be choosing to sing 'There's a light upon the mountains,' 'Earth was waiting,' 'Let all mortal flesh keep silence,' 'Wait for the Lord,' and of course 'O Come, O come, Emmanuel.'   Not everyone likes the wonderfully wistful melancholic tunes to which these are set, but for me they are truly magnificent.

I am considering using the O Antiphons as the basis for the service - possibly with several mini reflections rather than a sermon - but am struggling to find anything much by way of resources (a few RC things that give possible readings, guaranteed to freak your average Baptist who wouldn't know an apocrypha if it bit them).  I am after, I think, images, poems, pieces of music maybe, that capture something of the mystery of waiting which can be justaposed with or linked to these great names of Jesus, for whom we wait.  Anyone got any ideas?!

For those who know the context, this service needs to relate to the good folk of Dibley and D+1!

I have just been tagged by Baptist Bookworm with this potentially amusing meme:

The Rules

1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

So, in the spirit of general nonsense in which it is intended, and in no particular order, here are six things you probably never wanted to know about me but now you do!

1. For two years at primary school I sat opposite Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime (and beat him in every subject except English!); our class teacher from '3P' Miss Cottingham is mentioned fleetingly in A Spot of Bother.
2. My first car was a bright yellow Ford Cortina with a black vinyl roof (!!!) - the only three door version after one of my brothers reversed it into a gate post and my Dad muffed replacing the affected door.  After six months I changed to buying dark blue super-minis which no brothers ever want to drive!
3. In a recent conversation about what we'd come back as if Buddhists were right (the things theologians get up to!), I reckoned I'd have to be a lab-rat given the number of times in my life I've been part of an educational experiment from student teachers, first-time lecturers to brand new post grad courses.
4. I can recite the alphabet backwards as quickly as forwards, but am not good at saying the 14th and 15th letters as a single word...
5. I am the author of a scientific report that runs to 30 volumes, each about 50mm thick, and of which you can find the mere 9 volume sequel referred to in Google Scholar if you type in PTSE and Gorton (that's my bit of posing) (btw 29 of the 30 volumes are sets of tables of numerical results)
   
6. I once won a prize for making an embroidered seahorse!

Ok, so now I have to tag some more people who haven't already been 'got': Julie, Lucy, Angela, Simon, Richard and Tim (that's a nice gender balance, isn't it?!)

Just a bit of fun for a cold, dull afternoon.

OK, so maybe that's not such a rare occurrence, or certainly not when I'm chairing them 'cos I make sure we stay on task, but this one might not have been since it was mainly a case of reporting back on things done, flagging up items that need to be picked up after Christmas and sharing pastoral news.

Just this once, I moved pastoral news to the end of the Agenda - it usually comes first - because I wanted us to have a decent chunk of time for praying together which would include the pastoral stuff.  And this was the good bit!  We split into small groups for prayer (plenary open prayer just never happens, everyone gets too embarrassed for some reason, and we sit in silence) and prayed for a full half hour before silence fell.

And we were still done by 8:50, having started at 7:30.  This should earn me a few Brownie points with those who like to be done by 9pm and from those who think we don't pray enough.

Already some interesting ideas have been mooted regarding the bequests - including the possibility of buying things that will benefit the wider community!  If that comes to pass I will be delighted.  We shall see.