When people ask me what I like best about pastoral ministry, I often reply that I love funerals... not because I have a strange fascination with death but because they are times of privileged pastoral care that it seems (based on almost 25 years of feedback) I do well.  

On Thursday, I took a small group of ministers in training for their 'behind the scenes at the crematorium' visit.  The staff member who showed us round was amazing - having worked herself as a Funeral Director and for the Coroner's Office she was able to give us deep insights about the practical and pastoral aspects of her work, and also about resilience and boundaries.  A superb visit, which complimented a similarly excellent visit to the cemetery last term.  

Yesterday I was facilitating a day of reflection around end of life, funerals and grief which was led by a Baptist minister who had spend more than twenty years as a funeral director before they were called into ministry, and so brought unique and significant insights.

It was a large group - twenty two people had registered, though a few couldn't make it on the day, and some had requested a Zoom 'contingency' for various reasons.  It was also a mixed group, in so far as there were ministers in training, lay leaders and experienced ministers using this as CMD - a gentle experiment to see whether this is something worth developing in other areas of formation.  I think the answer to that is it depends on both the subject matter, and who chooses to attend.

Among other thing that I took along was my collection of resources around end of life, dying, death and funerals.  What I didn't take was denominational liturgies - I have to trust that people will access those themselves.

Definitely some learning to take forward, especially if we are trying to work in a hybrid format (we weren't really here, we simply tried to adjust a face-to-face delivery to accommodate others) but for a first foray into serving a wider 'audience' I think it went okay.

Importantly, I feel that 'my' MiTs have been good opportunity to think about these topics and that I've done a good-enough job enabling that  to be so.