Yes, the Vicar of Dibley is fiction (except that of course I am/was the real one) and yes some of the langaage in this is a bit colourful but take a listen - there's a lot of truth in here.

Thought for the Day Radio 4

This morning was a really important Church Meeting and we had worked really hard to try to encourage folk to come along and to find ways to help them engage with the subject matter.  The catering fairies and the chair-shifting fairies arrived bright and early to set everything up, the invited presenters arrived early and we began almost on time!  We had just enough cups of wine for the communion - and we had, so we thought, slightly overcatered!

It was, I dare to suggest, a good meeting, lots of excellent questions arising from deep engagement with the material presented and a sense of genuine commitemnt to the work of reflection and prayer needed before we meet again in a month's time.

It was a tiring morning - for everyone - and for the "fairies" a long one but it was so far as I could tell a good one, incredibly well attended, with everyone who possibly could get there, getting there.  "Well met by Christ-light noble Gatherers" if I may plagiarise the bard of Avon.

This post is a bit mysterious and enigmatic but this hymn, which we sang, represents our aspirations (please excuse the cheesy graphic at the start!!) ...

Whenever I go to ministers' gatherings, one of the most precious parts is the sharing of communion - and I love it best when it is the last thing we do together, as it was here.

With a fair deal of creativity, we were led into a gentle time of sharing and blessing each other, feasible in a context where there were only ~20 of us.  I could be sniffy about the use of two cups, one with fermented wine and the other with prune juice (!) but to do so would be unfair.

As part of the sharing, we were invited to offer to those to whom we felt led a word of encouragement or blessing, lirturgical, scriptural or, in my case, just plain English.  There were two people I wanted to encourage, and they, plus one other, blessed/encouraged me.  However God does stuff, what they said really touched me, and spoke to inner places...

• one person prayed for me and in so doing named the isolation that arises from being a woman minister in a Scottish Baptist context
• one person offered me 'well done, good and faithful servant'
• one person thanked me for coming and for particpating fully in the discussions

In the course of this communion service, the leader used the inclusive language NIV, I appreciated that.  And we sang a Taize chant (adoramus te Domine) which was lovely, as well as a more ubquitous worship song 'Light of the World, You Stepped Down into Darkness'

I travelled home much lighter of spirit, and not 'just' because I was going home, but because I had been blessed and encouraged and not a little humbled.

This doesn't mean everything in BUS-land is rosy, that suddenly all my moans and groans will cease... but I think what I realise is that for all their foibles, faults, carelessness in language, sometime sexism and even outright misogyny in some cases, I am learning to love these guys, these brothers in Christ, who are doing their best to fulfil the calls on their lives.

There's still a needed for sanctified stroppiness, there's still a way to go, but perhaps today I glimsped the green shoots of spring in unexpected places.

Posted on Day 3, oh well!

Whole day devoted to aspects of conflict resolution and healthy decision making.  Good stuff and, if all familiar, useful to go back over it again.  It felt timely to revisit some apsects of communal decision making, so overall quite useful if unexciting.

I do find the assumption that all ministers and church office bearers are male trying and wish that those at the front would make a more obvious effort to counter this... we can have 'church-persons' or 'chairs' (even if I don't like that term much) we can refer to 'spouses' not 'wives' (When someone said 'wives and families' in an open thought-shower session and I said "should that be 'spouses' (or "spice" which a tleast raised a smile) the scribe said "spouses and wives then".  No.  It's not that people mean to be sexist (well most don't) but they don't think and they don't seem to want to change... "everyone knows man includes woman" kind of thing.  Sigh, back in time by two decades.

Overall, I'm glad I came, it has been less anxiety inducing than I feared.  Just that it's demanding being that 'pioneer' person people think I am.  With all the talk about pioneer minsitries, I hope the various organisations realise just what they are demanding of those they send out in horse drawn waggons to explore uncharted terrain...

Nice apple crumble and soy-free ice-cream last night, and marmite on the breakfast table - grateful for the little things :)

Here's the poem we reflected with on Sunday

“Listen to me, my neighbors and my friends!

(To herself: I went to the well at mid-day.
I was thirsty and angry about
Having to walk to the well again,
Bear the burden of the bucket
Over these dusty streets for my man.
Men. They always demand more of me.
They use my body for their pleasure
And it is never enough, they want more.
They want my time, my labors
For their own satisfaction.
It has always been so.
Five men have lorded it over me.
They’ve whimpered like children in my arms
In the brief moments of their ecstasies
And moaned prayerfully, “Adonai,” never my name.
Then, like wounded birds,
They fall from those solitary heights,
And leave me alone in the bed
Without so much as a kind word.)

When I arrived at the well today
There was a man waiting there. A Jew.

‘Give me a drink,’ he said.”

I thought to myself, ‘What is it about men
That they think women are here to serve?’

I said to him, “You, a stranger, and a Jew,
Talking to me? A Samaritan woman?
Why do you do so?
What do you think I am?

“Woman,” he said, “If you knew
Who it is that asks you now for a drink,
You would ask me for life-giving water.
Those who drink from this well
Always find themselves thirsty again.
Drink the water that I will give
And you will never be thirsty again.”

Friends, I felt something stir in me at those words.
It was something like a fear, but I was not afraid.
It was something I’d never felt before. I said to him,

“That is bold talk for a stranger.
This well is deep, and you have no bucket.
This is a holy well, even as it was
When our father Jacob gave it to us.
But if you can give me this life-giving water,
Give it to me now, So that I will never
Have to return to this well again.”

He told me to go and get my husband.

“I told him that I have no husband, sir.”

“True enough. You have known five
And the one with you now is not your husband.”

His words shook me to my very soul.

It is clear to me that this man is a prophet.
So I asked him if he could tell me
Which of us is right, we Samaritans
We who worship God on this mountain,
Or the Jews who worship him in Jerusalem?

He told me, “There is a day coming
When people will not worship God
Either on this mountain or in Jerusalem.
The time is coming, and is already here,
When by the power of God’s Spirit
People will worship the Father
As he really is. For God is Spirit,
And only by the power of his Spirit
Can people worship him as he really is.”

“Sir,” I said, “I know that when the Messiah comes
He will tell us everything.” Then, he said,

“I am he.”

“Oh, my living God! My friends, my neighbors!
I have seen the Savior with my own eyes!
He spoke to me with such words, such clear words.
And in His presence I was known even to myself.
My neighbors, my friends, I believe this man is
the one for whom we have been waiting for so long!
The Messiah, He who will save us, has come!
Come with me to the well and see for yourselves!

From http://god-bless-you.org