Dog collarage

To (almost) the other end of the M8 yesterday evening, to see Derf – or should I now say, Rev. Derf (well technically The Dr. Rev. Derf, but she’s decided against that for thoroughly understandable reasons!) being received into her new congregation/circuit/parish (they’re a bit complicated, these Methodist types!). What a lovely evening. As soon as I walked in and saw her over the other side of the room in her dog collar I got all weepy (I’m still getting all weepy thinking about it), and although I did hold it together during the service, every time I looked at her I got all emotional. Just seeing someone doing what they were born to do, what a wonderful thing

The spread the congregations put on after the service was a wonderful thing as well

Wishing Rev. Derf every joy and happiness in her new ministry.

Of dongles, Dunblane and drinking

Apologies for blogging infrequency, our home broadband is not very well (understatement; we are currently waiting for BT to test our line and try and find out what is going on. In the meantime HD has got a pay-as-you-go dongle (what a great word that is!) so we are still able to connect, but I don’t want to use up all his credit so I am being reasonably disciplined and trying not to waste it all on scrabble. Though I might waste a little bit later ….).

Thursday evening I headed over with some other people from church to Dunblane, where our friend and former curate was being inducted (instituted? I can never remember the correct terminology. I’m pretty sure it’s not induced though!) as the new priest there. I have (and I know I’m not the only one) missed Kimberly a lot here, she was a wonderful curate, and St Mary’s are lucky to have her. I must admit to shedding a tear during the service – it was actually at the point that the church warden handed her the keys to the church. She had such a huge smile at that point it was clear that she had “come home”. What a wonderful service and wonderful occasion, and I hope and pray she will be very happy there. As if that wasn’t all wonderful enough, I can now also say that I have been in the same room as the Cope of Glory (that’s a reference that kingsfold will get, if nobody else!). My goodness, and it was quite glorious!

The end of the week has seen a couple of pre-birthday events – yes I finally reach that grand-old-age-with-a-0-on-the-end next week, and so had drinks with people from work on Friday night (shamelessly piggy-backing on another friend’s leaving do), and then with friends from church last night too. I think I feel alright about it, generally – I was really excited about the last birthday-with-a-0-on-the-end, and have loved being in my X0-ies (I don’t know why I’m not just coming out and saying the numbers, I’m sure you all know!), so I think I’m more bothered about not being in my X0-ies than I am about being *0.

Anyway – we are going to go on an adventure on the actual day, so hopefully that will soften the blow a little

Colliding worlds

The world continues to shrink and collide. I remember when I first started getting involved in online communities, talking about my “real life” and “virtual” friends, and then getting really startled when “real” and “virtual” worlds started to coincide and overlap, and “virtual” friends became as “real” as “real life” friends. People from the wibsite and Ship of Fools turned out to know/have grown up with random people I knew in real life (especially people from madchurch, bizarrely), and since being on facebook it’s been amazing to see how many people have unexpected mutual friends with me – a few people I know from online are friends with a friend of mine from uni, whom they know from GCN, for example. I’ve had several facebook exchanges along the lines of “where on earth do you know x from?!” – one madchurch friend saw a comment from someone (whom I got to know through a friend of HD’s) and messaged me to say “I was at a Crusader camp in the 80s with someone called Jane Bloggs*, I wonder if it’s the same one”, so I messaged her and it turned out they were indeed already acquainted but hadn’t been in touch for 20 years, and then they spent a fun evening reminiscing together and catching up via facebook messages. I’ve also had a couple of “real life” friends come up to me and sheepishly confess that they think they’ve been reading my blog. One of whom as lots of people already know now has her own blog here too – we first met in the early 90s, and I think at first we were both a bit freaked out by the real/virtual overlap.

Now it’s my various virtual worlds that are colliding. I’m really delighted that Katya, one of my most faithful and regular commenters over on my Glasgow photo blog, has started to comment here too. I can thank Ian for following her comments on Glasgow DP and starting to comment on her blog for her getting to know the wibsite a bit.

Every time I experience one of these mini-world collisions I get a bit of a jolt. A pleasant one mind! I think I didn’t realise until I had lots of friends in lots of different places coming together the extent to which I choose what I reveal about myself in each different context. I think all of them are authentic expressions of who I am, whether it be the creative, spiritual, pseudy, or whatever sides of me, but I always wonder if those who know best the spiritual side of me will be surprised by the slobby side, or those that know the creative me will be put off by the more spiritual, even though it’s all me. I think I’m rambling (Shurely not – ed), not to mention getting a bit “me, me, me” on you – anyway really all I want to say is despite the momentary discomfort I think the coming together of these different worlds is fun and helps make the world both a smaller and bigger place. Yay!

In other news, working at home hasn’t worked at all. I have no self-discipline whatsoever (she says, like that’s news). Tomorrow will be better (actually maybe I’ll go into work after all). Sigh.

* Name changed to protect the guilty, obviously!

Christingle

I guess one way of looking forward to the coming of Christ (something I’ve already explained I’m struggling with a bit this year during the current dry patch) is to look back. This morning’s service was action-packed if nothing else, being both Carol Service, Christingle Service AND a baptism (all 3 elements together worked really well – and still managed to take less time than the usual communion service! But I digress).

Some of you know I’m not from a church-going family, so church didn’t really feature in my childhood much apart from when my school orchestra and/or choir did concerts in churches sometimes. However, my late grandmother (whom we called Nanny – she died when I was 7 or 8 ) did sometimes go to church, and occasionally we would go with her, if there was a service which might be good for kids. So, one of my very earliest church memories, I guess I must have been no older than 5 or 6, is going to the Christingle Service – I remember precisely nothing about the significance of the Christingle or anything much about the service itself, but remember really vividly walking back home with my mum and nanny and aunt and sister and my sister and I both holding our oranges and shielding the still lit candle trying to protect the flame from being blown out. I remember the orange wasn’t beautifully decorated like the ones at St Frodo’s this morning, with red ribbon and sweets as well as the candle, these ones were literally just an orange with a cross drawn on it in red marker pen and a small candle. But, I remember that even from that very early age there was just Something about church, about Christianity, which just Felt Right, and that feeling never went away, even though I never did anything about it till I went to uni at 18 and joined the CU. Seeing those Christingle oranges this morning brought that all flooding back – the fact that God was calling me, little me, all those years ago.

And then in the readings, of course we got to Luke 2. I remember a few years ago when I was still in London, I think it must have been 1998 thinking about where I was living at the time and that I was getting ready to work on a hospital ward where I’d just finished a student placement for the early Christmas Day shift, so I was bleary-eyed and running around a bit. I had GLR (now Radio London, nowhere near as good as GLR was but that’s another story) on the radio, and then (as I think still now on Radio London) Jumoke Fashola was doing the early God-slot programme. While I was getting dressed I remember her reading out Luke 2, the story of the shepherds, and I remember when she read verses 10-11 “But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord”, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and the story of Christmas never ever felt as real as it did then. This morning the same thing happened, at the same place. I’m guessing God isn’t as far away as he currently feels after all … it’s just taking looking back to realise that there is a future.

More thoughts on the cathedral service

Now that I’ve got a bit of distance (both time and geographical) from last Sunday, I wanted to jot down a few thoughts on the service with Bishop Gene Robinson. Firstly, I said already but want to reiterate, the contrast between the glum protesters outside and the happy, buzzing, joyful congregation inside was not only striking, it was actually quite jolting. It’s something I’ve also noticed with some of the eastern European blogs I’ve been reading – the constant “down with this sort of thing” is wearing, wearying and downright unattractive, not to mention unloving and hateful, and as I’ve said before, I would actually feel quite self-conscious about self-identifying as a Christian there as that seems to be the predominant view of what being a Christian is. This is something I’ve been thinking more about for a while, and which is also touched upon in Tractor Girl’s remarkable blog post.

Back to the service. The first hymn was “All People that on Earth Do Dwell”, but sung to the tune of “Jerusalem”. I have to say, it was utterly wonderful to be able to belt out a hymn to that tune (normally I mumble along embarrassedly or refuse to sing at all to the usual words, as they’re so awful). And, as with so many familiar hymns, it took singing it to a different tune to notice how wonderful the words are, and how they illustrated again the contrast between the joy inside and the glumness outside.

The service continued, and as Mad Priest has already related [by the way, I just have to say, OMG I was in the same room as MadPriest, and didn't even know it!] what was quite remarkable about this was “it was exactly the same as any other Eucharist you might go to in an Anglican Church on a Sunday morning”. As I mentioned in my blog post the other day, I was a bit wary of going to the service to see a “celebrity Christian” (I think this is partly a hangover from my years at madchurch, where on reflection you could say there was a cult of personality around some people), but as I said I’d have been stupid not to go when what Bishop Gene has experienced/is experiencing and is part of is such a huge issue in the Anglican church right now. I was really saddened by his illustration of one of the services at Canterbury Cathedral during the recently concluded Lambeth Conference – apparently all the security guys on every cathedral entrance was given his picture and strict orders to eject him should he try to attend, and then one of the hymns that was sung in that same service was “All are welcome”. God help us all, how can that be right?

It was clear from both the sermon and from the choice of hymns that the themes of inclusion, service, justice, and grace, grace, grace were to the fore. Actually, if I’d been Mystery Worshipping the service (which I thought about but didn’t in the end, as I know the Provost and the church, and also because they were done a couple of months ago) I think that that would be the answer to the final question, what will you remember about this service in 7 days’ time? – grace, inclusion, love, service. Of course I’ll remember much more than that, but I think it’s testament to both Bishop Gene and to Fr. Kelvin that ultimately, the final memory won’t be of the participants, of the visiting celebrity, but of the God of grace.

At the end of the service Bishop Gene was presented with a recording of St Luke’s gospel in the Scots language (which, as Fr Kelvin said, once listened to would transform your understanding of the gospel!), and Bishop Gene pointed out the power of giving the Bible to oppressed people – because they actually read it, and seek to apply it. That I think was the most challenging thing for me – how much am I reading, applying, changed by, the message of grace, inclusion, love, justice and service contained in God’s word?

Bishop Gene Robinson in Glasgow

Yesterday I had the privilege of attending the service at St Mary’s Cathedral, where the preacher and presider was Bishop Gene Robinson, Bishop of New Hampshire. I was in two minds whether or not to attend, as I didn’t want to go just because of a celebrity preacher. However, I figured that as the Anglican church is my church, and Bishop Gene is an important part of what is happening there at the moment, I would be mad not to take the opportunity to listen to what he had to say when he came to my back yard (well, a bus ride away, but you know what I mean!).

And what a wonderful occasion it was too. There were a few protesters outside, looking rather glum and miserable, but they were easily ignored. [As an aside, is it wrong that I felt really smug that once inside the church we were all warm and dry, whilst outside the protesters got drenched? I guess it is wrong. But I still feel smug]. However once inside the church, the atmosphere was great – joyful, friendly, full of anticipation. The whole service continued in that vein – the sermon (preached without notes) was very much what I needed to hear, and the music and liturgy was wonderful. I suspect this is going to be one of the few occasions in my life where I ever hear a bishop getting a standing ovation.

More details are on the cathedral’s website, including the whole sermon, and on the blog of St Mary’s Provost: What’s in Kelvin’s Head.

Wrest House and Park

HD and I have just spent a nice afternoon wandering round the grounds at Wrest Park, which is an English National Heritage place in Bedfordshire, a stately home with extensive gardens which were landscaped by Capability Brown (though rather more formal than the other Capability Brown gardens I’ve seen). Here are some pics:

A very lovely afternoon out

In other news, in church this morning I was amused by this little snippet in the notice sheet:

6.30pm First Eucharist celebrated by [curate who was priested yesterday]

Would all worshippers please make sure that they are familiar with the evacuation plan displayed in Church, and note that there are no fire exits at the altar end of the Church.

I’m pretty sure they’re separate notices, but it read as though they were part of the same notice, which got me thinking that this might well be a Eucharist to remember – it got me thinking about the Vicar of Dibley wedding, with fireworks as she walked up the aisle. Pyrotechnic Eucharist, now that would be something – perhaps we should suggest it for Greenbelt, they have everything-else Eucharists.

In other other news, we’ve just been watching Neil Diamond at Glastonbury on the telly. How fantastic is he? – he was brilliant! I would have loved to have been in the crowd singing along to “Sweet Caroline”, that would have been great! I want to get his new album, which I think means I’m officially a fogey. But I’m a fogey and proud of it

Mystery Worship

I’m so behind on this blog, I’ve not talked about the conference the other weekend or going to Culzean this last weekend or the excitement of marking essays (er, yes. Ahem). And I’ve got more photos, from Culzean, that I was quite pleased with. Now that Chas has sorted me out with my technical blondery, I’ll try and get round tomorrow to putting them on the blog and catching up.

But for now, and also more in the catching up department, the Mystery Worship report I did while on honeymoon is now up – you can read it here. For London readers of a certain vintage, it reminded me a lot of my previous London church (it even had the same name!). Which may well be why I liked it so much.

Easter weekend

Yes I know it was two weeks ago, but I’ve only just now got round to downloading some photos. However, I’ve just noticed that flickr doesn’t seem to do the “view different sizes” thing that I usually use to get the code to put photos up, so can’t quite figure out how to put photos here. What’s all that about? Anyway, in the absence of individual photos, here’s the set on flickr for the whole weekend, hopefully suitably captioned.

We stayed in York, housesitting for some friends. On Good Friday we went to York Minster, where we saw the final hour of the Riding Lights performance (they do a dramatic retelling of the Good Friday story, interspersed with prayers, reflections and hymns, over 3 hours, but we didn’t go to all 3 hours), which was really good.

On Easter Saturday we went to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. HD had been before, on a friend’s stag do, but I hadn’t and was really keen to see it, and I have to say it didn’t disappoint, it was fabulous. It was the first time I’d seen any Andy Goldsworthy sculptures “in the flesh”, so to speak, and there was also an Antony Gormley which I spotted from a fair way away, amongst lots of other interesting sculptures. The day started off sunny but by the end we got caught in a snowstorm. I’d definitely recommend a visit to anyone who’s in the area (it’s near Barnsley), I thought it was great.

On Easter Sunday we went back to the Minster for the Easter morning service. Archbishop John Sentamu preached – the sermon was pretty straight-down-the-line evangelical victory-snatched-from-the-jaws-of-defeat type Easter message, but nothing wrong with that. I thought he was lovely, and I must admit that as he processed in I felt like I was in the presence of someone really special (well obviously I was, Jesus was there, but you know what I mean!). Apparently David Cameron was in the congregation as well, but I didn’t see him (can’t say I’m too disappointed about that!). After the service we went to have lunch with a friend (HD’s best man and his wife, and a few others), and then off to Visions for their early service (once a month they meet in the afternoon rather than the evenings so that parents with small kids can make it). It was great to see people again, and we also ate even more – after my Easter egg breakfast and vast lunch, I was really full, but lots of people had baked cakes for after the service, so it would have been rude not to have any

Next bit of the week will follow when I’ve put photos up.

Mothers’ Day

I’m not the biggest fan of Mothering Sunday (to give it its proper name!), especially at church – not because I’ve had bad experiences with my mum (I haven’t particularly, she’s lovely) or because I want to be a mum but can’t (I don’t know either way, but have never had any particularly strong urges to be a mum so I don’t have that ache that many other people describe at this time), but because I’m aware of so many people I know who have huge issues with the day – due to singleness, childlessness, past abuse, whatever – and have observed how often the church is useless at acknowledging this, instead subjecting everyone whatever their background to a cheesefest that is often spectacularly insensitive. I hadn’t forgotten to send mum a card, but it hadn’t registered that that would mean Mothering Sunday at church until we were walking to church, and then I just had to think oh well I’ll just have to put up with it, as it was too late to have decided to go to the early morning service instead. Anyway – thank God for my church. I did cringe a couple of times, but that was due to my inner Protestant rather than my inner bolshie cow (which is the usual reason I cringe at churches). Being an Anglo-Catholic church (ie Anglican but at the higher end of the spectrum – not stratospheric, but higher than any of the other churches I’ve settled at) the focus was well and truly on Mary today. I can’t say I was overly comfortable about singing a hymn which included as its chorus the Hail Mary, but a quick scan of the words reassured me that it was, in fact, not bad at all. And then another hymn which I presume was meant to be about Mary, but didn’t actually mention her and so ended up sounding like a cheesy Patience Strong ode, was just too cheesy for me to be able to sing with any enthusiasm (it was also too high, as it happened!). But, the fact that the service focussed on Mary, and her example of motherhood as relevant to the whole church, meant that the service wasn’t just “aren’t mothers wonderful?” like they so often can be, and so the grumbleometer didn’t actually register much at all. So that was good.

I think it helped that I read a post by unordered the other week which I found really helpful in thinking about Mary. Read it here.