Category: church

pushing the boat out

wonderfulexchange8 Comments

So, do you suppose after two years here, the congregations are ready for me to abandon a normal sermon in favour of paper folding and meditative prayer?

The idea spawned equally by tomorrows OT lesson on Moses amid the Bullrushes, and the fact that my voice is very weak after an infection.

I still remember the first time I put pen and paper out at my last church and had a substantial part of the congregation prowling up and down the aisle before the service saying:

what are these for? (wait and see)
what are we going to do? (wait and see)
Here, you can have this. I won’t be needing it. (yes, you will)

to the friend, the enemy, the warden, the rector:
Will she tell you what we’re doing? (no, of course not)

The second time there were paper and pens in the pews it went much better:

oh, I don’t like orange. Can I have that pink bit?
Do you like green? No! Give it to the rector.
My pen doesn’t work, does yours?
What are we supposed to be doing?
Here, N. (age 7) will show you.

Ah, happy days.

one body

wonderfulexchange19 Comments

It sounded like such a good idea: for a couple of months in the year, on the third Sunday of the month, the Piskie and the C of S congregations would join together for a communion service. When I take it, is according to our practice. When the C of S minister, it is according to his.

My goal is to help our tiny little congregation feel more at ease in joining in with their neighbours, and to remind all those English folk who have retired to Tighnabruaich that we exist and they can come for communion occasionally even if they want to worship with the larger church more often.

For the C of S minister, I suspect the goal is both to offer hospitality and to restore an old practice of occasional evening communion which he is happy to support, but doesn’t really want to preside at all the time.

Easy, right? Proper and good for small rural congregations.

And it will be.

But first we have to sort out wine (for us: wine, fermented grape. for them: grape juice, must be non-alcoholic) then bread (for us: bread or wafers. for them: oatcakes) then the requirements of coeliacs (OK with wafers/rice wafers. OK with oatcakes. But since I suspect they won’t be happy with wafers and we won’t be happy with oatcakes…)

So what do you think? How do we resolve the wine/grape-juice/bread/wafer/oatcake situation?

I wonder what other unforseen challenges with arise.

time and place

wonderfulexchange3 Comments

A year or two ago, I had to attend a three day meeting led by a person I had known for many years, but never particularly liked. This person has notable skills, but unfortunately, I usually found myself having to engage with his weaknesses.

The person who summoned me to the meeting knew I was somewhat ambivalent about the session leader, and after two days said, ‘what do you think about X? Is it better than you’d hoped?’

In fact it had been, but not for the reasons my interlocutor was hoping. I said, ‘Yes. Sometimes familiarity matters more than liking’. — and heard the gasp of disbelief as my questioner recoiled from what he heard as rudeness.

The thing is, I meant it; and I wasn’t intending to be cruel. I don’t suppose I will ever really like the person in question, nor have the sort of respect for his abilities that some do. But I’ve known him half my life now, and it was good to see him.

Sometimes, though, those old animosities do fade away.

When I was doing my theology degree, I went to a church known for its breadth. It doesn’t take much imagination to realise that ‘breadth’ is a nice way of saying that some of us didn’t much like or understand each other, and tolerated each other only for the sake of the community.

One of the people I ‘put up with’ was a woman about my own age who worked with the youth group. She and I came from opposite ends of the church. We got off to a bad start when I offered to help with a youth event (having come from two years of school chaplaincy), and she decided that I could pour the tea. The kids I liked were scared of her. The kids who loved her scared me. So, we co-existed for several years. There was never any conflict, but neither was there friendship or understanding. We were like two wary cats, forced to share the same garden when both were used to having their own patch.

But there she was at the youth camp last week, and I was genuinely glad to see her. More to the point — I was impressed that she was there. The SEC is not always as broad as it pretends to be, and she is right at the edge of what the church can hold. One might have forgiven her for seeking a church where she wouldn’t have to work so hard at being valued.

Now, I suspect she and I would still disagree over lots of things. But for the first time, I noticed how similar some of our reactions were. We were able to laugh together and encourage each other. And even when we talked about the things that might divide us, there was a mutual agreement that we wanted to the church to be big enough for both of us.

But I wonder: if we had stayed in the community where we first met, continually circling each other like cats, would I have ever noticed that we might get on? … that she’s quite impressive, really… that both of us had changed?