Borowski in veiw

I spent this morning in St Michael's College with a group of other retired clergy with permissions to officiate in the diocese, at a Safeguarding training session, run by the Provincial Safeguarding team. It is and should be requirement for us to ensure we're well briefed about those really sensitive pastoral issues one comes across from time to time. This was prompted by recent legislation changes regarding responsibility for reporting potentially abusive situations and how this should be undertaken, but it still relies on pastoral awareness, common sense and discernment to know if action is required. And that's not often easy, if as a visiting priest you're not fully acquainted with the people and their context. It was a good and refreshing experience nevertheless.

I returned home for lunch, and afterwards walked into town to shop for some small items. I rang Ashley and then we met in John Lewis' top floor restaurant for a cup of tea and scone, for a catch-up before returning home to cook supper and eat it with Clare when she returned from her choir rehearsal. Then an hour watching an episode of 'Inspector Borowski' on the All Four streaming site. I'm about a third of my way through a 'box set' package of episodes of european TV series, branded as 'Walter Presents'. I like this website, as it's easy to use, swift and reliable, also it's as easy to pause and resume viewing for a few minutes or a few days.

As for Inspector Borowski, he's a sympathetic character, and like so many heroes of detective fiction he is middle aged, workaholic, getting over a broken marriage and with difficult offspring. Each episode, as well as telling the story of a nasty serious crime, shows something of his everyday life and work, and his social context, in a relaxed and quite amusing way. Having said that, the most recent episode I watched was just hilarious, portraying his eccentric boss taking refuge with Borowski during a marital crisis, and a very young looking female recruit to his team who is streets ahead of everyone else in her ability to analyse and research a case, mature beyond her years. How he manages to take this in his stride in his dominantly men's world, with gentle respect and appreciation, give an insight into what positive male leadership can look like today.