Cinema as observatory

Another day of clouds with chilling north wind, and even a brief bout of hail this afternoon, with snow on high ground. It's just like we're back in early February again. My morning prayer upload went smoothly, and after breakfast, I recorded and edited two more day's worth of uploads without a hitch, in less than an hour. Finally I made contact with the chief mourner of the third funeral I'll be taking, and was then able to prepare the service.

I also made contact with osteo-myologist Kay, who has been out of circulation not just due to covid but due to a personal injury a while back. She's now resuming work, and I have an appointment with her in Newport a week today. My neck and shoulder still need sorting out properly, I have found a way to stop the condition getting worse and having seize up on me, but I think there's an alignment issue which only someone with expertise can sort out.

This evening I finally got around to watching last week's episode of 'New Amsterdam'. It was interesting in that it dealt almost entirely with concerns about palliative care, and the different needs of patients in their end of life phase. The NYC public hospital in which the drama is set doesn't seem to have a chaplain on the staff team as such, but many key staff clearly exercise extended pastoral roles in relation to patients. I'm not sure how true to life this is, but this narrative angle poses challenging questions about the role of ministers of religion in a secular setting.

Then, by accident I discovered that More Four Walter Presents is screening two more batches of episodes in the low key Italian detective series 'Non Uccidere', which mostly looks at crime in the context of family relationships. Religious issues crop up in some episodes, to more of an extent than in other modern crime series. Despite the Vatican at the heart of its capital city, Italy is as secular as any other European country. I wonder what this particular story telling slant has to say about society and religion there today.