Up at eight on a grey sky day. I drove to St German's after breakfast to attend Mass and sign the baptismal register, as I'd been unable to on Saturday night and left with Churchwarden Peter a small gift for Basma. Fr Jarel mentioned Dean Richard Peers in the prayers, It seems that he announced his early retirement on Sunday morning. Somebody else mentioned it to me yesterday, but I thought they must have been mistaken. It seems the ordeal of enduring a vexatious complaint process which started during his time at Christchurch College Oxford has taken its toll on him. Only last week was he exonerated by a clergy disciplinary court and his accusers castigated. It's so sad for the diocese to lose a gifted priest in this way. He's not the first senior cleric to quit recently. Does the church know any longer how to care for and protect its pastors?
When I returned, Clare was already cooking an early lunch, as she had an afternoon eye appointment at UHW. After we'd eaten I drove her there, then returned and went for a walk. It drizzled most of the time while I was out, but I got back just as the rain got heavier. The rest of the day I spent watching episodes of 'This Town'. It's a moving portrayal of dystopian life in outer suburban council housing areas in East Birmingham and Coventry at the time when the IRA was active in the West Midlands, with a spy thriller story embedded in it, in addition to a story about young people's striving to make a break their inherited family scripts. Of particular interest to me is the portrayal of non institutional religion in their lives.
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