Sunday, 1 December 2024

Advent awakening recalled

It rained in the night, but cleared for a while in the morning and the sun broke through the clouds. A good eight hours sleep, following an early night. I benefit from going to bed early but struggle to change my routine, as I enjoy remembering reflecting and writing while I relax at the end of the day.

I drove to St German's for Mass for a change and joined a congregation of thirty for a traditional Advent Sunday Liturgy. Fr Jarel didn't preach, as a Parish bring and share lunch was going to follow the service, combined with a group conversation envisaging the next ten years in church life, leading up to the 150th anniversary celebrations. I didn't know this was happening and didn't consider staying on. I am after all part of the past fourteen years of St German's and may not live long enough to see the day. At least the sun shone during the service, always a consolation in such a beautiful light filled building. 

I set out for home half an hour earlier than I normally would. The traffic across the city centre was very slow and took fifteen minutes longer than the journey there. I arrived earlier than Clare expected, so she'd been late starting lunch, not that it mattered., I opened a bottle of Italian Merlot that I won at the Christmas Fayre last week and listened to the news once I laid the table. 

The sky clouded over again by the time I went for an afternoon walk in the park. There was a lot of water on the roads from earlier showers and my lower half got soaked by a car driving through a water filled pothole. Later on there was a ten minute shower of rain, soaking my top jacket. Although my trousers dried out while I was walking, they needed washing as roadside puddle water is inevitably dirty water.

After an early supper we went to St Catherine's for the Advent Carol service. Nearly four dozen people attended. There was meant to be a bidding prayer at the start of the service, but it didn't happen. I suspect nobody reminded Fr Sion that he needed to provide his own text for this. There is a suitable one in the Oxford Carols for Choirs, which needs to be provided for the officiating cleric, or they need to be told in advance so that they come prepared. I've been nearly caught out by this before and glad that I'm no longer responsible and facing the congregation for worship.

Being in the congregation for Advent Sunday holds a special memory for me. In my first term as an undergraduate, I attended a silent retreat at a convent in Salisbury which catalysed a spiritual awakening in me that opened a way to contemplate the mystery of God. As a child I went to the early Communion service with my mother and this made an impression on me. I connect these two experiences as markers on my journey which set me in the direction life has taken me. 

Fifty seven years of active participation in the church's mission and ministry later, in response to a call which first came to me through others, I still wonder if I made the right choice. I never felt comfortable about being in the social role of a clergyman and it took time to feel completely at ease acting as a priest and preacher representing the church before God, and God's Word to the church. It's a matter of learning to pray all over again when performing the priestly role. When you no longer occupy the role it's a matter of re-discovering if not learning, how to pray as an individual member of the Body, blessed with the time and space in which to do so.

And now, another effort to get to bed earlier and change my habit!

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