This week has been interesting. Last Sunday we had a wonderful Mass to conclude my ministry at St Mary Magdalene's. It was nice that quite a few folk gathered together. Particularly my three daughters who with my two granddaughters sang to me. In our family this is the way you show how much you love another person. I often tell the story, with great joy, how my first son-in-law Dénes said to to Sarah, his beloved, "Your family always sing at each other!!" It was good to hear an 'outsider' [ for such he was then] discover this great treasure....WE just did it...sang G & S, Barby Girl, Musicals...all the time.
When I was younger and we used to drive to far beaches in SA in the car we would sing Church songs, the Beaumont Folk Mass...and all sorts of other things. My Dad, who was not particularly religious, used to love it. I just muse that now Dénes now sings to his daughters ... and indeed to us all.
I am glad I began this series of posts with the story of Jason, he didn’t turn up for Mass today. Nor, more importantly did She. I still hope he might connect that Tuesday or Thursday we are open. I am sad that we can’t do 24/7…we managed it in one the two churches in the last parish . But that was because I lived next door.
And there was the famous incident of Romeo and Juliet sleeping under the altar…but that’s a story for another day… I was in that parish for eighteen years and after sixteen years or more a couple of people did begin to articulate “It’s great that we can keep the Church open!” But I wonder if it’s open now.
I didn’t mean to project a false humility about my encounter with the broken J. But worry that I may have done that. I think ( after a long time) as a pastor that I still don’t have much of a clue. This series of posts is about the last two months of my full-time ministry as a parish priest. It is not that I am going to stop being a priest. I am one of those who think that ordination ontologically changed me and I will be ‘a priest for ever’ [Hebrews 7:17 ” For it is declared: "You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.””] This may be a romantic idea , but it works for me in my understanding that the call to priesthood is a universal charge on my whole being. I am inclined to think that I cannot divorce myself from my priesthood. There is is a lot of psychoanalysis, no doubt, that could transpire. But so what it works for me! I don’t want to be divorced from my priesthood, and I don’t think my priesthood is rejecting me. So, this is quite an important reflection for me, because in two months I will celebrate a Eucharist as a parish priest, knowing that this will be the last time I will celebrate as a parish priest…and this after nearly forty years. It’s taken a little while to work this through, but I am pretty sure that I am not defined by being a parish priest. I may be defined by being a priest, but as close as I have been to parish life, I can move away from it. The curiosity of this is that I will have a bit of a break ( maybe six months) and then I will pickup locus work here and there . I don’t quite know what locum work will be like. I know a lot of people in the Diocese and have a fairly good feel for how local parishes work, so I can do this. I think I will do it gladly and with joy. I will pander to my own need to preach…and to be appreciated for being able to do this relatively well. I think that ‘preaching’ is one of my charismatic gifts. And can act out of that model.
I wonder if you have questions about all this. And would be glad to respond. Leave them littered around..either on the blog or on Facebook. And I will see what I can do
