New Kid on the Blog

This month's 'thought from the Vicar' as printed in the parishes paper... Didn’t We Do Well? After last month’s thoughts, which might have seemed negative but which were not meant to, I thought I would – or indeed should – offer some of the reasons why I find myself constantly encouraged by the Mission and Ministry lived out by our Parishes within the Five Alive Mission Community. Did you know, for instance, that the national average for population attending Church in the UK is roughly 5%, of which about 3% attend Anglican Churches? In our villages that number is between 6 and 11% of the population attending our churches with some regularity, and when you add in our brothers and sisters of Baptist and Methodist Churches in the Mission community that number rises even more. Not that it is the numbers themselves that are important, but the fact that our church fellowships remain at the heart of our village communities. We are genuine community churches, existing for the benef...

I have continued my series of articles on 'Demystifying the Church' and think it's time to catch up with what has gone into the local 'Parishes Paper' which serves these five villages. The first one is from February, sorry for delay in posting. Anyway, the link to the posting is to my New Kid Deep Stuff sister blog.... Demystifying Church parts two & three!

Matthew 16.13-19 Muck Models... I am not in the habit of hanging around with Bishops or Archbishops – I have a healthy (Biblical) respect for those in authority, but I don’t make a thing of trying to meet up with them, or catch their attention. In my last Diocese there was a Bishop’s annual garden party where I would always say hello and make small talk with the Bishop for a minute then make myself scarce and chat to colleagues. I did have a tremendous day yesterday listening to the Archbishop of Canterbury speak at the Dioceses’s 1100th anniversary, but more of that soon, I didn’t actually get to talk to him or chat to the many other Bishops and Archbishops around in Exeter yesterday. There is one exception to this – I used to know an Archbishop quite well. He was a very unprepossing man, diminuitive in stature, though very much great of heart. I knew him in the last years of his life, having been the Archbishop of Uganda, predecessor and friend of the African Martyr and Ugandan Archb...

Today is the anniversary of my ordination, thirteen years ago I was a pale and trembling youth ascending the steps to St Paul's Cathedral to be ordained by the Bishop of London under the cross which sits upon the central dome of London's famous landmark. Actually, I wasn't pale, but I was trembling, and the weight of responsibility that came from that day, the 'cure of souls' shared with the Bishop, firstly of London (& Kensington), then Ely (& Huntingdon), and now Exeter (& Crediton) - the bracketed names are Suffragan/Area Bishops who work under the authority of the Diocesan Bishop - that weight of responsibility has never left me and I still feel hugely privileged to be serving the Church and the Communities in which I am set. I didn't have any particular 'celebration' of the day, but after doing an Assembly for the local school, then spending the morning doing admin, I went to visit a woman, aged 100, to share Communion with her and her h...

....since I last posted! It has been something of a rollercoaster over the past few weeks, a very very busy time which I wish I'd had time to blog about, but it seems one thing after another has cropped up and, as I have said before, when I've had energy I've not had time to blog, and when I've had time I've not had the energy. Anyway, after the marvellous George did his technomagery on my PC things I thought I would have lots of time (all those hours wasted watching little hourglasses on my screen, for instance) to blog and write, as well as catch up on some visiting and put my house, or rather study, in order. Unfortunately life has flooded in to fill the gap left by the hours of time saved, and a huge amount has been going on. There have been some marvellous events in these parishes, including a couple of weddings, and some rather difficult meetings/decisions/complaints/grumbles to deal with too. We also had a very big and moving funeral following the death of...

On the other blog at least.... apologies for fuzzy piccies, that's the screen capture, go to the site with the strangely formatted link below to see originals! title="Wordle: Deep Stuff Blog"> src="http://www.wordle.net/thumb/wrdl/924542/Deep_Stuff_Blog" alt="Wordle: Deep Stuff Blog" style="padding:4px;border:1px solid #ddd">

Finished my ranting, for now, so thought I would share my latest Wordle with you! I might have to do a 'Deep Stuff' version, as I notice that Jesus is near the centre but not as clear as I would hope (there's a sermon in that somewhere, I am sure). Not sure if clicking on above picture will work, so there should be a link below... title="Wordle: New Kid"> src="http://www.wordle.net/thumb/wrdl/924481/New_Kid" alt="Wordle: New Kid" style="padding:4px;border:1px solid #ddd">

Hmmmm, far too much ranting in what is to follow, so I have come back to edit, mainly because I am not sure I phrased things as carefully as I usually would, and partly because me having a rant doesn't necessarily help anything. Time for a little self-censoring, I think.... I normally make a point of avoiding political and social commentary on this blog, mainly because so many others of the blogosphere indulge in such, and make a much better fist of things than I ever could. The general idea of this blog is to give a bit of insight into the life of a relatively normal rural Vicar and the everyday situations he experiences (that's 'he' in a specific sense, meaning me, rather than an expression that I believe minister's should be 'he'). It's also to offer a bit of my 'out loud' thinking, for better or worse, in the hope that some of my ideas will receive a bit of a workout before I try and put them into action. Along with its sister blog 'N...