So what's it like being a Vicar (Second Service)

Having set the backdrop and walked you through the first of the Sunday services (with three as the nom.) we find ourselves with the second service quickly upon us.

Now although many seem to think that this is now a walk in the park because all we do now is preach the same sermon we've just done -  that isn't the case where I am because that would be merely reheating the previous meal and  attempting to pass it off as fresh - and that, from my point of view, would be very wrong indeed.

Wrong because the congregation and the setting are different and so, even with the same readings, the emphasis and sometimes the Bible version used are all different. Add to this the fact that there are hymns, songs and perhaps even anthems to be considered and with them comes music teams or organists and music groups or choirs and perhaps servers and acolytes and a myriad number of other changes and you will soon realise that what you have before you is a totally different entity indeed.

One of the first service strengths is that it is often the more traditional service of those on offer and this might mean the BCP or some other older language is on display. The next service might be another communion or a family service or a parade with uniformed organisations (something that is diminishing as some take the Scouting and Guiding movements away from their Christian birthright) or an all-age service - the combinations are endless and exciting indeed and the challenges all different and extremely varied.

This is the service where visitors are often most likely to be found and so after the service there are people, familiar and new, to be greeted, engaged with and enjoyed. There might also be wedding banns to be read and this often means that couples on their way to marriage will be [resent to be engaged with also. Then, being the principal service of the day we find that some of the families of those we have buried will be at this service too and this can mean time spent at the votive stand (where we light candles and pray) praying with and comforting those who mourn.

The musical side of the service has to follow, and support, the time and season and this means dialogue with the organist or music director or picking the songs and hymns yourself - something I love doing.

But by now what is certain is that there has been another period of time taken up to make sure that everything that needs to be in place is there. The sermon doesn't just happen and this takes some time if you are to read the passages before you and to get the various aspects of location, audience, what was happening at the time and all the other stuff that makes sense of the passages (we call this 'fixing the hermeneutic' -  it means finding out what there is in the text and what it has for us). Then there are the connections to be made. 

Those themes or characters or behaviours that connect the passage - sometimes it is tediously just the fact that all three readings have one word or character (recently we had shepherd as the focus) and sometimes there is some real work before us if we are to present a sermon that draws from all three (and we mustn't, as so many seem to do, forget the Psalm).

So there we are - halfway through the day and there's still more to do yet (Did I mention the 3.30pm baptisms?).

To hear the sermon I did yesterday at the second service, click HERE

Sleeping again Vicar?

Becoming a 'Vicar' - Crashed and burned at Selection Conference

I find myself having many conversations with people who tell me how they 'failed' or 'weren't selected' for ministry training in the Church of England. Stipendiary, Self-Supporting (SSM, the ministry formerly known as NSM) or Ordained Local Ministry (OLM) - they've been off and spent some time with assessors who have discerned that 'ordained ministry' is the calling presenting in the person before them (or at least not yet it isn't).

The problem is that what many hear is that, to use the words of one, 'Weren't wanted,' and this is not what selection does, says, or is. What it should be is an aid to help the person presenting themselves discern where they fit - after all, a square peg might well fit into a round hole but it takes lots of hitting with a hammer and damages the peg and the place you're trying to fit it. Better still to see and hear who they are and guide them gently into the right shaped receptacle for them. Less filing, banging, friction and pain all round.

So when someone I converse with on a fairly regular basis wrote, 'I offered for SSM and my offer was declined for perfectly good reasons. However, the report recommended me 'For Ministry in the Church of England' but with no caveat of which type of ministry?' I struggle a little!

I can understand the selectors writing, 'Not this one!' But when the response carries with it the additional words, 'But recommended for 'Ministry in the Church of England', ' I am a little at loss.

There are so many avenues for offering oneself as a worker in the Church of England, there are:

Ordained: Stipendiary Priests and Deacons (paid), Self-Supporting Ministers (unpaid Priests and Deacons), Ordained Local Ministers , Ordained Pioneer Ministers.

Lay:  Mission-Shaped Ministry, Pastoral Care Ministry, Pioneer Ministers, Prayer Ministers, Spiritual Growth Ministry, Readerships, Worship Leading and Youth Ministry (to name but a few).

Other: There are so many opportunities to offer ourselves for roles at church (and other levels) and these are as numerous and diverse and the numbers of churches, ministries and people that we have. The key is to look, feel the match and put oneself forward.

The issue with my friend quoted here is that there appears to be neither parish or diocesan level support for them and their quest to be used and useful in the right place.

They say that they feel a call to, 'Proclaim the Gospel in a public-facing ministry role,' and this can be done in a number of areas, not just ordained, but lay and not just pulpit-based but on the streets in evangelistic settings, teaching (sermons are not the only place for this) - but without support and prayerful guidance, discernment and care, we leave those 'feeling called' confused and, as time passes, impotent, frustrated and perhaps bitter too!

The warning to the Church of England is that I meet too many who echo the words of the person thus far quoted:

'Perhaps I just need to pack it all in and sit in the pews like the rest and be 'done to', or go somewhere else. Unfortunately, the call persists'

They say that cuts have removed Lay Training from the menu for 2013 - 14 (which is pathetic and destined to diminish the numbers coming forward for training and finish off those like our writer) and that there is no one outside of parish clergy - who should be the first port of call and then be supported a diocesan level - to engage with or find succour and guidance.

Shameful, sad, frustrating and unbelievable.

We need to support and encourage those who feel they have a calling - it's what we do:

Equip - Train - Release - Celebrate