Tuesday 16 September 2008

This, That and the Other.


Two Baptisms after Mass on Sunday following a glass of wine for everyone to wish Simon well. Lunch at home afterwards to celebrate our Parish Priests forty fifth anniversary of being ordained Deacon. Solemn Evensong and Benediction after that will bring the day to a close for many but your scribe will be going home for a restorative glass of wine. Our font looks very brooding in this picture which I took in the morning light but on Sunday it will glimmer with candlelight and a slick of blessed oil and the flash, I suppose, of a dozen mobile phones taking pictures. I do not have a mobile 'phone, so am allowed to be mildly acerbic towards them.

The altar looked very bare today as well, compared to Sunday morning, rather like taking the Christmas decorations down, but on Sunday night it will be ablaze in candles and the glory of the King as we approach Him in our best court clothes, to kneel at the foot of His earthly throne. Times and seasons plod on, lawns need mowing more or less often, but here we are and here we are supposed to remain, becoming slowly more detached from what some would see as a compulsory reality voted upon by the terminally deluded and more and more attached to the truth and to the Lord. I, for one, am perfectly serene about the whole proposition.

The postman today proved a bearer of exoticism, bringing a new High Mass set with cope from India, in lustrous green. It needs a little adjustment, here and there, but it will be blessed in two weeks from now, on the Sunday when I am preaching for a friends grandchild's Baptism elsewhere and we shall wear it the week after. Watch this space! Oh, I know, you do anyway and we are all very glad to keep such esteemed company.

A sudden baroque chalice also appeared today, back from the menders in Cheetham Hill, freshly gilded and straightened, much like Jeffrey John and shining in a new glory. Happy days. Excitement also came in the form of our Parish Christmas Lunch venue cancelling our booking due to refurbishment, so I am trying to find someone else to feed ninety hungry souls in December, on the same day at the same time. The local golf club seems a possibility, I shall pop in tomorrow on my way back from a meeting at the Community House in Mirfield.

Father Hunwicke, in his excellent blog wonders which Saint to keep on Friday, Theodore of Canterbury or Januarius. I favour Januarius, for the sheer excitement of the screaming 'aunts' of the Saint who scream at the relic and the continental nature of the thing. Theodore was Greek, though, which counts for something I suppose. I suggest in similar dilemmas that the merits of the national drink of each country be weighed and the most palatable decided upon. Not only will it bring a welcome note of cheer to the day, a practical demonstration might have a positive effect on numbers as well.