Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Friday, 20 October 2017
Monday, 27 February 2017
Video: Shadowing a priest in Scotland
That's a little snapshot of my week. I had such a good time. I've known the family for years, so it was good to be with friends and make new ones, and get away from work of course, but I also learnt a lot. I asked Alasdair if I could shadow him because staying with him and his family on previous occasions, I saw peripherally how his life as a priest was so different to the priests I know in central London.
The incident that set the idea in my mind was on his day off, answering the door in his pajamas and having to put on his wellies to go open up the church hall because whoever was supposed to hadn't! The vicar at the church where I work certainly wouldn't have cause to do that. It's good for me to see with my own eyes a situation I haven't really come across, namely a priest who is a radial point, the only full time person who ultimately looks after the church.
Also, his tradition is pretty Anglo-Catholic, and though my churches down in London are high enough to have robed servers and processions, Alasdair's Scottish Episcopal church is almost as far away from what I'm used to as the worship I experienced at the other end of the candle at Momentum or on Pentecost last summer, though not as high as my weekend with the Society of Catholic Priests. It's an important part of being in the Anglican Communion to understand the diversity of traditions held within it, and crucially it is in experiencing all these types of worship for myself that I am able to comprehend on a spiritual level that whilst my tastes and needs in liturgy and worship are different, God is in all of it.
So in doing thee's and thou's morning and evening prayer next door everyday, Mass both east facing and west facing (sometimes just the two of us), serving in cassock and cotta - I got my hands dirty in a way I didn't on the Catholic weekend away, plus Alasdair was very happy to answer my questions. Being with a priest who is not 'my' priest or just 'a' priest, but rather a friend, was a very useful space because (and this is also a mark of Alasdair's patience) I was able to push him to answer my questions further and defend anything I didn't understand or maybe didn't agree with, and also push back and challenge me.
That personal connection and staying with him and his family in the rectory was also able to give me insight into a priest as a whole, 'normal' person, that they talk about at vocation events, but is hard to actually understand in reality, to imagine a priest complexly, as the saying goes. At the same time, when off duty and in civvies, whilst not being the rector, even I as a friend and temporary member of his household could not shake an awareness of him being A Priest. That issue of perception is also often talked about at vocation events.
One thing I learnt about myself was I clarified why I don't like doing certain acts of kneeling in worship. I don't like kneeling to receive communion, and when I served on the Sunday in Scotland I had to genuflect, and boy, I did not like that either. It was as if, as my knee hit the marble, God winced. That kind of abasement is not part of our relationship. That's not to say I don't have a great reference for the Lord of the Universe, but you can have deep respect and show complete obedience without prostrating yourself. Sure, that's how some people show it, but I don't!
I'm also still processing something I 'learnt' in a way, but it's hard to articulate. It's something about being rooted in a place and how I don't feel called to that, at least not right away. I'm reminded of a sermon I heard about Psalm 84, and Hebrews 11 "They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one." I've written before how I don't feel like I have a 'home', but not in a bad way, because I look to making a home in God, and in a more tangible way, making a home where I find God in other people. I don't know, it just doesn't feel like that rootedness is part of my path ahead of me, til the distant future...
Anyway, I got away from my liberal urban bubble and also got to know some of the laity. They were all lovely and when I tagged along for home visits, everyone welcomed me in very gracefully. Sure I heard gossip and politics, but you get that everywhere there are people, and there was no maliciousness amongst the people I met. Talking to the theologian/CofS minister was also interesting to get away from Anglicanism and hear another story of vocation.
But against all that it was just a church serving God and creation. It is reassuring to feel the same undercurrent where ever two or three are gathered in Jesus' name, and to learn from people who are dedicated to God. As I said in the video, where ever I go, "it's still church".
Monday, 25 April 2016
Video: Young Women - Your Call
On Saturday 23rd April, I went to Coventry Cathedral for a young women's vocation's conference. There were 87 young women attending and about 20 ordained and lay women organisers, with a handful of husbands helping! It was the first all-women event I've been to, and I was having flashbacks to my school days at a girls school.
I videoed a quick summary of my thoughts as I waited in the train station, and below is a run down of what we did, and the notes I took during the sessions.
I had train issues but still managed to get there in time (go contingency time!) and we were welcomed before sharing in morning prayer. Celtic morning prayer, which was cool (I recently book the Celtic Daily Prayer book, which I'm looking forward to using). The first key note was Bishop Anne talking about vocation as a woman.
Notes from the welcome:
- under 40 and especially under 30 women under-represented as priests
- feeling of sisterhood! Surrounded by others, all have a story
Notes from the first key note
- God's voice is richer for being the living Word as opposed to human words
- what does God trust me with? Trust me to do?
- courage - embrace pain and joy, the risk of trusting the next step
- phrase 'anunciation moment' [useful to describe my moment in September]
- have sense of the potential of who I can be in God
- children and ministy = careful planning
- lifetime of discerning God's call that weaves in and out of the tapestry of our lives [this was an overriding theme and a really good analogy, such as only being able to see the mess at the back rather than the picture God is weaving on the front]
- women reject job descriptions if they don't think they can do 10% of it
- trust God through fear, like fear that you're on the wrong path - you can't fall beyond the reach of God's will and God's love
After a tea break, the second key note was basically a session on how to defend when someone brings up arguments against the ordination of women. I gotta be honest, I started getting uncomfortable at this stage, and realised that being at a targeted event about vocation may be great for young women who might not otherwise look at themselves as potential priests because of their gender, but I did not have that problem. It also rankled that a) I was basically being defined primarily by my gender which is an attitude I don't tolerate in my life and b) it played into the system of the gender binary, which is itself a factor in the patriarchal systems of female oppression, as well as just out of date thinking that I reject.
But speaker Lis did use the phrase 'the Gender Agenda' and sadly, people do have an agenda based on repressing the female gender. I made notes, and it was, I suppose, useful to hear positive interpretations of scripture, but I'm making the decision not to put them here, as a statement of my belief that we need to get past this position of defense; it was needed 20 years ago, but my generation is putting gender aside. It is not relevant to judging my aptitude at ministry, and as much as I love my gender and am proud to be a woman, I will not even give the space for the possibility of argument any more. It is finished.
I enjoyed talking to the young woman who I ended up sitting next to for the morning, but at lunch talked to others who migrated to the appropriate seating area designated by geography (ie south, south east etc). But sadly, because there were so many of us, and we weren't really pushed to stay in one area and talk to the same people, I spent most of the day feeling a tad isolated, and didn't bond with anyone the way I had at all the other, smaller, events I've been to.
Like in Kettering and York, we took seats at tables, and stayed there for most of the sessions, and lunch, which meant we had motivation to get to know our neighbours. Without the anchoring of a consistent place, I was really lucky to talk to anyone, and even luckier that I bumped into the woman I sat next to in the morning, at the train station, which was great.
After lunch, we split into smaller groups to attend short seminars that we had picked in advance. My first was 'Young and Ordained' and two women, a new curate, and a vicar, introduced themselves, told their stories, and asked us to talk to the person next to us about a person in the Bible that we related to.
My notes from this first half:
- hard to leave settled life - calling is not static, God 'sends'
- ordination is not peak of calling
- I related to Peter; the start and end of his calling by Jesus 'Follow me' and 'Do you love me?' - that's what Jesus is saying to me too
- but what can I, and only I, do in answer?
Then they talked about the challenges and joys of ordination.
Challenges
- 'Wisdom beyond your years' - expectation that clergy know what to say. Not necessarily 'the right quote', 'the right psalm' - no formula. God gives us words, just be yourself.
- 'Making and maintaining friendships' - friends spread out as you move around, especially young people move more. Be intentional - use holiday, make effort to go and to host. Who is important to make time to see?
- 'People taking you seriously' - not as bad as you might expect. Blagging it so people feel calm and reassured. People expect to see a representative of God. God equips.
- 'What people expect of the Vicar' - afraid to tell vicar that they [the vicar] are wrong as the priest should know. Can be asked about ethical and moral decisions.
- 'Being true to yourself' - look like self in dog collar. At first very aware of the collar. Feel judged. Alright to have friends in the parish. Rise to the challenge and adapt. Blurred lines especially for ordained with big personalities [!!] in different situations. Still forming in 20s/30s, getting to know yourself now in a public space.
Joys
- meet lots of different people
- feel right place, time and doing. Not what people expect lead to opening conversations.
Straight into the next seminar, it was really great to have sessions on other callings that parochial ministry, but uniquely in my experience led by actual practitioners of those other callings. I listened to three chaplains talk about school, prison and university chaplaincy.
Notes:
- spontaneous, holy spirit-led ministry
- broad, in every sector
- "religious/spiritual care in an organisation"
- finding God at work
- can volunteer to get experience, go through vicar or DDO
- multi-faith model, for the world
- creative, opportunities
- round peg, square hole in parochial ministry
- God also calls to stop
- drop in income doesn't matter if happy in position
- not imagine self in parish
- [thought to self, could there be an LGBT chaplain, rather than a place chaplain?]
- chaplains are on the edge
- prison - intense and emotionally demanding
- large capacity to love, love those otehrs would find difficult, and can't loveselves
- gift of love to loveless place, and bring hope that anyone's broken life can have meaning
- structured expectations - visit new prisoners within 24hrs, visit segregated, visit hospital
- paid by prison service, but critical friend eg on policy
- uni - students have less baggage
- Christian community
- wider community - all faiths and none, generous
- element of mission but not priority
- religious literacy - prepare students for a world that is 85% people of faith
- 'friar' in community [I like this image]
- "be you, there"
- school - welcome and hospitality, mental health
- resources for worship
- put on services for organisation
- "be a good guest"
- not of the organisation whilst in it
- talk to anyone, full access
- earn trust and show integrity
- lovely, a privilege
- transience, let people go
- listening
More tea and coffee, then a final session for a panel Q&A.
Notes:
- have to be recommended by vicar
- know where you could engage the debates, and where you can't
- trust each other to be under scripture and under God, and walk together in prayer
- mental health difficult in church context
- at first, revisit feelings of incompetency
- it will cost for family
- look at all college options - not straightforward - what experience do you want, needs in academic theology, time, community, tradition, somewhere you can come alive
- official discernment process comes under Equality Act
- call is complicated - follow and obey but also life does happen and can change course - God works through strange ways
- husbands not so hot on clergy spouse support as wives - careful of boundaries with your spouse - are they called to be part of ministry
- take ordination vows seriously eg obedience - can be part of the Church's own discernment - Issue of Human Sexuality "content to live within these guidelines" - have to accept to be put forward for ordination
- BAP - vulnerability of being 100% convinced whilst also knowing that you're coming into the possibility of being told you're wrong
After one more cup of tea, we have a lovely Eucharist, and as I said, I had a lovely chat with one of the other attendees at the train station, just after I filmed the video.
I videoed a quick summary of my thoughts as I waited in the train station, and below is a run down of what we did, and the notes I took during the sessions.
I had train issues but still managed to get there in time (go contingency time!) and we were welcomed before sharing in morning prayer. Celtic morning prayer, which was cool (I recently book the Celtic Daily Prayer book, which I'm looking forward to using). The first key note was Bishop Anne talking about vocation as a woman.
Notes from the welcome:
- under 40 and especially under 30 women under-represented as priests
- feeling of sisterhood! Surrounded by others, all have a story
Notes from the first key note
- God's voice is richer for being the living Word as opposed to human words
- what does God trust me with? Trust me to do?
- courage - embrace pain and joy, the risk of trusting the next step
- phrase 'anunciation moment' [useful to describe my moment in September]
- have sense of the potential of who I can be in God
- children and ministy = careful planning
- lifetime of discerning God's call that weaves in and out of the tapestry of our lives [this was an overriding theme and a really good analogy, such as only being able to see the mess at the back rather than the picture God is weaving on the front]
- women reject job descriptions if they don't think they can do 10% of it
- trust God through fear, like fear that you're on the wrong path - you can't fall beyond the reach of God's will and God's love
After a tea break, the second key note was basically a session on how to defend when someone brings up arguments against the ordination of women. I gotta be honest, I started getting uncomfortable at this stage, and realised that being at a targeted event about vocation may be great for young women who might not otherwise look at themselves as potential priests because of their gender, but I did not have that problem. It also rankled that a) I was basically being defined primarily by my gender which is an attitude I don't tolerate in my life and b) it played into the system of the gender binary, which is itself a factor in the patriarchal systems of female oppression, as well as just out of date thinking that I reject.
But speaker Lis did use the phrase 'the Gender Agenda' and sadly, people do have an agenda based on repressing the female gender. I made notes, and it was, I suppose, useful to hear positive interpretations of scripture, but I'm making the decision not to put them here, as a statement of my belief that we need to get past this position of defense; it was needed 20 years ago, but my generation is putting gender aside. It is not relevant to judging my aptitude at ministry, and as much as I love my gender and am proud to be a woman, I will not even give the space for the possibility of argument any more. It is finished.
I enjoyed talking to the young woman who I ended up sitting next to for the morning, but at lunch talked to others who migrated to the appropriate seating area designated by geography (ie south, south east etc). But sadly, because there were so many of us, and we weren't really pushed to stay in one area and talk to the same people, I spent most of the day feeling a tad isolated, and didn't bond with anyone the way I had at all the other, smaller, events I've been to.
Like in Kettering and York, we took seats at tables, and stayed there for most of the sessions, and lunch, which meant we had motivation to get to know our neighbours. Without the anchoring of a consistent place, I was really lucky to talk to anyone, and even luckier that I bumped into the woman I sat next to in the morning, at the train station, which was great.
After lunch, we split into smaller groups to attend short seminars that we had picked in advance. My first was 'Young and Ordained' and two women, a new curate, and a vicar, introduced themselves, told their stories, and asked us to talk to the person next to us about a person in the Bible that we related to.
My notes from this first half:
- hard to leave settled life - calling is not static, God 'sends'
- ordination is not peak of calling
- I related to Peter; the start and end of his calling by Jesus 'Follow me' and 'Do you love me?' - that's what Jesus is saying to me too
- but what can I, and only I, do in answer?
Then they talked about the challenges and joys of ordination.
Challenges
- 'Wisdom beyond your years' - expectation that clergy know what to say. Not necessarily 'the right quote', 'the right psalm' - no formula. God gives us words, just be yourself.
- 'Making and maintaining friendships' - friends spread out as you move around, especially young people move more. Be intentional - use holiday, make effort to go and to host. Who is important to make time to see?
- 'People taking you seriously' - not as bad as you might expect. Blagging it so people feel calm and reassured. People expect to see a representative of God. God equips.
- 'What people expect of the Vicar' - afraid to tell vicar that they [the vicar] are wrong as the priest should know. Can be asked about ethical and moral decisions.
- 'Being true to yourself' - look like self in dog collar. At first very aware of the collar. Feel judged. Alright to have friends in the parish. Rise to the challenge and adapt. Blurred lines especially for ordained with big personalities [!!] in different situations. Still forming in 20s/30s, getting to know yourself now in a public space.
Joys
- meet lots of different people
- feel right place, time and doing. Not what people expect lead to opening conversations.
Straight into the next seminar, it was really great to have sessions on other callings that parochial ministry, but uniquely in my experience led by actual practitioners of those other callings. I listened to three chaplains talk about school, prison and university chaplaincy.
Notes:
- spontaneous, holy spirit-led ministry
- broad, in every sector
- "religious/spiritual care in an organisation"
- finding God at work
- can volunteer to get experience, go through vicar or DDO
- multi-faith model, for the world
- creative, opportunities
- round peg, square hole in parochial ministry
- God also calls to stop
- drop in income doesn't matter if happy in position
- not imagine self in parish
- [thought to self, could there be an LGBT chaplain, rather than a place chaplain?]
- chaplains are on the edge
- prison - intense and emotionally demanding
- large capacity to love, love those otehrs would find difficult, and can't loveselves
- gift of love to loveless place, and bring hope that anyone's broken life can have meaning
- structured expectations - visit new prisoners within 24hrs, visit segregated, visit hospital
- paid by prison service, but critical friend eg on policy
- uni - students have less baggage
- Christian community
- wider community - all faiths and none, generous
- element of mission but not priority
- religious literacy - prepare students for a world that is 85% people of faith
- 'friar' in community [I like this image]
- "be you, there"
- school - welcome and hospitality, mental health
- resources for worship
- put on services for organisation
- "be a good guest"
- not of the organisation whilst in it
- talk to anyone, full access
- earn trust and show integrity
- lovely, a privilege
- transience, let people go
- listening
 |
| Bumped into a familiar face from CPAS! |
More tea and coffee, then a final session for a panel Q&A.
Notes:
- have to be recommended by vicar
- know where you could engage the debates, and where you can't
- trust each other to be under scripture and under God, and walk together in prayer
- mental health difficult in church context
- at first, revisit feelings of incompetency
- it will cost for family
- look at all college options - not straightforward - what experience do you want, needs in academic theology, time, community, tradition, somewhere you can come alive
- official discernment process comes under Equality Act
- call is complicated - follow and obey but also life does happen and can change course - God works through strange ways
- husbands not so hot on clergy spouse support as wives - careful of boundaries with your spouse - are they called to be part of ministry
- take ordination vows seriously eg obedience - can be part of the Church's own discernment - Issue of Human Sexuality "content to live within these guidelines" - have to accept to be put forward for ordination
- BAP - vulnerability of being 100% convinced whilst also knowing that you're coming into the possibility of being told you're wrong
After one more cup of tea, we have a lovely Eucharist, and as I said, I had a lovely chat with one of the other attendees at the train station, just after I filmed the video.
Friday, 27 November 2015
Exploring my doubts
Doubt is not something I want to put words to. Admitting that I have doubts about my calling is quite painful. But doubt is an important part of faith. I don't think a lot of people really realise that. I know for example I've had an argument with my boyfriend about the nature of faith - he thought is was something you feel and not based on evidence. I countered that he was describing blind faith, and I did not recognise his definition as the faith I have.
Blind faith is 100% convinced, but true faith has real conviction because it constantly doubts. Why have faith in something if you haven't reason to? I have doubted pretty much every part of my faith, including the big ones like do I believe in God. I like going back to the very Jewish idea, which I think Anglicanism embraces very well, of arguing. Arguing with your faith, interrogating your scripture, contemplating other possibilities. Moses (Exodus 4) immediately springs to mind as someone who directly shouted at God, questioned God (Exodus 3), and in the New Testment, the Apostle Peter wavered in faith (Matt 14); even Jesus had moments, eg. at the Mount of Olives (Luke 22), and I considered not even mentioning Doubting Thomas as the obvious choice.
These doubters were all true role models of faith. And so I feel stronger for being able to follow their example, and speak out about my doubts, to face them head on, in the never-ending struggle and journey of faith.
I have worried that I am deluded. Most of the time it makes so much sense to think that I am 'destined' to be a priest, then I scold myself for being so arrogant, then I worry that not feeling special is a sign that it's not a true calling, but surely modesty is better than self-grandeur...
It gets a little cyclical, and I end up feeling lost and guilty. Okay, so confront it, what if I am deluded? (Forgetting the possibility of being deluded that there is a God, and concentrating on the possibility of being deluded that I feel a calling from God). I have been getting more and more religious, so is thinking there's a calling just part of my very thorough way of doing things and being a priest seems the obvious way of 'doing religion thoroughly', and that's the real reason I'm doing it? Does it feel right because it feels like the way to do that part of my life 'properly'?
Okay, I might have a calling, but what if I'm called to something else? Being ordained and being a full time priest is just one of many callings for Christians. I might be copping out of the hard reality of juggling Christianity and other parts of my life. Many people, most Christians in fact, live out their faith whilst in full time secular employment, why do I feel I have to put my Christianity as not just my religion but my job, and not just that but a community role, a life vocation?
Surely I'm not the right person to represent the Church and lead an example of Christ-like living. I've never been naturally a 'people person', and a lot of people find me too loud, boisterous, direct and intense. I have very liberal attitudes to things like sex and relationships that many in the Church would probably object to, even though I go about my love life with as much care to Love God as much as Love Neighbour as any other part of my life. But part of me worries that I'm just wrong. I think I'm doing good not evil, that I'm living conscientiously, trying to not sin, but what if I'm wrong? I swear, take Christ's name in vain, get drunk, shout at my family, buy nice things, don't give change to beggars. There are people in the world who genuinely think I'm a bad person; there's at least one I can think of who probably actually hates me. That doesn't sound like a priest.
No one seems as enthusiastic about it as me. Is their support just politeness? There's a lot in the literature about other people affirming your calling - nope. One crazy stranger, that's all I've had. Not my priest, my boyfriend, my family, my friends, no one has positively said they think it's a good idea. I'm not trying to criticise them - if that's how they feel, I certainly want them to be honest. So if they are, if I'm in the minority of one that thinks I could be a priest, how likely is it that I'm the one that's right?
Let's look at the Criteria again (see also previous post) and what I can't do or haven't got.
So what do I doubt about my calling? I doubt that I'm called at all, I doubt that I'm called specifically to be ordained, I doubt that I'm the right type of person to be ordained, I doubt that I'm right to disagree with my support network, I doubt that I can fit the criteria for being ordained.
And it is terrifying. I hate having doubts. I have so much conviction, assurance and excitement about my calling, it knocks at my core to express doubt. I've used this metaphor before: I have a bedrock of trust in God, on which are pillars of faith, holding up the foundations of my soul, on which the building of my heart sits, in the infusing cloud of my brain. Doubt is lightning spearing from that cloud, and rocking the whole structure. My emotions get knocked about and chaotic, my soul ripples and sends shockwaves through my faith, and my trust is holding firm but not unwobbled.
If you want to read the positive side of this argument with myself, read the post Reasons I think I'd make a good priest/want to be priest.
 |
| Faith is not always blind |
These doubters were all true role models of faith. And so I feel stronger for being able to follow their example, and speak out about my doubts, to face them head on, in the never-ending struggle and journey of faith.
***
It gets a little cyclical, and I end up feeling lost and guilty. Okay, so confront it, what if I am deluded? (Forgetting the possibility of being deluded that there is a God, and concentrating on the possibility of being deluded that I feel a calling from God). I have been getting more and more religious, so is thinking there's a calling just part of my very thorough way of doing things and being a priest seems the obvious way of 'doing religion thoroughly', and that's the real reason I'm doing it? Does it feel right because it feels like the way to do that part of my life 'properly'?
Okay, I might have a calling, but what if I'm called to something else? Being ordained and being a full time priest is just one of many callings for Christians. I might be copping out of the hard reality of juggling Christianity and other parts of my life. Many people, most Christians in fact, live out their faith whilst in full time secular employment, why do I feel I have to put my Christianity as not just my religion but my job, and not just that but a community role, a life vocation?
Surely I'm not the right person to represent the Church and lead an example of Christ-like living. I've never been naturally a 'people person', and a lot of people find me too loud, boisterous, direct and intense. I have very liberal attitudes to things like sex and relationships that many in the Church would probably object to, even though I go about my love life with as much care to Love God as much as Love Neighbour as any other part of my life. But part of me worries that I'm just wrong. I think I'm doing good not evil, that I'm living conscientiously, trying to not sin, but what if I'm wrong? I swear, take Christ's name in vain, get drunk, shout at my family, buy nice things, don't give change to beggars. There are people in the world who genuinely think I'm a bad person; there's at least one I can think of who probably actually hates me. That doesn't sound like a priest.
No one seems as enthusiastic about it as me. Is their support just politeness? There's a lot in the literature about other people affirming your calling - nope. One crazy stranger, that's all I've had. Not my priest, my boyfriend, my family, my friends, no one has positively said they think it's a good idea. I'm not trying to criticise them - if that's how they feel, I certainly want them to be honest. So if they are, if I'm in the minority of one that thinks I could be a priest, how likely is it that I'm the one that's right?
 |
| I have no issues with my human sexuality |
Let's look at the Criteria again (see also previous post) and what I can't do or haven't got.
- Others have not confirmed my inner conviction.
- I have barely any spirituality; I generally never sit in prayer to God apart from reading other people's words. Nor have I done any Bible study. I don't see how the world and others have been affected my practice of prayer, and frankly I have serious issues with the notion of 'the power of prayer'. I've never understood how spiritual practice 'sustains and energises'.
- I've struggled with maintaining appropriateness in professional relationships - I'm a flirt, blunt, emotional. I'm an out bisexual - whoops, Issues of Human Sexuality.
- People don't follow me, my leadership skills leave a lot to be desired. How can I offer an example of faith when I feel culturally compelled to not mention God so as not to make atheists uncomfortable?
- I feel anger and fear about mission, a distinct mistrust and aversion to evangelising.
***
So what do I doubt about my calling? I doubt that I'm called at all, I doubt that I'm called specifically to be ordained, I doubt that I'm the right type of person to be ordained, I doubt that I'm right to disagree with my support network, I doubt that I can fit the criteria for being ordained.
And it is terrifying. I hate having doubts. I have so much conviction, assurance and excitement about my calling, it knocks at my core to express doubt. I've used this metaphor before: I have a bedrock of trust in God, on which are pillars of faith, holding up the foundations of my soul, on which the building of my heart sits, in the infusing cloud of my brain. Doubt is lightning spearing from that cloud, and rocking the whole structure. My emotions get knocked about and chaotic, my soul ripples and sends shockwaves through my faith, and my trust is holding firm but not unwobbled.
***
If you want to read the positive side of this argument with myself, read the post Reasons I think I'd make a good priest/want to be priest.
Friday, 13 November 2015
The first steps addressing my calling
My first step was talking to my rector age 19 (see previous post). My sense of calling died down again to just a niggle for the future. A classic discernment question is "Where is your calling? What does it feel like?" I always said it was at the back of my head, in a corner, and it was just a gentle, constant prodding, a soft poking.
My job as a freelance stage manager is very precarious but I have been either skilled or lucky (I'm not sure which) that from leaving college at the end of my degree July 2014, I have been in constant work as a stage manager. The life of a new graduate involves a lot of applications, CVs and cover letters, and for a new graduate freelancer, whose contracts are usually between 5 and 9 weeks, that process continues once you start getting jobs, to book in the next one, and the one after that.
I had a series of jobs with a week or less between them, always having the next one booked in before the end of the current. I did have a low bar for what I applied for, so I applied for a lot; I'm going to be open and honest here and say that I was extremely lucky that I was always able to fall back on my parents if it came to it, so I occasionally took low paid jobs and my dad supplemented my income, to support my career. Again, I realise that I am a Very Very Lucky girl.
After a year, I decided to become more specific in my goals, applying for jobs that paid a minimum I could live on, and only in the roles I preferred. This narrowed my number of applications down considerably, and unsurprisingly, the offers dried up completely. I got to the end of the last job I had booked in with nothing to follow and moved back to my parents in their little village, away from London, at the start of September 2015.
Two weeks. I was unemployed for two weeks, and I went a little mad. After a week, I lowered my bar again for what I applied for, but started making lists of things to do, hobbies to take up, skills to learn. Having not been in that position before, it ate at me immediately. Yes, this is middle class pathetic-ness, but this is my story, I can only tell it honestly. And with made up words like pathetic-ness.
One of the items on my many lists was to start writing again. I used to be a prolific story writer, doing things like NaNoWriMo, but my inspiration/leisure time had dried up. I sat down with pad and pencil, old school to get myself into the mood, and wrote a few pages of a scene, a girl in a church service, a young professional (sound familiar?)
A few days later, I sat down to expand on this scene a create a character, a world, a plot. This took me on a research rabbit hole, and I started developing the idea that this girl could take a sort of gap year to explore her faith - visit Iona and Taize, go on a silent retreat, that sort of thing, culminating in doing the Camino di Santiago, something close to my own heart as we have a group at church called the Camino group, as it is also known as the The Way of St James.
Abruptly, I looked at the mind map I was creating and realised it wasn't fiction I was writing - it was a wish list. I looked up how long to the Camino took and got it in my head that a lot of people did about six weeks, and suddenly, with my unemployed future stretching out in front of me like an empty void, I thought "I could do that." Excitement gripped me as the reality of that thought sunk in, but rather than booking flights and getting my rucksack out, I went through all the usual vocation websites that I had gone through several times - CallWaiting, CPAS, LondonCallings (my church's diocese vocation page), CofeE Vocations - then calmed down a little and wrote another email to my rector, subject: "Adrift...again."
Could I arrange with [the parish secretary] a time to have another chat with you about vocation and looking into the discernment process?
I talked to my best friend, the one I met at sixth form, my parents, my boyfriend. By the time my appointment with the rector came around, it was on the same day as two interviews for jobs starting at the end of September that I had applied for before this massive kick from my calling. When asked again where it was, the niggle had moved and grown, and now felt like a pervading presence covering the top of my mind, a presence over everything in my life.
That meeting was mixed for me. She probed me to get an understanding of my position, which at that moment was a bit dramatic, wanting to give up stage management and concentrate on following my calling, under the continuing delusion I mentioned in this post. I just felt a sense of urgency but I didn't want to make a big deal, a "look at me, I'm special" statement, nor did I have any idea what the next step was, except maybe there was someone who's job it was to deal with people like me in the diocese and I needed my rector to put me in touch with them.
She was very supportive and encouraging that we needed to keep the momentum up and explore that I was feeling. We booked in another appointment that was sadly cancelled when I got offered one of the jobs I interviewed for, the schedule for which meant we didn't have any free time in common until a month later, and I went off wondering if she was taking me seriously. In hindsight, I didn't give her much to go on and she probably rightly assessed that I needed to do my own digging to come up with what I wanted to do next rather than just giving me options like I wanted to, because it needs to be a slow process. I have moments where I'm chomping at the bit, angry even that I have put up with continuing this stage management career whilst my want to make this other thing me priority.
But I have done some digging, like finding this amazing Guide to CofE Discernment, and done a few other things, and I've gained some perspective. More on that, and my second meeting with the rector, in my next post.
God bless.
My job as a freelance stage manager is very precarious but I have been either skilled or lucky (I'm not sure which) that from leaving college at the end of my degree July 2014, I have been in constant work as a stage manager. The life of a new graduate involves a lot of applications, CVs and cover letters, and for a new graduate freelancer, whose contracts are usually between 5 and 9 weeks, that process continues once you start getting jobs, to book in the next one, and the one after that.
I had a series of jobs with a week or less between them, always having the next one booked in before the end of the current. I did have a low bar for what I applied for, so I applied for a lot; I'm going to be open and honest here and say that I was extremely lucky that I was always able to fall back on my parents if it came to it, so I occasionally took low paid jobs and my dad supplemented my income, to support my career. Again, I realise that I am a Very Very Lucky girl.
Two weeks. I was unemployed for two weeks, and I went a little mad. After a week, I lowered my bar again for what I applied for, but started making lists of things to do, hobbies to take up, skills to learn. Having not been in that position before, it ate at me immediately. Yes, this is middle class pathetic-ness, but this is my story, I can only tell it honestly. And with made up words like pathetic-ness.
One of the items on my many lists was to start writing again. I used to be a prolific story writer, doing things like NaNoWriMo, but my inspiration/leisure time had dried up. I sat down with pad and pencil, old school to get myself into the mood, and wrote a few pages of a scene, a girl in a church service, a young professional (sound familiar?)
A few days later, I sat down to expand on this scene a create a character, a world, a plot. This took me on a research rabbit hole, and I started developing the idea that this girl could take a sort of gap year to explore her faith - visit Iona and Taize, go on a silent retreat, that sort of thing, culminating in doing the Camino di Santiago, something close to my own heart as we have a group at church called the Camino group, as it is also known as the The Way of St James.
Abruptly, I looked at the mind map I was creating and realised it wasn't fiction I was writing - it was a wish list. I looked up how long to the Camino took and got it in my head that a lot of people did about six weeks, and suddenly, with my unemployed future stretching out in front of me like an empty void, I thought "I could do that." Excitement gripped me as the reality of that thought sunk in, but rather than booking flights and getting my rucksack out, I went through all the usual vocation websites that I had gone through several times - CallWaiting, CPAS, LondonCallings (my church's diocese vocation page), CofeE Vocations - then calmed down a little and wrote another email to my rector, subject: "Adrift...again."Could I arrange with [the parish secretary] a time to have another chat with you about vocation and looking into the discernment process?
I talked to my best friend, the one I met at sixth form, my parents, my boyfriend. By the time my appointment with the rector came around, it was on the same day as two interviews for jobs starting at the end of September that I had applied for before this massive kick from my calling. When asked again where it was, the niggle had moved and grown, and now felt like a pervading presence covering the top of my mind, a presence over everything in my life.
That meeting was mixed for me. She probed me to get an understanding of my position, which at that moment was a bit dramatic, wanting to give up stage management and concentrate on following my calling, under the continuing delusion I mentioned in this post. I just felt a sense of urgency but I didn't want to make a big deal, a "look at me, I'm special" statement, nor did I have any idea what the next step was, except maybe there was someone who's job it was to deal with people like me in the diocese and I needed my rector to put me in touch with them.
She was very supportive and encouraging that we needed to keep the momentum up and explore that I was feeling. We booked in another appointment that was sadly cancelled when I got offered one of the jobs I interviewed for, the schedule for which meant we didn't have any free time in common until a month later, and I went off wondering if she was taking me seriously. In hindsight, I didn't give her much to go on and she probably rightly assessed that I needed to do my own digging to come up with what I wanted to do next rather than just giving me options like I wanted to, because it needs to be a slow process. I have moments where I'm chomping at the bit, angry even that I have put up with continuing this stage management career whilst my want to make this other thing me priority.
But I have done some digging, like finding this amazing Guide to CofE Discernment, and done a few other things, and I've gained some perspective. More on that, and my second meeting with the rector, in my next post.
God bless.
Thursday, 12 November 2015
Video: My faith story before the start of this blog
Now it is a reasonable hour of the day, as opposed to the dead of night like my first post, I'm going to set out a few more details of who I am, and my faith journey so far, to give a bit of background to where I am now.
Who am I? From a secular point of view, I grew up in a rural village in a middle class county in the south of England, with my mum, dad, and younger brother. I was schooled at a private girls school and a mixed state sixth form, spent a gap year first on work experience then travelling (see this blog) and I realised I was bisexual age 14 (see another blog. You can see I like blogging). I went to drama school to do a degree in stage management, and I have been working in the theatre industry in London as a freelance stage manager since August 2014, so for just over a year as I type. This in itself was a vocation that I wanted to do since I was 15, but I have since realised that it was a step within my greater vocation ie. my calling to ministry.
Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. My mother is an atheist and my father is a non-practising pluralist. It wasn't that I grew up without God or being told God didn't exist, God just wasn't mentioned. I was baptised, but my parents really did it for social and cultural reasons. But my uncle gave us various children's Bibles so I had one as my favourite book for a while as a young child, without any real understanding of the stories as 'scripture'.
Consciously engaging with Christianity as a philosophy began in my Religious Studies classes at my new school. When I was about 12, my teacher answered a girl's question about what she personally as a Baptist thought counted to be Christian. She said if someone believed Jesus Christ was the Son of the one God, and he lived, died and was resurrected to save us from our sins, everything else was arbitrary, and even the how/why of those statements was up for debate. I looked down at the textbook on Christianity on my desk and realised I have thought of myself as a Christian since primary school but never thought about what I believed. It was more of a cultural default, part of being British. But I knew in that moment I did believe those two statements, so for the next years of school, I digested and dissected the different beliefs and practices of the different churches and navigated my own belief system.
When I was almost 14, I started noticing a girl around school who had a crucifix necklace, and I
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| On holiday after starting to wear a cross. I still have that one. |
It was at sixth form, age 16, I met a girl who would become my best friend, who had grown up in a Church of England household, so knew a lot more about community worship. I knew the theory of worship styles, but had yet to find the motivation to go to a Sunday service or become involved in a congregation. So we would have discussions about our shared but basically very different religions, and she took me to one Sunday service in our two years studying for our A-Levels, as well as helping me pick out a Bible, which I had never actually thought about buying before, oddly.
On my gap year trip, I started going to church. It happened quite naturally, almost incidentally. My work experience had been with a Christian theatre group on tour, so I had had a little go at being with other Christians, like church-lite, but one day in a town called 1770 on the Australian coast, I went to a Sunday service and every week after that I googled the local Anglican wherever I woke up on the Sunday morning. I also picked up a devotional so I read that and the readings from my Bible, which I took with me, every day for a couple of months until it ran out.
Moving to London, one of my priorities was finding a church where I could throw myself in and really go for it. Having spent years working on my personal faith, time for some community faith. [This is a view I have gained retrospectively. At the time, none of it seemed liked the steady step by step progression it was.] I had met the associate rector of St James' Piccadilly in New Zealand, and I went along a few months after starting uni, and fell deeper in love. I could go on and on about St James', but for the purposes of this blog, the main things that SJP has done are: I go to church every week, I'm a reader, server, alto in the choir; I run the youth discussion group, gave a talk at the general discussion group. run the LGBT group including marching in the Pride parade with the Christians, do the tea and coffee after the service once a month; and I was confirmed in St Paul's Cathedral.
IN SUMMARY
6yr I went to Christingles
12yr I turned to Christ
14yr I wore a cross
18yr I went to church
19yr I found my church
21yr I got confirmed
I'll cover the last two years of my life in my next post. See you then!
God bless.
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