Video: sacrifices for my calling

Video: Going through the Criteria again

Video: Assessments coming up

5/11/16

Contrary to my last statement in the video above, it's not the latest update, I just didn't get round to putting it up before I filmed the next video! That one ^ was about how I'm feeling about the forthcoming Examining Chaplains, and the next one below is about my chat with the rector about how to go about them. You also get a great opportunity to compare what I look like with and without make up!

9/11/16

07/09/2016 One year into exploration of vocation

As you can tell from the date, this post is tiny bit late, but the idea behind it is to do an anniversary blog, to look back over my vocation journey. You can see a summary of my progress so far on my page Steps on My Journey (recently nicked as a concept by my antipodes-based-vocation-blogger-turned-friend whose amazing blog you can find here).

I just watched my first, minute long vlog, which I did at 2am, having decided to start logging my journey, and in hindsight, it's bloody prophetic. In it I said that I was excited and whilst "not wanting to sound dramatic", I felt like I was on the verge of quite a big change. Sitting here, two weeks into being pastoral assistant at the church on London's Trafalgar Square, too right it's been dramatic, my life has changed entirely!

My second post was my faith history, and in the video accompanying the blog post, I said how putting it down as a sequence of events brought forth a coherent story. That feeling has been firmed up considerably in the last year. I've actually been aware of the story as it unfolds rather than only when looking back, and I think that's because I've been very slowly opening myself up to God and actually looking for God in my life, which is a big step that I'm still working on. As my last post said, God has been an underlying current in my life and often I've gone along without any awareness of God supporting me, carrying me, surrounding me, and loving me, at the time. This last year, probably more like this last six months, I've started connecting with God in the everyday fabric of life, and so catch glimpses of the pattern God is weaving.

As I said in the other post, it's been a task of submission, and I'm inching my forehead closer to the floor at God's feet, and getting better at looking at my life through heaven's eyes.

Then I watched this video after my third talk with the rector, on the 30th Nov last year, and two things struck me. I said we talked about how my stage management skills and ways of being need to be used outside of the theatre as well, and I didn't know it at the time, but I think this new job is exactly what I need to make that happen. Who I am professionally is being overlaid and interwoven with who I am at church (because I'm now professionally at church!) and that's part of the larger journey of my identity reforming as more in Christ, because I am tangibly serving God everyday. I've always said I'm not wired to be a good 'secular Christian', and sure, I'm only two weeks in, it's too soon to really say, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to prove myself right on this one.

Second thing from the video was the laughable hope I had that Lucy would send me to the ADO in January. Ha ha I laugh at myself. I have audio visual evidence that setting up expectations and deciding my own timeline for the future is utterly pointless and again, I should submit to God, be taken along by the river and just try and keep paddling in the same direction.

So many things are actually happening now. Over the last year, I have had many moments of frustration, feeling like nothing was happening at all. But looking at that list of Steps, I've been rather busy. But I shouldn't be surprised - God and I have a very slow-moving relationship, because it is true that I do better at things in life if I get to work up to it in a thorough and methodical manner. God understands that better than I do when I'm being blinded by my enthusiasm and passion. If I were able to tell my past self from a year ago that by now I would still not have seen an ADO, past-me would have been angry and sad, dismayed that what felt like a real pushing drive to follow God's call is being acted upon on a timescale that doesn't match.

But that's past-me. Present-me has grown an acceptance of the situation. I've pretty much relinquished control to God, though I still get the odd twinge of anxiety when contemplating my future. And now I'm in this job, it's enough to keep my busy and distracted, whilst at the same time obviously itself being God's tool to shape me for that future. Lucy and I are also making headway, and as you'll see in a future vlog, I'm meeting others that will be part of the journey too. Things are moving, I am changing, and I'm just so pleased with where my life has brought me.

How I've changed in the last 6 months

So I'm not yet on the official diocese discernment process, I've only talked to my rector and my curate about my calling, but I've been on a discernment process since the start of September 2015. It's been six months, and yes, it's frustrating that it's taking what feels like forever to feel like I'm getting anywhere, but I was reflecting recently, and looking at myself, I think I have actually already got somewhere.

Six months ago, I was ball of excitement and impatience, and I've got a handle on that now. God is doing what God always does in my life. My path is a series of steps, and I am given the opportunity to progress to the next step ONLY when I am ready, and almost never when I actually

want it. God gives me the amount of time I need on each step to grow and develop in whatever way that step is for - it's like completing a level on a computer game and going up to the next, except I don't know the aim of the step, or how long it will be for, or how many levels there are (I suspect, from the trend of the last 23 years, I won't ever run out of levels), or how close I am to completing it. But I just have to keep faith, because I'm on God's schedule, not mine. That has always been the path that has served me well, and so unsurprisingly, the last 6 months haven't been the purposeless waiting game that they felt like many times.

I am more confident talking about my calling. In my first conversation with the rector, I talked in vague terms and she had to coax me to even say the word 'ordination'. I had generally been embarrassed to talk about my sense of calling, worried about people thinking less of me for listening to the 'imaginary friend in the sky telling you your destiny'.

But I know what I feel. I am called to do the right thing, be a good person and show others they should be too, for many reasons, but ultimately in response to the universe and the love of God that permeates every place and moment in spacetime.  That's what the story of Jesus Christ, the good news, tells me. I am called to be part of God's church, to have role in helping humanity have a relationship with God and the universe that balances inner truth and outer truth in active and reactive harmony. This discernment process is to explore the interpretation of that call that leads me to believe that I can fulfill that call best in the priesthood.

A big part of these last months has been reading the stories of others on their discernment of ordination (see my blog roll), and being inspired and educated. It's inspiring even reading of people who are rejected at BAP, because they don't give up, they keep going in their journey to serve God. That's so encouraging when I face the prospect that it might one day happen to me. And the stories that reach a 'yes' answer from the BAP fill me with hope and excitement that God willing that is what will happen to me.

As you know, if you've been reading my blog, I've been working on prayer, knowing that it needs to become the cornerstone of my life. That in itself is a slow process, God and I are something like sporadic penfriends rather than bosom buddies right now, but that's an improvement on relatives who talk 3 times a year because they have to, which is sort of what it was like before I got the massive kick from my calling and started putting some effort in. My main barrier is I am terrible at getting into habits, especially as freelance stage management doesn't have the same routine for more than 4 weeks max. But over this period, I have stopped worrying so much about 'being bad at prayer' or not praying enough, and taking the pressure off makes it less scary. So that's an improvement.


As well as reading blogs, a huge part of my activity has been reading books (see my reading list). I love reading, which is helpful, but it hasn't just been a case of leisurely interest. It has kept my focus, explained about the priesthood, military chaplaincy, prayer, vocations, the theology of Jesus, being friend's with Christ, and whetted my appetite to keep learning, deepen my understanding, and not stop, forever and ever amen. Whilst reading, I get a touch of what a God centred life is like, because they're good at being a constant reminder to turn back to God, to remember God.


It's been a similar thing reading the Bible everyday - the same as the other books, it's turning my focus back to God, back to the divine within the ordinary. My eyes have also been opened to the narrative structure of the OT; before I was used to hearing the individual extracts of specific episodes, and now I have a much clearer understanding of who Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Moses were.

I worked a job in September/October/November and then took December off to do Christmas at church. Things weren't too bad during that contract; I was excited about setting up this blog, and meeting the rector several times, and simply getting used to starting the discernment process, finding out what it involves and working out how I was going to come at it. Then I did a job January/February, and this happened. I stressed out to the point that I did break down a week before the job ended, and my beloved had to put the pieces back together so I could hobble to the end. That's not job stress. Yes, the job was more stressful than previous jobs, but I think it got to me because I was stretched, torn between two paths that I was attempting to follow simultaneously. I have been challenged to follow my path whilst also working as a Deputy Stage Manager, and basically I think I failed. I'm not sure yet if it was my failing, or an indication that the two are incompatible, but I lean towards the latter.

It was horrible, but I love my job. Even that bastard of a contract was enjoyable. Here and now, reflecting on both jobs, I can see a comparison of the happiness for myself that I get at work vs the joy inspired in me by the happiness of others when I help at church. And it is the latter that feels the most right, and also the more fulfilling. I'm now taking March and April off to do Easter, some more conferences, and a spiritual retreat, and these last few weeks of first recovering, and then setting out my to-do list for church things, and life things, and discernment things - I feel back on track.

Another gain over the last six months has been affirmation, be it not very much so far. Several people when asked have said they think I'd make a good priest, and a couple have said so without prompting.

A more recent change has been starting to appreciate evangelism. You'll remember from my selection criteria video (which was a bit long, true, here's a link to the relevant section of the video) that I don't like charismatic worship, and have issues with the mission element of ministry (this section of the video). Reading about RainbowGirl's similar problems has helped me work through some of my own, and I'm a lot more open to learn about the positive evangelical worship and ethos, without being worried it'll be all conservative negativity.

Changes galore. Baby steps along the path, but at least heading in the right direction and making progress.

Why I don't think I'm called to be a Lay Reader

Won't be in my wardrobe

The discernment process is not a series of tests and interviews for me to convince the church that I should be a priest, or at least it should not be seen as such. It is not just the hoops I have to go though to attain a dog collar as the end goal. No, the goal is the discernment what I am being called to. The doctrine is that everyone has a vocation, all Christians have a calling (see 1 Corinthians 12), so when someone like me gets the urge to consciously put the effort in the reorientate my life to follow God's will for me, it is key not to just assume that ordination and the priesthood is part of God's plan.

A question amongst the many in this process is "If not ordained ministry, then what?" and it's a question I am rather terrified at looking at. Obviously there's the angle that if I even dare contemplate living my discipleship in another way, it feels like I'm undermining my desire and pull towards the priesthood, like I have to be 100% otherwise I'm a fraud. This is nonsense, but it is my response, irrational as it is, nonetheless.

It's also scary because it throws the net so much wider, and I feel like I'm 15 again in PSHE class, looking at career options. The vastness is daunting, in a murky way, for I know not where to begin and certainly have limited understanding of what my other options actually are.

But there is a clear option top of the list when given alternatives to being priest. Lay Reader, or just Reader I think is the official term. Writing this post was inspired by reading the excellent discernment process blog The Pilgrim Explorer. I've been reading his story in order, and I've just reached 17th Feb 2014, weirdly exactly two years ago last week, when he met an Examining Chaplain who asked him "So why do you want to be an ordained priest and not a Lay Reader?"

Now defining a Lay Reader is tough. I just read through this short but thorough piece, but it is still hard (as the pilgrim explorer himself discusses) to work out a concrete difference between them and non-stipendiary priests. They have some training in theology, and preach/teach, and step in when a parish doesn't have an incumbent. There's a pastoral element to their ministry, and they are often the quiet face of the church, having authority but without the baggage that comes with a dog collar that can put some people off. They also have a job and a secular life. A good blog post by a Reader who contemplated ordained ministry can be found here.

Basically, I get the impression that a priest lives the theology of Sunday, and a reader is involved with the theology of Monday. I think I am the former.

I definitely want to be sacramental, be a direct conduit and facilitator for people's relationship with God. My focus when I think about helping people like that is towards the spiritual within people's lives, not spiritual within the wider world, if that makes sense. I think about serving God, and there's less of the every day - I'm built for the crisis stuff, the stress and emotion including big transitions like marriage and death, and I am drawn to live in the the world of story where people understand their lives, not necessarily in the day to day living of their lives.

ASMing, not what I'm built for

It's very similar to my feelings on being a deputy stage manager not an assistant stage manager. An ASM is on ground level within the cast, just like a Lay Reader operates within a congregation. In stage management, I prefer to work on the behalf of the cast with authority and distance, even though we do create a bond, and know and trust each other. I'm not the voice from on high, but I'm not one of them either.

That's linked to my aversion to the fact that they are most often based in a parish. Yes, there are Reader chaplains, and I'm interested in chaplaincy, but I relate to the clarity that a dog collar provides - being identified as a disciple of God as a defining part of who I am and my role resonates more than just doing the job as a lay person.

It's that focus, that full time lifestyle that suits me better than fitting my ministry around another job. And I also want to operate within the formal structure of the church.

I wonder if I'll remember all that if I get asked the same question in an interview...

Video: First chat with the curate

I covered pretty much everything I wanted to say in this video, which is why it's a bit long.

What my experience as a stage manager can bring to being a priest

This is a helpful little exercise I've decided to set myself as I'm vaguely aware that there are a lot of transferable skills and experiences, but I've never done a thorough run down. It's certainly from a secular angle, tackling the part of being a priest that is actually 'a job'. So here goes:

The big one is Relationships. Reading the Summary of Criteria 'relationships' section is very similar to reading a realistic job description for a stage manager. In SM, you're biggest responsibility is your relationships, and being the central force to establish and sustain cohesive working relationships, creating boundaries, and maintaining a professional standard, whilst also being the department that provides the pastoral care. Stage managers are the ones company members come to with any problem, and that often can include things not related to the show. It becomes habit - "I have a problem: I'll go to the stage manager." The ability to be inclusive within diversity is paramount as well, as the theatre is full of more varied selection of people than outsiders might think - a stage manager cannot reject any of them, even the really annoying ones, or the ones who can't do their jobs (as much as we would sometimes like to).

The next biggest one is Stress or Pressure. The responsibility of a stage manager is broad and deep,

with little things and big things of wildly different sorts all coming under their remit - the prop pencils on the set desk have to be arranged just so, and also the company time sheets have to be cataloged; make the coffee, and also coordinate the timetable to accommodate every single department's needs. Often needing to be in three places at once, doing a lot of running around the building/city, coming in first and leaving last, being expected to be in charge of facilitating everyone else's ideas in time, to budget, often without much help. All with the other expectation that you are the cheery one, the calm one, the one that knows everything that's going on even (though no one seems to bother to tell you anything), the one everyone can rely to put in the extra effort, and achieve miracles out of nothing.

Piggy in the middle AKA the SM department

I like to call one of the traits of stage management Translation, and I think this applies to being a priest as well. It means being a radial point from which vastly different spokes connect for the one interconnecting reason or goal, and therefore needing to know exactly what each spoke wants, how it operates, what it needs out of the other spokes, how to get that, and most importantly, how to translate the one's needs into the other's language so they can coordinate.

Linked that idea is involvement in Negotiation/Conflict. Your spokes, even with you translating, can push against each other, and as the radial point, it is your job to put the reason/goal for working together first, often reminding them of it - the stage manager is the person who puts the show and the humanity of the people involved first, helping everyone compromise to achieve their shared goal (once they've remembered what that was) and do what is best for that goal and each other, rather than letting ulterior motives, or petty issues of pride dictate the company's choices.

A little bit of blasphemy...

How does one achieve that? Change and Flexibility. Being able to speak the language includes adapting to each spoke's needs. But also on different shows, the lighting spoke on this show might be very different to the lighting spoke on the last show eg style, people, resources. The stage manager has to still hit all the criteria, but that can look very different when you have more direct people, less people, no money, rather than people who 'play the game', loads of people, and a bit more money (it is never enough money...). How I interact with my line manager or my director has looked vastly different show-to-show, based on the sort of people they are and the show we're doing.

It comes down to Facilitating, Collaborating, and Communicating.

At least on the outside...

So what sort of characteristics does a stage manager need? I'm going to copy and paste from the Criteria again. Mature and Stable - there are enough egos, motivations, dreams, emotions and mental states to deal with and manage, without the person who's supposed to coordinate them adding to the complicated mix. Stage managers are relied upon, by dint of being stage management, to keep calm. It is the stage management department that in practical terms, has 'being the grown ups' as part of the job description. That also means having an exterior support network that you can rely on when you need time to be your own person, so as not to lose you humanity. You have dreams and emotions and the rest of it too, so it's important to have people in your life you can express those to, when most of your time is spent putting them aside for the sake of others.

Another thing that a company will rely on is the Integrity, the Trustworthy-ness of its stage management. It's that putting the humanity of people first thing again, and going back to the acceptance of all, rejection of none motif. If you go to your stage manager with a problem, as part of their role as problem solvers, the importance of trusting their judgement, and also knowing that you won't be judged yourself, is paramount for that vulnerable relationship to function.

This links in with the element of Leadership. SMs have 'manager' in their titles, even the assistants. I find this one quite challenging, as I've never been a person people naturally follow. Enough words have been written on the characteristics of leadership without me adding much to them, but for an SM, or a priest, it is a leadership through serving, ultimately. You make decisions, give advice, lay down the law occasionally, but when you get down to it, we are doing all we can to improve the lives of the flocks we have committed to minister to with everything we have in us, and bring about a creation, a world where all are happy, their dreams have come true, and (S)He's purpose for us all has been brought about. (People in my life have realised that I may tell an anecdote and mention someone known only as 'He' or 'She', and they've worked out that the only person it can be is the director of whatever show I am currently working on, as often, making them happy becomes the centre of my life, and their pronouns are therefore capitalised).

And of course you want to be the cool guy that everyone likes.






The last parallel I'll draw is the element of Lifestyle and Vocation. Okay, so no one gets a 'calling' to be a stage manager, but it is still a vocation in the secular sense. You're not just taking on a job, it's a whole life. You're schedule is precarious, often overloaded and changed last minute. Don't even try and have a sleep pattern. And the diet goes out the window. It sounds like priests often have a similar diet to stage managers on those days when a 'lunch break' or 'dinner' are basically out of the question - microwave meals, a quick sandwich in between or even during meetings, and phrases like "I haven't eaten since breakfast" lose their drama when echoed more than 3 days in every 7. There's an unwritten, unspoken expectation of 24/7 service, and as much as we know we should carve out private lives and personal time, and even rest once in a while, we often find ourselves checking the email, taking the call, or agreeing to do just a little more, because that's not just what we do; it's who we are.