Back to index of vicar's letters - Back to the main index
Hope to Follow Julie
Once upon a time, when the world was very young and naïve, clergy days off were recorded in our Diocesan Year Book. This was supposed to stop people telephoning the Vicar when he was out but, being based on the assumption that the enquirers had a Year Book, it didn’t work. It was removed because them in the office claimed that it provided the burglars with a a handy list of days when Vicarages would be unguarded. As I am ultra-cynical I think that the real reason that this information was removed was because clergy long ago gave up all hopes of having a day off.
Take this month as a typical example. Being a family man, the only day on which I can reasonably expect to take a break is Saturday. Anyone who has telephoned on that day and has been roundly abused will testify to that fact.. In July there are four weddings on Saturdays. In the good old days, when I began my ministry, that would not have been a problem because the parson was invariably invited to the wedding breakfast and a good time was had by all. Now they might invite him round for a pint afterwards, but only occasionally.
Did you think that I was griping? Not a bit! Weddings are so enjoyable that I am willing to lose a whole month's worth of days off just to do them. Like baptisms, they are one occasion when there will be young people in church. And they are a shop window for the faith. Too many people associate church with dreary services, boring preachers, and irrelevant religious practices. Too many people expect it to be like that so a wedding is a time when I, too, can let my hair down and be me instead of trying to fulfil a role expectation.
The congregation here present are well aware of the fact that their Vicar is unstable, unpredictable, unorthodox and sometimes completely unhinged. Luckily, few of them witness him in action at a wedding. Believe you me, I know a good number of clergy and only a very small number fit into the popular stereotype of an unworldly wet. Being Christians, and that does go with the job, despite what the press think, we are full of the joys of life and, faced with a crowd of sceptics at a wedding, we pull all the stops out to convince them Jesus Christ is someone well worth following.
May God bless you all, Fr Allan
Back to index of vicar's letters - Back to the main index