Hallelujah He is Here - Chataway

[DutchOma]

Well here you are then I don't post often, but just to save Nickel a job...

marking my spot!

And me

And me

:) all aboard :)

Thanks Oma

A quick note of explanation of the thread to Newbies and lurkers :)

"Everyone welcome - the aim of this thread is to generally chat about church life, or just gossip in general!
You don't have to be a regular church-goer, nor do you have to know what we're going on about!
It's not about debate, it's just about chatting"

so... advice needed... emailed my Vocations Advisor 2 weeks ago... no reply... rang her up yesterday and left message... nothing so far... what do I do next? wait a bit longer?

you could try again at a different time of the day?
and then email her?

If she's your Advisor, then it's pretty shoddy that she's not got back to you.

Blue- yes, more phoning necessary. Although I'd be a wimp and try another email for the time being as I'm a phoneophobe :) Hope she's a good one who knows her stuff and isn't too irritating...

I'm in my second year of our diocesan Course in Christian Studies, and they did the 'where are we heading next?' talk this week. Cue attack of the ordination bug again. Am pretty sure it's still not time (have been there before, and find the 'articulate your sense of personal call' so hellish that I just sit there and sob. Not fun! Somehow I have to get over that before I can take things any further), but feel I need to be doing something. Wondering about doing the one year Children's Ministry course, but concerned I might find it all a bit obvious (am a teacher, and grew up with my mum writing children's work resource books). Also vaguely pondering being a Reader, but not sure how they'd take it if I said I was 'brooding a vocation but it's just not time for it yet'.

If Alex gets the church he's after, it may well be useful for them to have a woman in some 'official' church capacity for their own growth- it's ABC.

Hmm. Lots to think about.

Thanks for the new thread, Oma.

How frustrating, Blue... It's never easy when you feel as if you're hassling people, but yet need an answer... Sympathy.

Could you try another email, saying 'I'm sorry - I have tried to contact you but I keep missing you, so I'm obviously trying at bad times; please could you let me know when would be a good time to call?'. Obviously, you're dependent on her emailing back still, but at least you're giving her the option to decide on a time that suits her... Hoping it works... And good luck to you and to Marmite in exploring your vocations.

oooh I am a phoneophobe too, will send other email! :)

do you wanna come to our parish? our vicar has just announced his retirement! we are a benefice of 2 churches, the other church is AB, but we aren't! we would love a 'younger' family

TuO I will do that! good idea!

I'd like to ask some advise please, if I may? DS has started using the expression"oh my God!". Neither DH or I say it so he must hav picked it up at school. I don't like it, netiher does DH (who although atheist still thinks it's blasphemous), but we are both well aware that there are far worse expressions that he could be learning. We've tried talking to DS about it and said, "we don't like that expression"or "we don't say that" but being 4 he doesn't understand. To him it is something that you say when "when so and so happens" or when "so and so does such and such", which is understandable.

Am I being precious in thinking that this is not a "good" expression to use? The school is RC. In a way I'd like to mention it to his teacher as I think they should discourage its use but am worried that I'm over-reacting

Could you try to turn it into Oh My Gosh? or something similar?
I'm afraid I'm not much help in that respect, because I do use those types of swearing routinely instead of proper swearwords.

We're in front of you in the queue for new vicars!!
We had our PCC meeting last night, and have been informed that, provided there are no objections to the current proposals, that the Team Ministry should be in place on 1st March!
That means that we will start interviewing for a vicar straight away, but to expect one in September because of families and new schools years etc.

I don't know what ABC or AB means, but We've got 2 churches in our benefice (which will be a Parish after the new proposals), one of which is carpetted and modern/happy-clappy and the other of which is traditional.
We need new heating systems, but what we really need is leaders that want to build on our individual/team strengths, and don't want to change anything, but want to build on what we are to get people in, and to help us grow. (which means that small changes are okay)
and allow the music leaders in each church to continue to choose the music.

hehe Nickel good luck! very exciting times ahead :) I'm in the position of kind of choosing my own boss here as the vicar and the church wardens are my management team.

Different diocese though, don't have a clue where we are in the queue

Did you put your music requirement in the job advert ?

Forms of Parish Resolution under the Priests (Ordination of Women) Measure 1993

Resolution A
That this parochial church council would not accept a woman as the minister who presides at or celebrates the Holy Communion or pronounces the Absolution in the parish.

Resolution B
That this parochial church council would not accept a woman as the incumbent or priest-in-charge of the benefice or as a team vicar for the benefice.

And C = alternative episcopal oversight aka Flying Bishops (I always imagine them with a cape, their pants over their cassocks, and a big B on the front).

oh, that's sad :(

We had a woman NSM for a while, and curate and stand-in (same lady of course!) and we've had services conducted by women preists quite often. I can't imagine we'd refuse one.
Although, one of the servers asked how we would go about objecting to a woman priest (at the PCC meeting last night)
I was quite shocked, because he's never made any negative references to women priests before - at least, I don't recall, and it's made me have to think about it to remember if he had. And it saddens me, because although he's a staunch traditionalist, I didn't realise he was that kind of traditionalist.

We haven't done our job advert yet, but our parish profile will say something along those lines.
The last few years since Nick left have been really positive for our benefice - we've pulled together in such an amazing way, and we really need a vicar who will support us in what we've been doing, rather than going "right, I'm the boss, I'm taking charge" - the lady priest I spoke about above had a habit of changing the music at the last minute, and it was really really annoying/frustrating because choosing the music takes long enough, and then the choir and organists have to practisse it, and then she'd change it. just like that. and wonder why we were about it.

Ooh, that does sound annoying re. changing the music, Nickel. She must not have ever done anything musical herself, not to realise that you need to practise (even if you're a good musician - which I emphatically am not) in order to sound good. Grrr!

Exciting times, though, to be appointing new leaders! And Marmite - you nearly made me spit coffee out over my keyboard with the image of the caped bishop with his pants on the outside. Our bishop is - how can I put this? - definitely not a pants-on-the-outside kind of a guy! (He's not a Flying Bishop though either, so maybe that's why!)

Gingercurl... Sympathies. DD1 says it all the time too and I don't like it at all, but I have no hope of getting her to stop, as DH also says it (along with things like 'Jesus Christ!' as an exclamation, which I dislike even more!). DD2 adopted 'Ohmigosh' (definitely all one word!) when she was in America (where 'God' seems to be more unacceptable - unless it was just that they were in a Catholic school) and has stuck to it. I would think, though, that at 4 it's probably just a 'new phrase' your DS has picked up and that if you continue rigorously to model NOT saying it he will stop soon enough. You could say something like 'We don't say that', but without making a big deal out of it, and I bet he'll soon move onto the next thing (and let's hope it's not something worse... ).

I need to ask about baptism. DD2, who's nearly 10, is saying she wants to be baptised. Neither of the DDs was 'done' as a baby, as I was in my heathen non-church-going phase at the time. Previously DD2 has said it was 'too embarrassing' to be baptised at her age (with the implicit criticism of me for not having had her done when it was not embarrassing!), but now she has said several times that she'd like it. (Previously we'd talked about her being baptised and confirmed together when she was a bit older, and when there'd be a bigger group being confirmed so she wouldn't feel so conspicuous.) At her age, would she have to attend a course or some other sort of preparation first? I presume she'd be able to speak for herself, and wouldn't need godparents or anything? I will talk to one of the priests about this on Sunday if I can (those who know what these terms mean... do you think it comes under the remit of 'Canon Pastor' or 'Canon Missioner' or someone else?) but I am a bit at having been so unholy myself when she was born... I know they shouldn't but I am worried they will think badly of me!

PS blimey... sorry... I wrote an essay by mistake!

Just talk to the first one you can collar, (s)he is much more likely to know who to speak to than you are. People who turn from being heathen non church going to actually coming to church are so rare that anybody would fall over themselves to accommodate them.

worse, TUO, she was a proper musician herself - guitarist.
(HC persuasion...)
a lot of those HC songs are really hard to sight-read too

In our church they talk with you the day before your baptism, explain what it involves and ensure you understand the reasons behind it and are totally comfortable beforehand anyway

also marking my place

Ds1 and DD both started with 'oh my God' (then stating a minor shocking event). Made them complete it by saying a prayer each time 'Oh my God, M's jumping on the bed...' (darling, you forgot to ask Him please protect M. from injury till mum gets there...)

Oh yes, and I kept saying in that same annoying tone 'oh my ds1', 'oh my dd' (What do you want mum? Nothing, just saying your name for no reason) till they got fed up

maria - love your dealing with the OMG problem! DS has started saying it but in Romanian . He doesn't say it much at the moment but will have to deal with it I think.