Two Different Services

Took a Holy Communion at St Saviour’s today. We only have one mid-week Communion per month and even that struggles. Today there were four of us, including me. It was so cold despite the infra-red heaters which beam something approximating to luke-warmth onto the top of your head, that I cut the service as short as possible. Well, I didn’t want three stiffs on my hands (stiff with cold, you understand). Then we repaired to the church rooms for coffee which was more than welcome.

I invested in knee-length sheepskin boots some years ago, having spent a few winters standing on stone floors. Not the last word in elegance, but they do the trick. A damp cold seems to seep into these medieval buildings and take up residence in the walls so that it can insinuate intself into your marrow at every opportunity.

This afternoon was a funeral. Never let it be said that we don’t put the fun back into funerals. The family had ordered service sheets from the funeral directors, but unbeknown to me had only ordered fifty. Whe we reached the forty-ninth person, one of the granddaughters sauntered in and asked if there were any more service sheets. That was the first I knew about it. Fortunately all the hymns were in the hymnbook, so we dished out hymnbooks to the extras – there must have been around a hundred and twenty at the service.

Then at the last minute the son suddenly said, “I’m not doing the reading.”

“Oh. Who is?”

“You are.”

Hmm. Thank you very much.

Anyway, it all went well in the end and the family were pleased.

Ken Livingstone, ex-Mayor of London, is reported to have once said that the average Church of England funeral is about as moving as the check-out queue in the supermarket.

So I like to make sure that isn’t true!

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