Palm Sunday

Palm Sunday passed off OK, except that one church didn’t have enough palm crosses to give out.

Here in the UK, we give crosses made out of woven palm leaves (well, I think it’s leaves. Could be bark or stem for all I know. But you get the idea) to everyone in church and like to have a few extra to take to the housebound or those who are ill.

On the previous Sunday – being a fifth Sunday – we all met together for the service, so I asked churchwardens to take with them sufficient crosses for their congregation for Palm Sunday. This particular churchwarden counted out thirty crosses and put the remaining ten down, but then her attention was grabbed elsewhere and she inadvertently picked up the ten instead of the thirty. So there were twenty or so disappointed people in that church. Still, they can always mosey around the benefice and grab a spare palm cross from one of the other churches. After all, one church must have had twenty left over.

Sadly, we’ve had another sudden death and the family were in church on Sunday. Concentrates the mind when delivering a sermon to be confronted by the newly bereaved sitting in front of you. Have to think very quickly as whether what you have planned to say is suitable. Not the time to be increasing their pain but to be offering comfort and support, so need to temper down any challenging aspects. (And I do like to challenge. I spent so many years sitting in the pews absorbing garbage from preachers, that I vowed to spend my sermons raising difficult issues which are usually avoided. Makes for an interesting time.)

This week is arguably the busiest week of the year, so not the best time to be dealing with funerals and bereavements. Always happens, though. Sod’s law is alive and kicking.

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