I had a wonderful Lent, Holy Week and Easter. We did lots of good stuff together, which can be found elsewhere on this blog. One day I promise to ‘tidy the blog up’ a little. This Easter week has been a little surreal, given that I have had a plethora of funerals, conversations and watched a rather wonderful police raid take place at the local shops. I use the words rather wonderful is a slightly ironic fashion.

It strikes me yet again that what I do is bumble. I know I have said this before on a number of occasions.

I stood for about an hour talking to others yesterday about the police raid. Each of us was watching; but we talked about what they were doing. We chatted about the police dogs; the weather and life. In middle of all that, I took a booking for a bab to be done; which roughly translated is Brummie for ‘can my child receive one of the sacraments of the Church of England?’ (baptism or christening). Time was just spent observing and being.

I wonder why I do not do more of this; especially when I know it is appreciated, effective and I actually feel quite good in myself about it.

Is it because it is too costly? It takes time of course; time that could perhaps be better spent beginning my tax return (I do think about it even this early), dealing with the forthcoming APCM, filling in a form for a faculty – again I am specialising a little in irony. I wonder whether it is too costly because it requires us to be human – and it is such a long time since priests were just encouraged to be human.

Perhaps it is costly because it is also encourages us to be alive in the presence of others.

To bumble is then an amazing thing; an act of generosity, because it allows us to touch and be touched. Now that is a scary sacred thought for this season of Easter.