Trinity Sunday
Dear Family,
This feels like one of those “been there, done that” moments. How many times can you keep returning to the front line of the parish with the hope that you’re here to stay? It felt very good to be able to celebrate Pentecost with you all, breathless at moments as it might have been. Will you not feel too badly if I tell you that you didn’t take my breath away? Our current intention is getting rid of the water.
I went back and looked at all the Twitches since this began on February 17th. I was impressed, deeply moved, tickled, proud and a whole bunch of other adjectives. Reading the Twitches of Nancy Adams, and Frank Krauser and Annie Gardner made me delighted to be a part of this community.
I sat here chuckling at Krauser’s description of the place as one of fun. In five years I never thought of it that way, but I think he is absolutely right. What’s to say that living the gospel can’t be fun? I guess maybe the caution is that it’s not fun and games, just fun. The gospel is serious business but it doesn’t have to be gloomy business.
Frank and Nancy and Annie all captured elements of what it means to be a community that knows it has a mission, even as we deal with the mundane things of maintenance. Maintenance isn’t always about facilities. Maintenance is also about exactly what so many of you have been doing for me through your prayers and your thoughtful acts.
Speaking of maintenance of buildings, etc, there was one day when I had come home a couple of weeks ago and I stopped short at the front driveway, because I was looking at a golden dome glowing in the afternoon sun. My only thought was, “when did that happen? I don’t remember the cranes or whatever it would take to get up there. How could I not remember something like that?”
Well, it wouldn’t be too hard if you weren’t around when it did happen. I thought maybe I was finally losing it, and then peace returned, together with thanks to the Men’s Club for paying for it. That’s why they have their Spaghetti Dinner. This time the paint is supposed to be an automotive derivative and hopefully will last. It’s not the paint that costs, but the machinery to get up there. My sincere hope is that I will be around for a while, and the burden of another dome painting will fall to my successor.
There we other things that happened while I was out. Bill Schneider’s death really got to me because he along with Bill Fuccillo were regular as the sunrise, opening the Church and setting things up for us. I hope the memory of Bill will keep reminding me that I don’t want to take people for granted. Some folks are so totally dependable, and so completely undemanding, that it isn’t hard not to just presume they will be there. And they are the ones who will never complain.
I heard a story in recent weeks about something that was asked of us from someone we hadn’t heard from in more years than we could remember. I will admit I am guilty of getting very annoyed when I feel we are being used to put on a good show. Then we never see the folk again. I ask, “What would Jesus do?” I just know punting them into the middle of next week would not be his response, so I shall return to my kneeler and ask God for his patience with me and his wisdom with regard to others. (Actually the knees are not doing kneelers well, so make it my chair in the chapel.)
In Jesus,
