Getting Intense

No, not an article in anticipation of this summer's camping trip - it is a couple of degrees too cold to even think about that - but an interesting and informative insight into why we go back to college almost two weeks before the rest of Cambridge.

The early part of January is the one chance that the colleges of the Cambridge Theological Federation (see here) get to offer their students in-depth training on topics that interest us - a choice of 2 from 12. Trouble is I wanted to do most of those on offer, but as I only get to do 4 of them while I'm here, and 2 are compulsory I had to choose carefully. I've chosen Bereavement, which I had this week, and next week I'll be studying Race Awareness (that's a compulsory one).

Here's the list I had to choose from:

• HIV/AIDS:Issues and responses in the Church
• Prayer
• Storytelling Skills in Ministry
• Storytelling Advanced
• Sexuality and the Pastoral Encounter
• Bereavement
• Godly Play
• Jewish Christian Relations
• Race Awareness
• Christian Responses to Islam
• Christian Responses to Eastern Faiths
• Science, Religion and the Environment

Now there are a couple on there that you would expect to be covering anyway - and you're right - we do. I will emerge equipped to deal with bereavement and funerals, whether or not I chose to do this particular intensive course, but I'm sure when the timetabled teaching comes around I will be an annoying 'expert' on the topic, having studied it in depth already. There is inevitably some duplication when teaching happens for different qualifications at different times - my peers who started at the same time as me on the Cambridge University qualification already know a lot more than me about ethics, which I won't study until next year. They know about the Reformation, but I know about the Early Church (pre 1000AD) which they have no idea about yet...swings and roundabouts. And along the line a topic will grab each persons attention and we are all free to follow up anything which grabs our interest, in our own time.

The courses are 2.5 days long, which doesn't seem like much, but it's equivalent to the 2 hours a week we get in other term-long courses. However, concentrating so much in such a short time makes you very tired - I've gone to bed earlier this week than I have for a very long time.

So what is there to find out in 2.5 days of Bereavement training? Quite a lot.
We had to imagine a situation in which we had been knocked down by a bus and killed. How would your family find out, what would happen next, who would gather at your house, what would your funeral be like and how would your nearest and dearest know what you want at it, how would they cope financially?
We looked at loss, grief, the differences between expected and unexpected death (e.g. terminal illnesses vs accidents), how different people cope, how WE cope when we are dealing with death so frequently, the ongoing process of grief for individuals, the implications for us as vicars when a disaster happens in our town (the press and experts arrive and deal with the immediate aftermath, but what is our role as a community leader?)

Tears flowed frequently, as we were brought to face the inevitability of death, and the consequences for those left behind. It would be easy to be depressed by this all, but we didn't forget the hope we have in Heaven. And that will form the subject of a future article. Watch this space as I look at the place where we will go....