False Alarm!

I had an e-mail yesterday inviting me to make an appointment with the Bishop. As I'm currently in his vicinity I wasted no time in making a phone call, and was pleasantly surprised to find myself in his study 7 hours later!

We'd spent all day speculating about which exotic Wilts/Dorset location he might be asking me to consider, but unfortunately we're still none the wiser. That's because I've got a really good bishop!

As I might have mentioned before, we have to fill in a fairly limited tick-box form, which tells him very little about us. So the purpose of today's meeting was for him to hear what I want out of my first placing from my mouth, not from a form. Now we've done that he's in a much better position to match me to a suitable parish and vicar than he was this morning.

The wait continues, and I now expect to hear from him again at the end of August!

Four Croissants and a Funeral

The title seems to be a fairly accurate summary of the last seven days. The final week of my summer placement seems to have been mainly one of food, although there have been other highlights:

Monday - Deanery Synod (yawn) - cup of tea and a plate of biscuits
Tuesday - a pre-funeral visit, preceded by a McDonalds lunch (offering value for money!), and a 'Council of Churches' meeting where the refreshments were notable by their total absence.
Wednesday - 'Essence' - a cafe church where at least 2 if not 3 of the aforementioned croissants were consumed.
Thursday - Men's Group, with a cup of tea (but no biscuits), and a Marriage Preparation Review Meeting (with Dot's 'Lavender Cake')
Friday - 'Thirst' - another cafe church (technically not part of my placement, but my stomach doesn't care), followed by the funeral, followed by an interesting combination of crumpets and baked beans.
And tomorrow morning I round it all off with a prayer breakfast.

More tea vicar?

EDIT: Saturday morning - the prayer breakfast brought the tally to 5 croissants!

Where are you going to be working?

...is a question that I'm being asked increasingly.

And the honest answer to that - at the moment - is "I don't know". But I might know soon.

The Church of England has a process for allocating the outgoing ordinands to suitable training posts - curacies - and this process is just starting to kick into effect.

Just before the end of term I had to fill in a form stating my preferences (type of church, location, personal requirements etc). It was tempting to put my standard post-gig demands here - a crateful of chilled Carlsberg and a flock of nuns mopping my fevered brow in the vestry - but unfortunately I think it was after more practical stuff such as housing needs. At the same time the staff and Principal were writing a report on me that by now has gone to my Bishop.

The default position for all candidates is that our 'sending' diocese has first call on our services, and until they say that they have no position for us ('releasing' us) we have to work on that assumption. So around about now the cogs are turning in Salisbury to try to match my preferences with curacy opportunities that Bishops David, Stephen and Graham have in mind, taking into consideration anything flagged up in my college report as a specific development need. Shortly I'll hear from the Diocesan Director of Ordinands, and will be asked to visit the parish that they have in mind. Which could be almost anywhere in Dorset or Wiltshire.

Then we'll arrange a visit, probably over the course of a weekend, and will have to assess whether we think it will work or not. Both sides can say 'yes' or 'no'. If both are positive, we have a result. If either are negative we see if the diocese has anything else in mind. If they do, we try somewhere else. If not, I'm released and we go national, and there's a whole other bit of process for that.

Of course, I might not be able to tell you anything more for ages - we've got a busy summer ahead of us so it's going to be a while before we can visit anywhere - and even if it does all work out first time there are going to be formalities to go through before I can write about it....