Caramac: Surprisingly few. In fact, my diet has suffered more of a tremor than a wobble. Graduated, in the heat and under extreme pressure from hayfever, from Caramac to Hagen Daz Ice-Cream x2 (Strawberry Cheesecake Flavour). Have put weight on but still fit comfortably into clothes. Caramac melts anyway.
Alcohol: Hardly any – it is just too hot to drink anything – and who wants to drink a pint of one thing knowing that more than a pint comes out of the other end. Have settled for cold, fruit based drinks.
Coffee: There has been a restriction on coffee based beverages due to cost implications, and the threat that I should have to get a Van Haigh card or something – but aren’t they only for retired people? I continue to sponge off the supernumerary ministers at their support group – using their loyalty cards when I buy a round – and pretend that I am Graham Tooth, Ray Garfoot, David Parkes, Jo Goodridge – or their wives. Will by my own discount card in the future.
I have had complaints that there have been few Secret Life entries and these are warranted. I went through a ‘This is really important, people need to hear this’ phase as I felt the need to underline how The Methodist Church and we as a circuit and local churches needed to remember our calling to ‘Advance the Christian Faith’. I hope this was helpful to people. I felt a bit Thatcheresque, laying down the law before the idea of closure enters our minds as some acceptable option, preventing us from thinking creatively about how we live out Our Calling….I had this image in my head of the Lady with the Handbag saying, ’You turn if you want to. This Lady’s not for turning.’ I hope it does not end for me as it did for her. I remember the riots and when the resignation was announced in our lecture theatre at York University! Seriously though, there comes a time when we discover what I….we…are all about. And so the Secret Life stopped. But now it is back by popular demand.
Summer is upon us. Our women’s national football team are number three in the world – it was a slightly surreal experience as the tables were turned for most blokes. Did you notice how, that not once did anyone make any comparisons to the men’s game such as…’They are rubbish, you are not; There was the killer own goal in the semis – a cruel blow – but to judge the side on that alone would be tabloid journalism. Murray lost Wimbledon – or perhaps it would be better to say that he managed to get through to the semi’s. The England Cricket team looked good in Cardiff and then collapsed under the weight of a really scary bodyline fast bowling attack at Lords. Mitchel Jonson looks like an animal when he runs in. I would not blame them. I would just run away. Here’s hoping that the Lion might roar in the third test. There is something Kingdom like in the nature of sport. We try to make our own Kings and Queens, which is never a good idea. We are filled at times with our own sense of dominance and prowess until, the Australian Batsman Chris Rogers sees the grandstand moving at Lords and retires with a dizzy spell due to an ‘ear problem’…or the cruel bobble of a ball or a limb in the way destroys everything. We go for gold and forget the joy of playing the game so easily. We need both.
It is becoming a repeated message – but an important one. When I look at Wimbledon I see similarities with what we do at Church. In one sense Wimbledon should all be about the tennis. But in another sense it is not. It is something that is at the heart of British culture and whilst the two do not collide, what the ball does should be more important. And so it is with Church. Some of what we do at Church is bedrock. Other aspects of what we do at Church is cultural decoration. Lest we take our eyes off the ball, we need to remember what is important and celebrate the rest, so long as it does not get in the way.