Moving Diagonally

Almost on the spur of the moment, I pretty much took the day off. I did attend to some Peru-related email correspondence, but otherwise let myself be swept away by personal and family errands. There'll be time enough for workin' ...

Customary Thursday weights and treadmill workout. Morning Prayer (memorized short form) in the car  en route  to the office. Devotions and intercessions in the cathedral. Brief email volley with the Dean, working out the weekday Mass rota for the first quarter of 2017. Normally I cover Wednesdays, except when I'm traveling. Hit the mother lode this time, with lots of my favorite saints days falling on Wednesday. Entered these occasions into my task planning application. Spoke by phone at some length with Fr Mark Evans about the (fairly brief) trip to Peru it now looks like we are both making in early February to check in with out companion diocese there, which is very much in flux. Spent some mental energy and time building out the nugget of my homily for this Sunday (Feast of the Holy Name, at St Barnabas', Havana). This time I won't be showing my work, as it will be delivered extemporaneously. Many times I have arrived at the office only to discover that I've le...

Usual weekday AM routine. Morning Prayer in the cathedral. Prepared to preside and preach at the midday Mass. Dashed off an email to the new(ish) United Methodist Church bishop for this area, whose installation I missed during my sabbatical, inviting him to set a lunch date sometime in January. Conducted a thorough review of our diocesan mission strategy. Noted where we have had incremental success, where we are spinning our wheels, where we need to keep doing what we're doing, and where we need to do new things. This should happen every six months, but it's been about eleven--again, due to my sabbatical. Scanned and otherwise processed accumulated hard copy in my physical inbox. Reported to the cathedral chapel to celebrate Mass, but I was a party of one. When this happens on a ferial day, I just pack up and leave. But today is a feast day, when there is a general obligation to have a Eucharist, if at all possible. So I vested and began the liturgy solo. However, in the ...

Usual AM routine. Morning Prayer in the cathedral. Debriefed with the Archdeacon on various matters professional and personal. Responded (in Spanish) to a new email message Bishop Jorge Aguilar of our companion diocese of Peru. Contacted (via email) the priest in a parish where I'm scheduled to be on a Sunday in January just to touch base on some of the details of the visitation. Took an incoming phone call from a priest from outside the diocese who was (benignly) seeking some information about someone inside the diocese. After looking at a couple of other examples of the species, mentally charted a course toward an extemporized homily on the Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, this Sunday at St Barnabas', Havana. Scheduled an appointment with my eye doctor for an exam next week. My current glasses are not really working for me, on a number of level, and I'm due for a checkup anyway. Spoke by phone with a priest of the diocese over an emerging pastoral and administrati...

Springfield Cathedral I can be something of a grouser and complainer during the weeks leading up to Christmas.  At no other time of year do I find my own inner being quite so much at odds with what’s going on in the secular culture. But even I must admit that there is a certain mystique to it all. The “Christmas spirit,” however we think of it, does encourage us to look for the best in one another, which is remarkable precisely because most of the time we tend to see the worst in each other.  Shoppers see inattentive and snippy sales clerks. Sales clerks see obnoxious and demanding shoppers. We see drivers expressing “road rage” on the highways. Con artists find a new sucker every day. Bad cops are paid off to look the other way at crime and office holders sell their power and influence to the highest bidder.  All this tends to make us pretty cynical about human nature. We end up defining people by their behavior: so-and-so is a drunk, someone else is a philander...

Generally took it easy most of the day ... weights & treadmill ... some work on the ministry teaching document ... headed to the cathedral around 4:30, where I preached at the early Christmas Eve celebration ... out to dinner with Brenda between services ... preached and celebrated at Midnight Mass. All was lovely.

Morning Prayer in the cathedral chapel (since there were people still putting the finishing touches on Christmas decorations). Responded fairly substantively, and in Spanish, to an email greeting from a Peruvian bishop whose consecration I participated in when I was there in July 2015. Processed some responses to the vetting request I made yesterday about the teaching document on ministry that I've been working on. Responded by email to one of our clergy regarding some parochial concerns. Read and responded to a handful of Ember Day letters from our handful of postulants. Re-registered the YFNBmobile with the Illinois Secretary of State's office. Attended to a small administrative issue pertaining to my Nashotah House duties. Lunch at home. Leftovers. Kept a 1:30 appointment at home with a notary tasked with getting us to sign a stack of documents that signify the closing of a new home mortgage loan. Refinancing was a prudent thing to do at this time. Back at the offi...