What am I doing?

At the moment I am mostly wandering around asking myself what I am doing.

In my last blog post I bemoaned the confusing situation whereby I am guilty that I cannot be both 'maternity leave Mummy going to baby groups, providing thoughtful development activities and cooking wholesome organic purees' and 'final year ordinand working hard on MTh and preparing earnestly for ordination' at the same time.

But enough of that already. This week I am looking to the future and wondering exactly what it is I am letting myself in for. What is full-time ordained ministry? What will I be doing? What exactly has skilled me for this job? What will life look like?

I can list what I know ordained ministry is not. A 9-to-5 job. Some may say it is not even a 'job'. It is not salaried in the strictest sense - a stipend is, by definition, an amount of money you are given to free you from financial worries and allow you to do church work full-time. Ordained ministry is not exclusive from personal life - whether you like it or not, there is overlap - you are in a sense 'on duty' as you go about your daily business.

A Priest is required to teach, but I am not a teacher. To listen, but I am not a counsellor. To tend to the sick, but I am not a nurse or a doctor. To co-ordinate, but I am not a manager. To have an awareness of finances, but I am not an accountant. As I contemplate every aspect of church work, I feel completely de-skilled. I'm glad I get 4 years of Curacy to continue my learning, but even then I won't be a teacher or a doctor or an accountant.

Perhaps the Priest's special 'skill' is that they have no implicit skills at all. Faith in God and time to spend doing His work. Prayer is so important, and I'm all to aware that prayer ends up being the thing to slip down the clergy 'to do' list, but without it the Priest has no foundation. The Priest brings what he/she is. Mother. Occasional Blog writer. Average maker of purees.

Anyway, the big update this week is that the Curacy seems to be making steady progress. Yes, I know, I have been saying this since June, but there is actual progress now. Things have been signed. Letters have been sent. I think there are a few more things to sign and letters to send and a Bishop to meet and an announcement to be made at the Churches and then it's official.

We had a good weekend visiting Mum and Dad this weekend just gone, and managed to take the time to look around a nursery for Arthur. We have come to the conclusion that Paul, Arthur and I spending our days under the same roof is not constructive to getting anything done. I just can't leave Arthur alone, as much as Paul assures me he's very happy to look after him for as long as I need every day to get on with some work. Work and homelife feel very mish-mashed together, with Arthur's constant care always winning, and while he is top priority I will be no good to a Parish if I let this situation go on next year. The plan is he will be in nursery part-time with Paul working part-time and caring for him part-time. My training incumbant seems very understanding of our situation, and the priority that family takes. My plan is that, unless there is something specific I have to go to, the time between Arthur getting home from nursery and going to bed (4.30pm to 7pm) will be mostly spent with him. And I'll be very strict about my day off every week. Feels good.

We also might have a house! The Diocese were talking about buying or renting one in the Parish, but they have now identified a vacant property they already own about a 15 minute walk from the outskirts of the Parish. We went and wandered around the outside and it looks pretty good. If we're able to have this one, it at least takes the stress of not knowing where we will live off our minds.

Coming up next week we have Arthur's assessment with Orthopaedics. A lot of people have asked us about his prospects in terms of mobility and it's a question we've never been able to answer properly other than to say that, to us, his legs seem strong and he can certainly move them very well! But we're no experts. So I guess we'll go in with open minds and hope. While we've always hoped they'll say he's just fine, we know that leg braces might have to be an option. There's worse things in the world than leg-braces.

And for the moment all Arthur cares about it that he's in his baby walker and there's a lovely bowl of pureed butternut squash for tea.