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Road Rage...Or Angst
January 21, 2007 - 6:12 p.m.

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This morning I paid a visit to St. David and St. Patrick, one parish with two names, in Guelph. It's part of the archdeacon's plan to introduce me to the diocese. I've never seen most of the parishes in Niagara, so it's a much-needed intro.

St. David and St. Patrick is on the "relaxed and groovy" end of the ecclesiastical spectrum. Their liturgy is fluid, but not loose, if that makes sense. It feels as if they can flex and adopt and change, but they still commit to doing liturgy. It's intuitive without being sloppy. A great deal of this is due to the incumbent, a man whose theory of ministry is to be himself, to be real, and to do liturgy from that place.

After church the incumbent and his wife (also a priest, who happens to be the chaplain to Niagara's students at Trinity) had me over for lunch. We had a good chat about the church, and how to save it...I could have spent the better half of the day there.

The only down side of the day was driving back and forth...and getting up obscenely early. I'm not fond of driving, you see. Rather, I'm not fond of myself while driving. I get anxious and angry and tense and start thinking up reasons to move to a tiny, windswept, carless island off Newfoundland. I much prefer sitting back on the GO train or streetcar, reading or watching the scenery.

This will make living in the increasingly autocentric Diocese of Niagara a challenge. Oh, well.

I wonder how much a horse costs...

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