What Shall We Do With This Oil

The village of Emwood is about ten miles from Swanvale Halt. My friend Cara has just become its new incumbent and I went to her installation this week. In fact, Cara isn't just rector of Emwood but also of two other parishes which have been bolted onto it and actually transferred from another Deanery to make this possible. I think you probably need to be an Anglican to realise quite how tectonic such a move is.

During the service Cara's hands were anointed by the Bishop of Dorking. This had not happened to me when I arrived at Swanvale Halt, nine years ago now. Anointing on the hands with chrism is a standard element of the Western ordination rite though it was only introduced in Guildford Diocese a couple of years after I was ordained in 2005 and I opted not to go back to the cathedral to have it done retrospectively. Evangelical though he is, our diocesan Bishop Andrew was anointed at his translation so perhaps the motif is spreading out and it is now held de rigueur for any new ministry to be inaugurated not just by praying for the gift of the Holy Spirit on the new minister but signifying it physically by anointing with chrism. Or the Cathedral vergers could have been wondering what to do with all the oil that gets consecrated on Maundy Thursday and persuaded the bishops that taking a bottle out whenever someone arrives in a new parish is a splendid idea.

Emwood is very dark at night and I had never been there before, so it was an exciting occasion in more than just one way. I failed to kill myself picking my way along the paths, but an elderly gent making his way out of the churchyard came a bit closer to it.