Talking to the Rector

It was a large and somewhat chaotic baptism, for the younger sister of a boy who I baptised five years ago: about a third of the congregation was under 16 by my estimation. I knew a lot of them have been there for multiple baptisms, and it's reached the point on such occasions that I acknowledge that many people will have heard my spiel before but I'm going to say pretty much the same just in case they've forgotten. There were eleven godparents, several of whose names I recognised, a number being young fellows whose awkwardness in their unaccustomed suits was rivalled by their awkwardness in being in church at all. So far as young fellows are concerned, this discomfort often manifests itself in mild mucking about. There was one who fell under this temptation more than the others: when we were almost right at the end and I thanked everyone for being there to celebrate and acknowledging that they would be going 'to celebrate in a different way and a different place' he said very audibly 'right, off to the bar then, ho ho ho'. I was on the brink of saying something to him after it was all over, but restrained myself. The baby, in contrast, behaved impeccably.

The congregation bundled out of the church as quickly as they could manage without positively trampling one another, leaving about enough in the collection plate for a return bus ticket to Guildford (and we didn't notice anyone using the card reader). It was as I was tidying up that the joker in the pack of godparents came up to me. 'That was great, thank you', he said. 'You won't remember, but you baptised my daughter in 2010. Look, this is her now,' he went on, showing me a snap of a disgruntled looking fourteen-year-old on his phone. We had a very pleasing talk about what had happened to him since, and the passage of time more generally. There you are, do not rush to action, I thought to myself.

Earlier, our lay reader Gizel overheard me quoting Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes to the ladies serving coffee, which they'd clearly never heard of. My 'sermon' that morning had been an examination of the spiritual relationship between Anglicanism and Orthodoxy, with various audiovisual aids including a scary video of the Russian Military Cathedral built in 2020. 'You're a virtually inexhaustible source of nonsense', Gizel told me, which I think she meant kindly. Being German it's sometimes difficult to tell. I suppose it's positive that I cultivate such a warm and approachable working environment that she feels she can say something like that.