One of my duties as a lecturer in theology is supervising students on their Sunday placement and block placement during the long holiday. The latter will send me back to Soroti, which I’m looking forward to, and to Kigali, Rwanda, which I’m REALLY looking forward to! Especially since I think I’ll get to fly, vice taking the bus.
So, we finally began visiting students this week (as last week, they were involved with the Martyrs’ Day activities), and while I know that I can never be inconspicuous in a church here, I had hoped that I could go to church, try to hide (so as to not scare my students if they saw me), and then greet the vicar.
I got to the church rather early, so I sat in the parking lot until people started arriving. There were no pillars in this church to sit behind, so I sat in a back row.
That is, until the service leader asked me to go to the vestry. I’m a priest, so I was wearing my collar, but I had intended to *observe* the service, not participate. What is the saying about good intentions?
The vicar is a lovely man, and he insisted that I process in with them, then sit up front, next to the service leader. So much for trying to be inconspicuous. He introduced me to the congregation (which I expected), then asked me to bless the children as they went to Sunday School.
I’m honored that he asked me to participate (and recess out), and of course, after the service there was tea. One delight from the day is that the guest preacher was a friend of mine from seminary, and it was delightful to hear him preach and catch up with him after.
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