One Of Those Days

I spent almost all day yesterday with many of the Clergy of the Diocese of Panama at Clericus. I am not a meeting kinda person, and meetings in Central America (or at least meetings in the Episcopal Church in Central America) go on forever. Everybody who wants to say something gets to say something, kind of like meetings at St. Mark's, Berkeley, except about FIVE TIMES LONGER!!! (At St. Mark's they used to say it was a good meeting if everyone got their say, whether it had to do with the subject or not.) The meeting started at 10:00 am and ended at 4:00 pm. Spending the day in a long meeting en español tends to suck the life out of me, and then to run home to work on a sermon for the next day, well, it wasn't the best sermon I've ever written, and I could see the confusion on the congregation's faces when I delivered my closing line: "So the bunny, the puppy, the kitty, and the little lamb all became Jesus' friends. And YOU can be Jesus' friend, too!"

We've started the work on the ceiling of the church and the re-wiring of the building, which means we can't use the area. So we held our Mass this morning on the patio. The table I used for the altar was a bit small, but it worked. But the street running along side the patio is a busy, noisy street. We'll adjust. We will be holding our Sunday services across the street on the patio of Instituto Episcopal San Cristóbal, the school associated with our parish. It turns out that I will be presiding at a funeral on the school patio on Saturday, too, which should be interesting.

After Mass we went visiting the sick, which, outside of the driving, was nice and calming for me. Then I had a meeting with the committee which plans and teaches our classes. We (Parroquia San Cristóbal) offer classes to the community to help folks develop skills for employment. We teach cooking and stuff; I've posted about this before. Lately we have received some financial help from Caribbean Ministries in New York, which has been a real blessing. After the meeting I had to work on my sermon for Sunday. I am trying to finish my report for the parish meeting next Sunday. I'm picking up some folks at the airport tonight around 11:00 pm and I have a meeting with the clergy of the Panama Metro region tomorrow morning. Then a meeting with el obispo en viernes. I don't know why, I'm feeling a bit rushed. And then I listened to that terrible "When Jesus Met Santa Claus" thang at MadPriest's place. Boy, that'll teach me. AND there's all that crap going on with the Anglican Communion!!!

At times like this, we all need to look at a cute little bunny. A bunny without a pancake on its head.

Cute Overload