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Posts Tagged ‘Inner city’

A Dog and His Man

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , on 15 October, 2013| Leave a Comment »

A sweet wee dog called at the Vicarage again today. With his owner, of course. We see them from time to time – always polite, good to chat to, usually asking for a little food. And homeless. His man is beginning to think it’s too cold to keep on camping out. But his man hates staying around other people. He likes his tent in the woods. We invited him to come back tomorrow to think about housing options. It really is getting too cold for camping. We sent them both on their way with a packed supper and a torch. Praying their night isn’t too uncomfortable as I listen to the wind whistling outside.

The dog had a coat on too. Needed it.

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Not Gone But Who?

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 2 October, 2013| 4 Comments »

Who has been sleeping in the holly bush at the entrance to the church? We’ve not seen them, but they seem to have built quite a little den. But since Gone is away at Her Majesty’s Pleasure, we don’t have an immediate suspect. I’m afraid the bush dweller may be disappointed tonight, as we’re clearing out this evening and the Vicar will be taking the debris to the dump.

There’s a funeral in church tomorrow and it’s respectful to the mourners to provide a tidy churchyard. The bush is right next to the church steps by the main entrance door. The church is being cleaned too, as we’ve had scaffolding in whilst damp plaster and ant chewed woodwork right up in the ceiling above the chancel has been removed and repaired. Theological college training can never cover all the bases for ministry life.

Bed (and sitting room it seems) in the bush

Bed (and sitting room it seems) in the bush

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Gone Beyond Help?

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 1 October, 2013| 5 Comments »

Dear old Gone showed up at our door the other week. He’d just been released from prison, where he’s spent the summer. It’s almost an annual event, him showing up in September, homeless, almost like he has a plan to help new Ministry Trainees learn good doorstep skills.

He’d thrown his prison release paperwork in the bin and first went to Rev Very Benevolent over in the next tow-un to ours. Rev V-B tried to help Gone find somewhere to live, but sadly the housing group who’d accommodated him before said they wouldn’t take him on. In fact, they’d been about to evict him before he went to jail.

The trouble for Gone is that he’s not really a criminal. He shouldn’t really be in jail. He’s a vulnerable and increasingly frail man with a serious alcohol addiction. And he’s enormously annoying and quite scary when he’s in the drink. And then charming and sweet and can talk the socks off anyone who’ll listen. But he’s frightened and anxious about other people, which makes him a pretty dire neighbour. And he can cause trouble and stress when he turns up somewhere boozed up. What he needs is something like an old fashioned asylum, where he’s not allowed out, not allowed alcohol, and not given his own money. He’d spent £75 of his getting-out-of-prison money on a portable dvd player and some dvds. He could have had a couple of nights in a hotel for that. But he’s incapable of spending money wisely and no-one will house him for long. So I guess in some ways he knew what would happen next.

Rev V-B contacted me a few days later to say that Gone had been conspicuous by his absence for a few days. And that he’d had a call to say that Gone would be up before a magistrate for another breach of his ASBO. So it looks like the prison service is once again expensively accommodating a vulnerable man who doesn’t fit in the system. And maybe it’s the only way that will work for him. It does seem crazy though. Pray with us for wisdom to know how to help him in his next foray back into the world a few months (I guess) from now.

Gone left his calling card in our flower bed

Gone left his calling card on our drive

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Vicarage Recruitment Drive

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 9 September, 2013| 1 Comment »

The lovely Radiohead left our attic yesterday. He’s headed back home and is busy applying for jobs in teaching. So now there’s a space in the Vicarage for a new Ministry Trainee.

We’re looking for someone who has a passion for people and for seeing God at work in their lives. You don’t have to be considering ordination, although the Diocesan Director of Ordinands would be very happy to see you and two of our previous attic dwellers have taken that path, and Red, who’s still here, is aiming for a dog collar. Perhaps you’d like some time to think about ministry life, or just want to serve in a church before going into something else.

A fondness for cake and the ability to negotiate your way around a cluttered family home might be an advantage. And you should know that we have a cat, a fish and a rodent. But you don’t have to have the rodent sit on your head if you don’t want to. If it’s not for you, maybe there’s someone you know who might be up for Vicarage life. Do please point them in our direction.

More details can be found on our church website. And below you can see a pic of Radiohead and Red in their attic living room, where they are able to escape from the pets, the clutter and the mayhem. If the kids don’t follow them up there…

Working hard. Or possibly on Facebook.

Working hard. Or possibly playing games. There’s time for both.

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Tennis in Another World

Posted in Fun, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on 24 June, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Wimbledon starts today, with all its fervent discussion about Andy Murray, the weather and the price of strawberries. I had the pleasing experience a couple of weeks ago of going to a Wimbledon warm-up tennis tournament, the Aegon Classic, courtesy of the kind people at the Lawn Tennis Association. There was no Andy Murray (it was a women’s tournament) nor any sign of strawberries. But we did have weather, alas.

It was super easy to get to leafy Edgbaston where the tennis club is. As you drive from our parish the suburbs get gradually smarter until you get to Edgbaston, full of wide avenues lined with enormous Edwardian mansions, university halls of residence and independent schools. We were pleasingly able to park for free on one of the wide avenues by the club. A good start.

Once there we were able to take our seats with great views of the centre court without any queuing or stress. Then we enjoyed some great tennis – Daniela Hantuchova played Kristina Mladenovic. I spent some time transcribing Hantuchova’s grunts of effort. Her baseline noise is ‘Woo-ee’. And her service is accompanied by a ‘Uh-ee’. Transcribing them distracted me from the irritation of the noise. A little. Mladenovic won the first set and then, about half way into the second set, the rain arrived. As it was lunchtime we took shelter in one of the cafe tents. It was pretty squashed, but we found a spot to sit down amongst the damp tennis fans. It was Ladies Day, so a few spectators were decked out in impressive hats. We’d opted for smartish trousers and tunic combinations – a wise move I felt, as we sat on the floor to eat our sandwiches.

Sadly, it rained for the next couple of hours so we ended up returning home feeling rather undertennissed. But the tournament continued over the week and Hantuchova eventually triumphed. So thank you Lawn Tennis Association. I’d love tickets again next year. And now to get my Wimbledon head on…

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A Pooch About the Parish

Posted in Church, Inner city, tagged , , , , , , , , on 17 January, 2013| Leave a Comment »

It’s been a bit of a busy start to the year so I’ve been rather off blogging. But yesterday I went for a walk with Dreamer and Freddie the Pooch. We headed to our local park and the frost was so beautiful that I took a couple of pics. Glorious, eh? Only slightly marred by the three young couples snogging under separate trees. At 3pm on a Tuesday. Not sure what that was about.

Tower blocks looking mysterious in the frost

Tower blocks looking mysterious in the frost

Freddie pooching about

Freddie pooching about

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Gone on the Step Again

Posted in Inner city, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 16 November, 2012| 1 Comment »

Gone, our occasional hedge lodger, has been under the hedge for the last couple of nights. Brrrr – very chilly and damp in the fog. He rang the doorbell very drunk on Wednesday evening, but we didn’t chat for long. This morning he was on the doorstep as I took the boys to school and there again when I returned. I was despairing about his housing situation.

Not the comfiest bed

As usual, he was drinking a bottle of Frosty Jack and listening to a cheap radio on headphones. But he was also mellow and happy. He asked me to take care of his new debit card that allows him access to his benefits. I declined, thinking that he’ll forget what he’s done with it, but I gave him a wallet to keep it safe.

Wonderfully, I also found out that he has does have somewhere to live – he’s in a hostel and has his own room. But he’s been too drunk to get himself home the last couple of days – hence the hedge sleeping. I’ve made a note of his address and am hoping we’ll be able to keep an eye on him. And that he’ll manage a winter without prison this year. The needs of the homeless are always complex, and Gone is extremely vulnerable, so I am very thankful that our prayers for him have been answered at last. And am praying that he’d keep it together enough to keep himself housed. He knows that he needs to but the confusion and anger brought by drink and mental illness always means that his home situation is precarious.

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Dreaming of the Kingdom

Posted in Church, tagged , , , , , , , , on 22 October, 2012| 8 Comments »

We are very excited in the Vicarage. In about 2 weeks time, Dreamer will be joining us as our Families and Community Worker. Our church family are delighted to have appointed her and are looking forward to getting to know her as she comes to live and minister amongst us. In one of those ministry swings and roundabouts, a couple of days after she was appointed, our lovely Ministry Trainee Sweet Tooth decided that he wasn’t quite ready to step into ministry yet and left the Vicarage to start another course of study. So our house is a little emptier just now, although the children and other visitors (including Dreamer and her happy dog last week) seem to fill the place up well enough.

One challenge for Dreamer when she begins here will be leading our small youth group. Since the Vicar had A Very Important Meeting last week, I was helping out along with our new MT Radiohead and Cheery, a laughing lady from our congregation. The group has almost doubled in size since last year and in the meeting I attended the boy:girl ratio was 9:2, so testosterone levels were running pretty high. About a third of the kids have learning difficulties of some sort or another, which mainly means that attention spans can be rather limited. So, all in all, it was a pretty fizzy evening. But despite that, they still read the bible out loud and talked about what the narrow way looks like. And, as Dreamer said afterwards, noone died, noone was bitten and noone set fire to anything. I’m sure that many involved in youth work will recognise the experience of trusting that the Lord is working even when we don’t feel like much is going in!

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Happy Hair

Posted in Inner city, tagged , , , , , on 16 October, 2012| 1 Comment »

And what would make you more happy about your hair than having it cut for £4, like I did yesterday? And I had the added bonus of being able to have a sweet chat about a lovely lady from our congregation who went to glory a few weeks ago. And I was able to walk to the hairdressers from the Vicarage. Sometimes there are unexpected pluses to urban ministry.

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Gone Going?

Posted in Church, Inner city, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 9 October, 2012| Leave a Comment »

One of the lovely things about the Midlands Women’s Convention last weekend was the opportunity to catch up with friends from around the region. I was able to have a good chat with another vicar’s wife from the Black Country who has been sharing with us the unusual experience of having Gone sleep under the garden hedge.

Mrs Very Benevolent and her husband live in another Sandwell town, just a few miles from here. She told me that Gone has been supplied with a sleeping bag by a local Food Bank and has camped out in their garden for the past few weeks. Another vicar nearby sometimes allows Gone to use his bathroom to spruce up. So he’s surviving. As usual.

Mrs VB is finding that Gone is alternately awful, abusive, threatening and foul and then repentant, sweet, thankful and charming. Same mix as ever. But the good news in all this is that the local police have decided that enough is enough and have demanded that the local housing office sort it out. Since Gone is without doubt the most vulnerable person I have ever met, I am thankful that at last some people in authority are taking responsibility.

My friend said that the first option will be to get him to Betel, although we all know that Gone struggles with trusting others, so the Betel community may not prove to be the best place. Whatever happens we are praying for a good solution for him. But at last there seem to be people in the ‘system’ watching out for Gone and there will be other options if Betel doesn’t work out. Keep on praying for him – we would love him to to feel secure in a home.

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