It can be difficult to articulate what it is like being a minister in secular employment/self employment, with roving chaplaincy work, together with being a curate in a church setting. So when I came across the following it was a relief to read how someone of much more experience than I articulated the situation in a way that clearly reflected my own thoughts and feelings. I would like to make clear that I feel a long way form heroic and have much to resolve in the outworking of my chosen ministry settings…
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“… Chaplains exercise a heroic calling , because of the stories that they live out in their work . Not only do they respond to a call to live the “story” of their faith community, they also seek to live the “story” of the secular organisation or institution (be it the Army or a healthcare trust, a university or shopping centre) to which they belong. To live two stories in this way is a considerable challenge, not least because of the sense of dislocation which can result from the ambiguity of belonging in two spheres, and yet, in another sense, in neither. But to bring the two stories together in dialogue is the chaplain’s daunting opportunity for doing significant contextual and public theology.”[1]
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To live two stories is a powerful way of putting it, this got me thinking, all those that profess a faith and try to live out that faith will usually have to bring together two stories, and perhaps three if home is also a difficult setting, which serves as a good reminder of the challenges, the difficulties and the frustrations facing the bulk of our faith communities.
[1] Andrew Todd, Editorial. Crucible, The Christian Journal of Social Ethics, January to March 2008 (Suffolk: Tynedale Press, 2008), p. 3.