Chris Hansen’s blog

Have to make this friends only in case someone from St. Anne’s reads my blog.

It was my monthly turn to be the Companion in Ministry at St. Anne’s Bermondsey. Unfortunately, while I would like to attend on a Sunday when they have Holy Communion, I am often constrained by my companion Companions’ schedules to turn up on a Family Service Sunday.

And so it was today. When I arrived, I saw that my regular pew was occupied by a group of young girls. It was Brownie and Rainbow Girl Sunday, and the Family Service was dedicated to them.

When they marched in with their flag, they also had a stuffed animal of some sort and a lifesize baby doll. To the strains of “He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands,” we welcomed the stuffed animal, their mascot (which was placed to the right of the altar), the flag (placed in a stand at the left), and the baby doll, which was called “Brownie Precious”. Precious was there to teach the Brownies how to take care of babies (seeing as most of them weren’t yet 10 years old, a bit precocious I thought).

We then had a worship song, the words of which were “Hallelu (x2), Hallelujah, Praise Ye The Lord!” You sat for the “Hallelu(jah)s”, and then stood up and raised your arms high in the air on the “Praise Ye The Lord”. I could barely contain myself. I managed, with a great effort.

And then came the sermon. As it was a Family Service, the sermon would be aimed at children. And so it turned out to be. Louise (who is quite sound, usually), produced two balls of yarn, one lurid orange, the other fluorescent green. She asked “Who was born in London; raise your hands.” The Brownies took the orange wool and unravelled it, with the people born in London each taking hold of it. Then something else, and those who held up their hands at that were handed the unravelled green ball of wool. Those of us who were still without wool were asked more questions, and the wool was alternatively unraveled all over the church. By the time we all had a piece of wool, the place was a Health and Safety nightmare. Had there been a fire, everyone would have ended up tripping and falling over the criscrossing woolen threads. Louise was trying to show how interconnected we all are. She just managed it without killing or strangling us all.

And so, back home. I mowed the lawn, which seems to have inspired our neighbour to mow down the field of stinging nettles that passes for his lawn this evening. Thanks to , I think I know how to ensure that the daffodils we bought at the Christmas Fair last year can be planted and thrive. To lunch with a friend from Singapore, Vernon. Then we walked to the Tower of London, dropped him off there to take the overpriced tour of the Tower, and continued on to Brick Lane, where we bought bread at the 24-hour Beigel Shop. It seems that upper Brick Lane is a haven on Sunday afternoons for vendors of all possible items. All you need is a blanket or sheet spread out on the pavement with the swag tastefully arranged over it. Some of it was quite interesting stuff…I think that students were selling off their treasure troves of items to keep themselves from starvation. We looked in a couple of art galleries: Shoreditch seems to have become the happening place in avant-garde art in East London, replacing Hoxton, which has become terribly overpriced and crowded. So the same fate will befall Shoreditch in about 5 years or so. Buy your bargain lofts now! Then the Number 35 bus and home.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 20th, 2007 at 04:54 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.