Ember Week again?

How can it be an Ember Week again already? I need to write my letter tomorrow. In one way this has been a pretty uneventful time. I haven't been able to do any Clinical Pastoral Education or field education, and the Bishop never set me up with the priest-mentor he kept mentioning. If there are any aspirants to ministry out there, here's a bit of advice. Don't be afraid to take matters into your own hands. The Bishop said he'd initiate the connection with the mentor, but when it became apparent that he wasn't going to, I should have either nudged the Bishop or gone directly to the mentor. One can wait out one's entire postulancy waiting for other people to make things happen.

Yet in some ways I've been quite busy. I've preached three times: twice at my old parish in Barchester (Advent 3, Lent 1) and once at Saint Swithin's (Epiphany 6). I'm scheduled to preach again at Saint Swithin's (Lent 2) and in Barchester (Good Friday). I've helped plan a Solemn Evensong, played a dozen services or so, and talked church with all sorts and conditions of men.

And best of all, my intellectual life is moving in a decidedly theological direction. Just today I signed a contract for a heavily theological piece in a collection on medieval philosophy, agreed to review an intellectual biography of a great medieval theologian, and got invited to contribute a piece on theological method for a new volume from Oxford. Increasingly I will look like a plausible candidate for a job teaching at a seminary. Granted, that's not what I really want -- I want to be a parish priest -- but it's a move in the right direction.