An appointment with God

On one of my trips around town I had come across the Catholic church outside which was loitering a nun. She looked harmless enough and of some certain age but having been taught by nuns as a child I know better than to cross them. One step out of line and they’re capable of crushing your windpipe with a rolled up copy of The Catholic Times and all while smiling as if to say ‘it’s all for the good of your soul’. Not wanting to approach her from outside her direct line of vision and therefore increase the chance I’d surprise her and take a blow in the gut for my trouble I looped around until I was in front of her and kept a safe distance until I knew she had seen me. Approaching cautiously I asked her what time mass was held on a Sunday morning and she smiled at me sweetly and told me eight-thirty. Her face as she smiled folded into a thousand wrinkles and her eyes looked merry and blue but I was not to be fooled and I thanked her and retreated back across the road keeping my eyes on her until I was well out range. Nuns, you’ve just got to be so careful with them. Mass the following morning was well attended, by the standards of my village church anyway, and there were well over a hundred people though most as usual in their fifties and older. There was a whole flock of nuns either sitting in clusters or dotted here and there and even though the service was mostly in German I knew that as long as I followed their cue I’d be fine. There were two priests residing for some reason and I couldn’t quite work out if they were both happy with that or not. But what I did like was the sermon, which though delivered in German and so mostly beyond my understanding was delivered with passion and vigour and much pulpit banging (my favourite) and with what appeared to be no reference to notes. It seems to me that back home members of the clergy no longer deliver their sermons from the heart and as if they mean it but just read from ready prepared notes and its generally very dull and sometimes its very difficult to stop yourself from yawning. Me, I like a bit of fire and brimstone on a Sunday morning and though I couldn’t understand most of what this priest was saying I am catholic enough to know that he was promising hell and damnation if we didn’t Watch Ourselves and Become Better Souls so I went away from the service happy.