EDITOR’S NOTE:
Pages are trickling in slowly. Sorry, but that’s just the way it is.
May 20th, 2023
Dear Diary,
Fr. Tommy is still doing his exercises. I hope he gets back soon. I hate to say it, but he keeps me out of a lot of trouble! For example, we had one of those “breakout sessions” or “curia huddles” or whatever they’re called yesterday. Other bishops do these regularly – or so they say – and I don’t want to be out of step. Sometimes I think the guys are just saying things to see if I’ll do them.
I was put with the vocation director, the guy in charge of evangelization, and three secretaries. We were supposed to answer the question, “what is your passion?” I’m so glad I didn’t go first! The VD did and he talked about his passion for sharing the faith, then one of the secretaries talked about her family. When I first saw the question, I thought “pizza” but as we went around the table I realized that would have been out of place. So I said something about synodality, because that’s what we’re supposed to talk about. Synodality blah blah. But what are we going to do? Great idea, right? But it sure involves a lot of really boring meetings that usually end in my having to go out with Fr. Tommy to some restaurant rather than eating there. I mean, they could at least bring in PIZZA from Gaetano’s. Fr. Tommy would have immediately known about the sort of thing to bring up rather than pizza. Fr. Gilbert? Not so much. Gotta say, tho, I’m proud of myself for the synodality thing.
Apart from pizza, which is a no-brainer, I guess I’m also “passionate” – the right word? – about cufflinks. I got my first pair from my granddad when I was in the seminary. Nice little gold squares with my initials on them. It used to be a pain to find a nice shirt with those french cuffs, but now I have a guy who makes my shirts for me, so that’s nice. I’ve got quite a few now. They cheer me up. Some have good memories linked to them… HA. I’ll have to look them over and see how many I have.
French cuffs? Not in this pontificate!
Backwardism!
Rather than “break out” sessions, why not regular golf half-days? Help the staff get into this healthy sport. Nothing like regular foursomes among the staff for building teamwork and esprit de corps.
This poor guy seems down a lot. We should ask the Bishop of Auckland to send him a lei of Snickers bars. Just keep it away from Chester.