Last week some of us went to Boscombe to find out all about the new Missal. As we entered the crowded hall we were each handed a wad of papers in a slippery folder, a cup of tea and a piece of cake. Our photographer, having placed the folder on a chair with a slightly sloping seat, and the cup of tea on that, watched in horror, camera in one hand and cake in the other, as the cup gently slid to the floor with a great splash, drenching the shoes of his neighbours, spraying their ankles with a caffeinated shower, and leaving a spreading tannic flood around the Lymington contingent's chairs. Fortunately for him nobody else had her camera with her, so this embarrassing incident went visually unrecorded.
Every word of the speakers, led by Paul Inwood, was brought to us through Lymington parishioners' dream of a sound system. We were patiently and expertly guided through the minutiae of tiny amendments to the wording of the Mass, and were each given (in the slippery folder) a pack containing all the information we needed to help us benefit from the changes. We were assured that these changes will be good, right and obligatory. The audience, who had clearly been well brought up, neither protested nor indulged in riotous behaviour. Tom quietly pointed out that the changes will introduce more trivial awkwardnesses into ecumenical services. It seems, however, that Mother Church is more concerned with ensuring that the ship is sailing in the right direction than with which way the sails have to be set at the present time in order to enable her to do so, and who could criticize her for that?
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