The 22nd of November I had a short journey to the Neilston Spiritualist Church... President is Sheila Carruthers who has been connected to the Spiritualist movement for many years and is an excellent medium in her own right....
23rd ... Again only a short hop to the Paisley Spiritualist Church (SNU) which hold its services in the Glenburn Community Centre...
24th ... A little further this time to the Balloch Spiritualist Church and it was amazing at the turn out in considering the atrocious weather conditions.
26th.... Down to the Dumfries Spiritualist Church (SNU) and I always stop on my way down for a fish tea in Thornhill... This is one of my favourite towns...
27th and 28th busy with voluntary work....
30th ... A double booking which happens from time to time so the night in did me no harm...
Doing voluntary work is a chance to do something that you feel passionate about... It can give you a chance to meet new people and add a variety of experience and skills to you. Such good work can be done even within the confines of one’s own home, as two of my friends have found out. I mentioned a few months ago that a friend was going to foster cats till they were rehomed or while their owners were in hospital. Well, she opened her home to her first little lodger a month ago, and this friendly little feline will leave for a permanent home at the end of the week. I have also another friend who is fostering two cockatiels at the moment.
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Even though my travelling increases each year I have not found travelling a problem. But there will come a time when I will and I will have to think about cutting back. I am retired so it is not as if I am working hard all day and then having to get to a church driving through rush hour traffic. When I was working my work was over at 1pm so I could leave early to miss heavy traffic or travel a good distance to a church. I do feel sorry for mediums that don’t finish work till 5pm or 5.30 and then have to be at a church for 7.30.
One has to remember a medium cannot be judged on the number of bookings he/she has a year, or the number of miles they travel to churches. Work and family commitments play a big part in all this. Then we have mediums who don’t drive and we all know how scarce public transport can be at nights and on a Sunday.
John’s question conjures up a few memories of travelling to churches.
Over the years I have found that many booking secretaries have not being very clear in giving directions to their churches. In fact one booking secretary did not know her Church’s correct address and another knew little about the area surrounding her church. I am not complaining about this as in the end I found it rather funny.
A booking secretary sent me a letter confirming my booking and giving the address of the church. As I had never been to this area before I decided to leave early, yet I was driving into a nightmare and I was orbiting around an area one-mile from where the church actually was, for an hour. The problem was the address on the letter heading had Road instead of Avenue, nd there was both a road and an avenue of this name, but they were a mile apart. As it turned out I had been sitting yards from this church at 6.30 and after asking directions I was sent a mile away. There I kept getting directed to one church after another but they were connected to almost every faith under the sun, but spiritualism. Eventually I stopped a passing police car and the officers finally realised the mistake in the address and they not only told me to follow them to the church, they also found a parking space for me.
I entered the church fifteen minutes late and the service had of course started with another medium. The committee member on the door was none too pleased that I was late but immediately I showed him the address I was given his face went red and I received an apology.
Shortly after this I was in another new area to serve a church for the first time and over the phone I checked with the President three times that the address was correct. I thought I would get into the town and then ask for directions. Spirit must have been my navigator that day because when I did stop and ask directions I was right opposite the road the church was on.
The following week another new medium to this church got lost. She phoned the church and was told to sit at a particular roundabout till a committee member arrive to take her to the church. But after sitting there for an hour she gave up and went home. The president was not too pleased the following day when he phoned her. But it transpired it was the committee member who went to the wrong roundabout.
The trials and tribulations of travelling to churches.... But it is not always the churches to blame I have also got it wrong from time to but that’s another story...
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“Tom, there are more than the SNU as far as Spiritualism is concerned. I thought that Spiritualism would be different from other religions and that different groups of your religion would be more in-tune with each other than with other religions. But your site seems only mention the SNU which you are a member”.
You are correct Jamie, I have failed to mention other Spiritualist organizations but this has not been intentional and I will put that right in the New Year.
As a medium I serve several different spiritualist churches and never concern myself with what group churches belong too.
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