Right in the middle of Lent we have a time of respite – Mothering Sunday. Flowers are allowed in those churches who maintain a strict Lent. For those who fast, it is a time when a little relaxation is permitted. Such relaxation provides encouragement to face one of the most emotionally draining parts of the church’s calendar – Passiontide and Holy Week.

The theme of the sermon for this year’s Mothering Sunday was nurture. This encompasses not just the nurture of a mother’s love for her children, but the nurturing role we all play as members of the church and the church’s nurturing role as Mother Church. In otherwords as the church nourishes us spiritually, so should we care for and encourage each other.

In Anglican churches there is a tradition of giving Mothers’ Day posies to the mothers in the congregation. Children go up to the altar, collect their flowers (usually daffodils and evergreens) and take them to their mums. Sometimes adult members of the congregation also collect a posy if their mothers are there. At the church I attended in Cambridge, posies were given to everyone who has a mother, has had a mother, or would like a mother! Last Sunday, as there are always spare posies, I was given one as in the words of the rector ‘you’re a Mother Church person’. I suppose he meant that, as a server, I have nurturing role in facilitating worship. Whatever the reason, it is always nice to have flowers to break the gloom of Lent.

We are well into the penitential season of Lent, the run up to Holy Week and Easter. The church takes on a sombre aspect – vestments are purple and the liturgy omits the gloria. Flowers are prohibited in church for all but Mothering Sunday.

I was serving again on Lent 2. As it was the first Sunday in the month, the junior choir were in attendance, the church full and much chaos as usual. For once, nothing went wrong in the serving dept aside from confusion at the beginning of the service on who was administering communion and from where. Cock ups were left to those in charge of the sound system who forgot to put out the microphones. We all forget sometimes.

The sermon as based on the Gospel reading for the day ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord’. The importance of the message was underlined by the preacher dressing one of the children as a special messanger.

Strange then that the annual general meeting that followed was so heated (should we get rid of the pews and replace them with chairs). Very little charity given here, but people feel strongly on this issue. What annoys me though, is the misuse of tradition. Too often it is cited when what people mean is the status quo. Following tradition, we should get rid of pews and chairs and have the nave as the open space it would have been in centuries past. It would encourage preachers to keep the sermons short…