Rectories … A house or a home?
It is an undeserved privilege to live in a rectory, especially the one I happen to be in now. Someone thought carefully about the life we clerics live and set things out accordingly. I have lived in 8 rectories now and each one has been a joy.
On the surface of it, the rectories are just a building. Something else has to happen before they can legitimately be called home with a capital ‘H’.
The pictures on the wall help and when you get the internet and TV to work that is a huge relief. A comfy bed to snore in is also essential.
But it is something more. Memories are to be created, looked back on and savoured. This sunny corner is where I read that amazing book. The dinner table where old so and so came and regaled us with hilarious, albeit slightly dubious stories. The veggie patch has given so generously and responded to attention and pruning. All are ingredients that are daily stirred into the fabric of the place. Over time, gradually, ever so slowly, without us realising it the address becomes a Home. It’s not something that you can rush or construe. It must happen organically of its own accord. Then one day you look back and you realise that something has shifted, altered and changed.
But the most important factor to enable this transformation is to be completely "at Home" within your own self. To be as relaxed with yourself as you are with the sofa and your surroundings. You can never be at home in any building if you are jarring and jangled. Being at home starts not with a view of the lounge room, but looking within yourself. What do you see there and what needs doing to make yourself Home?