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On Saturday night we invited the – many – people who had offered us hospitality to have a meal with us in one of the hotels. And on Sunday we divided ourselves between the Cathedral and Union Church in central Kolkata. The preaching has an obvious focus when it is the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and you are in the ecumenical Church of North India. This is what I said

One of the things about being away in a place like India is that nobody really tells you what is going to happen next. So we did the worship – and North Indian breakfast with the congregation afterwards. And then they asked if we would like to meet the children …

And the children turned out to be a school which the parish runs for the street children in the surrounding area. Beautiful children, beautifully dressed … How do they do that? And there is a certain something about seeing a homeless child as the Angel Gabriel telling the homeless child who plays Mary that she is to be the mother of Jesus

We still have about a foot of snow here and no sign of a thaw. Alison’s car with winter tyres has been moving around with ease – but the Polo with ground-hugging fuel-saving etc., etc., is literally grounded.

I had to give up on a visit to the Vestry at Holy Trinity, Dunfermline, on Tuesday evening. But I picked my way through the remnants of four foot drifts across the Sidlaws to Dundee to meet the Vestry at St Margaret’s, Tayport, last night, We discussed how I could magic up a priest ….

And Edinburgh today for the Mission and Ministry Board giving another nudge to the Whole Church Mission and Ministry Board – and to our process for discussing Human Sexuality issues – and getting a first look at the MinDiv report on TISEC

Which – just in case you didn’t get the point – is by way of saying that I still do the day job. Tho’ I have to admit that people are really nice to you when you are away!

We’ve been at Serampore today. It’s across the Ganges and to the north – another extraordinary journey of horn lowing while shouldering aside lorries, cattle, bicycle rickshaws and anything else that wanders across the road.

It’s an impressive College approaching its bicentenary and has about 100 theology students in a student body of 3000. It was founded by another of those giants which the times seem to throw up. He translated the scriptures into myriad Indian languages, built and established the College and managed three wives (in succession) at the same time,

We met the Principal, Professor Dr Laitiuangliana Khiangte and the theology students. They were singing choruses – including ‘We are gathering together unto him’. That brought back memories of the last time I heard it – St Patrick’s Hall, Killicomaine in Portadown. Whatever wonderful liturgical innovations I proposed, it endured ..

Professor Trevor Hart found one of his books in the library and autographed it. We had lunch with the students which involved learning to eat with the fingers.

This is Revd Shreeraj Mohanty, Rector of St James Church where we are staying, Last time I was here, the church was being restored with advice lime mortar from the Scottish Lime Society.

In the cacophony of early morning Kolkata – traffic, trams, barking dogs and calls to prayer from the Mosque – he rings the bell and celebrates the Eucharist barefoot at 6.30 am. I joined him with some of our group this morning. Shreeraj represents something which we rather lack – a cohort of able and well-trained younger clergy.

This is St Andrew’s Church – part of the Diocese of Kolkata and the Church of North India. This is the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity so it is worth noting the ecumenical nature of the CNI. Anglicans and Presbyterians are among the six denominations which came together to form the Church of North India,

As you can see, St Andrews is firmly Presbyterian in character and Scottish in identity. But it is part of the diocese and gathers around the bishop …

In the aftermath of the rape and death of the young woman in Delhi, issues of gender violence and the place of women in Indian society obviously loom large. It’s very hard to know what the impact of all this has been and will be.

So I was delighted to meet Revd Moumita Biswas who is Women and Gender Justice Co-Ordinator for the Diocese. She gave me a copy of this book of Bible Studies which she and Sushma Ramswami have gathered together

Moumita and I talked about the place of women in this society – even at the basic level of whether or not it is safe. I got the impression that women here need to think carefully and ensure that they do not put themselves in situations in which they may be vulnerable. I suspect it may also be the case that, while women may think and talk deeply about these issues, men don’t find it so easy.

One of the things which I think surprised our group is that things can be a little more formal in India. To say that probably gives an unhelpful impression. What I mean is that sometimes we can be a bit casual about things – possibly because we don’t take ourselves quite seriously enough.

So on the first evening, we were taken to St John’s High School for Girls and properly welcomed. That meant a speech of greeting from the headmistress. It meant presents for each and every member of the party – delivered by a different person in each case and all beautifully organised. It meant the charming use of that delightful Indian usage word ‘felicitated’ – as in ‘Bishop David will be felicitated by …..’. There was a programme of singing and dance from the pupils and then a speech of welcome from Bishop Ashoke with a response from me. Then there was a beautiful meal with the chance to mix and talk.

Even at that early stage, I could feel that our relationship with the Diocese of Kolkata had moved on. Things seemed more open somehow. It’s always easier when you are meeting people for the second time and I think that the size of the party we have brought is a clear sign to them of how we see this link.

And the welcome also gave our party the opportunity of recognising that some of the most impressive people around are the senior staff in the schools. These are institutions with over 2000 pupils – fee paying and serving the whole population while being explicitly Christian in their ethos. I found myself in an intense discussion of James Joyce with one of them. It would not be hard to know more about that than I do and she easily passed that test

We are great ones for talking – exhaustively and exhaustingly about what we do. I don’t think they do so much of that here – not so much of ‘if we weren’t doing this what might we do?’

So we spent a morning together at Diocesan School in a beautiful meeting room and we began to talk about what we do and how we might grow together. Canon Dom Ind, our Diocesan Director of Ordinands, shared our thinking about vocation – about how we discern vocation and the kind of people we are looking for as future priests of our church. What happened then was very interesting. We have found in the schools a real reverence for education. Scotland has that too – but we may have lost some of the feeling, that is very strong here, that education is what makes possible progress for an individual and a society. That seems to be true among the clergy – many of them are academically more qualified than we are. So we talked about how an academic path is complemented by other kinds of brightness – deep interest in every aspect of society and its life, emotional intelligence, spirituality …. And we shared with them what it is like to minister in a very secular society and the kind of gifts of character and temperament which are needed in a priest if he or she is to sustain ministry in the long term.

We also talked together about outreach and growth in congregations – sharing with them some of Casting the Net experience of shaping Mission Action Plans. I was struck again by how helpful it is to be talking simply about a biblically rooted ‘Casting the Net’ rather than something like ‘The Diocesan Strategy for Growth’

The diocese here is blessed with a group of young, well trained and very capable clergy. It also has some extraordinarily talented and experienced lay people. There are all sorts of possibilities for what we can share together

Note the presence if endless bottles of water – symbolic of a visit to India. Up to the time when I left, nobody had had to reach for the Immodium. We were very careful. Nothing but bottled water. No salad or unpeeled fruit. Exercise great care about almost everything else – our hosts were particularly impressive in their care of us in this area. They constantly steered us away from risky foods. It’s a pity because so much of the food was beautiful.

So here is the party with some of our,hosts – outside St John’s Church – and Bishop Ashoke Biswas with me at our flower-bedecked welcome. That’s the place where the memorial to those who died in the Black Hole of Calcutta is in the churchyard. We were also greeted by a blast of Auld Lang Syng from the organist with a follow up of ‘Be thou my vision’ just to preserve Celtic comprehensiveness.

It’s a remarkable thing that we have come as a party of 17. It’s been going well and there is clearly an appetite for this relationship on both sides – of which more later on. Thanks to Canons Val Nellist and Dom Ind who have done the organising.

The group is:

Robin Anderson – Sr Saviour’s, Bridge of Allan
Jill Birch – St Saviour’s, Bridge if Allan
Patricia Butler, St Ninian’s, Cathedral
Rev’s David and Janice Cameron -ABC Grouo
Kqtherine Cran – St Mary’s, Kirriemuir
Prof Trevor Hart and Naomi Hart – St Andrew’s, St Andrews
Canon Dom and Anna Ind – St Saviour’s, Bridge of Allan
Ingrid Jackel – St John’s, Forfar
Catherine Meikle – St James, Cupar
Canon Val and Robert Nellist – ABI Group
Vanessa Stark – St Mary’s, Newport
Prof Alan Werrity – St Andrew’s, St Andrews
Myself

Our relationship with the Diocese of Kolkata (Calcutta) continues to develop. So,we are off tomorrow in a party of 17 for a visit. We hope to share some of what we have learned about congregational development and to learn from them …

If I can get a wisp of wifi when we are there, I’ll let you know how we get on.

Most of the party are spending a second week in Darjeeling where the diocese has a school. I’ll be back next Monday.