As a newly ordained deacon, Br John spent July and August working in our parishes in Jamaica, and here shares some of his memories from the summer. Forty-eight hours after I was ordained a deacon by the Archbishop of Birmingham, I was on my way to Jamaica, there to spend the next two months learning the pastoral ropes and supporting our work in the Caribbean.
Our Kingston set-up is perfectly suited to a Dominican mission, and there was plenty for me to get stuck into right-away. We live in a house on the site of the Diocesan seminary, there is a major hospital and university across the road, and our two parish churches are a short drive away, one Aquinas 2 minutes up the road, and the other Christ the King , 5 minutes down the road.
The first responsibility I had, beginning the day after I arrived, was to preach at Mass every day. It was a great learning experience among a very encouraging and appreciative congregation, aided by voluble responses and the spontaneous completion of scripture-quotes.
Fr Clifton is the superior and parish priest, and I learnt a huge amount from his tireless ministry. Much of his time is spent driving round Kingston, responding to the various needs of his parishioners, whether home visits, deliveries, bread runs, or transporting case loads of frozen vegetables.
It is said that the work of a parish priest is to hatch, match, and dispatch, and I was certainly given plenty of exposure to these typical, and some other atypical, parish duties. I prepared a couple for marriage, I preached at funerals and led prayers for the dead in funeral homes, and my summer came to a wonderful conclusion when I baptised five babies during my final Sunday Mass.
