I slept in this morning and after brekky was picked up at 10:30 by my new colleage PJ. We went to PJ and Elaine's place had coffee & cake. I also had a lovely time with their 8 month old Siofra (She-fra). Around noon we went to mass at St Gabriel's Church (it was a family service). After church we drove into the Irish country-side to Glendalough (stands for valley of the 2 lakes). We had a light lunch at the hotel there and then had a nice 3km round tr...

Today (Saturday) I was teaching the 40 or so full-time and part-time chaplaincy students at Mater Dei. Most of these are school chaplaincy students although there were some who worked in different contexts. I did 4 sessions: 1 Chaplaincy in Australia - I began by introducing myself and singing the group a song 'Such a Time as This'. I got the group to introduce themselves before we looked at the wide range of contexts where chaplains are found, within ...

Today was a very simple day. Spent the early morning in devotions and email, followed by preparation for my day of lecturing tomorrow. At 10am I went down and chatted with Barrie, Mater Dei's chaplain - a wide ranging chat about chaplaincy, the universe and everything. After a lunch of fish & chips in the student cafeteria I caught up with Mary. Mary & I discussed some of the details of Mater Dei's and CHC's chaplaincy practicum programs. Now I have ...

Got up late (a lot later than yesterday and did some computer work, my devotions and checked my emails. I then went downstairs and made myself a late brekky of cereal & toast before heading back upstairs to get ready for the day. Mary, one of the Mater Dei lecturing staff, picked me up and took me to the College. As it happens, the College is just at the end of the street where I am staying - 5 minutes easy walk so that'll work out just great for tomorr...

My day today started at 4am. After a coffee, a little face-booking and the completion of my packing I checked out and met my Toyota-Prius-driving taxi driver. He had me down at Redhill station in plenty of time but didn't have any change for my £20 note, so he swung past the servo to get change where I picked up a sandwich for Brekky and then he helped me work out the ticket machine (the station was unstaffed at that ridiculous hour). Ticket organised I c...