I think, one of the scariest things that ever happened to me, happened here at St. Peter’s Parish. For lack of a better description, I will call it “The Pandemic.”

On the first night, after the government announced the official lock down, I went to bed frightened about how the parish community would survive if we could not let people into the church. That same evening, at about three in the morning, I was awoken by a non-stop banging. It took me a few minutes to figure out where it was coming from. At first, I waited and assumed that it would stop. However, it did not stop and it sounded like there was someone pounding on the door with a hammer. I soon realized that it sounded like someone pounding on the door with hammer, because it was someone pounding on the door with a hammer. Because it seemed like it was never going to stop, I was stupid enough to go to the door to see what was going on. At the door, I was greeted by a man completely wrapped in plastic from head to toe, afraid of catching COVID and seeking a place to stay. After I explained to him that the fact that he was yielding a hammer made it difficult to feel safe proving him with shelter, I went back to bed and he seemed to understand. Shortly thereafter, I was awoken on two evenings by the alarm system and could hear someone in the rectory in the early hours of the morning. On both occasions, the police told me to stay in my room and wait until they had cleared the rectory. They sent three police cars and six officers on both occasions. Each time, although the man had left the rectory before they arrived, it was the same man who in the daytime had been throwing rocks at the church for no apparent reason. Throughout all of this, I found myself asking, much like the disciples in the boat with Christ in the midst of the storm, Lord, “do you not care that we are perishing.” Continue reading →