If you've read any of this blog you'll know that I'm not the kind of person who believes in God having some kind of direct hand guiding and directing my life. Now as I look back over my life I’m not so sure. As I mentioned in my previous post I believe I am being called to full time ministry within the Uniting Church. People often talk of God opening doors, in my case I feel like god has closed doors in order to make this one path even more obvious. This something that I have been reflecting back on over the last few days. Below I have listed some of those closed doors.
Door 1: Mathematics Teaching
Because of some unhelpful Austudy and Centrelink rules I was not able to finish maths education degree despite having done 3.5 years out of 4 and despite a chronic lack of mathematics teachers. Living in Newcastle at the time with one of the highest unemployment rates in Australia work was very hard to come by and I ended up with a part time job in at a semi rural Anglican church as a children and youth worker. An appoint that happened only because the arch bishop was on holiday – he told me that there was no way he would of let someone with my evangelical background through if he was not on holiday.
Door 2: Working with AFES
I still remember meeting with an AFES head cheese who I’m sure seemed a little worried that two women were basically running the group with the full time worker having left. As we chatted and I was asked questions that only had one right answer (I was given that answer if I didn’t get it right). I could sense that my version of evangelicalism (learnt from someone who was going from Moore Theological College to live in Byron Bay) was not really going to gel with the expected AFES line.
Door 3: Newcastle
I lived in Newcastle after I moved out of home. I loved Newcastle and I still have a soft spot for the city, but I just couldn’t get permanent work or finish my study so I had to move somewhere Perth was it.
Door 4: Studying somewhere other than Murdoch
When I applied to work with the Anglican Church in Perth I needed someone either with a theological qualification or studying theology. There are a huge range of theological colleges in Perth but with no money behind him or not a big enough ongoing income to pay for fees it turned all those choices to just one Murdoch Uni. Don’t get me wrong I loved my time at Murdoch, it has no only really dawned on me that if I study to be a minister I would find it incredibly hard to take off 4 years to study but now I only have one year left to go.
Door 5: Working with the Anglican Church
I loved my time with the Anglican Church I felt like I learnt a lot and really came to appreciate the Anglican ways of doing things. Maybe I could have stayed with the church in some capacity but the roles I had just didn’t have enough hours and although many people were keen to get me some other work to supplement it I had to stop the role. At the time I was gutted that I had to stop but there was no way I’d be priest in the Anglican church I just couldn’t honestly do the liturgy honestly as if it was the way that I best connected with God.
Door 6: A “Real” / “Decent” Job
I am a reasonably intelligent hard working honest person. Most people I meet think I could easily get a job in almost any field I feel like. The reality is I’ve been unemployed and underemployed a lot. Even in my current job I’ve been encouraged by people to find new work as they all think I can “do better”. I once took a careers course with a woman who had helped a lot of UK miners (made famous in the film Brassed Off) get new jobs. In a group of about 10 off everyone felt that they had major break throughs and clarifications about where they should be working. She apologised to me as she had no suggestions for me and admitted I was the only person she met that she couldn’t work out anything to suggest. Skills of Public speaking, teaching, pastoral care, a passion for social justice, experience working with and coordinating volunteers and the ability to work by myself just brought up blanks all the time.
Door 7: Climbing The Ladder
The normal thing to do in most companies is to climb the ladder to some comfortable middle management position. I haven’t been able to do this. The organization I work for is small there is no professional development and as the organization expands any position above mine is always looking for experience and qualifications above mine in fact I’m sure if my current role was re advertised it would ask for qualifications I don’t have. So I continue to the same role I have done for the last 5 years adding extra things to what I do as continue to become more efficient at what I do.
Any way that’s just a few things I could think of off the top of my head. This is probably not good blogging to blurt out all of this. But I’ve always blogged more as a public diary rather than trying to get a crowd of followers I could maybe one day sell advertising to.
Door 1: Mathematics Teaching
Because of some unhelpful Austudy and Centrelink rules I was not able to finish maths education degree despite having done 3.5 years out of 4 and despite a chronic lack of mathematics teachers. Living in Newcastle at the time with one of the highest unemployment rates in Australia work was very hard to come by and I ended up with a part time job in at a semi rural Anglican church as a children and youth worker. An appoint that happened only because the arch bishop was on holiday – he told me that there was no way he would of let someone with my evangelical background through if he was not on holiday.
Door 2: Working with AFES
I still remember meeting with an AFES head cheese who I’m sure seemed a little worried that two women were basically running the group with the full time worker having left. As we chatted and I was asked questions that only had one right answer (I was given that answer if I didn’t get it right). I could sense that my version of evangelicalism (learnt from someone who was going from Moore Theological College to live in Byron Bay) was not really going to gel with the expected AFES line.
Door 3: Newcastle
I lived in Newcastle after I moved out of home. I loved Newcastle and I still have a soft spot for the city, but I just couldn’t get permanent work or finish my study so I had to move somewhere Perth was it.
Door 4: Studying somewhere other than Murdoch
When I applied to work with the Anglican Church in Perth I needed someone either with a theological qualification or studying theology. There are a huge range of theological colleges in Perth but with no money behind him or not a big enough ongoing income to pay for fees it turned all those choices to just one Murdoch Uni. Don’t get me wrong I loved my time at Murdoch, it has no only really dawned on me that if I study to be a minister I would find it incredibly hard to take off 4 years to study but now I only have one year left to go.
Door 5: Working with the Anglican Church
I loved my time with the Anglican Church I felt like I learnt a lot and really came to appreciate the Anglican ways of doing things. Maybe I could have stayed with the church in some capacity but the roles I had just didn’t have enough hours and although many people were keen to get me some other work to supplement it I had to stop the role. At the time I was gutted that I had to stop but there was no way I’d be priest in the Anglican church I just couldn’t honestly do the liturgy honestly as if it was the way that I best connected with God.
Door 6: A “Real” / “Decent” Job
I am a reasonably intelligent hard working honest person. Most people I meet think I could easily get a job in almost any field I feel like. The reality is I’ve been unemployed and underemployed a lot. Even in my current job I’ve been encouraged by people to find new work as they all think I can “do better”. I once took a careers course with a woman who had helped a lot of UK miners (made famous in the film Brassed Off) get new jobs. In a group of about 10 off everyone felt that they had major break throughs and clarifications about where they should be working. She apologised to me as she had no suggestions for me and admitted I was the only person she met that she couldn’t work out anything to suggest. Skills of Public speaking, teaching, pastoral care, a passion for social justice, experience working with and coordinating volunteers and the ability to work by myself just brought up blanks all the time.
Door 7: Climbing The Ladder
The normal thing to do in most companies is to climb the ladder to some comfortable middle management position. I haven’t been able to do this. The organization I work for is small there is no professional development and as the organization expands any position above mine is always looking for experience and qualifications above mine in fact I’m sure if my current role was re advertised it would ask for qualifications I don’t have. So I continue to the same role I have done for the last 5 years adding extra things to what I do as continue to become more efficient at what I do.
Any way that’s just a few things I could think of off the top of my head. This is probably not good blogging to blurt out all of this. But I’ve always blogged more as a public diary rather than trying to get a crowd of followers I could maybe one day sell advertising to.
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