Easter Sunday

The Easter Sunday service began at 5am!!! I found this all a bit odd as the usual point of early services on Easter day is to have the first Eucharist of the day to celebrate Christ's resurrection, but we'd had a Eucharist service the evening before to celebrate this. I know it wasn't actually Easter then but if were acting as if it was then surely we wouldn't need 1 so early the next day, whereas if we hadn't had such a service the night before then I can see why people would like to have 1 early that day. I wasn't the only 1 who thought this+many didn't like that we had the service last night which they haven't had before at COTT (Fungayi has changed much of COTT's services since joining as chaplain in January and its not always gone down V well!).

That aside, it was a lovely typical Easter day Eucharist service. In fact it was a wonderful service! It was great to have a typical COTT Eucharistic service here as the last thing we do together at COTT before we leave. Everyone was joyful, the songs were in various languages, the marimbas were played in several points during the service, etc. During the peace I tried to get to everyone to give them a last hug+I V. nearly did this,but just ran out of time before getting to a few people at the other side of the chapel. Several of these came+gave me a hug goodbye anyway after the service which was good.

At the end of the service Dom,me+Jon were called to the front by Fungayi. He said a few words of appreciation for our time here +then we were asked to kneel in front of the altar as various people came forward to lay hands on us+all prayed. Among those who came forward to lay hands on us were Fungayi, the Rector Bill, Fr.Percy a lecturer, Vic a lecturer, +students Vernon, Gregory, Godukile, Jeannean+Badaneli, among others. During the prayers a chorus was sung +many prayed at once in their own languages. As this came to a natural end Fr.Percy said a prayer in English. It was a wonderful moment where I felt so supported+loved.

Grant, the student chairperson, then said a few words+gave us the 1st copies of the 'Who's Who' -the COTT directory of all staff+students. This is great as it has everyone's photo in+email addresses,among other info. Grant saud we'd wrapped ourselves around their hearts and he hoped they'd done the same for us.

Fr.Isaias who organises the exchanges at COTT then said a few words of appreciation+asked us to share our experiences of our time here which I+Dom then did. We mainly said we'd enjoyed the expereince, we'd loved getting to know everyone and we'd take back with us the community mindset and their passion for God.

Following this Bill said a few words too, including that they’d learnt from us, particularly from Dom that ‘disability is different abled, not dis-abled’, from Jon they’d learnt what it means to support your spouse, and from me they’d learnt ‘that dynamite comes in small packages!’

It was all incredibly touching+we all felt a tinge of sadness to be saying our farewells.

Next we went back to our seats for a final prayer+then a hymn which was sung so joyfully that many,including Dom,danced their way to the altar! I didn't as I was busy banging the pew with a marimba stick +therefore just dancing on the spot!

It was a fitting service to end our time here.