This portion of my journey begins today, with a little drive to Houston, TX. And Sunday I fly to Scotland. I will be spending six weeks on the Isle of Iona, Scotland at the Abbey. Many folks have asked how you learned about this opportunity.
Last year a couple of my friends were planning to spend a week at Iona, but it never came about. While looking over the website http://www.iona.org.uk/ I noticed that they accepted volunteers to work throughout the year. And that started my brain churning. You must apply for a volunteer position, which was an interesting process. Fortunately, through my experiences on VIM (Volunteers in Mission) teams, I have developed a wide and varied skill set. The application also required recommendations from employers and pastors, so it was a detailed application. I was very excited when the process concluded with my acceptance to work for six weeks.
One of the funniest moments came when I was told that I had to obtain a criminal background check to enable me to work around children. HA! After enduring all those questions during Safe Sanctuaries training about “why do we need to do background checks” it was a joy to learn that this was a universal precaution. And thanks to the capable assistants in our Board of Ordained Ministry office it was handled, and completed in short order.
From June 16 to July 28 I will be working as a kitchen assistant and childcare worker and I couldn’t be more pleased.
I always resented interruptions to my work until I realized that those interruptions were my real work. Ronald Rolheiser
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