Jude Smith

In my last post I threw out a line- “ I am aware that the Anglican notion of working six days a week is ridiculous. The extra half day outside of work is just about a doable thing, but I think we need to shove things into five days for the good of everyone.” In facebook and other comments that is the thing that seems to have stood out to people- and so I feel that I need to explain a bit more fully why I’ve come to that place in my thinking. Firstly, this is a personal choice that I’ve made, which has come through a journey of acknowledging that I am a driven sort and finding ways to ensure that I am still alive and functioning in twenty years time.   Secondly, this is a work in progress. Thirdly, and more expansively- when I say that we should work five days not six this is what I think I mean. (I think it was clear in the first post that I do actually work more than five days) I realised quite early on in ordained life that I needed to have two days a week wh

Each year I take a calendar month and record what I do in it. I break each day into twenty minute chunks and note down what happens in each twenty minute block. I don’t do the same for designated Sabbath time (nor do I note each bit of time outside of the beginning and end of a working day, no-one needs to know how long I clean my teeth for).   I categorise each thing that I do (an imperfect science) with a view to getting a handle on what I do with my time.  This year I did the audit in November (as clergy I always avoid doing this in Lent, Advent or August).  So- what did I discover? I work around 55 hours a week. (thats up one hour from last year) That work is spread over five and a half days. The only sabbath day that was interrupted by work was about processing a painful meeting.  Of 26 working days, I worked 12 evenings. In terms of what I do: In November 17% of my time was taken up with prayer, reading and learning. Thats a slightly false r