Starring Ellyn as the Sour Church Secretary!!!

Mary (aka -any random caller to the Church of St. ____) : You don't know the first thing about love.
Hilary Faye (aka Ellyn) : [Hilary Faye throws a Bible at Mary] I am *filled* with Christ's love!
Somewhere in the past couple of weeks I ‘celebrated’ my third anniversary as a part-time church secretary. I’m not sure of the exact day I started......it is all kind of a blur. I do remember that I worked up the courage to call about the job opening on 9/11/01. So it has been three years and I still love the job. There have been the occassional days when I haven’t particularly felt like putting on decent clothes or driving through lousy weather, but not really any when I flat out didn’t want to go to work because I didn’t like the job. Today is another day when I’m looking forward to getting to work. ( Not necessarily looking forward to showering in our chilly house or battling the killer SUV’s in the parking lot, but looking forward to doing my part for the Church.) I do have a slight twinge of guilt about not doing my best on Friday; could be a nice lead off topic when I meet with my spiritual director this afternoon before we get into the hard core St. John of the Cross stuff. Here is my quandry: We had a phone call from a funeral home regarding a funeral on Saturday for a three year old. The funeral director said that the family would find it comforting to do a balloon release after the funeral. As I expected, the business manager nixed the balloon release......we just don’t do them because of all the trees outside of the church. Past experience has proven that a large percentage of the balloons never make it up into the sky. So I tell the funeral director to check with the cemetery - they probably have unrestricted air space. But the child was to be cremated later, so there would be no opportunity at the cemetery. So....
I did my job. I was pleasant and sympathetic yet firm and practical. Yet, should I have gone out of my way to beg the business manager (in the pastor’s absence) to allow a balloon release just this once? Or suggest that the park across the street might work.....Or the parking lot behind the church? The strict constructionist in me wanted to say that if the Mass itself could not bring some comfort to the family what makes them think that letting go of helium balloons would help. But I’m not there to advance my opinions. (Oh, if I were only paid a commission on the stuff I don’t say I would already have a nice retirement fund started.) So.......it’s the Monday after the funeral and it still bothers me. Maybe I should have done more....