Easter in the prison went really well – beyond all expectations. We didn’t overthink it this year, and just let it unfold. It was beautiful. On holy saturday Jenny brought in platters of bread, cheese and grapes – we decided that we would celebrate god’s presence in our hell by having lunch together. One woman just sat looking at the food, she couldn’t bring herself to eat it, and after a while she whispered to those of us around her, ‘I think I’m in heaven’.

I had another of those conversations last week with someone who insinuated that we were doing something virtuous or sacrificial or brave by being in the prison over easter. Really, I’m not that generous – I do it because it makes sense of my world in a way that nothing else does.

I left the prison each day and went home to pack boxes, moving house the day after easter. The new place is gorgeous but currently internet free. It’s meant that I’ve started reading the newspaper again, instead of reading news on line – it feels like a reclaimed luxury, and like I know stuff again about the world! There was a great article hidden in yesterday’s paper about the fallacies of multi-tasking, particularly as it relates to creative, non-linear work. The article gave all the common sense reasons why multi-tasking is damaging: when we multi-task we ‘do by rote’, disabling our capacity to reflect and change what we do, which is of course the most critical part of double or triple loop learning; things take longer when we multi-task and we lose a sense of accomplishment when a task is finished because our mind groups all current tasks together. The kicker was the line that talked about how we all think we multi-task better than anyone else, but really we’re deluding ourselves… and worse, multi-tasking is addictive, feeding into our desire for constant stimulation.

I’d like to get back in the habit of uni-tasking. I’m going to ask myself, when i begin a task, whether it’s something that’s worth focussing on to the exclusion of all else, and if so i’ll create an environment of singular focus and non-stimulation in order to do that. I think that means I have to not be afraid of being bored. I also suspect it’s going to be much harder than i imagine…

I’ve learnt, over the last few months, that the expected never happens. I’m used to the significant moment in the worship being when we light the candles, or when we’ve finally finished all the words, and after the blessing there’s a long period of silence. That’s the point at which peace seems to descend. But this time it was in the a’capella renditions of ‘Away in the manger’ and ‘Silent night’ – songs chosen in the hope that the men who can’t read would at least know the first verses, and could simply repeat them as often as the carols required. They did. And we stumbled through the verses with infinitely more enthusiasm than ability, stopping between them to listen to the loudspeaker announcements about medication, breakfast, and the morning program… Forget any cathedral children’s choir, in spite of it being hopelessly out of tune and out of time, I have a hunch this was as close to angels singing as you could ever hope to hear.

I still don’t think we could sing on any other day but christmas – but there’s something about christmas in the prison that makes everyone who’s at the service determined to make it work. And perhaps there’s something about being used to having no dignity that lets you sing as though no one is listening. In most of the events that I’m part of, I assume that my ‘audience’ is cynical – that i will have to break through that cynicism in order for people to engage. I think the cynicism is justified [though perhaps i'm justifying my own by saying that!] – we’ve been offered cheap cliches and hackneyed promises too often – but i’ve also realised it’s a luxury of those for whom faith is an option. In the prison, the men are on side from the moment we walk in the door. They want – need? – it to work much more than i do, which makes, as i’ve said before, an overwhelming responsibility. They’ll search out the moment of transcendence in the most awkward of liturgies. Just the fact that we’ve turned up means it’s christmas… People kept insinuating that i was doing something noble by going into the prison on christmas day, but in reality it’s hard to imagine anything more humbling, or any role more privileged. How very lucky i am.