This photo and entry will give away quite a bit about who I am and where I am, but ach well… in for a penny…

Just before Christmas I had a phone call from a council employee who is working on promoting our local community. She thought it would be a good idea if the local new residents were seen on lamppost banners doing some of the things you can do around here. So she had contacted the library, a local historical society and some of the local businesses. She wondered if as one of the local churches we would like to be involved…

It seemed like a little bit of fun and recognition that we are part of the local community, so I tentatively agreed but said I would need to gauge interest amongst the Kirk Session.

For the most part they were extremely positive, with much the same view. There was some concern about where the photos might happen, and would there be a pretend wedding – all very legitimate questions. One elder even volunteered two people they knew to dress up as the pandas.

After two days of wild wind and torrential rain, it was a pleasure to see the sun on the day of the photo shoot. Both the photographer and the two council employees wearing the suits were extremely helpful and keen not to overstep the boundaries some elders felt were important, and so there are shots on the outside and at the top of the aisle as you would leave the church.

It obviously caused a little flurry of attention, with another photographer turning up because he had heard there was something happening at the church. However there was nothing much to see, but two children in tow holding panda heads for the poor girls who were suffering from the heat inside the panda suit and a minister in ordinary clothes holding a bunch of flowers.

That all seems quite normal to me…