LUNCH ATMOSPHERE

For the first time in a long time I decided to join the regular crew for Friday pub-lunch today.

Well, the weather was nice, the workload was low and the general bonhomie around the office was such that the usual suspects were happy enough to invite me along to the beer garden in The Crown.

I had forgotten. I sat there, in front of a jacket potato and a pint of Pepsi while the euphemisms and filthy in-jokes flew around the table. Some things I understood; some things I didn't. One thing was clear though - I was uncomfortable.

They knew it too. After a while it became a bit of a thing, and one of them said:

"I bet you're sorry you came out after all now..."

... which wasn't quite as true as my face was showing. The truth is that if somebody says something appalling, my face reacts before my head has had a chance to adapt and respond. I sat, wondering whether Jesus would get up and walk back to work on his own or whether he would show his unique mastery by accepting people where they were at - but by the time those thoughts had flicked by, my face had already given way to shock and disgust in all its eyebrow-raising-red-cheeked embarrassment.

At one point I just said, "That is so distasteful," in response to something that was actually far worse than distasteful, and which wild horses would not drag me to repeat. Ever.

They knew it was too; I could tell by the reaction.

I don't know what Jesus would have done. He might have challenged what he saw, speaking right to the heart of what goes on underneath the subtext. He might have stayed, he might have said something outrageous, he might have been kind, angry, silent or ready for a parable. It struck me as interesting that I didn't really know.

I stayed. I listened and observed at the end of the table, hoping that integrity would win the day, even if today was not that day.

On the way back, I chatted with one of them, mostly about work-stuff. The sun was blistering through the sky and the air was roasting. It occurred to me suddenly, that this person simply would not be able to say the things to me that they had been saying twenty minutes before. It would have been inconceivable to them, given the new tone of our conversation, one-to-one.

I also knew somehow that it would have been inconceivable to all of them - I thought around the table - every one would have been the same on the way back to the office. Yet together...

I found that at least a little bit comforting. I might not have been able to directly change the atmosphere in the same way Jesus would have done it; I certainly don't think I'd be as courageous or as controversial. I might not have made the right decision to go in the first place, but given that I had, I thought I'd done okay.

Would I go again next time? Not without thinking more carefully about it. Can I change the atmosphere? Of course, even if it has to happen one-to-one, face-to-face, one atmosphere at a time. I do hope that came across.