Hospital
Arthur smelled very bad.
No one really knew where he came from, but our wrinkled noses certainly told us when he was coming. He always wore the same grubby, threadbare overcoat, his stained teeth were impossibly crooked, and he was famous – or infamous, perhaps – for disturbing our Sunday services.
Arthur was very strange indeed, and for years we couldn’t work out why, though there was plenty of speculation. Arthur would usually interrupt the preacher, asking an off the wall question that was both right in the middle of the sermon, and bore no relevance to what was being talked about. A message on prayer would be punctuated by an enquiry concerning how likely it might be that Queens Park Rangers would win next Saturday’s match, and what the actual score would be; a study on the High Priest in Hebrews would prompt a public interrogation about the rising price of haddock in the High Street. Firmly, but with incredible kindness, our lovely, patient minister would ask Arthur to be quiet, and tell him that he’d love to pick up the chat about soccer or seafood at the end of the service. Arthur would always grunt the same apology, settle down for a while, until the next urgent question popped into his brain, prompting another outburst. After a while we got used to it, although it was a nightmare for visiting preachers who had not been forewarned.
Once our church rented a bus and we all attended a district event in another town, Arthur came along, and bought his dog with him. The service was convened by a very well spoken, mildly pompous minister who had no knowledge of Arthur’s questioning habits. Those were the days when we used to “sing choruses” rather than have a time of worship, and, appallingly, we were also invited to shout out our requests for the selection of the next song – a kind of devotional desert island discs. At the end of a rather dreary song, the Minister asked the packed church if they had any requests. Arthur put his hand up.
“I have a request”, chortled Arthur, a huge grin taking over his entire face.
“Delightful. Lovely. What is your request?” asked the Minister.
“Can you change these awful chairs? They’re really ‘ard, and my bum’s killing me. Even me dog ‘ates ‘em”.
Blood drained from the pastor’s face, who had probably never heard the word “bum” in his entire existence, and possibly didn’t even possess one himself. I looked across the congregation; shoulders were shaking in barely controlled mirth, and some were stuffing bibles into their mouths to avoid laughing out loud.
Then one day the mystery of Arthur’s mild madness was revealed. It turned out that he had been the innocent victim of an East End gang war many years earlier. A revenge attack – probably over territory - went badly wrong with mix up over addresses. Two hired thugs knocked on Arthur’s door, and then knocked him over the head with an iron bar, creating some catastrophic and irreversible brain damage. Arthur was never the same. In classic East End style, when the gangsters realised that they had attacked the wrong man, they came back and apologised and helped him get to the hospital.
Arthur recovered – but the essential skills of tact and appropriateness were gone for ever. For the rest of his life, he just said whatever came into his damaged head.
Arthur is probably long gone now. I’m so glad that he was a part of our church. He didn’t really fit anywhere else, and had been handed a life sentence of being odd and strange because of his calamity. His presence gave us the opportunity to be kind, compassionate, and inclusive. He showed us that the church is not a trophy case crammed with nice, together people. It’s a place where those tragically dubbed as misfits can find that they fit; where odd types can belong and believe, and where the word “nerd” is banned. It’s a hospital, a place of healing. Church is not an elite gallery for the smooth, the sleek, and the strong.
Which is good news for us all; Arthur’s malady was, at times, painfully obvious: we hide our dents and disabilities more efficiently. But there is a welcome for us all.
Thanks, Arthur. And if they have chairs in heaven, I’m sure that they are more to your liking.