Reflection on Zac's a week later

A week has passed so I can write calmly about last Tuesday's bible study at Zac's, the one I was leading.

I got there early and a young woman who doesn't usually come wanted to use the toilet so that was fine. Then she asked if we were doing food and when told no, we were doing bible study, she said she wouldn't stay. She was quite apologetic but went. Again fine.

A bit later Martyn, one of the regulars, arrived and came and found me in the kitchen. He said, 'Christine (not her real name) just came onto me at the corner of the road and said she'd been thrown out of Zac's because she was a Roman Catholic.'

I think my jaw must actually have dropped.

I reassured him it was no such thing, which he knew anyway, but thanked him for telling me. What on earth happened in the 100 yards between leaving us and meeting Martyn that caused such an enormous ... well, lie? 

I suppose in her head it wasn't a lie. Somehow it had become true for her. Or it was a lie and she wanted to damage Zac's for not feeding her. Who knows? 

I should have known the evening wasn't go to go strictly to plan after that.

Will (not his real name) was there. I confess my heart sank a little when he walked in. Will likes to talk, has an opinion on everything, says he believes in Jesus, has humanist beliefs, takes discussions off at tangents, irritates people, doesn't know when to stop. But he's clever and I do quite like him.

Later in the study when I'd been doing my best to get things back on track two young men came in. One asked me to read a prayer, one of those little prayer card things - RC incidentally - Christine would have approved. I said I'd read it at the end. 'Okay,' he said, then  asked me every three minutes.

His friend, who is one of the rare people to have been banned occasionally from Zac's, said, 'Jesus saved me,' just before telling us that the yellow people were coming, the Meking. Fortunately he quietened down after that. Or did he leave? I can't remember. It was turning into a bit of a blur.

His friend meanwhile took a seat at the back and continued to converse with his neighbours in between apologising and asking me to read his prayer.

Afterwards he came up to me and said, 'You didn't read my prayer.'
'I did.'
'Oh I didn't hear you.'

Postscript
At least I wasn't spat upon and I didn't have to intervene in a fist fight as was the case for another study leader recently. Physical violence is rare but occasional; verbal abuse more frequent.