I don't know if you have old churches in your area that have churches with something that looks like a brick triangle attached to the side. That is a buttress, designed to keep the walls straight and not allow the burden of the roof to force the walls apart. It is sometimes used as an addition to an older building for the same purpose. Flying buttresses reach further up and are often designed to keep the stresses from forcing the ceiling to collapse and the walls to fall outwards.

One of my functions in life at the moment seems to act as a buttress, in the family and in the church I belong to. There are small changes happening and when that happens life as a whole changes too. We often do not know to what extent until the cracks appear and then the buttress is used for support.

We are starting a new year in Australia. Now any of you think that happened on the 1st of January? That is just when people THINK the New Year starts. For us people here on the coastal strip the whole of January seems to function as a holiday month. Life is wound down, laid back and taken apart while families deal with children on holidays, grandparents form support teams and how businesses and industry still functions I don't know. Life is slowed under the bright blue sky and burning sun. Then school goes back, February comes and the annual general meeting season starts.

And it seemed today as if everyone says:"We should do something, I know, let's phone Sue and see what she thinks." And so my phone was busy discussing various projects with various people. BUT there really is nothing much to do or say because our church is scheduled to close on March 19. So reforming the Craft group, arranging to clean out the cupboards, planning for the next luncheon all seems to be part of what an active church does, not part of what a closing church does. It saddened me to remind friends that we were participants in an event that really would change life as we have experienced it.

When the church closes we will lose a lot of close relationships, some of our congregation will move to a new church, some will go to another denomination, some will simply stay home on Sundays. Some will continue to ring their friends and I do hope that such friendships do survive the changes. But the network set up to supply emotional, spiritual and in some cases pastoral needs will collapse. In some cases these will be replaced by other services, other friendships even. But some of today's callers know that that doesn't apply to them. Like stroke survivors the aged and frail do not always make new friends.

And so my life as a flying buttress is coming to an end. I rang my daughter about this tonight and her husband said I was being unduly pessimistic. I don't think I am. Ray and I are not as attractive package as we were 22 years ago when we joined our present church. Ray was a muscular and active tradesman. He was Mr Fix-it for all that went wrong. Washers on taps, screws falling out of pews, the front doors jammed again? Call on Ray, that fellow can fix anything! And the missus? Good with kids, helping in the Sunday School, studying the Bible with the other women, helping set up the luncheons. And the kids too, just what we want, more young families in the church!

And then as others aged I took over their jobs too, flower arranging, secretary or president of the groups, organizer of luncheons, picnics and excursions, visitor to hospital and home. Then Ray had the strokes and that was curtailed a little, but there I was still one of the flying buttresses.

I wonder if there is a place where flying buttresses go when their useful life is over? Do we finish up as part of the demolition on site, thrown away or do we become part of a wall, or pavers on a pathway to the new Garden Of Remembrance? I hope there is a plan for us all as I have reassured people today. A plan for all our lives after March 19.