Sanctus1 ... Continued

I need to blog about that service I went to on sunday before I either completely forget about it or my memory becomes so warped that I remember things that didn't happen.

I arrived at about 10 to 8 and the service was due to commence at 8. That's incredibly early for me, my usual time for arriving at church is about 5 minutes after the service has begun. I was one of the first non-involved people there and I was shown into a room with seats around the edges, beanbags and rugs on the floor in the middle and a projector set up to project onto a big screen at one end of the room. The room was fairly dark but with ambient lighting in the corners faintly illuminating the church architecture. A steady stream of people began to come into the room, most of whom seemed to know each other and there was a fair bit of chatting going on. I got talking to the girl sitting next to me, she was very pleasant, she wanted to know how I'd found out about them.

As the service began the chatter stopped and the room fell into a reverent silence that would last for most of the rest of the evening (until the tea and coffee broke the spell).

The service began with lighting three candles to symbolise each member of the trinity. We were then told the legend of St Christopher. I had heard the bit of the story before - about St Chris carrying a wee lad across a river only to find out it was Jesus he had been ferrying. But I hadn't heard the rest of the legend, about how our St Christopher got the job as human bridge in the first place.

The purpose of this saintly story was to introduce our theme for the evening 'All Saints', relevant with it being close to all saints day. After this brief intro I was still wondering how the rest of the service would be shaped but I soon found out that from this point on I was expected to get up and move around. There were several small romms set aside in different parts of the building. Each room laid out with a different activity.

The first room I entered had a very short (<2 meters) athletics track marked out on the floor in white tape. I didn't really get the reason behind this demarkation of lanes on the floor but perhaps it was simply to mark out a pathway for each traveller to journey down. In that room we were told we were travellers, so we should take a pebble and add it to the cairn. The carin wasn't very big by this time but it was the first room I had gone to, I imagine it would have grown beyond the small handful of pebbles I added my offering to. As instructed, I marked a friend's name on a card and added it to a 'prayer shrine' of people we should try and help along their journey.

I made my way into a second room. The room was already pretty full of industrious people kneeling on the floor. As I found room to kneel down alongside them I saw what they were industriously making - origami cranes. I did read the reasoning behind this prayful paper folding but the exact meaning escapes me - something to do with Francis Asissi and a completely unrelated story of a japanesse girl who had folded a thousand cranes in order to have her wish granted. I wrote my prayer for peace on my blue sugar paper and then spent an agonizing 20 minutes trying to follow instructions that said things like 'fold the bottom corner of the top sheet over the top corner ...' I did eventually fold an acceptable paper crane - but not without the help and guidance of a few others who had folded before me.

The third room had a tv playing a looped video of Madonna's 'like a prayer' and a cross decorated with many different images of all types of people. The 'like a prayer' video features a statue of a black saint coming to life, and is supposed to be about combatting racism. I'm afraid it didn't make me think much about racial equality - only about Madonna's use of religious iconography and how much of it is an attention-getting act.

The final section was a presentation about some modern day saints - but I only saw a couple because the wandering around section of the worship was drawing to a close. I had thought that would be the end of the service but it wasn't. When we came back together we had a slow and respectful communion. One by one we went forward in silence to help ourselves to the bread and wine. I have to say the wine was the best communion wine I've ever had. It was proper full-bodied red wine, not the sweet sickly stuff I've had elsewhere (or the horrible ribena-like stuff we have at my church!)

That was the worship over with and there was chance to chat again. I really enjoyed that bit - especially so when I was invited to the pub to continue the conversation.

I did have a good night. I enjoyed the worship and I thought it had a lot to offer - but I did wonder if it placed a lot of emphasis on personal prayer and introspection - no matter how creative - and not enough on corporate worship and looking outwards toward God.