Sunday was a good day at the church. For the first time in over 18 months we had congregants back in the Sanctuary for worship. There were plenty of tears and lots of joy. I didn’t know what to expect going into the day. Would it be awkward after all this time? Would it feel different? Would our reservation system and the process for checking vaccinations work? Would it get in the way of having church?
The systems seemed to work just fine on Sunday, except for problems with viewing the service through our website. We are not sure what happened here, whether it was the number of people trying to connect or what. If you did have problems and want to view the service now, I hope you will. Here’s the link:
https://boxcast.tv/channel/uio1swe8fnfspcmtxuba?b=nqcamnqjrf3kkflawm4i
What surprised me on Sunday were the things that I noticed. Little things, like little gasps of joy when people were invited to sing “Shall We Gather at the River,” or the way certain phrases in the Responsive Reading seemed to catch people and somehow be enlarged by the way we, together, read them. How I had forgotten what a blessing it is to hear the subtle responses verbalized to the prayer or reading I was offering. Or the ways people had changed over these months—longer hair, a little older, hints that these months of isolation and fear may have taken a toll in ways we still may not completely appreciate.
Sunday was just the beginning of our regathering. It will take some time before we know much at all about this new church that’s emerging. You’ll notice more intention in our words to reflect the fact that going forward a significant number of people who take part in our worship will be online. I hope if you are one of them you will feel very much welcome. This new church is something we are all creating together. And there are still lots of questions: When will social hour return? Can we buy books in the bookstore for our holiday shopping? Many things to be determined. And we can no doubt expect a bump or two along the way.
But Sunday felt like a blessing. And a start. Next week will be Celebration Sunday when we’ll be invited to make our own commitments about our part in this church that’s unfolding. I hope you will join us next Sunday whether it is online or in person. The church needs all of us right now. In the meantime, I invite us to notice the people around us and what might be stirring inside each of us as we find our way in this hopefully-almost-post pandemic world.
In that spirit, let me share one of my favorite poems by Billy Collins about community and about noticing. It is entitled “Passengers.”
Passengers
At the gate, I sit in a row of blue seats
with the possible company of my death,
this sprawling miscellany of people—
carry-on bags and paperbacks—
that could be gathered in a flash
into a band of pilgrims on the last open road.
Not that I think
if our plane crumpled into a mountain
we would all ascend together,
holding hands like a ring of skydivers,
into a sudden gasp of brightness,
or that there would be some common place
for us to reunite to jubilize the moment,
some spaceless, pillarless Greece
where we could, at the count of three,
toss our ashes into the sunny air.
It’s just that the way that man has his briefcase
so carefully arranged,
the way that girl is cooling her tea,
and the flow of the comb that woman
passes through her daughter’s hair . . .
and when you consider the altitude,
the secret parts of the engines,
and all the hard water and the deep canyons below . . .
well, I just think it would be good if one of us
maybe stood up and said a few words,
or, so as not to involve the police,
at least quietly wrote something down.
— Billy Collins