Evening Illumination

On Christmas Eve, as I usually do, I sang with the choir at the two evening services. I also played with the handbell choir, which provided music before the early service. My stations at the back of the nave and in the chancel were particularly good vantage points to evaluate the lighting for the service.

As the ringers waited to begin, acolytes were lighting the pew candles. Many years ago, when I was involved in preparations for the Great Vigil of Easter, the lighting of the pew candles was the subject of much discussion and planning. Back then, every effort was made to make the process both smooth-running and dignified. Fresh candles were used, so that the wicks could easily be reached over the glass chimneys, and tall acolytes were preferred to make lighting the candles easier. On Christmas Eve, however, as has lamentably become our practice, no chimneys were in evidence. Even though the candles were relatively short, one acolyte took candles out of their holders to be lighted by another acolyte. The lighted candles were then replaced in their holders. The effect was to turn a ceremonial task into a supremely pedestrian one.

Of course, I had to wonder why we even bothered with candles. It seems to have been forgotten at St. Paul’s that lighting for an evening service should not attempt to reproduce daylight. The lighting for Christmas Eve was apparently the same as for a Sunday morning service. The effect was to make the candles look downright silly.

Someday, I hope that worship at St. Paul’s will recover the sensitivity to ambiance and solemnity it once had.

Handicapped Access

New door from parking lot. The button to
open the door is at the right.

I was delighted when the automatic door was installed at St. Paul’s off the elevator lobby. I have helped more than one wheelchair-bound visitor enter the building from the parking lot in times past. It has been a cumbersome task and one that would be almost impossible without an escort.

Unfortunately, the new door and door opener have yet to provide reliable access for the handicapped. Ever since it was installed, I have pressed the button to activate the door opener when entering or leaving the building to see how well the new arrangement was working. In fact, the opener is virtually useless. I would guess that pressing the button works about once in ten tries. I have complained about this, but the automatic opener remains a cynical joke. Why can we not get this piece of technology to work? A door opener is not, as they say, rocket science.

As helpful as a working automatic door opener would be, that mechanism is not the only piece of infrastructure needed to facilitate access to the building by people with limited mobility.

Broken sidewalk outside door to building.

Entering the church from the parking lot in a wheelchair is made difficult by the fact that the path to the door is uphill. As if this weren’t bad enough, the sidewalk outside the door is broken, presenting another hazard to anyone navigating the path to the door using a walker or wheelchair.

It is gratifying that St. Paul’s is making some effort to facilitate access to the building by handicapped persons. Unfortunately, we are not paying sufficient attention to details. We seem to be solving the access problem only in the abstract, rather than thinking about what a handicapped person actually faces.

Being a welcoming church requires more than self-declaration. Being welcoming requires putting ourselves in the shoes of visitors and asking ourselves what visitors want and need.

Postscript. I have suggested that we should have an automatic door opener on the handicap rest room. Even the able-bodied can find the door to this facility tough to open. An automatic door opener on the rest room would be very helpful and a thoughtful addition to our physical plant. Of course, the door opener would not be helpful if it worked only as well as the opener on the door to the parking lot.

Bishop’s Pastoral Letter Issued

The bishop has released his pastoral letter regarding blessing same-sex unions and ordination of persons in committed same-sex relationships. (Both will be allowed.) Details can be found here.

Sad News

I just learned that Heather Roman, wife of Andy Roman, died yesterday in Florida. There will be a service for Heather at St. Paul’s at a time to be determined with the bishop as officiant. I expect that an official announcement from St. Paul’s will soon be forthcoming.

Give rest, O Christ, to your servant with your saints, where sorrow and pain are no more, neither sighing, but life everlasting.

Is Youth Ministry Killing the Church?

That provocative title is not mine, but the title of a 2010 blog post from Kate Murphy that has received a lot of attention lately in the Episcopal blogosphere. The question seems silly, of course, but Murphy makes an interesting case. Given that St. Paul’s has had a long-time commitment to youth ministry, that case should be given consideration. Her point is that strong youth programs tend to isolate youth in their own ghetto, rather than integrating them into the overall life of the church. When they graduate from high school, young people no longer have a connection to the church. Read her essay and see if you don’t agree with the problem she identifies. Is our youth program on the right track?

On Feeling Needed and Being Yourself at Church

A recent issue of Episcopal Journal, a privately published monthly newspaper that tries to replace the defunct Episcopal Life, carried two essays by Lisa Fox. The essays first appeared on Fox’s blog, My Manner of Life, where they carried the titles “No one needed me there” and “Ministry of denim/ministry of pearls.” In Episcopal Journal, they appeared under the title "On feeling needed and being yourself at church.”

These thoughtful essays make interesting reading for St. Paul’s parishioners. “No one needed me there” argues that we should not only welcome newcomers but should also give them something to do, so that they can get to know others and feel a part of the parish community. “Ministry of denim/ministry of pearls” tells the story of ushering in jeans with a companion usher dressed to the nines. Fox’s message: “If we want to claim to welcome everyone, we need to make that visible.”

Sound System for Dummies

Choir members have been quietly grumbling about the inability to hear what is going on in church. The new sound system has two small speakers in the chancel, but the sound level they produce is clearly inadequate. It is difficult to hear the scripture readings or sermon. Yesterday, I finally decided to say something about the problem, but before I did so, I took a look at the new equipment in the ambulatory. Although there are level controls accessible for sound system inputs (wired and wireless microphones), I could find no output level controls either on the front panel of the system or in back. Instead, there are pushbuttons for soft, medium, and loud sound.

I spoke to Paul Barker about the problem with the level of sound in the chancel, and he said that it was necessary to call in a technician to change the balance of the system. (Making the overall sound louder was clearly not the right solution.) This is ridiculous. Our new sound system seems designed for dummies who cannot be trusted to make even the most minor adjustments to the system. Instead, we have to call in a technician, who,  I assume, we have to pay for.

I was audio-visual coödinator at St. Paul’s for nearly two decades and often thought about what a new sound system should look like. I even served on two committees that solicited bids for a new system. The system we have now is nothing like what I thought we needed or what was bid by the vendors we spoke to.

The new sound system has its virtues, but it also has some serious limitations. That it was designed under the assumptions that we’re all idiots at St. Paul’s is certainly one of its faults.