Church Auditions, Week 3
Ooooooh - and to think I almost went somewhere else this morning!
I had a hard time picking which church to attend today. Having gone to the two "largest" Methodist churches in the area, and knowing I have an affinity for the medium-large sized churches, rather than the "baby" churches (for one, the music. for two, baby churches are almost always informal, and I like the more structured service rituals I grew up with. It has nothing on a Catholic service, mind, but still...)
I knew there were several other UMC churches in the area, and so I decided I would try one more before I moved on to auditioning UCC or Presbyterian churches - the two denominations closest in both form and beliefs to my own. I've been attending a UCC church for several years now, and have been very, very happy there, so I almost ditched my plan to try one more UMC church and just jump right into a UCC one instead.
I'm glad I didn't. Instead, I stuck to my guns and researched the other nearby Methodist churches. There were 3, one larger than I thought (it has 3 services; more than any other church I've dealt with lately except for Church of the Saviour back "home" in Cleveland Heights) and the other two clearly "baby" churches.
I almost went to the larger church....except that of the 3 services (8:30, 9:45, and 11:10) only the 8:30 service was billed as "Traditional." The other two were called Contemporary - and my experience of contemporary worship is....I am not comfortable there. I don't find it to be a good balance of meditation/reflection and engagement. It is more like a production than a worship service. There generally is a "praise team" that leads the music - which is heavy on Bill Gaither and Amy Grant - and makes me cringe. There isn't any contemplative time in the service, and it is unrelentingly positive. Things are treated like a show, with clapping for good performances.
Can you tell that I'm not much into the contemporary scene? :P I know that many, many people are - but I would much prefer a service with a better balance of introspection and praise. I find it very, very difficult to connect with God in any meaningful fashion during a contemporary service - whether it is during the music, the sermon, or the prayers. I miss the quieter tone of a traditional, more structured service - and I prefer not to be told that everything is wonderful all of the time. Because it isn't.
ANYwho. Since I didn't feel like going to the 8:30 service and standing out (NOBODY except little old ladies goes to the 8:30 service when it isn't summer and golfing weather), I decided that wasn't the church for me today. Besides, their aggressive stance toward a "non-dress" dress code also put me off. Mind you, long gone are the days when I felt compelled to wear a dress or skirt to church - but I DO try to look nice, and sometimes I do opt for the skirt! Being told it isn't necessary rankled more than a little bit. What do you mean, I shouldn't look my best for God? Maybe there will be days when my "best" IS jeans and a sweatshirt - but the key here is "my best" - not "don't trouble your pretty little head about it, nobody cares." Yeah. I care. I care about wanting to show honor/respect: to God, to the others in the church, to myself. Troubling about my appearance is part of that.
LOLOL - ok. So now you know where I most emphatically did NOT go! And the irony of it is - it really doesn't bother me anymore to see others not dressed up in church. It was more the feeling of being told, in effect, don't bother.
My second choice was a smaller church - but they only had one service, and it was touted as a "Combined" service - part traditional, part contemporary. My feeling is - if you have to tell me that, then it is going to be all Contemporary with a prelude or organ piece thrown in as a sop to all us "old-timers" who prefer more traditional things. Besides, it was at 9:00 am - still more early than I'd hoped. It also says that their normal message is "upbeat" - code for: We're not going to make you sad or tackle hard things here, so if you're struggling with some issue of faith, forget it!
At this point, I almost gave up and went looking for UCC churches. In fact, I had the google page all ready - but then I realized that there was one more Methodist church in the area. Just 10 minutes away - closer than the other two I'd already attended. Grandview United Methodist Church.
It vaguely reminded me of one of my early childhood churches, both in the building look and in the description of the activities. Just one service, it started at 10:30 - earlier than I'd hoped but still highly acceptable, especially compared to the 8:30 service I'd first contemplated! I decided to give it a shot.
I was right - it very strongly reminded me of any one of several small suburban churches that my Dad served when I was growing up. There were between 50 and 60 people (probably closer to 60-65 by the time all was said and done) attending the service, with an additional 11-12 in the choir, the liturgist, and the minister. The sound system guy was upstairs in the balcony (tried to get a shot of him up there, but it didn't take.
Here's the chancel area:
In the first pic, the minister and liturgist are headed into the chancel. The minister (on the left in the view) has obviously dyed her hair since her picture on the website. The second picture shows the choir sitting on the right on padded chairs. What isn't very clear is the view of the two stained-glass windows, one on each side of the chancel. They were lovely, in a contemporary stained-glass style. I think there's a picture of them on the website somewhere, but I'm not sure about that.
I got there just about 5 minutes before the start of the service and ended up sitting in a pew 2/3 of the way back in the sanctuary. After the service was over, I took a pic of my seatmate and some of the parishoners, as well as a shot of the back of the sanctuary and the balcony:
There weren't actually seats in the balcony - in fact, it looked like it was either a rehearsal or Sunday School area up there or something. But I thought it was cool.
There were many more positives than negatives about this experience; in fact there were just a few, minor negatives, so I'll list those first.
MINUSES:
* The minister, as good as her sermon was, NEEDS to learn to pray better. I found myself counting the number of times she said "Just" during her prayer - as in "I just want to tell you, Lord" "I just ask, Lord" "I just want them to feel your arms around them." NO. No, no, no, no, no. No Justs!
* No passing of the peace. Darn! I miss that when it isn't there! Not that this particular congregation really needs it; first, they are just as good at the "making you feel included and welcome" as the first church had been and, second, they know when not to talk! Even so, there was neither a passing of the peace nor an attendance pad. Darn. I would have liked to have known the name of that rather nice looking dude I was sitting in a pew with! I did notice there was no ring.....
* ummm.....hmmmmmm. I think that's it.
PLUSES
* The Music - it was not the amazing organ of the previous two sundays, but a good one, and a good, solid organist. Nothing flashy, but just very solid, excellent playing. Good tempo on the hymns, sure-fingered on the prelude/postlude, good piano skills on the anthem. Speaking of which, there were actually 2 anthems - the bell choir played one of the anthems. They had 7 ringers, plus the director who also rang a bell (telling me that at least one person was absent today). It was an appropriately scored piece for a choir that size and they nailed it. It was lovely! It wasn't horribly difficult - an arrangement of Thy Word Is A Lamp Unto My Feet, but it had a couple of tricky spots. They were not phased. It really was impressive - but even more impressive was after that obviously well-played piece? NOBODY CLAPPED. YAYAYAYAYAY!!!!!!!! There was a respectful moment of silence and I saw smiles all around me.....but no applause.
For me, that was a moment of deep joy. For years now, I have been battling a fierce but silent battle to promote the following thought: I am not performing in church - I am pouring out my music to the glory of God, not for personal praise. Clapping after an anthem is like telling me I have failed - it means that you paid attention to me, rather than to the message. After all, we don't clap after a particularly stirring sermon or prayer or hymn, do we? We know that those were done for God, not to entertain the listeners or fellow participants. Instead (and I DID hear this from at least 2 people in the congregation after the choir anthem) if one wants to publicly express one's feelings, why not say, "Amen"?
Again, I know that much of that is cultural - that is the way I was brought up. Others of different traditions would have been appalled that no public spontaneous recognition of the beauty of the two anthems was made. But this is a church who, at least in this respect, is in line with my own personal preference. For as small as their chancel choir is, they chose a piece that was appropriate to their numbers and strengths (a Gordon Young arrangement of Immortal, Invisible) - and again. They nailed it. It was absolutely lovely.
For as small as the attendance was, there were 8 children under the age of 12 who went up for the Children's moment. That, too, made me grin. It told me that this is a church where there are young families as well as all the grey-heads I could see around me. The sermon was solid; the text was the parable about the Pharisee and the tax collector both praying in the synagogue - and she took it to an interesting place, talking about forgiveness. She also chose to stand in the middle of the chancel rather than at the pulpit. This would have worked better, I think, if she hadn't also used a music stand to put her notes on. If you're going to do that anyway, why not just go ahead and stand at the pulpit?
The clincher, though, was when she read aloud the cards people had given the ushers with their joys and concerns. The very first card she read had a Joy on it - that Taylor Panovec in Nashville had gotten a custom-made Tricycle from a special group. My jaw dropped. Taylor is the 18-year-old special-needs daughter of one of my good friends from college, Kay, who was a communications major and went on to work for the UMC at the district conference (and now the national) level. They moved to Nashville a year or two ago, and Taylor has really thrived there. Apparently one of the women in the choir either knows Kay or is on her Facebook feed (or both) - and the pastor suddenly recognized the name as well. I said something to her about it after the service. I'm still grinning. She has seen Taylor for years at Annual Conference, because Taylor always goes with her mom, and Kay still attends the East Ohio annual conference, even now that she's in Tennessee.
The people: wow! I was greeted by at least a dozen people coming into the building/sanctuary with "good morning" and "Welcome!" The person behind me said "Good Morning;" his wife, who was in the choir, gave me a quick "hi!" when she came down to whisper something to her husband before the service started. After the service, they were even more lovely. Several started up small conversations with me, introducing themselves and chatting easily. You really couldn't get out of the sanctuary unless you said hello to the minister - nice strategic placement, that! - and you couldn't greet her without first greeting the liturgist, who then formally introduced you to her. It was at that point that she warmly greeted me and gave me a Swag Bag. In it was a coffee mug (picture to come), 2 pens with church info, a bookmark (which has already been pressed into service!) the monthly newsletter (actually 2 of them, which I think was just a mistake) and some info about the Methodist church in general. It was very nice! On the way out of the sanctuary, another couple greeted me and chatted comfortably, and then, when I left, an older gentleman, who had left just a few seconds before I did, first apologized for not holding the door for me and then joked with me almost all the way to my car (no, he wasn't flirting - honest! He did mention his wife in the conversation!) He's clearly the Class Clown - all the best churches have one, and Mark is theirs.
Oh, here's the mug that I got:
And finally - on my way out of the pew, I noticed a bunch of people carrying cushions. Look what I found at the back of the sanctuary!
So, if you can't handle the hardness of the pews, you can snag a cushion!
Now, THAT's a nice touch!
And I think this is where I'm going to attend next week as well. Never thought it would be a baby church!
I had a hard time picking which church to attend today. Having gone to the two "largest" Methodist churches in the area, and knowing I have an affinity for the medium-large sized churches, rather than the "baby" churches (for one, the music. for two, baby churches are almost always informal, and I like the more structured service rituals I grew up with. It has nothing on a Catholic service, mind, but still...)
I knew there were several other UMC churches in the area, and so I decided I would try one more before I moved on to auditioning UCC or Presbyterian churches - the two denominations closest in both form and beliefs to my own. I've been attending a UCC church for several years now, and have been very, very happy there, so I almost ditched my plan to try one more UMC church and just jump right into a UCC one instead.
I'm glad I didn't. Instead, I stuck to my guns and researched the other nearby Methodist churches. There were 3, one larger than I thought (it has 3 services; more than any other church I've dealt with lately except for Church of the Saviour back "home" in Cleveland Heights) and the other two clearly "baby" churches.
I almost went to the larger church....except that of the 3 services (8:30, 9:45, and 11:10) only the 8:30 service was billed as "Traditional." The other two were called Contemporary - and my experience of contemporary worship is....I am not comfortable there. I don't find it to be a good balance of meditation/reflection and engagement. It is more like a production than a worship service. There generally is a "praise team" that leads the music - which is heavy on Bill Gaither and Amy Grant - and makes me cringe. There isn't any contemplative time in the service, and it is unrelentingly positive. Things are treated like a show, with clapping for good performances.
Can you tell that I'm not much into the contemporary scene? :P I know that many, many people are - but I would much prefer a service with a better balance of introspection and praise. I find it very, very difficult to connect with God in any meaningful fashion during a contemporary service - whether it is during the music, the sermon, or the prayers. I miss the quieter tone of a traditional, more structured service - and I prefer not to be told that everything is wonderful all of the time. Because it isn't.
ANYwho. Since I didn't feel like going to the 8:30 service and standing out (NOBODY except little old ladies goes to the 8:30 service when it isn't summer and golfing weather), I decided that wasn't the church for me today. Besides, their aggressive stance toward a "non-dress" dress code also put me off. Mind you, long gone are the days when I felt compelled to wear a dress or skirt to church - but I DO try to look nice, and sometimes I do opt for the skirt! Being told it isn't necessary rankled more than a little bit. What do you mean, I shouldn't look my best for God? Maybe there will be days when my "best" IS jeans and a sweatshirt - but the key here is "my best" - not "don't trouble your pretty little head about it, nobody cares." Yeah. I care. I care about wanting to show honor/respect: to God, to the others in the church, to myself. Troubling about my appearance is part of that.
LOLOL - ok. So now you know where I most emphatically did NOT go! And the irony of it is - it really doesn't bother me anymore to see others not dressed up in church. It was more the feeling of being told, in effect, don't bother.
My second choice was a smaller church - but they only had one service, and it was touted as a "Combined" service - part traditional, part contemporary. My feeling is - if you have to tell me that, then it is going to be all Contemporary with a prelude or organ piece thrown in as a sop to all us "old-timers" who prefer more traditional things. Besides, it was at 9:00 am - still more early than I'd hoped. It also says that their normal message is "upbeat" - code for: We're not going to make you sad or tackle hard things here, so if you're struggling with some issue of faith, forget it!
At this point, I almost gave up and went looking for UCC churches. In fact, I had the google page all ready - but then I realized that there was one more Methodist church in the area. Just 10 minutes away - closer than the other two I'd already attended. Grandview United Methodist Church.
It vaguely reminded me of one of my early childhood churches, both in the building look and in the description of the activities. Just one service, it started at 10:30 - earlier than I'd hoped but still highly acceptable, especially compared to the 8:30 service I'd first contemplated! I decided to give it a shot.
I was right - it very strongly reminded me of any one of several small suburban churches that my Dad served when I was growing up. There were between 50 and 60 people (probably closer to 60-65 by the time all was said and done) attending the service, with an additional 11-12 in the choir, the liturgist, and the minister. The sound system guy was upstairs in the balcony (tried to get a shot of him up there, but it didn't take.
Here's the chancel area:
In the first pic, the minister and liturgist are headed into the chancel. The minister (on the left in the view) has obviously dyed her hair since her picture on the website. The second picture shows the choir sitting on the right on padded chairs. What isn't very clear is the view of the two stained-glass windows, one on each side of the chancel. They were lovely, in a contemporary stained-glass style. I think there's a picture of them on the website somewhere, but I'm not sure about that.
I got there just about 5 minutes before the start of the service and ended up sitting in a pew 2/3 of the way back in the sanctuary. After the service was over, I took a pic of my seatmate and some of the parishoners, as well as a shot of the back of the sanctuary and the balcony:
There weren't actually seats in the balcony - in fact, it looked like it was either a rehearsal or Sunday School area up there or something. But I thought it was cool.
There were many more positives than negatives about this experience; in fact there were just a few, minor negatives, so I'll list those first.
MINUSES:
* The minister, as good as her sermon was, NEEDS to learn to pray better. I found myself counting the number of times she said "Just" during her prayer - as in "I just want to tell you, Lord" "I just ask, Lord" "I just want them to feel your arms around them." NO. No, no, no, no, no. No Justs!
* No passing of the peace. Darn! I miss that when it isn't there! Not that this particular congregation really needs it; first, they are just as good at the "making you feel included and welcome" as the first church had been and, second, they know when not to talk! Even so, there was neither a passing of the peace nor an attendance pad. Darn. I would have liked to have known the name of that rather nice looking dude I was sitting in a pew with! I did notice there was no ring.....
* ummm.....hmmmmmm. I think that's it.
PLUSES
* The Music - it was not the amazing organ of the previous two sundays, but a good one, and a good, solid organist. Nothing flashy, but just very solid, excellent playing. Good tempo on the hymns, sure-fingered on the prelude/postlude, good piano skills on the anthem. Speaking of which, there were actually 2 anthems - the bell choir played one of the anthems. They had 7 ringers, plus the director who also rang a bell (telling me that at least one person was absent today). It was an appropriately scored piece for a choir that size and they nailed it. It was lovely! It wasn't horribly difficult - an arrangement of Thy Word Is A Lamp Unto My Feet, but it had a couple of tricky spots. They were not phased. It really was impressive - but even more impressive was after that obviously well-played piece? NOBODY CLAPPED. YAYAYAYAYAY!!!!!!!! There was a respectful moment of silence and I saw smiles all around me.....but no applause.
For me, that was a moment of deep joy. For years now, I have been battling a fierce but silent battle to promote the following thought: I am not performing in church - I am pouring out my music to the glory of God, not for personal praise. Clapping after an anthem is like telling me I have failed - it means that you paid attention to me, rather than to the message. After all, we don't clap after a particularly stirring sermon or prayer or hymn, do we? We know that those were done for God, not to entertain the listeners or fellow participants. Instead (and I DID hear this from at least 2 people in the congregation after the choir anthem) if one wants to publicly express one's feelings, why not say, "Amen"?
Again, I know that much of that is cultural - that is the way I was brought up. Others of different traditions would have been appalled that no public spontaneous recognition of the beauty of the two anthems was made. But this is a church who, at least in this respect, is in line with my own personal preference. For as small as their chancel choir is, they chose a piece that was appropriate to their numbers and strengths (a Gordon Young arrangement of Immortal, Invisible) - and again. They nailed it. It was absolutely lovely.
For as small as the attendance was, there were 8 children under the age of 12 who went up for the Children's moment. That, too, made me grin. It told me that this is a church where there are young families as well as all the grey-heads I could see around me. The sermon was solid; the text was the parable about the Pharisee and the tax collector both praying in the synagogue - and she took it to an interesting place, talking about forgiveness. She also chose to stand in the middle of the chancel rather than at the pulpit. This would have worked better, I think, if she hadn't also used a music stand to put her notes on. If you're going to do that anyway, why not just go ahead and stand at the pulpit?
The clincher, though, was when she read aloud the cards people had given the ushers with their joys and concerns. The very first card she read had a Joy on it - that Taylor Panovec in Nashville had gotten a custom-made Tricycle from a special group. My jaw dropped. Taylor is the 18-year-old special-needs daughter of one of my good friends from college, Kay, who was a communications major and went on to work for the UMC at the district conference (and now the national) level. They moved to Nashville a year or two ago, and Taylor has really thrived there. Apparently one of the women in the choir either knows Kay or is on her Facebook feed (or both) - and the pastor suddenly recognized the name as well. I said something to her about it after the service. I'm still grinning. She has seen Taylor for years at Annual Conference, because Taylor always goes with her mom, and Kay still attends the East Ohio annual conference, even now that she's in Tennessee.
The people: wow! I was greeted by at least a dozen people coming into the building/sanctuary with "good morning" and "Welcome!" The person behind me said "Good Morning;" his wife, who was in the choir, gave me a quick "hi!" when she came down to whisper something to her husband before the service started. After the service, they were even more lovely. Several started up small conversations with me, introducing themselves and chatting easily. You really couldn't get out of the sanctuary unless you said hello to the minister - nice strategic placement, that! - and you couldn't greet her without first greeting the liturgist, who then formally introduced you to her. It was at that point that she warmly greeted me and gave me a Swag Bag. In it was a coffee mug (picture to come), 2 pens with church info, a bookmark (which has already been pressed into service!) the monthly newsletter (actually 2 of them, which I think was just a mistake) and some info about the Methodist church in general. It was very nice! On the way out of the sanctuary, another couple greeted me and chatted comfortably, and then, when I left, an older gentleman, who had left just a few seconds before I did, first apologized for not holding the door for me and then joked with me almost all the way to my car (no, he wasn't flirting - honest! He did mention his wife in the conversation!) He's clearly the Class Clown - all the best churches have one, and Mark is theirs.
Oh, here's the mug that I got:
And finally - on my way out of the pew, I noticed a bunch of people carrying cushions. Look what I found at the back of the sanctuary!
So, if you can't handle the hardness of the pews, you can snag a cushion!
Now, THAT's a nice touch!
And I think this is where I'm going to attend next week as well. Never thought it would be a baby church!