I had a long, detailed dream a few days ago
I was standing in a church at the back of the congregation. The church was like a Cornish church, broad and wide, with a screen similar to rood screen across the full width. I had the sense that there was
A priest or leader was at the front talking with the congregation. I speak and am included in a conversation with the congregation. I must have asked an existential question about where the foundations of their life and faith were to be found. They want to show me something or for me to see something in another space that they no longer use, to be found out through the door to the right.
We went out through an opening in the south wall and came to where the nave of the church once was (if it was once a church). To the right in this space was a freestanding wall and a tower with a weathervane on the top (the west wall of the nave). There was a ‘south’ wall enclosing the space. The space was barren, strewn with debris and rubble, weeds growing from the walls, as if in a war zone abandoned following a bomb strike. It was a void, no longer of use.
Old books are scattered about, in poor condition, broken spines, decaying pages. I pick up the odd book, open them. They are archaic. I wonder, out loud, what they are for. The people are around me, engaged with me, following, walking with, showing me. But ‘they’ do not know why anyone should be interested in these books or this building, what they are showing me doesn’t reveal anything.
To the left (east) through an opening in what might have been a stone chancel screen, was a space like a cathedral chancel, with a freestanding shrine in the centre and, perhaps, table tombs either side. Nothing happens in this space, we never use it, they tell me.
I wander back to the void space, large, derelict, no roof. I can see the space has potential, exactly because it was spacious and void, free from any particular furnishings or intended use.
Ah, I thought. This could be useful; this has potential.
I woke. It was the middle of the night. I carefully, consciously reviewed the narrative of the dream and in the morning, wrote the dream down.
My understanding of the dream
I’m engaged in conversations with various friends about the state of the Church today. A small core understand my awareness and ideas. The majority do not. When I engage people in conversation, they struggle to comprehend what I’m saying. They take the conversation to places that are familiar in their current Christian experience. Some want to take me to a place they are aware of but are unable to conceptualise what the contents are. The place that used to contain their awareness and vision is void, derelict. They have minimal awareness of what is missing though they pass through the derelict space all the time. I am aware of the space and of its barrenness. I am aware of the potential of the space, the energy, health, humanity, potential creativity and beauty of the space that is there, the space still imagined by poets and authors and dramatists, artists and mystics. But these people are usually not active campaigners for change and transformation. The future wasn’t visible in my dream.
I’m finding few of the churches I’ve visited in recent years have the active potential for a future Christianity that is overcoming the current dominant focus of activity in the Church of England.
This is how I feel about the Church today. The future is occluded. It is not visible to me in the life of today’s Church activities and priorities – on the one hand church growth and church planting by lavishly, selfishly funded HTB charismatic evangelical clones with superficial theology and awareness and on the other side, Society churches protecting themselves from contamination by the priesthood of women.
What I am not finding is a clear awareness that life in all its fullness is the essence of healthy, flourishing Christian life, fuelled by unconditional, infinite, intimate love, goodness, wisdom, and truth.
Examples of what I seek
I wrote about the churches in the Stepney area of the diocese of London that I visited whilst living at St Saviour’s Priory. I wasn’t particularly looking for a new church to make my home in, which is what people assumed. I was looking for churches that communicated the essence of God’s unconditional love in their welcome and worship and preaching, on their notice boards and through the quality and dynamic creativity of the space and something about the God people already know but who doesn’t feature in the leaflets available on the tables at the back.
Two churches I’ve visited inspired me and gave me hope that some people know how to pursued the vision of an unconditionally loving God. They are:
St Mary the Virgin and St Mary Magdalen, Tetbury
I visited Tetbury parish church five years ago. Their website communicates the essence. The essence is repeated on the TV monitor as you enter the church.
St Marys' is a Christian church that believes that everyone is created in the image of God with unique characteristics, beliefs, abilities, and infinite worth.
We believe that Jesus came to give humanity true and complete fulfilment without discrimination.
Malmesbury Abbey
At Malmesbury Abbey it’s the interior environment of the building that’s inspiring. I visited on a weekday when a lunchtime concert was taking place. The place was flowing with spiritual energy. It’s the seamless integration of a variety of activities that makes the building potent. There’s an excellent café in the north-west corner with, to the rear of the nave pews, sofas and coffee tables where people were sitting in conversation with friends or quietly alone; there’s a quality bookshop, the tomb of St Athelstan a with beautiful display, a contemplative prayer space that gives both quiet and privacy as well as being integral to the whole space, and artefacts around the building that invite moments of pause and reflection. The website doesn’t really communicate any of this and neither does it replicate the messages on the video screen welcoming visitors which are similar to Tetbury in their quality.
St Michael and All Angels, Amersham
I visited St Michael’s Amersham a couple of weeks ago, midweek. The church was open.
“As a Christian community, we seek to engage with the world around us and be a place of welcome and acceptance for all on a journey to God – believers, doubters and those who are seeking.”
They have a Mission Action plan dating from May 2018 and reviewed on an annual basis (though the latest update on the web site is from 2022).
The first element in the 2022 Review is:
More Contemplative . . . .
Honouring what has been lost through the pandemic by developing new things we have learnt –
Letting go of what was and is no longer possible and trusting God to lead us forwards.
Community Covid Service of prayer and meditation. Meeting people at point of need.
Setting aside Lady Chapel for prayer and meditation on God’s word. Exploring new ways to enrich worship of God, drawing closer to Christ fed by the Spirit.
And finally . . .
I know there are many other churches around the country that share these some of these qualities and that those of you reading this would like me to know about. They will not be the churches – the majority I visit – that are locked all through the week. They will not be the like the Victorian church I visited last Saturday which was only open that one Saturday in the year. It had a beautiful interior and lots of notices neatly arranged but nothing about God. What it did have was a crypt where they were serving coffee and fabulous cakes. A lay member of the congregation came and joined me. We discovered that we had several friends in common, had memories stretching back to the day of Mervyn, and we had the kind of open, adventurous conversation abut God and the Church that I yearn for. Back upstairs, I struck up a conversation with four members of the congregation. They told me a notice about the qualities of the God they worshipped wasn’t necessary because the walls were covered with biblical texts and paintings of biblical scenes. But they are all Victorian, I said, and I don’t identify with them.