Why Do We Do That? Part 3

Someone asked me recently why I was doing this series. The answer is simple. I think it is important to understand the reasons we do what we do in worship as a means of enhancing our experience. Plus, if we joined a club of some kind, we’d likely be taught the customs and traditions of the club to help us feel more at home. Same thing here. So today, in the last of these for awhile, I’m focusing on why the clergy and laity dress as they do to lead worship.

If you’ve come to the Episcopal Church from some other denomination, you’ve noticed we dress funny for worship, i.e., we have unusual garments that are worn. We are not alone in having special garments that are worn by the clergy and those assisting at the altar. We retained the Roman Catholic worship garments of the Reformation period of the Church and have been using them every since. [There is a “more or less” here, but there’s not space to elaborate.] Some other liturgical groups use the same garments and they are making their way into churches that might not have used them 50 years ago, such as some United Methodist parishes. So, what are they called and why do we do it?

The white garment we wear at services of Holy Eucharist is called an alb, from the Latin word for white.  A garment much like this, the toga, was the daily wear of Romans in the formative years of the Church.  When clergy wore them they were just wearing their “street clothes.”  But as the dress style changed, the clergy kept the alb as their basic garment.  Originally these street clothes might be of different colors, but over time, the Christian community settled on white as a symbol of purity.  

Laity serving at the altar wear albs too. Most albs have hoods, but some clergy wear a modified alb called a cassock-alb.  It is essentially an alb without a hood. The albs are tied at the waist with a cord called a cincture. One underlying reason we wear vestments is to cover what we wear under them so as to not call attention to ourselves in a way that distracts worshippers. 

While all those at the altar wear the alb, clergy also wear a colored strip of cloth around their necks called a stole.  The stole is a sign of their office as clergy.  Priests wear it over both shoulders, hanging down the front. Deacons wear the stole diagonally from the left shoulder to the right side.  The stole originally was a kind of Roman robe or cloak which was worn by civic officials.  Over time, in the Church it became simpler and took its current form.  The stole represents the authority of the office of priest or deacon with the priest’s stole also representing the yoke of Christ they took on at ordination.

The celebrant of the Eucharist also wears an over garment called a chasuble.  Chasuble is from the Latin word for “little house” because the garment shelters the celebrant.  The chasuble can be simple or elaborate, but it is always seamless as Jesus’ robe was said to be—the robe for which the soldiers cast lots and is meant to remind us of that robe.  

In some parishes, celebrants don’t wear the chasuble, wearing only the alb and stole. In other parishes, that might be considered “low church,” i.e., they have a little less emphasis on ritual and custom, the celebrant and others may wear a black garment that hangs to the top of their shoes and has a little square cut out at the neck. It’s called a cassock and is worn instead of the alb. Over that, they wear a long white scooped necked garment called a surplice. Over that, they wear their stole.  This was essentially how the clergy dressed at the time of the Reformation in England. The return to albs and chasubles, which had been Middle Age customary wear, came about in the Anglican Church in the 19^th century because of liturgical reform called the Oxford movement. That movement sought to return to the liturgical practices and customs of the Middle Ages.

Deacons don’t wear chasubles at the altar. They wear a similar though simpler garment called a dalmatic. It is the liturgical color of the day with simple decorations. Just like the alb had been the daily wear in Roman times, with some servants wore the dalmatic as their sign of office. It’s liturgical origin seems to have been Byzantine and was introduced in the West for liturgical use in the early 4^th century first in Rome. It spread from there and was universally adopted by the 9^th century.

For certain processions, such as major feast days, the celebrant or the Officiant may wear a cope.  The cope was originally just a cape worn outdoors to protect against the weather.  It is a large outer garment, open in front.  Attached to the back is a colorful section of cloth that originally was a hood.  Now it is purely decorative and is removed once the clergy are in position at the front of the church, just as you would take off your coat once you’re settled in.

For other services called Offices, such as, funerals, weddings, and Morning and Evening Prayer, the Officiant will wear cassock and surplice, unless there is a Eucharist.  The cassock is actually a garment some priests wear as daily wear over their other clothes.  For some of the offices, the Officiant may wear a black, stole-like band of cloth over the shoulders and down the front.  This is called a tippet and originated in the 14th century.  It is typically Anglican, though some non-Anglicans wear them.  Bishops dress differently from the other orders of clergy, that’s enough for today.

Peace,

Jerry

Why Do We Do That: Part 2

Last week I started by writing, “In this season of preparation for confirmation, I’ve found over the years that many people other than the inquirers wonder about why we Episcopalians do certain things in our worship.” The other thing I’ve run into is visitors commenting on how “Catholic” our liturgy seems. Today’s blog deals with that comment.

Yes, our liturgy seems very Roman Catholic and there’s a good reason. During the reign of Henry VIII in England when what would become the Anglican Church was developing, Roman Catholicism was the only way the English worshipped. This was true on the continent too, but Luther’s and other’s reforms on the continent didn’t just focus on theological differences with Rome, but with worship practices as well. The strong belief in the Protestant Reformation was that the Church had strayed far from the purity of the early Christians theology. Equally important for the reformers was that worship practices had been corrupted and needed to be reformed to return to that simple approach to worship. Consequently, much of the Roman liturgy was dumped and replaced with what the continental reform leaders thought the early Church was like.

But not in England. Sure, there was a strong sentiment to rid the liturgy and the Church of “excesses,” but the definition of excesses couldn’t be agreed upon. Also, unlike many continental Churches, the English Church kept archbishops, bishops, priests, and deacons and retained a bishop led organization--or episcopal with a little “e” structure. The big change here was these clergy could, and did, marry. (In the Episcopal Church, the other change is to give the other clergy and the laity an equal representation in the governance of the Church.)

There were many heated theological debates and some substantial theological changes were finally made. However, the liturgy retained much of the form and language of the Roman rite on which it was based. Many practices of the Roman church were retained as well, but many more were removed. For example, Anglicans still pray for the dead, but we have no provisions for paying for masses for the dead and we don’t believe our prayers hasten their departure from Purgatory--since we don’t believe in such a state. We pray for the dead, according to our Catechism, because we still love them and want them to continue to grow in grace.

During Elizabeth’s I reign, the Anglican Church really began to take shape. Tiring of the endless debates and tensions, Elizabeth decreed that, believe what you will about various matters, but we are going to all worship the same way. Using the Book of Common Prayer became a liturgical requirement and that Book, kept the essence of the Roman liturgy, while changing very little. Revisions made in the liturgy in her ordered Prayer Book, combined the more reformed ideas with the older Roman ideas, enabling people with both sensibilities to worship together and to “hear” what they needed to hear. 

The most fundamental of these is in what was commanded to be said when the bread and wine were administered. The more Roman words were, “The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee, preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life.” The more reformed words were, “Take eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee, and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving.” The first allows for the idea that the body and blood of Jesus are really present in the bread and wine. The second makes the sacrament much more a memorial of his death and requires the faith of the recipient to make the bread and wine “real.” Both of these sentences were to be said. And they still may be.  (Rite I on page 338, prescribes them as the preferred words at administration.)

So, we look “Catholic” in our worship, but we reformed a lot of our beliefs and practices. Elizabeth established in the Church the via media, the “middle way.” Often understood as wishy-washy, what via media actually means is we can accommodate a range of beliefs as we worship together as the Body of Christ. I think this is one of our great strengths. I hope you do as well.

Peace,

Jerry

Why Do We Do That? Part 1

In this season during which many parishes are preparing people for confirmation, I’ve found over the years that many people other than the inquirers wonder about why we Episcopalians do certain things in our worship. Today I’m starting a short series trying to address some of those questions.  Since this is the Season of Easter which spans 50 days, I want to begin by talking about a major liturgical change that’s made in the service for the season.

In most Anglican parishes around the world, the custom has developed to omit the General Prayer of Confession during this season. Why? Easter Season is understood to be the most joyous season of the Christian year with the focus more on praise, thanksgiving and our redemption than on confession. The Book of Common Prayer includes a rubric that allows for the omission on occasion and this great festival season is seen as a particularly good time to omit it.

There’s more! Before the Reformation, there was no general prayer of confession in the liturgy. People were expected to engage in self-examination and confession before coming to church to worship. This expectation influenced the trend for Christians to routinely to make private confessions to the priest on Friday or Saturday before Sunday worship. So, omitting the prayer is actually a return to the earliest practices of the Church. Outside of private confession, the idea also was that the very act of giving thanks to God was an acknowledgment of one’s sinfulness. The Prayers of the People also typically contained the Kyrie Eleison, which is penitential in nature. All this is to say, we don’t try to diminish the need to confess our sin; we just emphasize something else for a few weeks. 

Now to one other Easter practice. In many parishes, week after week, following the Sanctus (Holy, Holy, Holy...) most everybody kneels for the remainder of the Eucharistic Prayer.  In many of those same parishes, during the Easter season, people remain standing rather than kneel. Why? Same reason we omit the general confession. As redeemed people, we can boldly face God rather than humbly falling to our knees.

Besides which, kneeling for the Eucharistic Prayer is a particularly western or Roman practice to start with. In the Orthodox Churches, they always stand for the Prayer and always have. In the earliest Christian Churches in the west, there weren’t chairs, much less kneelers, so everybody tended to stand. Kneeling entered the worship practices of the western liturgy in the High Middle Ages. The reason many people in Episcopal Churches stand for the Prayer year round is because it is the more historically “correct” way to pray. [BTW, to be completely “correct,” stand with your elbows at your side, your forearms pointing away from your body at about a 45 degree angle to your body and in front of you, with your palms open. This is called the “orans position,” the historic posture of prayer. You often see priests in this posture as they pray the Eucharistic Prayer.]

However, local customs are hard to change unless a particular rector really pushes for it. So in St. Mary’s practice, at Easter you are likely to see only a very few people standing during Easter--I’ll be one of them. One of the wonderful things about the Anglican Church is we don’t force people to conform to a particular practice in worship. What seems to matter most to us is this: if what you’re doing doesn’t disturb others as they worship and it enhances your experience of the Holy Mystery--do it! Stand if you wish; kneel if you wish; sit if you must. We’re just happy you’re there to worship our Lord as a diverse community of the faithful.

Peace

Jerry

Creeping to the Cross

I had such a good response through emails and personal comments to last week’s post, I thought I’d continue the historical theme, but this time jump ahead to the medieval Church, especially in England, to which have much in common as Anglicans.

Holy Week was the heart of the Church year since Jesus’ passion and death was the heart of late medieval Christianity. From Wednesday on, the services were very elaborate with each day having special ritual observances. In the earlier medieval period the rituals were even more involved and powerful, but some of that vigor had waned. For example, the Vigil of Easter had been moved to Saturday morning rather than beginning at sunset Saturday night.

Palm Sunday’s procession was perhaps the most elaborate and eloquent of the processions of the Sarum rites. [Note: the cathedral at Salisbury, often called Sarum, had developed the liturgy that was largely in use across England. It was the revision of this rite that was the backbone of the Prayer Book liturgy developed during the English Reformation. Our present liturgy still has much in common with Sarum.] The rite began with blessings, sprinkling of holy water on the assembled people, reading the story of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and the crowd’s reaction based on John’s gospel account.

Flowers and green branches were then blessed, distributed to everyone, and then all began the procession out of the church, led by a crucifix. The procession wandered through the village or city, finally making its way back to the church. There were a variety of other elaborate ritual actions including during the liturgy. Back inside the church the Passion story from Matthew was sung by three clergy and while this was being sung, worshippers, using sticks brought for the purpose made crosses for themselves. These crosses were kept in their homes until the next year and were thought to have special powers for warding off evil. Remind you of the palm crosses still used in many parishes on Palm Sunday?

Maundy Thursday was a very solemn liturgy. The kiss of peace is omitted because Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. Three hosts were consecrated: one for communion that day, one for Good Friday communion, and the third to be used in a ceremony at the end of the Good Friday service. When the liturgy was over, the altar or altars were stripped of everything on them. Water and wine were poured on them and they were washed with a broom of sharp twigs. All of this was to allegorize the stripping of Jesus, scourging him and crowning him with thorns, and the water and blood that flowed from the spear wound. 

People attended Tenebrae services on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. These were services in which candles were snuffed out one by one to symbolize the abandonment of Jesus by his disciples. But the Good Friday service was the most significant one of the week. In medieval Christianity, the passion and death of Jesus was the center of their theology, and indeed, the idea of literally sacrificing Jesus again at each Eucharist was central to worship.

Good Friday was a day of deep mourning. There was no Eucharist. The Passion story was read from John’s gospel. A veiled crucifix was brought into the church while a series of reproaches were sung. The cross was unveiled in three stages. At each stage the priest would intone, “Behold the wood of the cross, on which hung the savior of the world. Come let us worship.” After the final unveiling, the clergy and the people would begin “creeping to the cross,” as it was known. They crept barefoot and on their knees down the main aisle of the church to kiss the foot of the cross. After this adoration, the third host from the Maundy Thursday Eucharist was brought from the niche and after all said the Lord’s Prayer, the priest, and the priest alone, communicated.

This practice of creeping to the cross was one of the most frequent targets of Protestant reformers from 1530 on. It was very hard to extinguish the practice because it was so much a part of the lay piety. Well after Elizabeth’s reforms were implemented, people still wanted to creep to the cross and did, in spite of an official condemnation of the practice.

But perhaps the most imaginative ceremony of Good Friday was at the end when Jesus was symbolically buried in a niche in the north wall called the Easter sepulcher. The priest, unvested and barefoot, brought out the third host from Maundy Thursday in a small container called a pyx. The pyx and the crucifix that had been venerated, were wrapped in linen and taken to the niche. A watch was kept at the niche until Easter morning that included the presence of many candles. The pyx and crucifix were removed on Easter and used in the Easter liturgy.

As you compare these rituals to our modern actions, you can see both the continuity and the alterations. For example, like them, we take the bread and wine of Maundy Thursday to a special place, but we do it on Maundy Thursday rather than Good Friday. Today we have no Easter sepulcher; we have an Altar of Repose to receive the elements. Many parishes have watches during the night on Thursday until noon Friday. And often there are candles and flowers. Our symbolism is not Jesus in the tomb, but Jesus in the garden in prayer and we are watching with him. This bread and wine are consumed on Good Friday and there is no consecrated bread or wine kept in the tabernacle because, as we understand it, Jesus is dead.

For our forebearers, the sepulcher was the central part of the liturgy of Holy Week, designed to inculcate and give expression to orthodox teaching, not merely on the saving power of the cross, but on the Eucharist too.  With its many lights and night watches, it constituted an especially solemn form of public worship of the consecrated bread or host.  It was a popular focus for lay piety and devotion.  But it was also the principal vehicle for the Easter proclamation of the Resurrection.

Yes, the services of our modern Holy Week can be long and sometimes tedious in our busy lifestyles. Still, without this visual reminders of Jesus’ final days and hours, can we really appreciate the wonder of his resurrection in its fulness? Earlier generations of Christians didn’t think so.

Peace

Jerry

How Early Christians Lived Holy Week

Sunday many western Christians will gather to commemorate Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem a few days before his death. In many places they will gather outside the church and form a procession, each person bearing a palm branch or a part of one. As you know, this day, usually called Palm Sunday and, less often but also correctly called Passion Sunday, gets its name from the palm branches said to have been strewn on the ground in front of Jesus as he rode his donkey into the city. Once inside, the usual liturgies will be said, but we will also hear a long reading of the Passion of our Lord. How old is this tradition?

Very. About 381, a Gallic woman known as Egeria (or Aetheria and even sometimes, Sylvia) made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. She kept an account of her travels in a long letter to a circle of women back home. Fragments of the letter survive and, among other things, tell us something about the customs in Jerusalem at Holy Week. A liturgical year, that is, a year divided into seasons related to events in the New Testament, was developing and would become a universal practice in the Church during her century. She provides a first hand account of what the Jerusalem Church, and by extension, much of Christianity was doing at such festival times. And it is clear, the customs were well established in Jerusalem when she visited. I thought you might be interested in a brief summary of her report about Holy Week.

On Sunday, “...which begins the Paschal week, which they call here the Great Week, when all the customary services have taken place...they proceed...to the greater church, which is called the martyrium [so called because it is where the Lord suffered].” Following some liturgical observances which she doesn’t describe, everyone goes home until the “seventh hour.” After they dine, they reassemble “in the church in Eleona, on the Mount of Olives, where is the cave in which the Lord was wont to teach.”

In the church there on the Mount, “...hymns and antiphons suitable to the day and place are said, and lessons in like manner.” This continues for two hours and at the ninth hour, the worshippers begin to process as they sing hymns, to “the Imbomon, that is, to the place whence the Lord ascended into heaven...Hymns and antiphons suitable to the day and place are said, interspersed with lections and prayers. And as the eleventh hour approaches, the passage from the Gospel is read, where the children, carrying branches and palms, met the Lord...and the bishop immediately rises, and all the people with him, and they all go on foot from the top of the Mount of Olives, all the people going before him with hymns and antiphons, answering one another: Blessed is He that cometh in the Name of the Lord. And all the children in the neighborhood [even infants on their parents’ shoulders]...all of them bearing branches, some of palms and some of olives [escort the bishop] in the same manner as the Lord was of old.” The procession continues “from the top of the Mount to the city, and thence through the whole city to [the sanctuary of the church] at a late hour. And on arriving, although it is late lucernare (the evening office) takes place, with prayer at the Cross; after which people are dismissed.”

Egeria includes Maundy Thursday, though she only calls it "the fifth weekday." After the usual service, everyone goes to the Mount of Olives for prayers, hymns and lessons, where they spend the night. “At the first cockcrow,” they come down and go to the place where Jesus prayed alone. “And then all, even to the smallest child, go down with the bishop, on foot, with hymns to Gethsemane; where, on account of the great number of people in the crowd, who are wearied owing to the vigils and weak through the daily fasts...come very slowly to Gethsemane.” The passage in which Jesus is taken is read, “...and when this passage has been read there is so great a moaning and groaning of all the people, together with weeping, that their lamentation may be heard perhaps as far as the city.”

As Friday dawns, the whole assembly heads to the Golgatha. Again, they turn to the Gospel and read of Jesus’ encounter with Pilate. “...Afterwards, the bishop addresses the people, comforting them for that they have toiled all night and are about to toil during that same day, (bidding) them not to be weary, but to have hope in God, Who will for that toil give them a greater reward.” The bishop continues to speak to them, sending them home to rest because yet to come is a four hour vigil before “the holy wood of the Cross, each one of us believing that it will be profitable to his salvation [as we] apply ourselves to lections and to prayer until night.” But they do not go straight home. They go to pray at the column where Jesus is thought to have be scourged, and then go home.

When they reassemble at Golgotha, they bring out a small casket in which is kept the wood of the Cross and the titulus that contained the charge against Jesus. The wood is placed on a table, and with deacons carefully watching, “both faithful (i.e., the baptized) and catechumens, come one by one and...” each person who approaches the wood, bow and touch the wood with their foreheads and then with their eyes before kissing it.

At the sixth hour, no matter what the weather, all the people assemble in a courtyard. The bishop’s chair is brought and from the sixth hour until the ninth, lessons are read, including Old Testament readings which seem to predict the suffering and death. Hymns are said and prayers are prayed and “...the emotions shown and the mourning by all the people at every lesson and prayer is wonderful...[as they] lament more than can be conceived, that the Lord had suffered those things for us.” Finally, at the ninth hour, a portion of John’s gospel is read in which Jesus “gave up the ghost.” A prayer and dismissal follow.

As we make our way through Holy Week, let us hope our liturgies will be as important to us as they were to our kin in the 4^th century, even though they will be remarkable shorter.

Peace,

Jerry

Avatars and Affairs

Last week I spent a day attending a seminar on the topic of affairs in marriage. The seminar was for counselors and focused on influences that lead to affairs and how we can help couples who are trying to deal with an affair.  One of the topics was, “What Is An Affair?” High on many lists is sexual infidelity, and until fairly recent times, this would have been the definition. 

In our time, the definition of infidelity has changed a good bit and the simplest is the keeping of secrets in an intimate relationship. This keeping of secrets often has a strong emotional component, leading the non-sexual relationship to be labeled an “emotional affair.” The secrets may involve a person or not, and as you’ll see below, maybe a virtual person. Secrets are being kept in these emotional affairs, secrets that the unsuspecting spouse would be stunned to learn.  Today, when we can text, tweet, and email, and largely avoid face to face interactions if we wish, boundaries are easily crossed and secrets are easily kept. In my very limited practice in retirement, I’ve had more than one couple who presented with an emotional affair made possible by Facebook, texts, and tweets.

In January attending another conference, this time on sexual addiction, I learned there is a website onto which one can log and join. The requirements, besides a credit card--must be married and wanting to have an affair.

Another shocking revelation had to do with online games. There is one in which players create an avatar and live in a virtual world doing all the real world kinds of things: earning money, building things, and the stunner--having virtual sex with another avatar. I’m guessing both of these fall into the category of something kept secret from a spouse.

So why is this in Theological Musings? I’ve become very interested in addictions of all kinds recently. One core theory of addiction is the addict, is using in order to dull the pain, anxiety, frustration, even guilt that rests at the core of many lives. There is an existential “hole” inside that the person tries to fill up by over eating, shopping, substance abuse, sex and emotional invulnerability to name a few practices. I’m pretty sure the virtual world falls into the same category, especially since people may play the game for 15-20 hours a week!

As the Palmist says, “As a deer longs for the flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God.” (Psalm 42) What is it with so many in our society that rather than longing for the flowing streams, keeps them content to drink at stagnant pools? Why the deep pain and why the wrong solution? More pointedly, what is the Church’s response to this growing phenomenon? Closer to home, what is our individual response?

Peace in a fretful world,

Jerry

The Nones

An article in the 12 March issue of Time titled, “The Rise of the Nones,” described the Nones as people who say they have no religious affiliation.  This group, the article says, has more than doubled since 1990 to about 16% of the U.S. population. It is the fastest growing “religious” group in the country. Yet, only 4% of the population characterize themselves as atheist or agnostic. So where do the Nones fit? They describe themselves as spiritual, but not religious, that is, they have no affiliation with organized religion, but “they’re not rejecting God...they are rejecting organized religion as being rigid and dogmatic,” Time quotes Erin Dunigan, a Presbyterian cleric who ministers to a group of Nones.

Diana Butler Bass, a noted author on trends in churches makes the point in her newest book, Christianity After Religion, that this phenomenon is touching nearly every religious tradition.  She includes the megachurches who historically market themselves to people turned off by organized religion. A 2009 Pew Forum survey found that, “40% of the unaffiliated people were fairly religious” in that they reported they believed in God and prayed fairly often. Many of the respondents reported they hoped eventually to find a suitable religious home.

Time goes on to remind us that the organizers of the so-called emergent-church movement are trying to “take religion away from the musty pews and fierce theological fights by creating small worship communities that often meet in members’ homes.” The historian in me can’t help but remember that long before the Church coalesced into an organization, it existed as small groups in peoples’ homes.  When St. Paul writes in his letters to the church in such-and-such a place, it is to a house church in that city, or maybe several house churches, not to the local cathedral--they didn’t exist.

What the Nones tend to do, at least the group covered in the time article, is gather for weekly worship, hear sermons, engage in spiritual dialogue and prayer, deliver food to sick members and work with the poor. In other words, they do something very much like any vitale institutional church, such as St. Mary’s. So what is the difference? I wish I knew for sure.

There is some evidence that those churches that market themselves to the “unchurched” or “disillusioned” or “Nones” emphasize informality, group cohesion, (small groups within the larger group who have a separate identity, like an on-going, more or less self contained Sunday class), contemporary religious music, and what I would call “warm fuzziness,” (because I don’t otherwise know how to characterize the atmosphere or experience).

I’m not being critical. If this is what helps you build your relationship to God and to others and gives you hope for the next day and the future--great! What I am being is curious about two things: (1) what happened besides scandal and infighting in the institutional church to turn these folks off, and (2) what this suggests to St M’s about reaching this group. I have a theory about number 1: incompetence and inattentiveness. By incompetence I mean, the institutional Church’s tendency to turn out people who don’t lead worship well and don’t preach well. How many jokes have you heard about counting ceiling tiles during sermons or compiling grocery lists? And by inattentiveness, I mean the membership’s reserve or reluctance to welcome others who show up on Sunday and to take them under your wing. See an unfamiliar face on Sunday: introduce yourself and invite them into the hospitality time in the parish hall for starters. The other inattentiveness is the institutional Church’s tendency not to teach pastors how to effectively care for parishioners and to develop the parishioner’s ability to care for each other. Again mentioning Paul, he did say we “should bear one another’s burdens.”

So with regard to number 2, there is not marketing plan to attract them, but if a None (or anyone else) visits on Sunday, we have plenty to offer. We just need to remember that making people feel welcome and at home is everyone’s responsibility, not just the clergy.

Peace,

Jerry