I am writing this very personal, very informal blog mainly for people who are not yet part of our parish. Current members and friends get a weekly email with pictures and news about what people are doing—births, travels, and so forth. (If you want to get on the list, just ask.) This one is for everyone else. It is, as I said, very personal, very unofficial, very informal. I have enabled comments so you can talk back and ask questions. (The comments are moderated, so your writing will not appear immediately—you would be amazed at some of the inappropriate stuff a blog collects!) Any time a person thinks of visiting a new church, there is a lot of stage fright. Will I know what to do? Will everyone stare at me? Am I wearing the right clothes? And to be honest, an Episcopal church makes it worse. If you have ever seen a YouTube video of a worship service at Washington National Cathedral (yes, that’s ours), it’s overwhelming. Ceremonial robes, pipe organ mus...
One of my coffee mugs has Robin Williams’s Top 10 reasons to be an Episcopalian on the side. (Yes, he was one of ours.) His list is funny and smart—and it’s largely true. Here I want to zero in on a couple of his items that visitors to St. Mark’s (or any other Episcopal church) might find problematic. Pew aerobics Several years ago, I visited a huge church in the Chicago area. The main auditorium was set up with very good theater-style seats and a stage up front where everything happened. That wouldn’t work for us. If you watch any Episcopal church on a Sunday morning, you will see a lot of action. People sit, stand, kneel, stand up again, kneel again, and then wander around shaking hands. After that they sit down, then kneel some more and finally make their way to the front of the room. And kneel. When they get back to their seats, they sit, kneel, and stand up to sing. Mixed in with all this, people do things lik...