My little Episcopal parish, Holy Moly, is closing at the end of this month.
I'm part of the lay leadership; I'm involved in this process. If you had told me 5 years ago when I reluctantly agreed to be on the Bishop's Committee that I'd be part of the stubborn remainder that had to come to this decision and actually deal with the physical and emotional and spiritual challenges that come with closing a church, I'd have said "no way. Not gonna do it."
Well, here I am, in at the death.
In my time, I've attended probably 50 normal B.C. meetings, and about 10 or 20 meetings related to church in some way, maybe more if you count the joint Lenten and Advent meetings we used to have with a former "yoking" partner. Many of the meetings had an anxious subtext: "How are we doing? Can we cut more from the budget? Can we get through another year? Can we find a partner? Can we talk to some other Episcopalians about being a really, really small church? How long can we go on?"
We had another joint meeting last night with the Bishop's Committee from the parish we're merging with. There's a lot of stuff to be discussed in the very few weeks we have left, as our closing service is December 31, the "transferred" feast of the Holy Innocents. Our vicar, a very gentle soul, earnestly laid out an ambitious program to create several smaller working groups to cover specific issues (he purposely avoided calling them "committees"). The issues include liturgy/music, finance, outreach/evangelism, care/healing, and so on.
And then he said the "M" word. He mentioned in passing that perhaps some of these committees might need to week much more often than monthly as in the full BC meeting. Some might need to get together every week to discuss things and keep ideas and goals and tasks moving and on track.
My friend the Warden, a woman who took on the mantle of leadership because none of the rest of us wanted to do it when the previous warden resigned, dissolved in tears. She simply could not handle the thought of yet another meeting.
There were tears in the sacristy as well; when you have worked the better part of a lifetime to help make a beautiful and meaningful Eucharist by providing the painstaking labor to ensure that "fair linens" are truly fair, it's hard to stand unmoved when the vestments and vessels you've cared for are being discussed as if they were housewares.
One couple brought wedding pictures – they were married at Holy Moly several decades ago.
It's really hard for the long-timers, who were there at the founding. They know the story of how the altar was built, and who made the embroidered banners, and how the modern steeple used to have stained glass in it that fell down and through the skylight one day during Mass. Right over the altar, showering the then-priest with broken glass, as he was about to serve the Eucharist.
I'm a short-timer; I've only been there 5 years. In that time, I've seen the numbers dwindle, and in the last year it seemed like every month, another face or family was MIA. They just got tired of waiting for the end to happen, and didn't want to be there for the unpleasant reality that we all face at the end of December. After the Eucharist on New Year's Eve Sunday, we'll have a party downstairs, while upstairs some people will busy themselves with dismantling the most essential of our liturgical "furniture" that must go with us to St Nicholas, and they'll carefully move it and install it there that afternoon.
I mentioned in the meeting last night, as we were getting lost in the discussion of how it would work to have some people partying and reminiscing downstairs while others were working and disassembling upstairs, that some people were meant to be movers, and some were meant to be shakers. There'll be a whole lot of moving and shaking going on before we're done.
The essential items appear to be:
- The Columbarium – ashes of some of our dead are in this, which is mounted on the wall
- The Risen Christ/Christus Rex – mounted on a pipe over and behind the altar
- Various chalices, vestments, vessels, hand chimes, prayer books, some hymnals
- a statue of Mary, and a couple of embroidered banners, a portable font, and so on.
Non-essential items include the Stations of the Cross, which are all about the size of a picture frame and in very bad repair. They've been repaired many times, and the one with the big wood screws that go right up our Lord's bottom really, really bothers me. Still, they hold a lot of meaning for some people, so they'll be repaired if possible, and put in storage for later. There's also a very big carved crucifix that is simply too big for the new space at this time. Several people seem to find this disturbing, but we'll find a way to use it if only during Holy Week, I suspect.
Frankly, we've got a problem. We'll do all this work, get all this stuff moved, and some of it will be stored in the basement of a parishionerr. And then, I fear, a significant number of us will decide that we can't make the move spiritually or emotionally, once the physical task is accomplished. We won't have familiar music, at least not at first, because we won't have an organ. We won't have a regular musician to play the portable keyboard, either, which is one reason why membership has fallen off so steeply since the beginning of summer. We'll struggle on, attempting to do things without music, or to sing hymns a cappella. It's going to be rough.
There are hopes and plans for an eventual digital organ, an impossibly expensive instrument on our budget unless the diocese secures one from some other distressed parish. I'm hopeful, but fear that we're grasping at straws on that one.
The current congregation at St Nicholas is losing some of the ways they do things, in the merger. They're much more informal and loosey-goosey about the Eucharist, and their music and liturgy are very contemporary and sort of "hey, let's have the kids do church!" They like church their way. They like the contemporary music, which is "easy to sing for those without much musical training." They like to have all the kids running around underfoot and out of control.
Meh. It bothers me.
I'm going along with everything and I'm even a little excited when I'm not dreading the last couple of "big" services at Holy Moly (I'm worried about the organist for Christmast Eve… and lack of rehearsal time or discussion of what we're singing). But I'm worried that we're going to get our "stuff" moved over there, and those of us who are holding it together will sort of fall apart, and a couple of people who are already not coping with it will well and truly go to pieces.
The food pantry stuff excites me, and being part of a much more energized community excites me, but I won't know if I'll be excited to go to church there for a good long while yet.
