So today I went to church at Trinity Episcopal Church in Seneca Falls and then I went to Bar Church at Swabys in Auburn. Using Outward appearances they were dramatically different.
Trinity is a very old church just celebrated its 125th anniversary in its present location. It is a beautiful,much photographed church with stain glass windows some of which are actually Tiffany windows.
Swaby's is a bar on South Street that has its own unique charm. It has all sorts of prison memorabilia up to and including an electric chair. It is dark and there are two small windows that appear to be stain glass in the room that church was held in. I am sure that had nothing to do with why church was held there anymore than the fact that the electric chair is in that room.
Trinity has an older congregation and it is pretty much comprised of people who either have gone there for their whole lives or just about. I was away for a couple years and there are a few people that I do not know who are there but mostly people know each other.
Lake Church at Swaby's was a very young group. I am very sure I was the oldest person in attendance by several years. I also figure I was one of the few without a tattoo but I didn't check around.
Trinity has a beautiful old pipe organ and a wonderful choir led by the very capable Doug and Susan Avery. The songs are traditional church songs that can be found in the "new" 1982 hymnal.
Today at Lake Church at Swaby's there was a head banging female fronted band from Saratoga Springs...Silversyde was their name and they were hard rockers. Bar Church promotes itself with "the energy is high and the music is load" They weren't lying.
In Trinity it is very easy to tell who you are by what you wear.
If you are in the Choir you wear one kind of robe, if you
are an acolyte you wear another type of robe and if you are a lay Eucharistic minister you wear an other and then the priest wears yet another plus the collar and the stole.
The congregation has no robes.
At Lake Church I never had a clue who was who...as a matter of fact I thought that the minister(?) worship leader..still not sure what he likes to be called... was the bartender.
Seriously.
The band kind of looked like a hard rocking band but there were several young people who had that same look so again...no clues there.
Trinity Seneca Falls follows a prescribed format. There is a lectionary that all the Episcopal Churches use so you can be sure that everyone is hearing the same lesson in all Episcopal Churches everywhere.
Trinity also uses the Book of Common Prayer and it has all the services for every possible occasion and the way they are to run right down to the sitting, standing and kneeling. This again pretty much makes it so you could go into just about any Episcopal Church and be fairly certain how things are done...if you know the Episcopal format that is. I did not when I started and it took quite some time to be familiar with it all.
Lake Church at Swabys had pretty much no actual format. I mean I am sure they decided that the band would play x number of songs and the then there would be a message and then some songs but...that was about it. It was loose. It started late. Well It started when it started but it said 12:00 so I was there at 11:45 because that's what i am used to. The band was still setting up, the sign was being put up and the chairs...which few people used...were being set up.
So different?..yes very very different.
Except for one similarity.
The message.
Priest Polly and Josh( maybe)not sure it was his name they both had the same message no matter how they got there.
Polly's lesson began with the lectionary.
Her core message...and lets be very very clear...this is what I got out of it and for the person sitting next to me or in front of me it may have been very different...was that we need to focus, in this 21st century we are distracted, tempted and we can lose ourselves and our place with God if we do not stop. God is our core but it is so easy to lose sight of that.
Josh( again if I am wrong on his name I apologize) his message was about Camping. Well that was his story but the bottom line and again...what I heard as the bottom line..was watch where you set up camp.
You can have all the best stuff and all the education and all the advantages but you need to set up camp in the right camp grounds or risk having it all disappear.
The focus, the camp, are both with God. God is here for us and all we have to do is be open to it and put our trust in God.
God is love and we are All, every single one of us, called.
And that is a message I can embrace with formal robed church or informal Bar Church.
Amen,Alleluia.
