Not Just Museums

How necessary, some have asked, was the total closure of our parish churches, so that not even live streamed services from the church building was permitted? There is a growing sense among one section of the Church of England that the decision owes more to the resurgence a Puritan spirit within the church.

"The Privatisation of religion,"  Bishop Peter Selby called it in an article in the Tablet;  and, more accessibly here on a YouTube Easter Message for members of the congregation of st. John the Divine, Kennington.

The big guns may be lining up in defence of the Church as Holy Place with a function more important than a museum of curiosities or a sheep shed.  In a thoughtful and inspiring sermon, part of BBC4 Sunday Worship service marking the 800th anniversary of Salisbury Cathedral, Bishop Nicholas Holtam had some important things to say about church buildings. The words were used in connection with the much loved Salisbury Cathedral, but are equally true for all of England's parish churches.

Church is people, as the reading from 1 Peter said ‘living stones’, as well as buildings. But it’s not one or the other: church is both. People and buildings are intimately connected across time. Our churches, what Simon Jenkins calls “the museums of England”, carry people’s stories and history. .......

Philip Larkin memorably wrote in a poem called Church Going, A serious house on serious earth it is.What is much less well remembered are the opening lines, Once I am sure there is nothing going on I step inside, letting the door thud shut. Well, now the doors are shut and the people outside, but the building is still working for us; “a thin place”, “where prayer has been valid.”  These are not just the museums of England.  They are places where we find ourselves in relation to God and one another and all creation.