The Very Rev. David Giuliano

Friday, May 23, 2008

This Moderator's Blog originally appeared on WonderCafe*.

Travelling to visit our extended church family across the country, we visited Erskine and American United Church in Montreal. Or what is left of it. The historic building with its magnificent pipe organ and Tiffany stained glass windows holds its ground amid the hustle on Sherbrooke Street West. The remnant congregation has dispersed to other United Churches, or simply stayed home. By most accounts the dissolution of the once influential assembly was not entirely graceful.

The pews have been removed. The 60 chairs set up for our visit were dwarfed by the cavernous sanctuary. The massive communion table, imported Italian marble, presides at the front. I’m guessing it is worth more than the entire church property in Marathon. The baptismal font, made of matching green marble and weighing perhaps 500 pounds, clings to the lip of the dais, stage left. Stage right the grand pulpit still thrusts its noble chest sky-ward. The preacher would have been at eye level with folks in the balcony.

The building has been turned over to the nearby Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal for use as a gallery. The sanctuary and exterior of the building will remain intact. The “newer” parts will be demolished, replaced by galleries to display Québécois art—almost by definition religious art. A portable screen was set up in front of communion table. A DVD about the museum’s plans to use and honour the building was projected onto the screen. It felt hopeful. Sort of.

At the end of the presentation the museum staff were thanked and excused. Forty or so of us United Church folks, like confused ghosts from another era, remained. We played a short round of “grill the Moderator.” Our voices echoed in the space once renowned for exceptional music and pews that packed in a thousand or more. I was asked to close our time with prayer.

I felt irresistibly drawn to the baptismal font. I had no idea what would happen when I got there. Only that I needed to touch it. Laying hands on its smooth sun-warmed surface we gave thanks for the babies, for the children and adults who had been sprinkled with the waters of the Way on that very spot. We prayed that they had known grace in that moment and since.

From there, it is a long walk across the expansive dais to the table. I laid hands on it too. We gave thanks for our brothers and sisters, saints and sinners, who over the years had confessed their hunger and thirst around it. We gave thanks for the many that ate and drank and were filled.

During the assent to the pulpit my knees began to shake. From there we thanked God for all the preachers whose knees shook in that very place as they, broken vessels, poured out the Good News. We gave thanks for preachers who by lunchtime most Sundays would regret not having said it better, said it more truly.

Finally, together we prayed the Jesus Prayer, all of us poignantly aware that it was the last time. Those precious words will not likely be spoken aloud by followers of Jesus inside Erskine and American United Church again. We were turning out the lights. “….forever and ever. Amen”

A Spirit, as tangible as painted light dancing through Tiffany windows, swirled about us. Only the most severely armoured could have missed Her longing and loving presence. We, the church, breathed Her into our lungs and then stepped outside into the sunshine. We exhaled. Closed and locked the door behind us. Descended to the street. The Spirit persisted. She was there, amidst the honks and shouts and hurly-burly of Rue Sherbrooke Ouest. Wondering where we were to go next, I heard a voice say, “Now you are on holy ground.”