Back in Cambridge

As my friends found out to their dismay this week, I arrived back in Cambridge on Wednesday. Since then I have had a day out with the choir to Westminster Abbey on Friday, which was a long and tiring day with many hours of rehearsal. The service’s music went well, though I did not like the way it felt so much like a spectacle with all the tourists. If we are to witness to them in worship, it is a pretty bad way of doing it. I would suggest seriously to the Abbey pastors to either scrap the antiquated format entirely or make it private, replace the gift shop with a room of books and free tracts and some volunteers to talk to people wanting to find out about the purpose of the building, and have some fun services that explain what is going on and genuinely invite the visitors to confession. It is just feels so empty and un-churchlike when those who have come to listen see nothing of the joy and praise and so little of the clear, direct proclamation that Christ’s body loves and wants warmly to extend. I found it so hard to sympathise with the pastor who reminded the choir to speak up in the prayers and lead the congregation because many were foreign and would have difficulty following. How many language schools remember to give their students ease with Henrichian English?

I have also bashed through a CATAM project in the last few days, a big relief.