George Orwell once wrote a lovely essay on the ideal pub, which succinctly laid out what he considered to be the ideal establishment. It's still pretty much bang on, though he seems to care more about china mugs than I do.
I was reminded of it a few weeks ago when, in lieu of actually going to a church away day, I wrote down what I thought we needed to do. I pretty much laid out what an ideal church looks like. Actually though, in the interests, of tact, brevity and pragmatism, I don't think I went far enough. So I have here. Much like Orwell's Moon under water, my ideal church simply does the basics right and is sensible.
It has services at a sensible time, which on a Sunday requires no one to be out of the house before 9:30, or still in church when it is really time for lunch. Information about those services, as well as specific seasonal services is available in plenty of places, including on a website. It is not evangelism to expect people to guess when the Ash Wednesday service is on if they were not in church on the Sunday. Details of the people and the logistics are also widely shared.
Those logistics are practical, with provision for children that neither forces them to listen to a service they find tedious; nor - worse - forces the rest of the congregation to endure too many children. No exceptions are made to this rule, even on high and holy days. It is not considered essential, as it is for so many churches, for children to be especially bored and their neighbours excessively hostile in the service of Easter. Both children and adults alike are well served with cake after church. And, on days of liturgical celebration, wine.
The texts are in proper prose and include the Old Testament - because we are not Marcionites. Sermons are short, no more than ten minutes, done well, and may even have jokes. They cover the specifics of the texts read. Hymns are mostly traditional, though there is no shame in choosing those that reflect the congregation occasionally. They rarely include the infantilising modern songs that are popular with children but have no place in a grown up church.
Liturgically, nothing too outlandish is attempted and all is done promptly. There is no Marian idolatry smuggled in through the back door of appropriate vestments, though vestments should be appropriate and reflect in no way any fashion of the last half century. In an ideal world, the language would be Cranmer's, but at the very least, the Lord's Prayer talks of trespassing, not Sin, and at no stage will there be any suggestion that the word disciple is synonymous with friend. Communion is taken in both kinds, and with red wine - no affection around transubstantiation here. There is, of course, no pause for the Peace. Everyone knows that the right time to swap pleasantries with your neighbour is at the end of the service.
This mostly describes a Sunday morning, but my ideal church would have daily services, to which I would go rarely, but it gives me a great deal of pleasure to know they exist. When services are not being held the church is open, often for events. Some may be Christian in character, but by no means all. This is a public building, open, supportive and embedded in its community. Someone, though of course, not me, can always clear up.
I am not hopeful.
