Cathedral in the Night

I have had the pleasure of participating in worship at an outdoor church called Cathedral in the Night in Northampton, Massachusetts for three of the last four Sundays evenings.

Funded, in part, by the Episcopal Church, Cathedral in the Night was launched in January 2010. It has three components: a 5:00 p.m. Eucharist service which is followed by a meal; a Thursday evening discussion group called “Common Ground Fellowship”, which is held at a local coffee house and is geared towards students at area colleges and other young adults; and an advocacy component which works to end homelessness. I have only participated in the Sunday services as I have class on Thursday nights. I have not seen or heard anything about the advocacy component of this ministry, other than reading on their website that it exists:

http://www.cathedralinthenight.org/Home.php

The three pastors--Rev. Chris Carlisle, the Episcopal Chaplain at the University of Massachusetts; Rev.  Eric Fistler of the UCC; Rev. Stephanie Spellers of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, and others organizers have worked hard to make worship as attractive and welcoming as possible. The church meets in the inviting space on the edge of the street in front of my Main Street UCC/ABC congregation, The First Churches of Northampton. It’s a space where street people, students, and others frequently gather to watch the world go by. Art students designed four lanterns to mark the corners of the space. The lanterns are white five-gallon buckets with fluorescent bulbs at the top and bottom and origami peace doves strung in between. The Communion table is covered with a beautifully embroidered orange cloth from Jerusalem which includes several small mirrors. Two tables set perpendicularly in front of the altar holds a long wooden cross-shaped box which is partly filled with sand and is used to hold votive candles and people’s offerings. (I’ll describe these later.) There was also a cloud, which was only used once. It was a broad, internally lit cloud-shaped "balloon" made from a patchwork of recycled shopping bags from local stores. It was suspended from poles in buckets and was designed to create the suggestion of a tabernacle. Let’s just say that the concept was better than its execution.  There are also four kerosene heat lamps to provide warmth on cold days.

The half-hour worship service opens with songs that are either taught or handed out. A time for bidding prayers is followed by a scripture reading. There is a five-minute meditation on the scripture text, which is usually geared towards persons who have struggled with addictions, homelessness, and other difficulties. This is followed by a Eucharist which includes singing and an opportunity for people to pick up wooden star or heart from a basket. Each shape has a word such as “listening”, “love, and “compassion” written on it. Everyone is encouraged to pick up an object from the basket and place it in the sand-filled cross to symbolize a gift they can share with others during the week. The service concludes with a song and a prayer inviting everyone to a meal of soup, bologna and cheese sandwiches, cake, cookies, and coffee. One night there was also cold popcorn shrimp.

Each week there have been about twenty people at the service. Most are linked to the service’s sponsoring Episcopalian, Lutheran, and UCC/ABC congregations or the local soup kitchen that provides the meals, rather than the homeless people and students the services are designed to reach. Most homeless people come after the service starts and gather around the periphery waiting for supper. Folks leading worship try to invite them to participate, with varied success. At one service a woman started singing “Were You There When They Crucified My Lord?” but only knew the first two lines. I sang with her and the rest of the group to keep the song going. On Sunday my friend John and I struck up a twenty-minute conversation with a newly-homeless Vietnam vet who broke down and wept when he described his situation. John and I walked him to the local shelter where he was planning on staying at the time he was expected to enter so he wouldn’t have to go alone. Providing a hot meal and a setting for this type of interaction seems to be where "church" happens the most at Cathedral in the Night. In Church 3.0: Upgrades for the Future of the Church, Neil Cole writes,

         "It dawned on me one day tht the Bible never
          commanded us to plant a church. When the
          disciples were sent out, they were to bring the
          kingdom (or reign) of God to place where people
          lived life" (Kindle location 1125-1127) 

Cathedral in the Night works hard to bring the reign of God to the street where people live. I cannot help but wonder how much street people were involved in the Cathedral's formation. Did the founders spend as much time working with them as they did working with student artists on the church's lights and "cloud?" Is this expression of church something that is done for street people rather than with them?

I hope the passage of time will make street people feel more at home participating in this service. In the meantime, they are getting a decent meal, being welcomed, cared for and listened to. They, along with the rest of us, are hearing the Word preached in a way that relates to their experience and we all have an opportunity to lift up our prayers, offer our gifts (and be reminded that we have gifts to offer). We are also offered the Eucharist before being fed supper. Oftentimes, people need time to feel “safe” in a new setting. Since the church is scheduled to shut down in May, at least for the summer, I fear that trust built up over the past few months will have to be rebuilt after the hiatus. Even so, I hope that, over time, Cathedral in the Night will be more successful in making homeless and other street people feel safe and included, so that it will be of even greater benefit to those it hopes to serve.