Reordering: the liturgical aspects
Why undertake a liturgical reordering of the church building? The answer has to be to make the liturgy more effective. It must not be simply to conform to a fashion, or to make the church more adaptable, for instance for plays or concerts. The aim must be for the regular worship of the church to be offered in a setting likely to inspire devotion and to create the possibility of experiencing holiness.
The difficulty is that the liturgy does not simply take place in the building. At a certain level the building itself becomes part of the liturgy. Unless we worship with our eyes closed tight, part of what is offered will be the glass, the wood and stone, the shapes and curves and spaces, all mixed in with the prayer and the Scripture, the music and the silence. People are conscious of this when they go into a great cathedral, or a building of particular beauty, character or strong simplicity but tend to take it for granted as they worship week by week in the building with which they are most familiar. But it remains true, whether they are aware of it or not. It means that all liturgical reordering should be approached cautiously and hesitantly (even if the final design is bold and imaginative). Otherwise, in the apparent interest of good liturgy, something is created that is out of keeping with the glass and wood and stone, and even more so with the shapes and curves and spaces. Where the liturgical arrangement is fighting against the architecture, there will be a tension in the liturgy that will get in the way of true worship. The building can be modified, but in sympathy with the basic design, not against it.
The principal liturgical furnishings of the church are the altar, the pulpit/lectern and the font. Each of these will be considered in turn.
The altar, or holy table, is both a functional and a symbolic furnishing of the church. Its function is to provide the table for the celebration of the Eucharist. Its symbolism makes it a sacrament of the presence of Christ, which is an extension of its Eucharistic use. For the celebration of contemporary liturgy, the ideal is a free-standing altar in a generous, uncluttered space, behind which the ministers may stand facing the congregation, and round which the people may gather to receive the consecrated gifts.
This is not always achievable. Sometimes the creation of such an arrangement would mean the destruction of a fine altar and reredos. Sometimes there would not be sufficient space for the ministers to do more than squeeze between the table and the wall. Sometimes there would be nowhere suitable for the distribution of the sacrament. Sometimes a new altar would have to be erected too close to an existing one. In all these cases, the church needs to consider whether it might not be better to continue a more traditional arrangement with the celebration facing east. In any event, only the part of the service from the Offertory to the Distribution need be at the altar. Not only the whole Ministry of the Word but also the Post-Communion part of the rite can be celebrated elsewhere, for instance from a lectern at the chancel step.
The question of the relationship of one altar to another is important. Liturgically the ideal is one altar only in the main church (side chapels, separate rooms in effect, are a different matter). Two altars, acting as alternative foci of the presence of Christ, are confusing and unhelpful so, where possible, a reordering should move the altar, not add a second one. Where this is not possible, or would be aesthetically disastrous, care should be taken to ensure the primacy of the altar at which the Eucharist is normally to be celebrated. What is quite wrong is the addition of an insignificant free-standing table for the Eucharist, while an older larger altar dominates behind. Also unsatisfactory is a scheme where, after a celebration at a nave altar, there is then a procession through the chancel to an older sanctuary for the distribution.
The shape and height of a free-standing altar need careful consideration. Altars against walls resemble sideboards, rectangular and tall. This is quite appropriate - sideboards look right against walls. But sideboards are not designed to be put in the middle of rooms. In the middle of a room a table is needed, perhaps a few inches lower then a 'sideboard' altar (though not too much if the celebration is to retain some dignity) and perhaps square or even round. Long rectangles for central altars are normally mistaken.
There are two other furnishings that need to be near the altar, though subsidiary to it: the credence table and the president's chair. The credence table provides a surface on which the vessels for the Eucharist are kept during the service, before and after they are required at the altar. The table is purely functional. It should draw as little attention to itself as possible but it should be sufficiently large to allow a satisfactory work surface, since a free-standing altar in full view of the people is not a proper setting for the ablutions that follow Communion.
More significant is the president's chair. People have often referred to the principal chair in the sanctuary as a 'Bishop's chair'. Technically of course there is no such thing except in a cathedral. It is that chair, the cathedra, which makes a church a cathedral church. Yet, a priest presiding at the liturgy does so as the bishop's deputy, and so it is not inappropriate that the chair used by the president at the Eucharist should be the chair in which the bishop sits when he comes and should carry his name.
This chair should be sufficiently different from other stools, chairs or benches in the sanctuary area that it clearly denotes its occupant as the president of the rite. It should not, however, be too grand and throne-like, like some Victorian sanctuary chairs. Its positioning is crucial. The occupant ought to have the whole assembly in view. The classic place for the chair is raised a little behind the table. Sometimes the chair may be to the side, but still facing the people, or angled towards them, providing the altar does not create a barrier between president and people. Reordering schemes that take no account of the place for the chair have missed an important aspect of a satisfactory liturgical arrangement.
The second major furnishing is the focus of the Word: reading the Scriptures and preaching. Traditionally in Anglican churches these two activities have each had a focus - lectern and pulpit. In some reorderings only one has been retained, with one focus for the Word, both read and preached. This focus, be it pulpit or lectern or, as Roman Catholics call it, 'ambo', needs to be of such a height that people can communicate from it, of such dignity that due honour is given to the place of the Word in the liturgy, and of a size and character that are in keeping with the altar. We hold Word and Sacrament in equal honour, and the focus of each in the church should reflect that. Altar and pulpit should not compete with but balance each other.
The third principal furnishing is the font. Like the lectern/pulpit it has an equal status to the altar. They are the foci of the two great sacraments of the Gospel, Baptism and Eucharist. In a reordering the font should not be made subsidiary to the altar, nor should it be given a portable or flimsy appearance where the altar seems solid and permanent. Ideally the font should have a space of its own, away from the altar focus and near the principal entrance, so that the people see it and pass by it whenever they come in to worship and also they can turn to it and see it in use when baptism is celebrated in the Sunday liturgy.
A number of factors militate against this in many churches. For instance, the principal entrance may be in a corner: space around the font may be cramped or pillars block the view. The solution too often is baptism out of a rose bowl set on a credence table at the chancel step, while the font remains neglected, a repository for flowers and leaflets. Here pastoral and liturgical principles sometimes have to compromise. One possibility is this: as with the Eucharist, it is possible to celebrate most of the baptismal liturgy away from the font, moving to it only for the part where water - and this should be more than a token drop - is crucial. Another is the repositioning of the font away from the door, perhaps near the altar. If this is to happen, the font must again have a significant space of its own.
Where a new font is to be designed, there are contemporary considerations that might lead to bold innovation. With the increase in adult baptism, a font should be designed to allow an adult at least to kneel in the water, yet to prevent more than one focus of baptism, it should also be suitable for the baptism of infants. Interesting new fonts are being made, of which one of the most splendid is that at Portsmouth Cathedral, that permit varieties of baptismal practice and should be studied in any reordering proposal. At the very least there should be the facility for sufficient water, possibly even flowing, and certainly visible. Rose bowls and ashtrays at the chancel step are not acceptable!
Two further considerations are also important in any reordering. One is the care that needs to be taken about the positioning of musicians, whether robed choirs or less formal singing groups, and of their instruments, whether organ or keyboards, flutes and guitars. The musicians are not performers who should dominate the liturgy but equally they are not separate from the congregation, to be banished to a gallery or transept where they do not feel part of the liturgical action. It is almost impossible to give specific guidance, for every church is different. However, in general the musicians need to be close to the liturgical action but not too close, and raised up but not too much.
Mention has been made of space. The altar, the lectern and the font all need their space. Very often the best reordering of a church involves simply the removal of excess furniture, without the addition of anything new. It is not just that the liturgy needs space for its movements, but that the space itself, unfilled by people or furniture, helps to create a sense of space in the soul, which is when true worship can begin to happen.
This text is taken from CBC's book Church Extensions and Adaptations (CHP 1996) available from Church House Bookshop.
Copyright © The Central Board of Finance of the Church of England 1996; The Archbishops' Council 1999 and reproduced by permission. Permission to reproduce this text should be sought from the Copyright and Contracts Administrator, The Archbishops' Council, Church House, Great Smith Street, London SW1P 3AZ (Tel: 020 7898 1557; Fax: 020 7898 1449; email: copyright@c-of-e.org.uk).
October 2001 & June 2008
