This happened at First Presbyterian Church of South Bend, but not on my watch. My dear friend David (1946-2011), who has since entered the Church Triumphant, was the officiating pastor for this wedding with a charming story attached.
You must know that First Presbyterian Church of South Bend is one of many very large and elegant Presbyterian Churches by the famed Philadelphia church architect Harold E. Wagoner.
“The great thing about being an architect, is that you can walk into your dreams.” - Harold E. Wagoner, 1986
His fine Presbyterian Churches can be seen across the land, and have an gorgeous and refined quality about them that is worth celebrating. FPCSB’s sanctuary is large, and the proportions follow the proportions of the Temple in Jerusalem, which means that the nave is a long rectangle and has a very long center aisle. It is a lovely place in a suave and subdued Georgian revival style. The sanctuary is placed on the city block so that it runs parallel with Colfax Avenue, which means that there is also a beautiful front lawn to the church, about which I have several stories to share in future.
The narthex, therefore, may be reached from either Colfax or from the parking lot to the rear of the church, and directly opposite the sanctuary from the narthex is the church parlor in which the bride and her attendants prepare for the wedding. As was the case on this particular Saturday. Then, when all things were ready, the bridesmaids entered the church one by one and processed to the Chancel down the long, long aisle.
Which left the bride and her father waiting, as the last to go.
As they stood there waiting, the doors to the sanctuary closed before them, the bride wanted to be sure that her long train was not twisted or tangled in any way. So she whispered a word to the church custodian, who had been standing in the narthex out of sight, watching the lovely event unfold. She said to him, “Would you please take care of my train?”
The custodian seemed surprised but smiled and nodded. And then then ushers opened the door and in a vision of loveliness, the bride and the father of the bride set off down the aisle, to the strains of the mighty organ.
The congregation stood in the bride’s honor.
She beamed at them, and they at her.
And proudly behind her, with a huge smile on his own face, holding the train ever so delicately yet securely, came the church custodian, every step of the way, down the long, long aisle!
Why is it that some folks get the wrong impression about the center aisle of the church?
Is it perhaps because choirs sometimes process and recess, singing as they go up or down the aisle as the case may be? I have several wedding center aisle stories that are worth passing along for your amusement….
This goes back to First Presbyterian Church of South Bend and a wedding in which the bride asked her roommate to serve as her matron of honor. The bride was petite and the roommate was not. In fact she was more like Miss Texas, gone to seed. We will call her Trixie DeLite, because that is how she acted throughout the proceedings.
First, there was the processional. The maid of honor is the last save the bride down the aisle so she is the one all eyes are on with anticipation at that penultimate moment. Trixie did not fail the assembled through as far as entertainment value was concerned.
I have done over 200 weddings and I can tell you that absolutely no one does that step-and-pause, step-and-pause in wedding processions any longer. But Miss DeLite did.
Trixie was agile, to say the least. As Trixie took each step, she swung her hips, so dramatically, first to (oomph!) and then fro (oomph!), that I feared she would take out some unsuspecting wedding guest’s eye. She must have been pleased with the effect that her walk was having, even though I truly expected her to burst into that song from “Gypsy” that has the refrain: “With an oooh! And an oooh! And an oooh, oooh, oooh…!”
True confession time, I was glad that no one was looking at me because I was biting my tongue and trying to stop my shoulders from heaving up and down hysterically.
That should have been the end of the story. But it was not, because the bride had also asked Trixie to sing the wedding solo. I cannot recall what it was, but she delivered like Marlene Deitrich, belting out “See What the Boys in the Backroom Will Have.”
It was so dreadfully wrong that one could only watch it like a train wreck in slow motion.
The saddest part of all was that the bride’s father was the long time choir director of the church and had on his list of friends about three dozen people who could have sung appropriately and well.
But then again, I wouldn’t have Trixie’s story with which to DeLite you!
Churches are such interesting places, a microcosm of society. One cannot help but be enlightened by seeing and appreciating the merely funny as well as the absurd and the ridiculous in life. And seeing and appreciating the poignant and the beautiful and the serious things of life, too.
From time to time when I was in Pittsburgh (1987-1997) I would be asked to do a wedding at a location other than the church I served, Fox Chapel Presbyterian Church. Indeed, as I look back through my Pastoral Record, I see that many of those off campus wedding happened on campus, that is on the Pitt campus, at Heinz Chapel. A beautiful place.
One wedding that was off-site was at Phipps Conservatory. Now this is one of the benefactions of the Phipps family, who were contemporaries of Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick. They gave the city this collection of large greenhouse rooms, in which are ever-changing floral displays. So, reasons a wise bride-to-be, no florist costs there, if we have the wedding at Phipps.
This may or may not have been the impetus for the wedding I did there, I cannot say. What I can say is that the procession was perhaps the most memorable of all the 200-plus weddings I have officiated. If that bride and groom read this, I hope they will have been married long enough, now, to appreciate what I found humorous about the occasion.
I asked them about all the things one asks when one is a pastor preparing to do a wedding. When I asked them about music, they assured me that there would be string music, and I envisioned a string quartet, surely a lovely idea, to have some Vivaldi and Handel amid the posies and parterres.
When the day arrived I found that their string music was somewhat different. They had hired the violinist from their favorite restaurant, you know the kind, the strolling violinist who comes round to your table and plays sad or romantic songs while you dine by candlelight. Indeed, he did not prepare something new for this occasion, but instead a selection that I am sure had pleased many a dining couple in their day.
For as the procession began, he launched into a florid rendition of Irving Berlin’s:
“A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody”
It was almost like being at the Ziegfeld Follies.
Pastors have differing views about the use of a Unity Candle in weddings.
The idea (as far as anyone can tell), comes from a wedding on a daytime soap opera. So the origins are definitely not religious in nature. I can say that in 1982 when I was ordained, the practice was very new and seldom asked for. These days, there are few weddings that occur without a unity candle.
Back in the Fox Chapel Presbyterian Days (1987-1997) I recall one wedding of note because of the unity candle. You will recall that I have told you that the chancel there is divided. We had a wedding policy that there was to be no movement by the photographer or the videographer, and this was when video cameras were large. So for this wedding the brother of the bride, who was not in the wedding, was stationed where he could capture all the action, with a camera on a tripod hidden by the tall wineglass pulpit, between it and the organ console. The majority of the wedding guest could not see him or his tripod and camera.
The night of the rehearsal, the bride and groom practiced all the parts of the service, including the lighting of the unity candle. Their candle had been made by the bride’s aunt, with the wedding invitation as part of the design. After the rehearsal was completed, the bride handed the candle to one of the church’s six volunteer bridal consultants and asked her to put it someplace for safekeeping till the wedding the next day.
At last the big day arrived. The procession got underway, everyone ended up in the Chancel in their proper places. But the bride had a worried look on her face and said to me in a whisper, “Where is my unity candle?” I could not turn around to look so I said, “Isn’t it on the communion table?” She shook her head, No.
Her brother, over to our right at the video camera said, “Do you want me to go and get it?” I nodded and off he went, down the stairway, down the long hallway in the classroom area under the sanctuary and off to find the wedding consultant.
Meanwhile the service progressed. I must confess that I had a bit longer prayers than the order of marriage provides. Indeed, I recall that I threw in a few extra prayers for good measure. The vows were done, the rings were exchanged, the homily delivered and we were nearing the point of no return, when finally the brother appeared at the doorway by the stairs, breathless, unity candle in hand.
“Do you still want to light your unity candle?” I asked the bride and groom in a whisper. They both nodded their heads.
“Wait right where you are till I tell you to move,” said I. Then, I went over and got the candle from the brother, and in as stately a manner as I could muster, did a one man procession with it, up to the communion table, and slowly placed it there as if we planned it that way. Then I indicated to the couple that they could light it, and after they did, I pronounced them man and wife, we had the benediction and everyone recessed.
Later, at the reception, not one but four young ladies who had been at the wedding came up to me at different points in the evening and said,
“I loved the symbolism of not bringing the Unity Candle in until the end of the service. And when I get married, I am doing it exactly the same way!”
So, if you have been to a wedding any time after the early 1990s, at which they brought the Unity Candle in at the end, like that, now, you know where the whole idea began.
We had such wonderful caretakers at Fox Chapel Presbyterian Church; that is, the custodial staff. They kept the church sparkling clean and bright, and did so with a faithfulness that was a marvel to behold. They saw it as a labor of love, and although they were usually behind the scenes, they made the scenes lovely. I believe they knew how highly I thought of them and how much I appreciated the work they did. Any church would have been blessed to have them on staff.
The Memorial Garden, as I have said in my last post, is a beautiful outdoor garden chapel designed for the committal of the ashes of church members. It was completed during the decade I served there. In the red brick walls that surround the garden are niches somewhat like post office boxes, into which the cremains can find their final resting place. A specially designed tool opens the front surface of each niche.
Soon after the Memorial Garden was completed, one of the caretakers came to speak with me, confidentially. He had been told in no uncertain terms that it would be his job to open the front of the niche and place the ashes in the niche whenever there was a committal. He then told me that he literally could not do it. That he had a horror of handling dead bodies even if these were only the ashes thereof. He had tried to explain this to his supervisor on the church staff and was told that it did not matter, he had to do it anyway. He was truly afraid he would lose his job over this very real fear being in conflict with a new duty added to his job description.
I at once said, “Do not worry. I will do it for you. No one else needs to know. Whenever you need it done, just let me know.” I could see that his sense of relief was both immediate and great. And it was something I could do, in a tangible way, to say how much I appreciated him. From that time forward, that is exactly what we did.
To this day, I wonder at the attitude that would have insisted that he do something that was so unsettling, and frankly, so unnecessary for him to do… Don’t you?
So when I came to Wekiva Presbyterian Church and in time we created our own Memorial Garden (a lovely space in the church courtyard for reflection and renewal as well as for placing the ashes of our loved ones), I said from the very beginning that I would place the ashes of those whose committal services I did there, in the Garden, personally. This is something I do after the committal, when no one else is present, in a dignified way, with a quiet prayer.
It happened at Fox Chapel Presbyterian Church some time after the Memorial Garden, pictured above, had been completed.
The Memorial Garden by the way is a beautiful space, cruciform in shape and surrounded by brick walls that give it a sense of a place apart. The Memorial Garden was the vision of a number of church members, led by Polly M., who also selected all of the plantings therein, with an eye toward length of bloom (early spring to very late fall) and also plants with Biblical associations. It is in fact a roofless chapel with a simple and dignified stone table that has on its surface an off-center vase for cut flowers, permanently affixed. The church and the Fox Chapel community are both blessed by its presence. Not only had Polly designed the garden and selected the plantings, she had overseen the planting thereof, and, being an avid gardener, was often to be seen tending the garden quietly on weekdays. It always looked gorgeous under her watchful care.
The Memorial Garden is situated along Springhouse Lane (see my earlier post) in the elbow of lawn between the Sanctuary and the church offices. As I have told you in that earlier post, we who served on the church staff parked our substandard automobiles along Springhouse Lane of a Sunday morning so as to keep the parking lot free for church members and visitors.
One Sunday after a long and busy morning of worship and teaching, round about one in the afternoon, perhaps a year or so after the Memorial Garden was completed, and the plantings thriving, I was exiting the church office by going down those stairs and then outside right by the Memorial Garden. It was a lovely day, sunny and mild, but even so I was surprised to see Mrs. A. standing on the walkway there, that led to the lane, instead of being home enjoying a late lunch.
“John, I wanted to point out something to you,” said she. I had this uncanny sense that she had waited there just to speak with me.
“Yes?” I asked.
“The Memorial Garden is full of weeds,” the implication hung in the air that I should do something about that, and immediately if not sooner. I guess you could say she was a woman with “Attitude”. It is a polite, politically correct way of saying someone is pushy. Arrogant. Yes, scratch the surface and the right word might be rude. (You know, those things that St. Paul says Love isn’t?)
Maybe that is why I responded thus:
“Aww, Carol,” I said, “Can you tell the difference between flowers and weeds?”
She acknowledged that she did.
“I am so pleased to know that,” I continued. “I will call Polly tomorrow and let her know that you’d be glad to help her with the weeding…”
Which, of course, was exactly the right thing to say. And, of course, Carol never did lift a finger to help with the weeding.
Another Janice story; this one from the no comment department…
Place: The Chapel at Fox Chapel.
Present: Janice, our DCE; Ray, our Property Committee Chairman; our Head of Staff; and myself.
Occasion: Janice was supervising the placement of the Presbyterian Creed Banners which had been made by church members and now were to be suspended all around the room, representing The Apostles’ Creed and so forth. Janice wanted to make sure everything would be as it should be. It is helpful to remember that Janice was at that time a maiden lady of a certain age who had spent her life in children’s education both in the public schools and in various churches. And that she looks very much like H.M. the Queen. Janice is hard-working, wise and kind; and it would not be incorrect to add the words prim and proper, too.
Here is how the conversation went:
Janice (having absolutely no idea of how what she said could be taken) to Ray: “Do you hang well?”
Ray (with a knowing look in his eye) to Janice: “Haven’t had any complaints so far…”
If I told you that yours truly exited the Chapel as quickly as possible, immediately thereafter, hand over mouth, biting my tongue to keep from laughing, well, you perhaps would not be surprised.
Another Janice story, if I may…
As every Director of Christian Education knows, it is sometimes hard to manage the flow of supplies that are used for Sunday School Classes. Whether paste, construction paper, crayons, markers, scissors, or glue, these things seem to disappear from the supply closet fast.
Janice, who served as our DCE at Fox Chapel Presbyterian Church for many of the years when I served there, had a way to slow down the misappropriation of supplies from the big walk in closet that served as our store room for such things.
Up in one corner of the room, where two walls met the ceiling, she put what looked to be a security camera, with a little hand lettered sign that read:
“The Eye of God”
The only thing was, the camera was not really a camera; Janice had made it out of a small box from which protruded an empty bathroom tissue roll.
It was effective in its purpose, nonetheless!
Then there was that memorial service….
For a church member who died, but no one bothered to tell us.
We heard it when we were doing a different memorial service at the same retirement community, when the activities director said in a stage whisper, “You know K… died?”
I said, “No! When? No one bothered to tell the church.”
The activities director sort of mumbled and sputtered, and got the day wrong by one, but still several days prior to that moment when we were then speaking. Asking what the plans were, I was given a slight shrug.
We tried to find out, even the funeral home in charge of “arrangements” did not know. Then we learned “K…” was being “shipped to New York”, which gave the impression that no services would occur in Longwood.
It wasn’t until a day or so after that that the only son called and wanted to know if I would do a service at the retirement community, here, and had a date in mind. Yes, of course I would.
Because he lives out of state, we planned the service by via the phone and email, which was a bit unusual, but went well. Even so, I had to bite my tongue at his response, when I asked if he wanted music. He said “No!” with vigor, and then added:
“Mother was tone deaf!”
As if I was asking Mother to sing, which would be a neat trick, don’t you think?
