Day 19 - Giggling in Church

If you've ever seen 'Vicar of Dibley' you will have a fair idea of our lovely parish church.  The village numbers about 330 of which very few go to church regularly, although everyone turns out for the Carol Service and the Church Fete.  We are part of a Benefice of three churches who all share the same vicar, but unlike Dibley we have a number of non-stipendiary vicars and lay readers, and several individuals in training for the roles.  This means we have plenty of people to take the services, which they all do cheerfully and capably, but sadly, very few capable of playing the organ.  Down at the 'Big Church' in the next village  they have a group consisting of the inevitable guitars, a saxophone, a flute, and, I think, a set of drums who can add to the variety of accompaniments should an organist not be around.  The Big Church is a tad more informal that our little place, we say 'trepasses', they say 'sins'.



Technology can be a wonderful thing, and has helped with the dearth of organists.  We do have one, but she can't be around all the time and so an ipod and speakers are used to play the accompaniment to most of our hymns.  This works really well, except for a couple of weeks ago when the hymns had been wiped off the playlist.  Undaunted, the 11 of us sang the hymns a cappella loudly and really rather enjoyed the sounds of our voices reverberating around the stone and wood of the gothic church.  We couldn't help but smile and congratulate ourselves, although I have to admit to being glad we had no way of checking what had happened to our pitch.

So today DN2 and I took our pew at the back of the congregation, I think we numbered 9 today, we were glad for the warmth of the heated pews.  You can always tell the frequent church goers at popular services; they know where the modern comforts of warm feet and bottom are to be had.  There is one problem with the heating under the pews: if you sit for too long you do get a bit too warm.  An overlong sermon and you wonder if you're going to be a point rather than bleu, but the Carol Service is usually brisker than that, so you are kept warm rather than roasted.

The service today was led by our vicar, a cheerful and clever man who manages to get the tone of service just right for me.  It was as he was announcing the next hymn, 317, How Deep the love of Jesus is, or something like that when the man in the pew in front of us turned to his wife and said 'How deep is your love'  isn't that a tune by, oh who was it?'  She looked thoughtful and I interjected under my breath 'The Beegees', whereupon DN2 and I, and the couple dissolved into childish giggles.  The couple in front are really sweet, but slightly stereotypical in their appearance.  They are conservatively dressed, late middle-aged, middle class owners of a beautiful house.  Not the sorts you would think would giggle in church, but I'm so glad they did.   And of course, no-one looked askance at our giggles, not even God, I'm sure.