News: What is the church?: News: What is the church?
News: What is the church?
Date Added: 19/06/2026 @ 10:12am
You’re walking down the road In your village. A car draws up, winds down the window, the driver leans over and says, ‘Excuse me, where can I find the church?’
What do you say?
‘Just go down here about 200 yards, you’ll see a turning on the right. Go up there and you’ll see the church on the left. You can’t miss it. But there’s no parking’.
Wrong Answer! Try again.
‘Excuse me, where do I find the church?’
‘Er, well, I’m a member of the church. I’m just going to see Matilda – She’s a member as well. We’re rather busy, but I’m sure you’d be welcome for a cup of tea. How can we help you?’.
The reason that you gave the wrong answer is that ‘church’ Is the most common example of metonymy in English. Metonymy: a figure of speech in which a word is used to describe something related to it. Another example: the White House - meaning the US administration.
The church is the people of God, made up of all its members, all of whom have charisms, all of whom are equal. It is served by ‘ministers’ (Latin for ‘servants’) who have ‘taken orders’ because the church is one body, throughout every land and culture, and not little groups everywhere doing their own thing.
Churchill said, We shape our buildings then our buildings shape us.
Churches have buildings to shelter them from the elements. These shelters, in our benefice, are mostly mediaeval, or if not, built to look as if they are. When they were built the idea of the church was hierarchical: there was a nave, for the people, ignorant, unable to read; a choir; if you were looked after by a monastery the choir was probably made up of monks and they signified the angels; and the sanctuary where the priest celebrated the Mass and the miracle of transubstantiation took place. The social order was hierarchical: villeins, yeomen, gentry, aristocracy, monarchy, angels, archangels, God. The nave might be 20 foot, 30 foot, 40 foot high. Most of the people who lived in the village were villeins who lived in hovels. The lord of the Manor lived in a great house somewhere. The church shelter was for God, the Lord of lords. It had to signify God’s greatness. Keeping warm or even dry was not a consideration, not to mention having a loo (read Chaucer if you want to know how they dealt with that; they were less inhibited than we are).
For a long time now we have realised that the Church is the body of Christ. The appropriate shape for a shelter for the church is circular - the whole people of God gathered around the LORD’s table. Ironically the denomination which best understands what a shelter for Christians should look like is the Roman Catholic Church. Next time you are in the Netherlands try to go to mass in The Hague. The service is in English, there are 2 to 300 people, 50 to 60 children of every nation under heaven, and it’s celebrated in the round. Or, next time you are in Vezelay in France, forget the cathedral, drop down the hill to the tiny Franciscan church. Mass is celebrated in the round, in absolute simplicity, with a small group all of whom know the liturgy and the music off by heart, and you celebrate the eucharist with the risen Lord.
The issue is not warmth, not facilities for tea and coffee afterwards, not even loos. It’s how we understand what it means to be the people of God. And we need to shape our buildings according to that understanding.
Rev'd Tim Gorringe
