Remember thou art in England

Last night I partied chez the evangelicals. And when I say “partied” I really mean prayed. And when I say “prayed” I actually mean I just stood there, perhaps in a salute to my stern Presbyterian roots, with my lips sealed and my hands firmly stuck in my pockets.

That’s not to say I didn’t have fun. Oh God no, I had the time of my lameass life. What I enjoyed so much is that it was completely unexpected. I mean, when I imagine the Church of England—even “evangelical” C of E—I imagine people in suits, women’s hats that seem to do their own interpretive dances, and a bunch of stiff people with posh accents saying, “Hallo.” You know, Queen Victoria, cricket, tuna and baked potatoes, and all that.

What I found at St Aldate’s, however, was a rock band, TV screens, and a crowd of people with their hands in the air. Old people were rockin out all over the places, and this one enormous gentleman who looked like Jeremy Clarkson only put his arms down once when he was very suddenly called by the Holy Spirit to rush off to the bathroom. To be honest, it was like being back at a miniature version of Willow Creek, my preferred megachurch back in the US. They had the same free-form prayers where every other word was “just” (“We’re just gonna take it down just a notch here and just pray, to just let Jesus know that we’re just thrilled that He could just be here tonight and just lead us to just know Him. Yeah, really just to know just how great He is.”), the live muzak during prayer intervals, the ubiquitous Australian teaching pastor who always seems on the verge of tears when he teaches, and the insanely hot member of the worship band—there’s always one.

The whole experience made me think of Roman triumphs, where the victorious general followed by a slave who has the job of being the dickhead who holds a wreath over the general’s head and reminds him, “Remember thou art mortal.” I just kept thinking that I need a dickhead like that to remind me, “Remember thou art in England.” Because I honestly didn’t believe it. Until last night it did not occur to me that actual, honest-to-goodness English people prayed like this. No, I kept telling myself, I am back in America. This is how Americans pray, not English people. The upside of all this is that I now know where to go when I’m feeling homesick.

Other than my initial shock at finding out that there are some English people (and a fair few!) who do enjoy rocking out while they pray, the service wasn’t all that different or weird from what I’ve seen before. Well, there was a sort of weird half an hour where I was convinced the guy giving the sermon had an Amish accent. I kept wracking my brain trying to figure out just how the hell an Amish guy ended up here and praying this way. Like, my family’s religious journey has been a weird one, but I think shaving off your chin beard and swapping your horse and buggy for a car kind of trumps everything…and then I realized that the guy was probably just from one of those Germanic or Scandinavian countries. But it was a lot more magical when I thought he was Amish.

Another thing that I love about this church, and about all evangelical churches really, is that they are constantly trying to pray for you. I mean, try getting evangelicals to NOT pray for you—Jesus Christ, there’s a miracle waiting to happen. All other churches you have to specifically ask for people to pray for you, which can often be really intimidating, but with evangelicals you have to beat them off with a stick if you don’t want them praying/preying on you. Evangelicals are kind of like benevolent zombies, lurching forward with their praying arms outstretched, groaning “Can we just pray for you?” instead of “BRAAAAAAAIIIINSSSS.”

Ah, it’s just so fabulous though. Knowing there’s a mini megachurch in my town, suddenly I feel a lot more enthusiastic about this year.