Week 6: So Many Churches

Yesterday (although it was so early and I took such a huge nap afterwards that it feels like it was two days ago) Averyl, Ben and I attended some of the morning services at Westminster Abbey. Although we had visited the abbey on basically our first full day here in London, we had the opportunity to attend communion in the Shrine of St. Edward the Confessor, which is cool in and of itself, but even more so because it's surrounded by the tombs of some of England's major kings.

The morning prayers and communion were very different from the style of worship that I'm familiar with, naturally, but I still felt that there was a special feeling present during the services. There's a certain sense of sacredness that comes with that place because the abbey has been a place that so many thousands of people have gone to try to get closer to God. It's a different kind of sacredness than we're used to in the LDS Church, but I still found it very moving.

After we were finished at Westminster Abbey, we went to the Brompton Oratory (or the Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary). It's a Catholic church, and the first Catholic church I've been in (possibly ever, but certainly) since I arrived in London—the rest have been Anglican. It was very different in style from the other churches I've visited, but still very beautiful.

While visiting both of these churches, I found myself reflecting on a lot of things. First of all, it was so moving to see people worshiping in each of these locations, although it was somewhat sad to walk into these enormous halls with so many seats, and then to see only a few people participating. Ben's project can say a lot more about dwindling religiosity in London than I can, but it's fairly apparent to me that, for all the presence of these enormous houses of worship, religion is not popular among the residents.

Secondly, during this past semester in my Christian History class with Brother Gaskill, we talked about the minimal numbers of people who choose to become clergy in major religions, most notably Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox. It seems that this trend is also occurring in the Anglican Church, because the majority of their clergy are quite old. That being said, it warmed my heart a little bit to see a much younger man among their ranks yesterday—it's such a great sacrifice, and somewhat comforting to see someone willing to make it.  

The third thing I spent a lot of time thinking about was the level of ornateness present in each of these churches. As I've visited each of them and taken note of how they are decorated and designed, I've spent a lot of time thinking about the symbolic nature of these various things. All the while, I kept having this same idea run through my head that has been thrown at me from so many different people: the idea that other churches whose meetinghouses are so ornate are "gaudy" and that this somehow is indicative of them being less true than our church, which in comparison is much more minimalist in design. Although I've always been taught to be respectful of other religions and to appreciate the beauty in these things, somehow this idea got slipped in there as well. 

And perhaps there is some truth to it. I'm thinking particularly of Nephi saying that his "soul delighteth in plainness" which may simply be a words/scriptures/doctring reference, but which could potentially be applied to other aspects of worship (2 Ne. 25:4) ... Or perhaps it's our just our Protestant background informing us that "'tis a gift to be simple" that makes our buildings seem so plain in comparison. 

I just kept thinking, as I was sitting in these churches, that they employ many of the same architectural and decorative strategies that we do in our meetinghouses and temples to symbolize aspects of our faith, especially symbolizing the path to return to God. We might see the bright colors and statues and paintings and vaulted ceilings and filigrees and columns and molding as being "gaudy" in comparison to what we're used to. But don't we employ spires and paintings and colors and staircases and various forms of decor to carry symbolic meaning? Don't we also focus on having everything be of the highest quality in a building that we're dedicating to the Lord?

I guess what I'm saying is that it seems to me that it's simply different interpretations and applications of similar principles: creating symbolic meaning in our places of worship. This might not be the most incredibly insightful post, but I spent so much time thinking about it yesterday, trying to understand what was so wrong about the so-called gaudiness of these buildings, trying to reconcile what I'd been taught with what I was experiencing, that it felt like a bigger realization than it was since now it seems like an obvious thing.

In other news, today is the 20th of June. Do you know what this means? It means I've been here for six weeks. It also means that in approximately 24ish hours, I will have been in London for 45 days. And that means that I only have 45 days more to go in London ... 

... which means this Field Study is halfway over, y'all. :)

Week 4: The Great Grocery Store

Today marks one month since I left the US. I don't know how this can be possible—I feel both like I just got here and like I've been here for forever somehow. Tomorrow will also be my last day in this flat before I move up to Enfield, and it's kind of bittersweet. While I'm excited for the new place and the good things that will come with it (like a real shower), I've really come to enjoy living with this family and the kindness that they've extended towards me. One of the children didn't realize that I'd be moving, and when she found out on Sunday, her lower lip ballooned out and it made me feel so sad. They're a really excellent family and I feel like I've learned a lot from living with them (including an incredible soup recipe that I will definitely be using in the future). So I'm sad to leave, but I'm glad I've been here and I'm excited for what's to come.


I've obviously been thinking a lot about the culture of London as I've walked its streets and talked to locals and long-term visitors and short-term visitors alike. The thing about London is that its culture is about as easy to pin down as nailing Jello to a tree or herding cats or some other such nonsense, the reason being that London is a massive collection of international people. We think of the US being a great melting pot, where people from all over the world were able to come together and become one thing: Americans.

London, however, is not a melting pot. Not even close.

As I see it, London is like an enormous grocery store. It brings in products from all over and collects them in one place, but in no way are these items melted together. It's divided into sections, each with their own particular focus—just like London's boroughs. It has particular sections that are dedicated to specific regions—like Chinatown, and the Middle Eastern sectors of the city. And then, of course, there are people milling about each of these areas and aisles—these are the tourists.

London is often called the Crossroads of the World, and rightly so. At times, I feel like I'm walking across BYU campus for the number of languages I hear being spoken! Not only does the city become a home for people from all across the world, but it plays host daily to thousands upon thousands of international tourists. In a way, this is has its perks. I love that I can get fantastic, authentic Indian food just a few minutes from Chinatown where there are spits of roast duck and bright orange squid-things, and still be within sight of a regular English pub.

London also has its own history that's remarkably present, which adds a certain sense of anachronism to a walk down almost every street in the city. Standing by the castle built in 1078 (now known as the Tower of London) and your eyes can pass over sections of a Roman wall built in the 2nd century AD and then on to the Tower Hill underground station that opened in 1967 and was refurbished in 2008. That's nearly two thousand years of London construction captured in one glance! Naturally, there are going to be hundreds of residents—homegrown or immigrants—and tourists captured in that glance as well who represent who knows how many nationalities. In fact, the first Sunday I was here, I went to Relief Society and we had small group discussions. My group had an English girl, a couple Scottish girls, a French girl, an Australian girl, and myself, an American. How's that for international?

Having never experienced this city before, I didn't know what to expect. I think I may have thought that somehow I could capture the concept of London culture in three short months and get a pretty solid understanding of it, that I could come out on the other side and be able to describe it in fairly certain terms, that I could catch on to what makes this city tick. It's become overwhelmingly clear to me that this would be like walking into my monstrous metaphorical grocery store, and then exiting with my basket of shopping somehow able to describe what the entire place was like. All the same, I've enjoyed wandering up and down London's metaphorical aisles, and catching glimpses of what each place holds.

So far, the best I can do to give you a full picture is to simply explain what I've just explained: that London is, to some extent, inexplicable. It is defined by its very own indefinability and mutability, by the endless stream of footprints that cross to and fro, over and under each other as people from all walks of life and all nationalities come into this city, to stay or go.