Church on Sunday....

Second life is full of surprises.

Just when you think you have a handle of things, something creeps up behind you and surprises you while your guard is down.

I've been to The White Armory a few times, HUGE store and often a free gown for members, a magnet as such for Gorean ladies with a thirst for dresses, but that is an aside here.

I had explored a few times and seen the Cathedral before, it's beautifully done and I had taken photos for here.

For some time there have been notices out in group about services, there is one at noon SLT every Sunday. I had never been.

I don't quite know why last Sunday, I had done what I was doing in my City, my partner had logged, I was hovering between things I might do and then the notice came and I thought “why not” and went.

I have written before about the fantasy/reality line (or blurring of it) and here it was in evidence again....Church filling up from the back, men out-numbered by women 4:1. I was not on a Sim, I was in Church, no question about it.

What followed was, for me, a moving half hour for which I was completely unprepared. It focussed on the Eucharist/Communion/Lord's Supper (depending on your background). It must be 2 years since I was last in a Communion Service – a variety of reasons, God and I both know where the other is but not a lot of formal visiting has been done lately.  

By chance I had arrived at the 1^st Communion service at this Cathedral and took Communion for the 1^st time in ages.

Without going into a full theological discussion on the subject, I come from the strand that focusses on the symbolic act rather than the physical elements, that the change occurs within the communicant. It occurred to me that this really was Communion stripped bare to it's very essence.

For a whole host of personal reasons that would mean nothing here, I can only reflect on the event and say a personal “Wow!”