SEATING FOR THE ASSEMBLY
Configuration of seating should be one of the first permanent decisions a design committee should make. To make that decision, you must first define how you want to worship. That discussion will lead you to the shape and type of seating you will need. When we brought the altar off the back wall and turned it around, we put the altar and ambo side by side as a sign of God’s equal presence in each. As we better understand the functions of what we do, we now understand we have multiple options.
John Buscemi reminds us: "The assembly stands equal before the challenge of the word of God, whereas the assembly surrounds the table. The Eucharist wells up from within the assembly, whereas the word is spoken into the assembly. The direction of each action is different. Proclamation is before the people while the altar is in the midst of the people."
This allows the procession from one to the other as well as through the assembly. This type of placement helps reinforce our understanding that God is present in three distinct forms; in the breaking open of the word, in the breaking of the bread AND in the gathered assembly. We begin to see that the psychology of proclamation is different from the psychology of gathering around the table. Father Dick Vosko always says, "If something is important, it deserves its own space so something else important doesn't compete with it."
Sunday is a festival. Eucharist is supposed to be a celebration, and the people must be allowed to be a part of it. Ritual is not just words on a page. Ritual is action that the priest and the people do. It has to be a work that demands energy and time to be done in the best way possible. Our ritual is a dialogue. Dialogue requires seeing the faces of our fellow assembly as well as the presider so we can communicate with each other. Our Eucharistic Prayer will probably evolve into even more dialogue. Dialogue Eucharistic prayer is more suited to an altar table embraced near the center, or at least with people gathered at its sides. We had centralized altars in the beginning as well as during the Renaissance.
During worship, not only does the presider need affirmation from the pew by attention, smile, and body language, but the assembly needs that affirmation from each other to communicate well our thoughts and feelings. Paraphrasing LTP editor David Philippart, how can we rightly worship God, if we think the presence of other baptized people a mere coincidence, distraction or unavoidable annoyance. Liturgy is not a private prayer but the work of the whole church...sacrament of unity. “Religion is not an escape from this world. It is a way of journeying in this world and of entering ever more fully into everyday experience, where God is to be found.” (The Sacramental Process)
Our physical actions are important. Gabe Huck reminds us that our gestures are too often "privatized", becoming half genuflections, mini signs of the cross, etc. When we can see our gestures mirrored across from us, we better recognize their significance. After all, the common gesture is a way to let the whole person pray. Liturgy is not just an intellectual exercise. Liturgy touches all our senses. Memory is important to liturgy. Our memories are interlaced with the smell of incense and candlewax...the sound of bells, choir, chanting...the sight of flickering flames and seasonal colors...the touch of palms, blessing water from the baptistery... the taste of bread and wine. Memory building is community building. Community building is experiential. The house for our Church is "inner city”, active and urban. It is not a place of silence and sanctuary during liturgy. That is contradictory to our history as a sacramental people. We are reconnecting with our history when we design places where we can engage each other in sacrament to be the Body of Christ. This makes sense when we understand that a sacrament is a festive action in which Christians assemble to celebrate their lived experience and to call to heart their common story.
Our liturgies are about movement, physical as well as mental. Theologian Andrew Ciferni says, "Good liturgy requires good choreography." Choreography should also be graceful and not truncated or awkward in the space.
Our challenge at the start of this new millennium is to provide an environment that engages people at the center of the action. We acknowledge we are a people who move at prayer, that liturgical action takes place all over the church. For example, there are entrance rites that begin at the portal. When we are seated gathered, that facilitates our turning slightly to view them. We are more a part of them when we can see them. The symbol ritual liturgy is a structure of processions. These processions are a prayer of the feet. Our seating spacing and aisles should be designed to facilitate that flow of movement. People should never feel confined to the pew.
When the space and the liturgy allow the mind, spirit, emotions and body to participate fully, the whole person has been allowed to pray. To facilitate that, the assembly must first decide how it wants to seat itself. That will tell us where the altar and ambo should ideally be. We design the space around the liturgical needs and experiences we want to have. Seating shapes our identity. The way things are arranged impacts behavior. If we want more active, conscious participation in an embracable way, then some arrangements bolster that. In a new building, the seating configuration should be decided before the wall placement is defined.
We will devote an entire paper to music, but two things should be mentioned here about choir seating. First, the choir deserves to be part of the assembly as well as ministers to it. Secondly, because space is precious and expensive, ideally choir seating should be usable by the assembly when alternative music is provided.
We need to remember that in the first layer of space, the five foci in the house of God's people are the altar, ambo, assembly, baptistery, and presider's chair as symbol of presider. With the exception of the assembly, the other four are primary because they are symbols of critical actions that take place in, on or from them. The assembly is primary because even without action, God lives in us. Please note the cross, while significant in its own right, is not a primary focus symbol. The second layer of space involves those objects used in liturgy and enshrined, the cross of celebration, the processional cross, holy oils, paschal candle. The third layer contains the art both seasonal and permanent, images, and devotional accoutrements. These should never vie for focus with the primary layer of space.
We must recognize that many other liturgies and activities occur in the worship space. Each of these should be carefully reviewed before seating is finalized. The wedding couple, the body of the deceased, the catechumen and the confirmed all deserve a place of honor specifically designed for them.
Choice of seating may be pews, benches or flexible seating. Until the 17th Century, European churches had no chairs or seating on weekends so worshipers stood. While pews seem traditional, benches allow greater freedom of movement. A combination of chairs and pews or benches is often used. Because seating touches us personally and affects our view of the church, it should be the best we can afford.
This worship space is to be an alive public space. The work of God is a little uncomfortable so it is all right for our churches to have some of that tension also. Welcoming is not a matter of carpeting and padded pews. It is an element of hospitality, color, design, and materials.
The challenge of architecture is to do something brand new and exactly to fit you. Your building should be a metaphor for you. We need imagination and to stop worrying about exactly where everything "should be" because it's been done that way before. If you don't work to make your church fit your personality and who your are, then the church building becomes a theme park for your denomination. Others will learn from what you do here.
I think it appropriate to paraphrase Boklov Havel when he accepted the liberty medal. We are at a point when something old is changing but something new has not been totally birthed. We are living in a time where anything is possible and few things are certain. We are now in a time of renewal. The liturgical movement might be out of its infancy, but it is still in its adolescence. That's probably as it should be. The gospel calls each Christian to a never-ending transformation, to struggle with the human messiness of the creative process, and to have the courage to dip temporarily into that chaos. Your journey of discovery will greatly enrich your lives, your story, your worship, and these are the underpinnings of what it means to be Church.