It's Friday night before our second ever
Assembly, the High Wycombe Sunday Assembly organisers Facebook group
jolts into life,
“You know it's remembrance Sunday,
what are we going to do about the 2 minute silence at 11am”. This seems like a minor problem, we delay the start, put
something respectful on the screen, explain sensitively to people as
they come in... The irony that we forgot Remembrance day is not lost
on us.
A new Facebook notification comes in...
“And you know we meet right opposite
the War Memorial...” Yes, our venue could not be closer to the town
War Memorial, it was as if the cafe had been built in that location
especially for its wonderful views of the memorial.
A hasty rearrangement of the schedule
takes place, we can't be singing “Don't Stop Me Now” while those
outside are respectfully remembering the dead. We will start later,
we can do talky stuff at the start, we can move songs to later, yeah,
this can work, no problem.
Sunday comes, we apprehensively share
breakfast together at a local restaurant, we make our way over to the
venue, will the roads be packed with people? No, we are lucky, just a
few people milling around, this is OK, some people will gather for
the silence then disperse, we can start at five past 11 and all will
be well.
Except that the pavement outside fills
up with people, and the road outside fills up with people, a PA
system is turned out outside, trumpeters turn up, brass bands turn
up, a military march of uniformed soldiers goes past. Veterans with
their medals descend on the area right outside the cafe we meet in,
only separated by a pane of glass
Our speaker for the morning
texts me “Just walking past a roadblock, amazing, didn't know you
would attract so many people”, this made me smile... for a short
time.
The church bells die out, signifying
that it is eleven, we have just about got our equipment inside in
time, we display the word 'Remember' on the screen, Twenty-five of us sit,
some respectfully, some awkwardly. The silence ends with a trumpet,
but the tone outside remains respectful, people don't float away as
we expected, no, there are wreaths to lay, prayers to say, and for us
this means a delay.
It is twenty past, people are happily
chatting to each other, some cake has even been passed around,
actually this is what it is all about, but it was not the plan, and
when something is not the plan it feels uncomfortable. We need to
start, we cancel a song from the running order, we tell our speaker his
talk will be up first, people can't complain outside about someone
talking, surely?
Our hosts start the service, they explain what Sunday Assembly is all about, we have a reading, an announcement that we will be singing our first song. THIS IS NOT THE NEW
PLAN! WE CANCELLED THE SONG! We quickly find the slides for
the song, BUT WE CANCELLED THE SONG!
I turn and look outside, and, like a
miracle has happened, the crowd has totally dispersed, there are no
old men with medals, the wreaths are laid, not a trumpeter in sight,
and inexplicably there is an ambulance outside taking any attention
away of noise we might be making.
We sing the first song, Our speaker gives
an amazing talk., we have our very own moment of silence, we finish at
12.15 and have a very fast clear up, we go to the pub and have a
lovely time. We all knew that it would be ok in the end, didn't we?
Yes, never a doubt, never a doubt.
Do join us for our next Assembly on the 13th December! www.facebook.com/WycombeSundayAssembly/
