wfn.org | Prayer room offers Lambeth Conference a sacred space of solace

["Christopher Took" <storm@indigo.ie>]

ACNS LC038 - 23 July 1998

by E.T. Malone, Jr.

Lambeth Conference Communications

In the Senate Building, an octagonal two-story structure on the
University of Kent central campus, the Lambeth Conference has
established a sacred place for prayer, meditation, and
counseling. A sign on the door declares: "Sacred Place. All most
welcome. Prayer, silence, rest, reflect." 

Outside, to the right of the entrance, a ten-foot wooden cross
rests against the building, as if to announce its purpose.

On the first floor is a small lobby and offices of members of the
chaplaincy team, one of whom is available every day from 6:15
a.m. until 10:15 p.m. Night prayers are said at 9:45 p.m. In the
foyer is a box for prayer requests and a table with books and
pamphlets on silence, meditation, and spirituality-for use only
in the building. 

"It is amazing, the requests for prayers we have received in the
box," said Lambeth Conference Chaplain Bishop Roger Herft of the
Diocese of Newcastle, Australia. "These are not requests that are
submitted for reading in a public service but to be offered up to
God in private by the chaplains." 

Visitors may select one of the pamphlets and take it up the
winding stairs to the second floor. Waiting for them is an
extraordinary collection of images, icons, and Bibles in the
official languages of the Conference. The prayer room contains
two collections of original prayer icons loaned by the Andipa
Gallery of London. There, in what appears to be a converted art
gallery, alternating streamers of light brown and baige fabric
descend from a gathering point under the skylight of the peaked
roof, giving the sense of being inside a tent or pavilion.

The upper room contains a walkway surrounding a sunken floor. The
images and icons are spread along the walkway, either on the wall
or on easels. Several large terra cotta jars are filled with reed
rushes. Pillows, small kneelers, and occasional chairs are
arranged around the sides of the sunken floor. Both the walkway
and floor are carpeted in soft fabric, and oriental style rugs
are laid in a pattern on the floor. At the center is a circular
rug on which rests a wooden stand containing three lecterns, each
holding-at staggered heights-an open Bible in a different
language. In late afternoon a shaft of light from one of the west
windows points like a sundial in reverse to the center of the
room. 

Hanging directly overhead is a large, heavy wooden cross. The
center of focus in the room, it is sometimes the very last thing
noticed by visitors who have circled the walls closely inspecting
the icons. And this can have a startling effect. The muted colors
create a calming, peaceful atmosphere in the room, and many of
the images and icons depict instances of nurturing and
consolation. 

^From time to time women and men wander in slowly, as if in awe.
Some fall immediately to their knees to pray, some circle the
room viewing the icons or praying before them, and others simply
sit and think in this sacred space at the heart of the Lambeth
Conference. 

For further information, contact:

   Lambeth Conference Communications
   Canterbury Business School
   University of Kent at Canterbury
   Telephone: 01227 827348/9
   Fax: 01227 828085
   Mobile: 0374 800212

   http://www.lambethconference.org