Shap Journal 2001/2002

Living Community

Discovering Living Communities
A reflection on fieldwork.

David Sutton Jones

In January 1999 I began a Farmington Fellowship
term at Leeds University looking at the potential of
the CD-ROM to enhance pupils' understanding of
religion. Over two years this developed into a full
programme: 'Christians: the life of a local church'.
Fieldwork for the programme led me to two contrasting
churches in Sheffield, which I followed for over a year,
filming all the events in which they were involved. This
is a reflection on that experience.

Walking into a community can be a daunting
experience: starting to film everything they do is
terrifying! Hiding behind the lens would offer, I thought,
some measure of comfort: instead it felt like being in a
fishbowl. I was the one who felt self-conscious and out
of place, which of course I was, but during the course of
the following months I was welcomed and accepted by
both communities, and my presence became treated as
a normal part of the churches' lives. The experience
raised personal as well as academic questions, prompted
by the clear and living faith of the members of both
congregations.

On the surface the two churches had many differences:
one was a Church of England parish church following
the Catholic Missal, with a priest who saw his role as
serving the spiritual needs of the people in his parish:
the other was a United Reformed Church linked in an
ecumenical partnership with four other churches in the
area, sharing a female Methodist minister and
committed to meeting the social needs of the local
community as a way of sharing the Gospel. Yet, for both,
the basis for their worship, actions and lives was the
same: their faith in Jesus as Son of God and Saviour.

Both churches worked as living communities. From
summer camps to Midnight Mass, from a Eucharistic
Festival to lunches for OAPs, these were people firmly
rooted in and committed to their communities. What I
saw was a relatively small number of people highly
committed and envisioned. They were prepared to spend
large amounts of time planning and putting on events
and services. Five or six people provided lunches for
OAPs at the URC three times a week: not only cooking,
but driving those unable to get there themselves, and
running afternoon activities. The church, through local
knowledge and analysis, was keenly aware of the needs
of local people and set to out to find ways for the church
to meet those needs. During the time I was filming the
thirty-or-so adult members of the church also wrote,
rehearsed and performed a pantomime with the
children, ran children's play schemes at Easter and in
the summer, held a meal for children to commemorate
the Last Supper, organised birthday parties at low cost
for local children, took members of the church on
retreat, ran youth groups and the Girls' Brigade, ran
weekly craft and skills sessions for local mothers, ran a
weekly mother and toddler group which included the
promotion of a local government reading scheme,
invited the local MP to visit the church and talk at a
service, and raised funds to finance these and future
events. People at St Catherine's organised the 40th
anniversary celebrations of the church, opened a daily
cafe in the church hall, helped with a bereavement drop-
in centre, supported members of the church who were
baptised, confirmed and married, put on a nativity play,
visited people in the four residential and nursing homes
in the parish, ran confirmation classes, organised a
regular meeting for the youth of the church and
supported another local church in a Eucharistic Festival.

Listing these activities does not come near to expressing
the life of these communities. Being present at all their
events, I was able to see the relationships between the
members of both congregations. As they became used to
my presence they ignored me and continued as normal.
I saw the short conversations at the end of services: the
expressions of concern and interest in the lives of others:
the ease and familiarity of relationships built up over
years of church membership, including the discussions,
disagreements and arguments, and the regular debates
about the mission of the churches; the willingness to
help out, to make costumes, put out chairs, clean and
decorate, attend meetings, support those in need and
pray for others, the support and joy of the community
at baptism, confirmation and marriage services. I saw
the expressions of devotion on faces during services: the
deep concentration in prayer and worship; the
contemplation of meditations on the stations of the
cross; the silence and depth of Good Friday services and
the shared joy and celebration of Christmas and Easter.

Communicating this sense of community to outsiders is
difficult, particularly when they are children who have
little or no experience of religious communities. A key
aim of the programme was to bring religious traditions
alive to pupils: to give them a sense of almost being
present through the use of multiple layers of images,
sound and text. The programme makes extensive use of
background sound, e.g. people greeting each other as
they arrive and the noise at the beginning and end of
services. The home page is a church notice board, and
events are described as though written for the members
of the church. Each topic begins with a montage of
images and sounds designed to give a flavour of the
atmosphere of that event. The overall aim of this
approach is to take pupils into events in a way which
will increase their understanding of them and their
importance for the church community. So, the wedding
begins with the groom greeting family and friends and
checking some details with the priest just one more
time. It shows the couple kissing once they have signed
the marriage registers, with the congregation
applauding, and ends with the departure of the newly
married couple. The confirmation includes scenes and
sounds of family and friends taking photographs of the
candidates and the bishop signing their cards and
presents. The funeral and burial includes images and
sounds of the priest and bearers walking through the
grass to the burial plot.

I could not have taken all the children I teach to these
events - nor would I have wished to! If they had been
present they could not have seen the services in the way
that they can in the program: they could not have been
where the camera was: they would not have noticed
many of the sounds and words and they would not have
seen the communities as they are. A result of this
paradox is that the best way to show the churches as
living communities to large numbers of pupils is
through the eyes of an interpreter who can open them
up.

Pupils' responses to the program have been very positive:
one saying, 'It feels like you're really there!'. They have
enjoyed submerging themselves in the material,
showing a positive attitude towards using the
programme and an enthusiasm to spend time on it. It
has enabled pupils to ask and discuss questions from a
more informed position, and their verbal and written
responses when compared to previous years' work have
shown an increased understanding of the nature and
importance of key aspects of Christian life. One Head of
Department commented that, 'It enhances pupils'
learning immeasurably.'

One response I had not expected was the importance
both communities grew to place on the programme as it
was developing. The minister of the URC said she had
thought that they were doing me a favour at the start of
the project, but as it went on she began to realise that I
was doing the same for them, not only by producing a
short CD-ROM showing the work of the church, which
they used for fund-raising, but also because my presence
caused them to re-examine what they were doing. The
priest at St Catherine's saw it as a good opportunity to
promote the teaching of the Church, the loss of which in
modern society he much lamented. Consequently, he
was keen to do everything possible to make the
programme work, and was most enthusiastic about its
potential.

In the fieldwork and construction of the programme I
had drawn on elements of Robert Jackson's Religious
Education: an interpretive approach, (1997), Hodder &
Stoughton. I was keen to show Christianity as a living
phenomenon and to present the churches in a way
which their members would recognise as a valid
interpretation of their lives. Showing a religious
community in this way has implications for the
producers and publishers of materials for RE as well as
for teachers and pupils. Spending time discovering the
life of a community is time-consuming, as is the
processing of recorded material and the design process
and programming of a CD-ROM. Such an investment is
costly, but the benefits for pupils are enormous. Rather
than looking at a disjointed electronic textbook, using
images from many different sources forced into a
predetermined framework, they can begin to discover
and experience the daily, yearly and lifelong reality of
commitment and participation in a living religious
tradition.

In the end only one church was used in the programme
- not for theological reasons or personal preference, but
because of time and the needs of the curriculum.
Schools, under the burden of over-prescribed syllabuses
still influenced by a phenomenological approach, need
to cover baptism, confirmation, marriage, death,
Christmas, Easter, Holy Communion and so on. This
made looking at the URC more difficult as much of its
work in the community didn't fit into these categories. St
Catherine's was the more straightforward of the two.

The images and sounds of the URC have been processed
and stored, as have the enduring sense of concern,
interest and the desire to envision others which I saw on
many occasions. Much of their work is low-key: being
present in the community and building relationships
over many years. My challenge is to find ways of
showing this valid and living expression of Christianity.

'Christians: the life of a local church' by David Sutton-Jones
(comprises a CD-Rom, postcards, worksheets and site
license. Cost for complete pack is £95.00, but items may
also be purchased separately from REACT Multidmedia,
256 Western Road, Sheffield, S10 1LF).