Month: October 2025

What is your ideal image of Heaven? A place of beauty, grandeur, or calm? A space free of suffering, pain, strife, and division? An opportunity to see those we love who have entered the Church Triumphant before us? Can we even imagine what a glimpse of Heaven looks like here on Earth? Not knowing can be incredibly challenging, but equally beautiful. 

Though we might all imagine the place and space differently, I am convinced we all embrace the opportunity to see those we have loved and lost. Whether seven days, weeks, months, years, or decades have passed, those who have gone before us occupy a very special place in our hearts and minds. 

This Sunday, we remember and honor all those who have left this mortal plane, reading aloud the necrology of those members of BMPC who have passed away since the last All Saints’ Sunday. A number of profound anthems will be offered by the Sanctuary Choir, helping to frame this special service. Music has the transformative power to take us to another place – another reality. How? I’m honestly not quite sure. Whether it’s a particular marriage of text and music, or a piece you’re hearing for the first time, or even perhaps the 100th time, there’s a timeless quality to being in this space, hearing voices soaring from above the pews. Perhaps the somewhat intangible nature of music adds to its transformative quality. Where are we transported to? Who do we see when we close our eyes?  

 In a war-torn and grief-filled world, hearing beautiful choral music and reading aloud the names of those who have dearly departed, maybe, amid a world in strife, we’re witnessing a glimpse and a snapshot of Heaven. 

 If you could see the journey whole,
you might never undertake it,
might never dare the first step
that propels you from
the place you have known
toward the place you know not.
                                 ~Jan Richardson

Through my own experience with the churches I have been privileged to serve, and in the process of calling pastoral colleagues to join the staff of Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church, I have learned a couple of things about what becomes, as we say in church lingo, a sense of call.

First, search committees that get elected by a congregation are made up of a diverse group of people who undergo a process of discernment to articulate a vision, draft a position description, and search for and converse with candidates. Together, they pray, dream in abstractions, argue, laugh, debate, and, over time, they become more than the sum of their parts. It’s a Holy Spirit thing.

Likewise, pastoral candidates begin with companion emotions of reluctance and readiness to leave one place of ministry and journey into a new venture. This too is a Holy Spirit thing – hard to pin down, complicated to explain, a mixture of risk, fear of the unknown, excitement for the journey. As Jan Richardson’s poem suggests, we can never see the journey whole when we take that first step.

What a joy it is for me now to look back and recognize that our mutual sense of call, between BMPC and me, feels whole. Thirteen years ago, I could not see the contours of the journey, but today I can say with confidence that the work to which I was called feels complete. The church is healthy, well-staffed, and poised for a bold new chapter with fresh leadership. Last Sunday’s reception of 30 new members, bringing with them 12 new children, is a clear sign of continuing growth and vitality for this congregation!

I am so grateful for the journey here and for your partnership along the way, and now feel ready to step forward into a new season. In Presbyterian polity, a departing pastor, the Clerk of Session, and the presbytery sign a Covenant of Closure, in which I have promised that I will refrain from any pastoral involvement with BMPC going forward. This, too, is a sign of trust that our mutual relationship is complete. Thank you for all your expressions of love and appreciation, and know that while I step forward into the new season of retirement, I do so with much love and affection for you and the corporate ministry of this great church. From a distance, I will continue to give thanks for our journey together.

“Film music is like a small flame put under the screen to help warm it.” — Aaron Copland

Silent Film is one of the greatest cultural legacies of the United States. Sadly, more than 80% of the more than 11,000 silent films produced have been lost. With the introduction of “Talkies” in 1928 (The Lights of New York), the era of silent film quickly ended. During a short, furious period of silent movie palace architecture, America saw a campaign of theatre construction that made gold leaf, ponderous chandeliers, and the Mighty Wurlitzer Organ the rule and not the exception. Thousands of movie houses depended on live musical accompaniment for their silent movies, and while some smaller houses merely had pianos, the vast majority had theatre pipe organs. While these wonderful instruments were not inexpensive, even back then, it was far more affordable to have a “Mighty Wurlitzer” with a few house organists on staff than to pay for a full orchestra or even a modest band to perform in the orchestra pit every day.

These organs became wildly popular, and several manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon to join the Wurlitzer company to have an organ in every movie house in the land. In Philadelphia alone, there were more than 157 theater organs (now only a handful remain in the Delaware Valley).

When the “talkies” became mainstream movie entertainment right around 1930, the production of theatre pipe organs came to a screeching halt. While some organs were used on special occasions for a few short years, many took over the namesake of their chief reason for being – they became “silent.” Some were destroyed when old theaters were torn down decades later, some were ruined and/or vandalized, and a modest number of them found their way into churches and private home installations starting around the 1950s.

While there were originally several thousand theatre pipe organs around the U.S. and U.K., today only a few hundred remain.

One of the greatest films of that era was “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” Filmed in 1923 and starring Lon Chaney as the Hunchback, it was Universal Studios’ greatest silent film success. Based on Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel (which led to the restoration of Notre Dame Cathedral), it is a masterpiece of stagecraft, makeup, and special effects. It premiered in New York City at the Astor Theater, which installed a large Morton theater organ for the occasion.

It is our pleasure to offer this film on October 31 at 8:00 p.m. in the chapel. The film will be accompanied by our organ scholar, Daniel Carroll, who will improvise the entire 1-hour, 40-minute soundtrack. The chapel organ has a kaleidoscope of colorful sounds that work perfectly in the genre of silent film accompaniment. Daniel is one of my most talented improvisation students. The Hunchback, accompanied by Daniel Carroll, will provide an incredibly enjoyable evening for all ages!

The film is free; concessions will be available! You are welcome to make a contribution toward the expenses of the evening at the door.

This coming Sunday, our new Associate Pastor for Congregational Care, the Reverend Melanie Hardison will be introduced to the congregation! She will be in attendance at the 8:00 a.m. worship service, leading worship at 10:00 a.m., and on hand for the Blessing of the Animals on the front lawn at 4:00 p.m. I hope that you will extend a warm BMPC welcome to her this coming Sunday.

Much of Melanie’s roles and responsibilities are identical to those of previous pastors who have overseen the pastoral care of the congregation, Senior Adult Council, Deacons, Middleton Counseling Center and coordination of the Care Team. In addition, as the church was transitioning from 6 to 5 on the pastoral staff, a realignment of roles brought the Connections Group ministry under her leadership as well, a programmatic and fellowship dimension that Melanie has said further attracted her to Bryn Mawr.

When you meet Melanie, you will soon discover what attracted the Associate Pastor Nominating Committee to her and her candidacy as we engaged a nation-wide search for an individual to fill this role. In addition to her experience and training in pastoral care, she brings a warm and joyful presence, a creative engagement with life and ministry, a love of working on a team with colleagues as well as laity, and a kind and winsome openness.

On a personal note, as I shared with Melanie my retirement plans knowing our overlap on the church staff would be brief, she shared that she is drawn to seasons of transition. She is happy to enter that liminal space that invites discernment, vision and growth which will surely be a blessing as Bryn Mawr enters an interim season between senior pastors.

Grateful for the many ways that this congregation cares for one another and reaches out in Christian love and compassion, I am confident that you will enjoy partnering with Melanie Hardison as she oversees the congregational care of the whole church family.