Seventeen years ago, the Sunday School at the Church of the Holy Trinity, White Rock began preparations to create and paint a labyrinth representing the church year.
It came about as a Sunday School project in the first half of 2006, essentially as a teaching device for the Sunday School – to help explain the shape of the Church year and its seasonal colours. Formally, it reflects the annual Christian cycle of worship rooted in the birth, crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. In practice, it echoes the journeys that all of us make, from birth to death, childhood to adulthood, innocence to understanding, doubt to faith.
(Peter Johnson, Annual Report for 2008 Vestry)
The completed labyrinth was received and blessed on June 18, 2006. It was used for a Lenten program in 2007, beginning with a sermon by Peter Johnson and followed by a series of five sessions, three of which included labyrinth walks (music, scripture, and silence). The labyrinth has since been lent to other churches from time to time.
After a long hiatus, it was time to get the labyrinth out again at Holy Trinity and put it in place for three sessions:
- Friday, March 17 to walk the labyrinth with music.
- Saturday, March 18 to walk the labyrinth with prayers of hope and giving - supporting the lost, homeless, those who are hurting. If they wished, people could make a donation in support of the Sources Peer Support Group, who use the parish’s hall space, or the Sources Food Bank.
- Sunday, March 19 to walk the labyrinth in memory of loved ones (those who have died or those in need of our prayers).
A highlight of the Sunday walk was the return of one of the children who was involved in making the labyrinth in 2005-2006, now a young woman engaged to be married! She was able to tell the present-day children in our Children’s Chapel about the work she and the other children did all those years ago.
Representatives of the parish are planning to set up the labyrinth more often in future and will use a variety of options to advertise its availability - the power of social media is one change from 2006.
Article and Photo by Carol De Boeck