Curtains and windows

This post is scheduled for Hallowe’en, when there are closed curtains and decorated windows.

My starting point is a photo I took. Walking into the mainly unlit building for a weekday Morning Prayer at the back of the church with participants sitting in a circle, I was surprised to see the curtain behind the choir stalls lit up. I quickly positioned myself for a photo of it. A couple of minutes later the relative positions of the sun and the church were such that it was in semi-darkness again. It was an unexpected moment, which could have easily been missed. My helpful phone keeps asking me if I wish to adjust the lighting – as if that wasn’t the whole point of the photo.

The choir stalls in St Bees Priory Church

I began to think about curtains in general. It is not a theme that has been suggested at the local ACW writing group I attend, although the current one of Darkness is not unrelated. The curtain in the picture screens the choir from the Lady Chapel. It also stops some draughts. There is nothing of religious significance about it, unlike the curtain in the temple, which was rent in two at the hour of Jesus Christ’s death by crucifixion. (Matthew27:51)

Curtains may be used in the theatre to reveal the stage at the beginning of each scene and to hide the stagehands as they rearrange props. There is also a safety curtain in case of fire.

How people talk about moving curtains across windows varies. I open curtains and either close or draw them. Many years ago a friend surprised me by asking whether she should pull the curtains off. (I thought of ‘off the rails’ before I thought of ‘off the windows’!)

Then again the word curtains may be used as a euphemism for death.

Some windows never have curtains, stained glass windows for example.

The light from the sun had passed through stained glass before illuminating the curtain in the photo above.

A church in the nearby town of Whitehaven burned down in a catastrophic fire in 1971. Only a small part including the tower was left standing. I have only known this church in its restored state. It has a café and a chapel downstairs. Upstairs there is more seating with views over the gardens around the original church. A beautiful stained glass window there inspired me to write a prayer six years or more ago.

The stained glass window in the tower

Risen Lord,

I love your picture

in the tower café

where from destruction

new life has come.

Through the stained fragments

sunlight builds a picture of you

creating and redeeming your world by love.

May we who see it

See beyond it to you.

Strengthen our fragmentary faith;

clarify our vision of you;

quicken our steps to follow

View from the window including a memorial to coal-miners

and our hands to serve.

May we know your will

and find peace in obedience

by the power of the Holy Spirit

and to the glory of God the Father.  Amen.

If you are looking for writing ideas (although I know many readers of this blog are more experienced than I am) perhaps you might explore these topics or find a stained glass window, which inspires you.