Church Round the Table?

By Stuart Murray Williams

Arguments about seating arrangements – pews or chairs, straight lines or circles, etc. – have occupied many happy hours at church meetings! Memories of these discussions and the bruises left from such encounters may discourage us from recognising that how we sit together is actually rather important. Our seating arrangements reflect and underpin what we believe about the church community, its worship, ministry and mission.

But it has been wisely suggested that starting with the seats is to start with the wrong item of furniture. Start instead with the table. Once you have discovered where the table goes, the seats tend to follow. I wonder what difference this might make to debates about seating arrangements in some churches.

For some Christians the place of the table has become increasingly significant, especially among those exploring fresh ways of meeting together. For those weary of churches that are focused on preachers, worship leaders and other performers, placing the table at the centre represents a place of gathering, levelling and inclusion. If the table (rather than a lectern, altar, bank of microphones or overhead projector) is the central symbol, the congregation is encouraged to think in fresh ways about its community life, forms of worship and openness to outsiders. Some alternative worship groups have thought deeply about these issues. Others have developed café-style churches where congregations sit around many small tables.

For others, weary of large-scale gatherings and ritualised informality, the dining table has become the place where church happens. Unlike house groups that sometimes share a meal before the meeting proper begins (a shift signalled by a move away from the table, the strumming of a guitar, an ‘opening’ prayer or a call to ‘begin now’, and resulting often in a change of atmosphere and stylised rather than relaxed relationships), these Christians remain at the table all evening. Church happens around the table, around a meal, in a domestic setting.

Why? Some point to many occasions in the Gospels when Jesus and his disciples are at the table as a ‘biblical basis’ for this practice. Others have rediscovered the link between the Eucharist and meals, with hunks of bread and flagons of wine replacing the ‘nip and sip’ of formal communion. Some note that in a culture where fewer homes possess a dining table because families graze individually rather than eating together, church around the table is counter-cultural, subversive and attractive. Others reflect on the significance of eating together for the success of the Alpha course and have found that many people who would not attend a church service do accept an invitation to a meal.

For some church around the table is essentially about mission – a place of invitation and open conversation. For others it is a safe place for learning to pray and worship in new ways, for exploring faith and discipleship, for rediscovering church as community rather than institution. Some groups have written table liturgies, so Bible readings, songs, prayers, silence, the use of candles, sharing bread and wine, and other liturgical elements are woven into an extended meal. Some have rediscovered church as community and speak of friendship rather than the over-used and emasculated term ‘fellowship’. Church around the table has been a place of refuge for over-committed church members, a place of discovery for those exploring faith and a place of reconnection for those who had dropped out of church.

Is this really church? It is not easy to foster transcendent experiences around a dining table. It is not easy to be genuinely open to all in a living room. It is not easy to avoid charges of cosiness and self-indulgence, especially if such tables operate mainly in comfortable suburban homes. Many do, but not all. I know a church for homeless and marginalised people that operates as a table church, empowering all to choose the menu and help with the cooking.

It will be some time before such groups can show they have enduring power (the oldest I know is nine years old). Some may be mission groups that help people find their way into (or back into) congregational forms of church. Others may take their place as one expression of an apparently global (though not unchallenged) shift towards small-scale, relational forms of church. They will not suit all individuals or fit every sub-culture. But they may represent one faithful and relevant expression of church in a postmodern and post-Christendom culture. If nothing else, they move the goalposts for discussions about seating arrangements!