Why I Pledge to Trinity Church
Comments by Murray Harrison
Trinity on the Green, New Haven, CT
I am not Episcopalian by family heritage; my parents and maternal grandparents were staunch, "tea-totaling" Methodists. Growing up, I was very under-exposed to other denominations and most especially to the Episcopal/Anglican Tradition (from which Methodism actually derived.)
My long-term affiliation with Trinity Church-on-the-Green actually began in 1989, when our then eight-year-old son, Derek, was invited to join the Trinity Boys Choir. Prior to that time, I had considered myself to be a "solidly migrated" Congregationalist, having discovered within myself not only latent Quaker tendencies, but also a fascination with "Full Gospel" ministries in the "mystical 'revival-tent' tradition" of Smith Wigglesworth and others. Knowing nothing about Episcopal tradition, yet experiencing a sense of incredible warmth and welcome, I instinctively knew that it was a great privilege for our family to have been brought here, and I as yet had no idea about the fundamental personal transformation this grand "adventure" was to also bring about in terms of my personal faith.
Over the course of years that I have routinely knelt and settled into these historic pews, I have come to cherish the canon of sacred choral music, imbued with the hallowed liturgical tradition that is at the very core of our Worship experience. It is within these walls and among you that I have come to a place where I can perhaps BEGIN to know and appreciate the profundity of God's Grace and love. Because of the opportunity and influence provided here at Trinity, Barbara's and my sons--Derek and Becket--have developed into accomplished vocal musicians and young men of compassion, character and promise! Trinity has offered to me significant and varied opportunities for personal discovery and nurture, within a supportive context for continuing spiritual discernment. Prior to attending Trinity, I was NEVER comfortable with the experience of Communion, and yet it is here that I have come to love the practice of sharing the Chalice of Our Lord's Grace with my brothers and sisters in the Faith!
I learned through my experience here at Trinity that the Lord does indeed have a marvelous sense of humor! Having attended for several months, I had an "epiphany" moment one Sunday after the conclusion of a Rite I service, when I experienced a deep inner sense of what I can only articulate as a "blessed inner-cleansing" and "lightness of Spirit"--what "blew me away" was that I recognized this as the very same sense I had previously experienced on occasions when I had attended "Full Gospel" services wherein "speaking in 'tongues'" was common practice! Though not a "cradle Episcopalian", through the majesty of hymn and anthem, conjoined with the eloquent, lingual formalism of Rite I, I consistently experience at Trinity a deeply profound sense of being "spiritually 'cradled'", and I confess that I have even come to recognize and accept that in essence, I am actually a "'1928 Prayer Book' kind of guy!"
I desire to pledge to Trinity Church because it is here that I have experienced the abundant Grace and Nurture of God both personally and in the life of my family. As a congregation, we are indeed so incredibly blessed; as someone expressed to me during coffee hour earlier this year, we are such a diverse population of believers, knit together into one community; we are indeed a church that is "alive" in the Spirit! I, like you, have heard the challenge time and again--year after year--about the need for us to step out in Faith and take up our own mantle of stewardship responsibility so that the Work of God in this Faith Community may continue. Despite the myriad uncertainties that presently abound in our midst, as Christians--a people who claim belief in a Sovereign, Omnipotent and Graciously Merciful God--is this indeed not a time in which we are both convicted and called to confront our doubts and fears, and to affirm our Faith through the yielding of ourselves and a portion of our material security back to the One Who truly has and does "give us all things"? In the words of Jesus, "...give, and it will be given to you. Good Measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you." [Luke 6:38]