(no subject)

[chess]

Today I read in a LARP post-action report that they did some scenes in a chapel, which the writer pointed out was 'not real-life consecrated'.

This caused some cognitive dissonance, because I realise I've never really got the whole 'consecrating space' thing (in the real world). My upbringing contained churches meeting in pubs and school halls (as well as the more conventional variety), and in most cases the ones that met in the pubs and the school halls seemed at least just as, if not more, 'real' and attended by the real presence of God as the ones that I suppose must have been in 'consecrated' spaces. I've always been pretty attached to the whole 'where two or three gather' thing, with a pretty big dose of 'always with you' to go with it.

I'm especially not sure why it would be particularly Not Okay to play pretend in a consecrated space as opposed to a non-consecrated space usually used for approximately the same things...

I can understand the decor and the history making a place feel / be particularly 'holy', but I've never really given much thought to the 'mechanics' of consecrating places. I'm not even really sure what that _means_, in physical terms, for - say - a standard Anglican parish church; what do they _do_ that makes it 'consecrated'? I mean, I imagine like basically everything else it is the intent that is the most important part? But I just don't know :).

Comments

[atreic.livejournal.com]

Do you believe in blessing things / people? Eg what do you think a CoE vicar is doing when he blesses people at the end of a church service? Do you have a model of the eucharist where the bread and wine are 'made holier / different' in any ways? How do you feel about the bits in the old testament, eg where Moses is told to take off his shoes because he stands on holy ground, or where God says only certain people are allowed in certain bits of the temple?

[requiem-17-23.livejournal.com]

For me, a space is consecrated by the gathering of people to worship there ("Whenever two or three of you..."), and is no longer consecrated when they are not there. I no longer believe in holy objects, although once I did.

I'd be more uncomfortable using a chapel for LARP or drama for the reason that I might make other people unhappy than that I'd be unhappy, being convinced that (as it were) God is not mocked.

[eriathwen-bob.livejournal.com]

I guess the point is that even while you don't believe it matters, there are people who do consider there to be special rules that apply to "consecrated spaces". The writer above was trying to reassure them that he didn't break those rules.

From what you've commented above, you don't believe in transubstantiation, but you'd be in a world of trouble if you did almost anything to a consecrated host in a Catholic church, because they do. Hence a girl got suspended in my school for taking communion, concealing it, and throwing it in a bin. Doesn't make much sense unless you realise that to them it was a bit of God.

In the same vein, all the churches in Italy which are touristy have dress codes and some have people there to shush you if you're too loud. That felt very weird when we were in the Pantheon, which is an intact Roman temple that was made into a church, but when in Rome(an Catholic Churches)....

[(Anonymous)]

I've always understood consecration as marking off a bit of space or landscape as primarily for the purpose of worship/carrying out Religion, which puts restrictions on what behaviour is acceptable there which would be totally unfeasible if they were to extend to all places that people might go - primarily because carrying out life involves a lot of time where you aren't actually primarily thinking about God and worshipping, eg: when asleep, or working, or talking to other people, or having sex, or finding food, or wondering if that itch is an insect bite and who that cat you often see in your garden belongs to.
So the idea is that it focuses the mind - if you go into the consecrated space you, and everyone else there, can only be there for the purpose of promoting Religion (probably worshipping, but maybe maintaining the space too), and that has benefits when combined with the way that some people think and also just practical benefits because there should be fewer potential distractions away from Religion whilst in that area, as there wont be people at the next table talking about the football, and you wont suddenly realise that you left out a mouldy mug where some of your prayer group can probably see it, etc etc.

[zebbiejohnson.livejournal.com]

(Also, the comment above from a random ip was me, I just replied then realised I'm not logged in)

Further to the above, with regard to LARPing in consecrated spaces - quite a lot of larps involve the characters doing things that break the 10 commandments (such as worshipping other gods and murder, particularly) or would otherwise be seen as a bit insensitive to Christianity (eg: blood sacrifices to demons, etc), so that might also be a factor in making LARPing in a consecrated space even worse than just getting distracted during a long sermon and thinking about your social life instead - because people would be in the dedicated space actively doing things that are the opposite of the purpose.