Community comes together at worship service

By HERB BROCK
Staff Writer

When George Foreman was planning the first Great American Brass Band Festival back in 1990, the founder and organizer of the event wanted to involve as many segments of the Danville community as possible, including churches.

The Rev. Norman Hagley, pastor of First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), recalls how Foreman floated an idea about involving local churches in the festival, how he didn't want the event to compete with Sunday morning worship but rather be a part of them.

``In a speech to the Rotary Club, George told us he wanted to get the bands out into local churches on the Sunday morning of the festival,'' said Hagley. ``I was interested in his proposal so I talked with him after his speech.''

During their conversation, Foreman told Hagley that it really would be ideal if a local church moved its Sunday morning service to the festival's main venue at Centre College and he would provide the bands.

``I thought an outdoor Sunday morning service with a brass band or two would be wonderful, and (the board of First Christian) agreed,'' said Hagley.

The wonder turned to worry as Hagley and the board began the planning.

``We'd never done anything like this before, so we really didn't know what would happen, what kind of music should be played in terms of hymns suitable for brass bands or how to serve communion,'' Hagley said.

The pastor and the board figured that if everyone who shows up at the church's regular 11 a.m. worship services were to attend the outdoor service at Centre, the crowd would be about 500.

``Just in case, we planned communion for 800, but we didn't think there was any way there would be that many people and we would have a lot of leftover communion wafers and cups of juice,'' said Hagley.

As it turned out there weren't enough wafers and juice.

``More than 1,200 attended that first worship service. People had to share communion cups,'' Hagley said. ``It was a little chaotic but it was a marvelous kind of chaos.''

Since then, the chaos has turned into a chorus of singers, volunteers and preachers from a total of seven local churches as the worship service has grown into a community event, a fixture of the festival.

And the number of people attending the service has more than doubled with more than 2,500 showing up at last year's service.

While First Christian remains the main organizer of the service, it has been joined by The Presbyterian Church, Trinity Episcopal Church, SS. Peter and Paul Catholic Church, Lexington Avenue Baptist Church, Christ the Head Missionary Church and the Salvation Army.

The churches provide volunteers to help with communion and offertory collection and their pastors have taken turns over the years giving readings from the Bible. The sermon normally is given by Hagley.

Music is provided by a community choir with singers from each of the seven churches and, of course, one or two brass bands. This year, the Olympia Brass, which has become a regular at the Sunday morning service, will be joined by the Canadian Staff Salvation Army Band.

Also, the ``Hallelujah Chorus'' will be performed.

This year's sermon will be timely, given the tremendous amount of publicity in recent weeks about violence in the American culture.

``I'll be talking about the gift of the gentle heart,'' said Hagley. ``There is a need for more gentleness in our society, a need for people to touch each other in a gentle and loving way as opposed to the violent way we sometimes deal with people, including the ones we love.''

When Hagley gave his first sermon 10 years ago, he didn't realize the service he was leading would turn into not only one of the major events of the festival but something that has gently touched so many people.

``We've received so many letters from people who say it is so nice to see so many churches come together, who say the service is truly a moving experience for them,'' said Hagley. ``It's been a moving experience for those of us who have had the pleasure of presenting it.''

The Community Worship Service will begin at 9:30 a.m. Sunday, June 13, at Centre College. Those who plan to attend are asked to bring their own chairs. Those who would like to participate in the performance of the ``Hallelujah Chorus'' are asked to bring their own score and be at the main stage at Centre at 8:30 a.m. In case of rain, the service will be moved to Newlin Hall at the Norton Center for the Arts.