Cedric and Kelvin kindly allowed me to shadow them each for a week to see how St Mary’s functions and these are some of my observations.

We all experience the beautiful music and liturgy at services and worship – but what happens behind the scenes to make this happen so seamless, and what about the day to day running of a place like St Mary’s ? My immediate impression was that it is run like any other small company and, like any other company, it has to promote itself, sell a product, and keep afloat keep financially.

St Mary’s promotes itself in its own unique way, through the style and quality of its music and preaching, and its commitment to being welcoming, open, and inclusive. St Mary’s promotes itself in other ways too, making full use of twenty-first century technologal advances. It has its own website, which is constantly updated and kept ‘fresh’, and also uses social media and networking. Doors Open days allow individuals to pop in and see the building, ask questions and, hopefully, become more interested in the ‘company’ and its product.

The St Mary’s company, like any other, has to be innovative and diverse. As well as selling its main product, it has to make full use of its premises in other ways such as hiring out the building for concerts and exhibitions. Like any other company, accounts and reports have to be prepared and produced so that ‘shareholders’ know what is happening, know how St Mary’s is performing, and are aware of plans for future developments.

Observing the workings of the ‘company’ was both interesting and informative. I saw how Jo the administrator prepares the liturgical pew sheets containing the order of service, the praise, and music. I became aware of the seasonal changes to the kyrie, eucharistic prayer, and blessing, and that settings for the Propers change once every six weeks, and the Collect changes every week. These sheets are prepared some weeks in advance and involve a lot of hard work and time.

Then there is the logistics of producing the Sunday services, something which again is no mean feat, and entails a lot of organisation. There is what is called the ‘Cast’, a list of all the participants in the performance and every member has to tick his or her name on arrival. Some of the ‘performers’ are the celebrant, the deacon, the sub-deacon, the preacher, the MC, the crucifer, the acolytes, the thurifer, the lesson reader, the intercessor, the eucharistic assistants, and the welcomers.

Beyond the Sunday services there are other numerous other activities and groups going on such as the study groups, choir practice, visiting the sick, pastoral visiting, and Faith in older people (FIOP), where an elderly person who cannot come to church regularly is visited by a member of St Mary’s. There is also the Contact Group, which organise visits to individuals with particular needs, such as hospital visits and the like.

I was allowed to sit in on meetings with Kelvin, Cedric, and Jo, where everyday issues where discussed and plans for future developments were brain -stormed. What came across was that the ‘company’ of St Mary’s realises it cannot ‘rest on its laurels’ and has to be insightful and innovative to remain successful. It also came across that everybody has his or her own interests and remit and that, although it is their responsibility to carry out that duty, there appears to be flexibility. Importantly, there is a good sense of humour, which helps the working environment and light relief when needed.

Successful companies have, among other things a good and committed ‘workforce’, and St Mary’s has an abundance of this. There are approximately one hundred and fifty volunteers helping to make this company work. The obvious ones are the choir, the stewards, the open church volunteers, the hospitality volunteers, the bell-ringers, the young church volunteers, the welcomers, the servers, and probably others whom I have missed out. I spoke to a number of individuals who volunteer at St Mary’s and have done so for many years, and the success of the company is very much due to their energy and commitment, and to the efficient way their work is managed.

Then there are the working groups of St Mary’s such as the Compliance Group dealing with health and safety; the Property Group dealing with the fabric of the building; the Finance Group dealing with money, and the Core Group dealing with future development. Like any company, St Mary’s needs money to survive, and every year there is a Stewardship campaign asking individuals to review their giving and to pay for the upkeep and maintenance of the building and its salaried personnel.

Further entrepreneurial spirit is also revealed in the rental of the parking bays at the front of the building to local businesses, and of space in the spire to a telecommunications firm where they have installed their aerial.

You have probably noticed the main product this company sells has not been mentioned so far, and this is its CEO – God! Yes, St Mary’s is like many other small companies and has to run in a business like way, but the big difference between St Mary’s and other companies is that it is not in the business of making financial profit, but in the special business of promoting and worshipping God.

The cathedral was dim, a far cry from its Sunday brightness, as we, warmly dressed and sensibly shod, put down our bags and rucksacks and gathered in a circle of friends and strangers around the altar. We prepared ourselves to journey towards the sea with St Brendan’s prayer in preparation for setting sail, the prayer of a man preparing to leave all he knew for a strange land as so many did in the early centuries of the church, and so many thousands do today.

“Shall I turn my back on my native land, and turn my face towards the sea? Towards the elements, the noise, the wind, the spray, the hostility, the misunderstanding, the abuse, the ridicule, the uncertainty, the fear, the isolation?”

Unlike early Christian explorers or modern refugees, our journey was not a final departure laden with fear and supported only by trust in God but a day pilgrimage to Whithorn, undertaken in modern comfort on a luxury coach by our group of 32 pilgrims, led by Rev Cedric Blakey and Rev Kirstin Freeman.

It is a surprisingly long way to Whithorn, particularly when a closure on the A77 sent us on a winding diversion through many extra miles of the beautiful countryside of the south west of Scotland. When we arrived at Whithorn, we were very thankful for the thoughtfulness of the kind people at the Whithorn Trust visitor centre, who had arranged tea and coffee in generous quantity in an upstairs room. Some of us – me among them – felt an imperative need for cake after the early start and long journey and were not disappointed. The baking in the visitor centre cafe is notably good!

Suitably refreshed, we were driven out beyond the town to our first real ‘destination’ – St Ninian’s cave. Like so many other figures in the early church and since, Ninian is said to have spent time in a cave on the beach, seeking quiet and space to pray and meditate away from the community in which he lived. Approached through a wooded glen, the bay gives a tremendous sense of peace even today with no houses visible, just the pebble beach with sea-rounded stones in a variety of colours.

The cave itself is small and narrow, marked by centuries of inscriptions from visiting pilgrims, some of whom have also left stones from the beach or small crosses as symbols of their prayer, intent or presence. The site has been a place of pilgrimage for over 1000 years, with the earliest carvings (now in the Whithorn museum) dating from the 700s or 800s.

We gathered in a circle outside the cave for a very simple short Eucharist, led by Rev Kirstin Freeman. A central element of the service was the idea of laying down the burdens of worry, anxiety for self or others, the need for forgiveness that we had carried on our pilgrimage. In turn, we each poured out a little water from a glass as a symbol of all that we were relinquishing and laying down in God’s care. It was very peaceful with the sole accompaniment to our prayers the rapid rhythm of the waves sweeping onto the rocks in front of the cave and the slightly softer sound as each wave ran up the pebble beach.

Thus spiritually refreshed, it was time for bodily sustenance and we scattered to find picnic spots and enjoy the surprisingly warm sunshine and the beauty of the sea. For many people, this quiet relaxed time on the beach was the highlight of the day – certainly it was for me.

All too soon it was time to return to the bus (pausing to pick brambles) and to Whithorn itself where the group again separated to make the most of the warm, sunny afternoon as seemed best to them, whether eating ice cream, taking a guided tour of the archaeology or heading for a pub to watch Scotland’s crucial game against Samoa (Scotland won!) in the Rugby Union World Cup.

I explored the ruined priory, built to house the relics of St Ninian. The Romanesque ruins we now see form part of what became a far larger structure, a combination of cathedral, priory and parish church, although it is hard to get a sense of the scale of the mediaeval structures, so completely have they vanished beneath the old graveyard, itself full of old stones telling complicated stories of families’ misfortunes, long lives or the kindness of friends.

Earlier stones, mostly dating from the tenth and eleventh century and unearthed in Whithorn and the surrounding area, form the core of the priory museum. While the ‘Latinus stone’, Scotland’s earliest Christian monument with a Latin inscription and a chi-rho symbol is probably considered the ‘star exhibit’, I particularly enjoyed some of the stones with ‘Celtic’ interlace patterns – not least because the carvers made mistakes! Seeing the points where a curve had been carved in the wrong direction or a mistake made in the rhythm of the pattern made the long-dead carvers human and living for me in a way perfection could not.

After tea, more delicious cake and a brief service in the priory ruins, it was time to head north back to Glasgow where eventually tired pilgrims arrived, enriched by history and the beauty of Whithorn and St Ninian’s bay.