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 New site coming soon St. Paul's Episcopal Parish and the Rock Creek Cemetery will soon have new sites. If you have any questions about upcoming events, please contact the office at (202) 726-2080. |
 OUR CHURCH: Worship & Music
Worship The very heart of everything we do and are at St. Paul's, Rock Creek Parish is worship. Worship is where the community comes together for praise to worship and adore God. Worship is the setting in which we proclaim the word of God and where the Word is made manifest in Sacrament. Churches often speak of the offering of time, talent, and treasure, frequently assuming the last is really what we mean to focus upon. It is our intent at St. Paul's to offer in worship the very best we can muster, We research, rehearse and prepare, we work, we express through flowers, vestments, the texts spoken and sung, the faith within us and that which we seek to proclaim. We seek to worship as people created in the image of God and enlivened by the presence of the Holy Spirit. On Sunday morning we offer two services of the Holy Eucharist. 8:00 a.m. Eucharist- This service uses Rite II of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. Many attending this service continue their morning together with breakfast and Bible Study in the Dining Hall of the St. Paul's Center. 10:30 a.m. Eucharist- This service uses Rite II of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. This liturgy is marked by strong congregational singing. The preaching at this service makes every effort to connect the Gospel to our daily lives, and, like the music, is related to the scriptural themes of the season and the day. Congregational Music St. Paul's Church, Rock Creek Parish has a long tradition of choral and congregational singing as a fundamental component of our weekly principal service. Anglican tradition has always held music as central to our liturgy: the chants, prayers and psalms were transcribed by John Merbecke (a musician and composer for the days of Henry VIII) and his colleagues in English during the early years of the Reformation. In St. Paul's today, the sung service is immediate and accessible, honoring the musical richness of the past and including congregational elements of modern liturgical worship. Our parish history records the presence of professional singers in the choir from shortly after the Civil War. One of our stained-glass windows depicts a singing choir seated around an organ. The prominent placement of this window in the Narthex of the Church proclaims from the start--this is a building in which music praises the Creator. We are blessed with a choir in the congregation-regular worshippers who sing the congregational responses and hymns as if inspired by that author of many hymn texts, John Wesley, who wrote: "Above all sing spiritually. Have an eye to God in every word you sing. Aim at pleasing Him more than yourself or any other creature..." Music at St. Paul's is not offered as entertainment. The music is an expression of the Church's faith and worship. Performed in a concert setting, religious music so often seems lifeless, removed for that context which endows its most profound meanings. Our goal, then, is to reunite what contemporary culture so often separates, and to allow both the music to adorn our liturgy with sublime beauty, and the liturgy to vivify our music as a vehicle of adoration capable of lifting us from eath to heaven. The Dobson Organ The present organ of St. Paul's Church, Rock Creek Parish was installed in 2004. Built as Opus 80 of Dobson Pipe Organ Builders, it was designed expressly for the physical and acoustical space it occupies. The case was designed in the tradition of the Georgian Baroque instruments in England about the time of Christopher Wren. The organ has mechanical key action, electrical stop action, two manuals, 21 registers and 26 ranks of pipes.
SWELL (expressive) PEDAL
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GREAT