History and Religion: In the mid 1980s, I went on a
performance tour through the UK and Europe with an orchestra and a choir. I think I've mentioned that here before. At one of our stops, in a small village in England, we performed in an ancient church. After helping to set up the orchestra chairs, I took my seat in the orchestra, put the music for the concert on my music stand and looked around the inside of the church.
Finally, I looked down. I was sitting on a grave stone, level with the floor. As was the practice then, people were buried under the floor of the church in some cases. Inscribed on that stone were seven names. A husband and wife, and five children. The dates of their birth and death were inscribed, as well. All had died in 1666, within a week of each other. I can't remember the names now, and I didn't take a photo, since cell phones didn't exist yet.
I remember being struck by the fact that I was about to play music while sitting on graves that were over 300 years old, in a church that was built in the 17th century. An entire family's bones were just a short distance from my feet. It was a sobering idea. Also sobering was the idea that an entire family died in the same week of the plague that swept through that area like the wind.
We played our concert, and then boarded a bus to move on to our next performance venue. That sense of history I felt in that old church somewhere in England, though, has stuck with me ever since. My ancestors came from England and Ireland. For all I know I might be related to those people buried under my chair.
It was a moving and troubling experience.
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