stark beauty - communion and praying

As part of this year's celebration of the Advent season we are offering communion every week, rather than the normal 6 week rotation or so. This time we were asked to take the elements by "intinction" (tear piece of bread to dip into the cup on your own at the communion table standing at the front of the church).  The bread and cup were at the far end of the table and a handmade light quilt or prayer shawl was draped on the near end. As each person approached the table they were asked to make a prayer for our music direction who was scheduled for surgery the following morning. To tie the silent prayer onto the fabric, each person was to select a tassle and form a knot at the end of their prayer.
       During this process our music director sat at the piano and played in the silence of the people standing in line, bathed in the morning sun steaming through the south-facing wall of stained glass. The effect was stark beauty, since the slow but tuneful music sounded each note in crystal clear tones and the palpable concentration on the table, the "cleansing of one's heart" by taking the communion, and forming a meaningful and sincerely prayer for our young music director all combined to intensify the sound of the music in the room of sunlight. It was somehow similar to an imaginary feeling of nearly all the air leaving the room; or another image: the intense focus of a calligraphy with inked horsehair brush making the first stroke on a sheet of thick, absorbent handmade paper.
       Truly the combined force of sincere and focused prayers in the aggregate is a powerful thing.