Rev. Anna Friedrich
A year in the making, the Lifting the Veil conference here in Boston was a labor and a joy! The HopeWords conferences team, Common Good magazine, Inkwell by Christianity Today, and our humble addition to the planning team from Church of the Cross managed to put together an unforgettable weekend — with more than 750 registrants, a book table that nearly sold out, and a celebration of the life work, and the many collaborations of the poet-priest Malcolm Guite, culminating in a benediction for all of us in attendance, that we might each “lift the veil” in the various and creative ways God has called us to.
The conference began on Thursday, with a tour of the piano factory Mason & Hamlin, several sold-out spiritual history of Boston walking tours, an introduction and invitation into the Tabernacle—a liturgy of the body, and a long line at the Well coffee shop. Our first hope was that the “veil” on the facade of Tremont Temple would be lifted, but alas, the historical restoration work continued throughout the weekend. I liked to think of it as a kind of dramatic architecture-scale work of art for all of us to walk through in order to get inside the historic theatre many of us here at CotC know well from our 2024 Easter Vigil.
Our beloved Directors of Music, Megan & Daniel Tavani, incognito as a touring singer-songwriter-producer-duo-Lewis-inspired-literati-band called “davy” could not have enjoyed a more rapt audience, in my humble opinion. Simply put, they rocked. The rest of the weekend flowed in and out of conversations and loooong line-ups for Malcolm’s signature, musical performances, panels, Poets in the Round (that I got to partake in! nervously following a spoken word poet who at one point was also beat-boxing, but it worked!), and then a spell-binding 90 minute story-telling session from the much-acclaimed Martin Shaw.
Not only did Church of the Cross give a fantastic showing at Lifting the Veil (thank you all!), but Boston itself showed up in droves for a Faith & Art conference like we’d never hosted before. What an encouragement! We’ve long known here at CotC that the arts are crucial to the work of imagining and living into the kingdom come, but this was nothing less than a small renaissance—poets, musicians, novelists, painters, designers, songwriters, printmakers, theologians, pastors, farmers, floral designers, teachers, and many more all gathered in to be inspired, and to hear a hearty “go and do likewise” from the beloved Rev. Guite. May it be so.
Rev. Anna A. Friedrich is our arts pastor here at CotC, a working poet, mother to Cole and Adam, and wife to our Rector, Dave. Her second book of poetry, Yahweh Loves a Desert, a 33-poem collection riffing off the Old Testament prophets Elijah & Elisha, will be released in just a few short days!