In a world that rarely stops talking, the United Methodist Church of Estes Park is inviting people to spend a little time listening to the stillness.
The church will hold a contemplative prayer service Friday, Aug. 28, at 5 p.m., offering about 30 to 40 minutes of silence, Scripture, simple chants, prayer, and candlelight.
There will be no sermon. There will be no expectation that participants arrive with experience in meditation or contemplative prayer. There is no registration or cost.
Ann Lantz, the pastor of the church, said the idea grew from a congregational survey conducted about two years ago. When church members were asked what they wanted more of in worship, one answer stood out — silence.
“United Methodists aren’t so good at that,” Lantz said with a laugh.
Church member Sarah Gardner, who comes from the Episcopal tradition, was among those who expressed an interest in creating more opportunities for contemplation. She and Lantz began exploring what a separate contemplative service might look like, drawing on several Christian traditions and consulting with United Methodist clergy experienced in contemplative worship.
The result is intentionally different from a typical Sunday morning service.
“We live in such a loud world, loud and busy,” Lantz said.
The invitation, she said, is to set aside a short period of time to “tend to our souls” and allow space for God to speak rather than filling the time with words directed toward God.
The first service will focus on world peace. Lantz said the theme emerged during conversations about conflict involving Iran but quickly broadened as she and Gardner considered unrest and anxiety around the world and closer to home.
“Our goal is to provide a safe, quiet, reverent space for people to be able to just be and to be with God,” Lantz said.
An ancient practice of becoming quiet
Silence and contemplation have deep roots in Christian spirituality.
Unlike prayers built primarily around spoken petitions, contemplative prayer emphasizes stillness, attention, and an awareness of the presence of God. Rather than trying to fill every moment with words, participants deliberately become quiet.
That can be more difficult than it sounds.
People accustomed to constant conversation, television, phones, music, and other distractions may find even a few minutes of complete silence surprisingly long.
Lantz knows that from experience.
She earned a graduate certification in spiritual formation from Garrett–Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill. During her studies, one gathering opened with prayer and singing followed by 45 minutes of silence.
“I thought I was going to die,” she recalled. It took repeated practice before that much silence became comfortable.
That experience helped shape Friday’s service. Rather than asking newcomers to sit through long stretches of silence, the church will begin gently. The first silent period is expected to last about two minutes, with another lasting approximately three minutes. Several periods of silence will be interspersed throughout the service.
“I’m assuming most people don’t regularly meditate,” Lantz said. The shorter periods are intended to help people slow themselves down and become comfortable with stillness rather than making silence feel like an endurance test.
The service will also include two Scripture readings selected around the theme of world peace, followed by slowly offered prayer intentions.
Participants will remain on the main floor of the sanctuary rather than centering the service in the chancel, reinforcing the quieter and more intimate nature of the gathering.
“It’s a time for centering,” Lantz said.
Music that does not demand attention
Music will also help carry the service into silence.
The church is drawing partly on the style associated with the Taizé tradition, known for short, repetitive sung prayers that can be learned quickly and repeated without requiring worshippers to concentrate on complicated lyrics read out of a hymnal.
Lantz emphasized that the church is not attempting to reproduce a Taizé service. Instead, organizers are borrowing elements of that contemplative tradition and combining them with practices from other Christian traditions.
One of the chants will be the familiar “Jesus, Remember Me,” a short prayer that can be repeated until the words no longer require much conscious effort.
That repetition, Lantz said, can allow prayer to move beyond intellectual processing.
The purpose is to slow breathing, quiet the mind, and become more conscious of something that, in Christian belief, is already present.
“God’s always there,” Lantz said. “But most of the time, I am not conscious of it.”
The chants, she said, can help people move toward that awareness — not simply thinking about prayer but experiencing prayer as being in the presence of God.
Brianna Gress, the Estes Park High School choir director, will serve as cantor, accompanied by piano. Lantz said organizers experimented with several chants while developing the service and were struck by the simplicity of the music and the atmosphere it created.
Candles will add another contemplative element. During part of the service, people will have an opportunity to light a candle representing a prayer intention while the cantor sings.
The church also owns a canvas labyrinth used for walking meditation, and Lantz is considering incorporating it into future contemplative gatherings. A labyrinth differs from a maze because it has a single path leading toward the center and back out, allowing the person walking it to concentrate on prayer or reflection rather than choosing a route.
For now, however, the heart of Friday’s gathering will be simpler: Scripture, music, candlelight, and silence.
The church plans initially to offer the contemplative services quarterly. If there is sufficient interest, Lantz said they could eventually become monthly gatherings.
She does not view the service primarily as an effort to recruit church members.
“I see this more as a service for our community,” she said.
The gathering also offers something that can seem paradoxical: the chance to be quiet and inwardly focused while sitting alongside other people doing the same thing. In contemplative prayer, solitude does not necessarily require being alone.
For Lantz, that opportunity feels particularly important at a time when people can feel overwhelmed by conflict, fear, and the relentless pace of information.
“There’s so much good in our world,” she said, but it can become drowned out by the sense that “the world’s on fire” and everyone is panicked.
The challenge, she said, is learning to find moments of stillness amid that turmoil. Friday’s service is intended to offer one of those moments.
The contemplative prayer service begins at 5 p.m. Friday, Aug. 28, at the United Methodist Church of Estes Park, 1509 Fish Hatchery Rd.