The beating heart of Trinity: A Conversation about CotG with volunteer and community member Rachel Scotch

Trinity's own Rachel Scotch washes the feet of a community member on Maundy Thursday. (Photo credit: Kyle Picha)

Rachel Scotch believes that every person at Trinity on the Green should come to Chapel on the Green at least once. For her, it is the "beating heart of Trinity," the "most meaningful part," and the part that keeps her coming back to church every Sunday.

Before moving to New Haven, Rachel lived in Boston and attended common cathedral (the worshipping community CotG is modeled on) and was a part of MANNA (Many Angels Needed Now and Always), a ministry formed with and for the unhoused community. She loved the way "people [who worked in these ministries] weren't there to do to or for, but with." When she moved to New Haven and found Chapel on the Green, she said, she felt the same ethos at work.

Going to the service "can be uncomfortable in some ways, if you're used to very formal, litany-based, ritualistic services," she says, but it's worth it; CotG has its own rhythms and rituals. Prayers of the People, which happens every Sunday after the sermon, is particularly meaningful. "I really love how people are allowed to just... go," Rachel says. "It's really important because sometimes [the community members] are people who have no one to listen to them, and this is the only time during their week that people are listening."

Josh Rohrbach, Rachel Scotch, and community members serve a meal to CotG parishioners and guests.

The meal after the service is just as important as the service, Rachel explains. At Chapel on the Green, no one is required to attend the service to receive a meal. "Sharing food with people is the most fundamental thing you can do to experience your shared humanity," Rachel says. Since Chapel on the Green is dependent on volunteers to provide the meal, Rachel and her husband, Josh Rohrbach, began to host the meal periodically; they often sign up for days that are the most difficult for us to find volunteers, like Sundays that fall on a holiday weekend, or Sundays in the sweltering heat of summer or the frigid cold of winter. Josh is not a religious person, Rachel says, "but, even without a faith tradition, he loves Chapel on the Green.... he participates in the service--he says the prayers, he sings the hymns, he gets a blessing during Communion."

When I asked Rachel what her hopes are for Chapel on the Green, she repeats, "Just come. Because these [community members of Chapel on the Green] are our fellow parishioners."