Scottish Episcopal St. Vincent's

We chose St Vincent's Chapel Scottish Episcopal for our first Sunday services in Edinburgh. It was a mere three minute walk down the street, of strikingly similar name to our Catholic parish at home and was celebrating the Harvest Festival, which sounded fascinating.

Despite a delay and a 10 minute detour on our supposed three minute/three block walk to church, we managed to arrive at the chapel just in time to tag along as the congregation and priest's procession was entering the church.

Apparently, due to filming for the Fast and the Furious 9, they have been closing down streets all over the city for filming. It just happened to be on the block in between our home and church on Sunday.  FAF9 is the latest in the series and it seemed the film crew didn't know there was a practicing chapel in the middle of the three blocks they were filming! Wonder who planned to film in front of a church on a Sunday?

The Car from The Fast and the Furious 9 - You saw it here first!

Christine got off to an auspicious start as Adam needed to use the bathroom and we ducked inside the one along the hallway. We couldn't find the light switch and I suggested Sam pull the red chain from the ceiling (several of the bathrooms here have pull strings to operate the bathroom light). Alas, it wasn't the light but an alarm in case you've fallen and need help in the bathroom. Ack! Luckily I was able to think quickly and saw the reset switch and I just prayed the alarm that was subdued in the bathroom wasn't louder elsewhere in the church! It took a while to calm Adam down but we were able to join the service and the boys all behaved quite nicely.

Turns out Scottish Episcopal means using an older prayer book/liturgy with more thy and thou and older language. Still quite understandable, though. Everyone proceeded to the small room opposite the church for "coffee and conversation." We had a chance to chat with a wonderfully warm and welcoming congregation.

They happily invited us to join them for their Harvest Parish dinner the following evening in the main chapel and we eagerly accepted. Great to meet so many lovely people and to try such traditional Scottish food.

Sunday was spent stocking up the house and unpacking our suitcases. We ended with a lovely home cooked meal and family game of Tripoly with a self-fashioned game board!