The Compline Community
A reflective strand of the Northstowe Church Network
We are a community shaped by shared practice — a rhythm of prayer, silence, learning, and hospitality.
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We are welcoming and non-judgemental, offering space where people can take their first steps in encountering God.
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We honour silence as much as words, trusting that God meets us in stillness as well as in speech.
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Our life together includes liturgical prayer (Compline, Choral Evensong), Communion — both spoken services and shared meals — alongside book discussions, contemplative silence, and spiritual practices.
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We are rooted in new monastic traditions, drawing on ancient rhythms to shape life in today’s world.
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We trust that doctrine and orthodoxy are held within the liturgies we share ecumenically, while recognising that teaching and reflection can continue to deepen faith and understanding.
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Our ecumenical roots lie in Churches Together: formally the Local Ecumenical Partnership (Baptist, URC, and CofE), with a Shared Vision alongside the Quakers and Methodists, and deepening links with Roman Catholics.
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Within the Northstowe Church Network, we are a missional and worshipping community — a true church home for some, and for all a strand that contributes fully to the festivals, shared worship, and community life of the wider network.
Whatever your background — whether you are just starting to explore your spirituality, or a pilgrim dusty from the journey — you are welcome to rest in God’s presence with us.
🌀 Autumn 2025: Our Weekly Rhythm
We meet on Thursday evenings in Northstowe and Over, loosely alternating between homes. Together we’re gently weaving prayer, silence, and conversation into a weekly pattern of contemplative worship.
Running Over Rocks – alternate weeks
On these more discussion-rich weeks, we’ll read together a chapter from Ian Adam's book "Running over Rocks" — with the leader choosing and sharing which section to focus on in advance. Using the silence-and-sandtimer model developed by the Wednesday group, we’ll read aloud, reflect, and create space to listen to one another and to God.- Please arrive from 8pm
- These evenings are more spacious and aim to finish around 9.15 pm
Poetry and Silence – contemplative prayer weeks
These weeks build on our practice of praying Compline with silence, while exploring a wider range of contemplative approaches: some weeks might use a guided meditation or poetic liturgy; others may return to the comforting rhythm of Night Prayer.- Please arrive from 8pm (not before)
- Prayer start at 8.15pm,
- Concludes by 9pm, at which point we leave in silence - giving the option for the last words of the day being addressed to God.
Communion Meals
At least once a term, we share food, conversation, and sacrament — ecumenically, creatively, and rooted in the richness of our traditions.
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Gathering prayers and scripture open our meal.
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We “break open” the Bible together while eating.
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We reset the table with bread, grapes, and wine for the Great Thanksgiving and the sharing of Communion.
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These meals are rich in poetry and a deep sense of encounter with God and each other.
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We normally celebrate Maundy Thursday, Ascension, and All Saints in this way.
We also sharing in simple spoken communions in the other half of term.
Check with the WhatsApp group or email hello@northstowe.church to confirm the venue
🌱 A Network of Communities
The Northstowe Church Network has always been envisioned as a network of small, friendly, worshipping and missional communities — not a single large congregation where everyone goes to everything. We don’t expect people to be part of every gathering (unless they want to!). Each community expresses something of God’s life in a different key.This next step for the Compline Community is part of that vision maturing. We hope it offers space for those who have been bridging Sunday afternoons with Pathfinder and midweek contemplative spaces to let go of the pressure to be everywhere — and instead to find deeper rootedness in this emerging expression of church on Thursday nights.
At the same time, we’re not closing any doors. If being part of both spaces nourishes you in this season, you are very welcome to continue.
💬 A Note About the Name
“Compline Community” hasn’t always felt like the perfect fit — it only captures one strand of what we do. Whatever the name, what matters most is the shared rhythm of silence, prayer, and hospitality that shapes us.📍 Where We Meet
This term, we’re alternating between homes in Northstowe and Over, with occasional gatherings elsewhere. We look forward to inhabiting the Chapel by the Lake in due course.
To confirm venues, please check the WhatsApp group or email hello@northstowe.church
What is compline?
“Compline” is the ancient monastic service of “Completion”.
In the 8th century, Benedictine monks began a pattern of praying 8 eight times a day: Matins (before dawn), Lauds (at sunrise), then Prime, Terce, Sext, None, and Vespers throughout the day (each about three hours apart). Finally, at bedtime, Compline. Today, Anglican prayer books offer four such ‘offices’ – morning, midday, evening, and night. Like most prayer offices, Compline includes a confession, a reading from the Psalms and other Scriptures, written and responsive prayers, and a time for silence or extemporaneous prayer.
This final service of the day is an opportunity to reflect on the day that has passed, to peak through a small window of Scripture into the Big Story of God’s ongoing encounter with his people, and to draw on words hallowed by tradition as “a way to wade into the ongoing stream of the church’s communion with [God],”* as Tish Harrison Warren expresses it. She goes on to explain “Scripted prayers—the prayers of Compline, the Psalms, or any other received prayers—are not static. As we pray them, we read our own lives back into the words we pray. Our own biographies shape our understanding of these prayers as much as these prayers shape us and our own stories.”
* Warren, Tish Harrison. Prayer in the Night (pp. 7, 125).
Want to find out more? A good place to start is Tish Harrison Warren’s excellent book “Prayer in the Night; for those who work or watch or weep”. An American Anglican priest, she combines her own personal experiences of prayer in a time of suffering [trigger warning: miscarriage and bereavement] with a rooted and thoughtful unpacking of the wonderful ancient tradition of Prayer in the Night.
Useful Prayer Resources
Ten Minutes of Silence with our Northstowe Sand Timer
Centering Prayer (one way to pray with Silence)
Useful Prayer Apps and Prayer Podcasts
Church of England Daily Prayer - Access web-based full-text versions of CofE Services of Daily Prayer, which are available in both Contemporary (Common Worship) and Traditional (Book of Common Prayer) forms and for all times of the day. Audio files are also available. With links to Time to Pray and Daily Prayer Apps.
Pray as you go - Pray As You Go is a daily, audio prayer app that helps you to encounter God wherever you are. This will help you to pray whenever you find the time, but particularly whilst travelling to and from work or study.
