Church celebrates 50th anniversary with light show focused on environment

A light installation was displayed at Winchester’s United Church last weekend

“Wonders of Creation” reflected on the creation of the earth, “its place in the cosmos and our impact on it”, with large installations fixed to the interior walls.

Earth, numerous creatures and planets were also featured throughout the show, which aimed to highlight the world and our impact on it.

Organiser of the event Christine Cook said the light show was created to “help people think [about] how special and precious” the world is, and how it’s “the key thing with Green Week”.

Visitors entered through the coffee bar to begin the show and explored the two levels, with the “downstairs reflecting on the theme of space” and the “upstairs being earth”.

The show included a short AV presentation that was repeated every few minutes, to allow those to reflect.

Jane Lawson, a visitor who experienced the show on the final day said her first impression of the show was “stunning, really stunning, it was lovely to be sitting amongst it instead of just looking at the front and watching”.

Steve Lawson, who attended alongside his wife Jane said: “It was very interesting to see how the darkness was being lit up in different places, and how it was completely different to our usual experience in that space.”

The United Church was opened in 1853, and its current congregation “was formed in 1974”.

The church celebrated its 50^th anniversary linked with Green Week to showcase the “Wonders of Creation”.

The lightshow ran from the 27^th – 29^th of September.