THE only prayer most people associate with the Las Vegas Strip is the kind offered by gamblers hoping the Lord will send a certain card. Yet in its own quirky way, Las Vegas Boulevard accommodates and even markets to the spiritual needs of guests.
Most people who turn off the Strip onto Cathedral Way have literally made a wrong turn or they're simply hoping to make a U-turn. But if they kept going a few more yards they'd find the Roman Catholic Guardian Angel Cathedral, whose welcoming newsletter attempts to "encourage you to consider our Guardian Angel Cathedral your church away from home." Your "church away from home" is across from the Stardust and next to the massive Wynn. Its stained glass windows augment the usual religious themes with a nod to the secular iconography of Las Vegas, including images of the Las Vegas Hilton and the Stardust.
Guardian Angel is a very modest building on one very expensive bit of Strip real estate (it was probably a lot cheaper when the church opened in 1963). Aside from the looming shadow cast by Wynn, Guardian Angel really does appear to be a community church. On a recent Saturday morning, about 15 people, mostly locals, gathered in an administrative building behind the church to sing Handel's "Messiah."
The listing for the event was a contrast to the rest of the Strip's activities: "No audition, no cost, no commitment, no experience necessary. No music score? No problem!" The only hint that just beneath this spectacle-free presentation lies a massive turnover congregation of tourists, is watching box after box thick with copies of its single-sheet monthly newsletter being unpacked.
Dennis Grant did not expect to sing along and praise Jesus during his vacation. But on Sunday morning the tourist from Australia's Gold Coast, along with his wife, Terre, and their daughter Nicca, not only sing along but also wave their hands and napkins at the House of Blues in Mandalay Bay enjoying the gospel brunch.
"I was surprised to find gospel here," Dennis Grant says. At first, he was suspicious that the music would be a kitschy Vegas take on gospel. But after witnessing the Gastons, a local group that includes three generations of the Gaston family and that has been performing a mix of contemporary and traditional gospel for almost three decades, Grant is thrilled. "We don't have anything like this in Australia."
