Shaney does bring them dinner and offer to show them the guest room and invite them to church the next morning.

Will there be singing?

Yup!

They'd love to come! 

They head up the highway in the opposite direction from the town to a two-story drystone building where a few dozen other families have gathered; some of them are a little standoffish, but most of them are friendly, and soon enough everyone files into the nave and the service starts. The pastor briefly introduces them and thanks them for sharing their healing song during the announcements, and then the service starts in earnest with a hymn.

They do not take long at all to pick it up well enough to sing along! And do so, delightedly.

...wow. The choir sings on, but most of the congregation falters and picks up again after a few measures.

...did they do something wrong?

No, everybody's just stunned at how well they sing.

Singing is so important!

They finish out the hymn, and then there's another one, and then a reading - enough of the words are unfamiliar that it doesn't make very much sense, but it's short - and then the choir sings while everyone starts filing up to the front to take little sips of wine and eat crackers.

...sure, they'll do that too!

They're entirely welcome to. The pastor smiles at them when he hands them the tiny cups of wine.

And then everyone files back to their seats and there's another hymn, and then a sermon about God's generosity to those who believe in Him.

The Elves're a bit confused by that last bit - do some people not? But okay.

As long as they're confused quietly. (Shaney's keeping an eye on them and will try to get their attention and murmur that they can ask her questions later if it seems like they're going to interrupt.)

And then there's another hymn and everybody files back out to the vestibule and then to a back room for coffee and donuts.

This is such a nice human tradition. 

It really is.

The pastor comes over to shake their hands and thank them for the healing song, and says that if there's anything he can do for them they should let him know.

They will definitely do that! They're talking to a lawyer soon about the getting rid of prisons and institutions thing. And listening to music, they're listening to lots of music.

That sounds like a worthy cause, definitely. He has a friend who does prison ministry, if they want advice from someone with a more personal perspective.

Sure! How does that work, how does ministering work in general, they think they might want to import it to Valinor, it seems nice.

It's about looking out for people, he explains, spiritually and practically, according to God's teachings - do they have a bible, he gets them a bible - with regular ministry being mostly services like they saw today and social programs - they have a food bank, and distribute clothes to the needy, and so on - and prison ministry being more focused on one-on-one support and advocating for prisoners. It shouldn't be hard to find pastors interested in spreading the good word to their world, either, if they want that; he can ask around for them if they'd like.

They already know God's teachings, Elves don't die so there are plenty still around from when they were created.

...they don't?

...they don't have original sin?

...they don't think so? What's that?

He takes them aside to one of the bible study rooms and gives them more bibles so they can read along, and reads the third book of Genesis to them.