It all just feels like the latest church ‘fad’ and, being completely honest, I long for this one to be over. I loved stripping church of all the non-essential bells and whistles, and a service with loads of liturgy just makes me feel like I did as a child. I freely and unashamedly admit that I don’t ‘get’ it. I find chanting together boring and abnormal, and I count the minutes till it’s over. I find it a barrier between me and God, and other people around me, not a uniting activity in the slightest.

It’s not something I feel I can introduce a non-Christian to without them writing me off as a nut-job – so instead of a Sunday service being a way of me introducing part of ‘what being a Christian means to me’ to my friends, I can’t bring them. I’d feel a traitor for saying ‘this is the part when I go and have a tea-break’ – I feel a traitor for even writing any of this, and I accept I may not be as well-read as many of the posters, but it would be a scary autocracy without dissenters :)

That said, your article was, as ever :), brilliantly written and persuasive… maybe I understand where you are coming from better (before reading, I was totally confused and afraid!) I wrote as Anon because I fear being ripped to shreds by the intelligentsia, but as a friend I’m happy to share and discuss it with you Jase, so I didn’t hide my email!

thanks for writing this- short, lucid, beautiful.
You’ve expressed many of the thoughts I’ve been having over the past few years as I worship at my ‘low’ CofE church and develop our ecumenical links with local Baptist and Free Churches…

Each church has its own ‘liturgy’ sure enough, but I hadn’t really thought about the imposed liturgy of our consumer culture…

thanks again.

I am a pastor at a Vineyard-esque church (former Vineyard actually) in the US, and we’ve just begun a satellite community that is embracing liturgical practices, church year, etc. for very much the same reasons you outlined in the article. I’ve also gotten many of the same strange looks from some folks! But thankfully I’ve also run into a lot of people who respond with a sigh of recognition and relief, saying “Yes! That’s what we’ve been intuitively longing for…”

So anyway, just wanted to drop a line – God’s blessings on your community as you continue to live out the gospel in the UK!

I really enjoyed the article. I grew a high catholic, and when I ‘discovered’ charismatic house church worship loved the freedom of dispensing with liturgy. However I was taken down a peg or two by a Anglo-catholic vicar who pointed out we all have liturgy it just differs in its complexity. Mine was just an hour or worship and teaching, rather than rather more involved smells and bells.

What you elucidate and has got me thinking is how this liturgy spills into the rest of our lives, very clever. Now this leads me to think about how liturgical (and possibly legalistic) is our Christian interface to the world. I’m probably looking at this negatively, whereas you highlight the positive aspects of presenting an alternative world to inhabit. But nethertheless as someone who wishes to contextualise the gospel this is an important factor, both that which is positive and negative – thanks for the stimulus.

I thought James Fowler and his faith stage development theory showed something similar, how modern churches often want to keep people in places of certainty.

I think maybe, that liturgy serves a several functions, in that it allows for depth in the face of plurality (some anchoring), by bringing a uni-vocal response, which ironically opens out into a sense of mystery.

In a post modern world what could be more mysterious than the notion that there is a non solipsistic self!

Great article, mate. I think this is a timely and important topic for the church.

There is another aspect to liturgy that I’ve been thinking about. In the book The Critical Journey, Hagberg and Guelich outline stages of faith that are initially about discovery, initiation and a new productivity in the community of faith. The authors point out that most protestant evangelical churches are ideally suited for people in those early stages.

But when people move into stages of uncertainty, exploring an inner journey that may be initiated by a life crisis, resulting in a new and deeper awareness of God’s love that transcends mere productivity and functionality, there may be no place for those people in the productive life of the church. This is not a function of discrimination, just a result of organizational design.

Because evangelical churches tend to focus on the sermon as the center of the worship experience, it is easy for those churches to have a demographic focus that emerges from the preferences and character of the speaker. But in classically liturgical environments (where, I might add, the homily is relatively short and a minor part of the service), sacred space is created where, potentially, the Spirit of God may work in the lives of people at diverse stages of the journey of faith. In the Eucharist, all stand shoulder-to-shoulder on level ground. I think the liturgy and Eucharist open up the possibility for transcending homogeneity in the community of faith–a place where there is no Jew or Greek, slave or free.

There is much for us to learn here. Thanks for initiating an important conversation.

Mike

Cheers Scott

as the wisdom of God in the seasonal ‘moedim’ or ‘appointed times/feasts’ that both told a story of the past that the people of God find themselves in, as well as pointing prophetically to a future…does our liturgical practices do that…both/and…not just looking back but forward also?

i guess my question about liturgical practices, in the context of a faith community that seeks to be ‘ancient-future’ or as you say ‘deep church’, how does innovation work its way out in the dance with tradition without succumbing to a ‘pick and mix’ eccelsiology? is it simply a matter of missional-incarnation in the context we find ourselves in? is it ‘blooming in the soil you are planted’? so-to-speak…

ps – since the end of november, i have gone liturgical in posting my wordcraft on my blog seeking to be inspired by and follow the church liturgical calendar…