Holy Patterns, or: What Baptists Can Learn From Episcopalians

I keep hearing again and again in discussions about liturgy a duality between "by the book" and "spirit-filled". I found this dichotomy both common and stark in my southern seminary which was largely populated by Methodists and Baptists. As a rhetorical device it can be very effective; as a spiritual construct it fails on a number of levels.

The Anglican forms of worship are rooted in liturgical patterns that we inherited from the historical liturgies of the Western Church with a pronounced Benedictine spin. The spirituality of these liturgies--Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, the Mass, all within the context of an ever-repeating liturgical year--is about rhythms and habits.

Some--the present writer apparently included--see this stability as stasis or stagnation. And it can be especially if we are just "going through the motions".

But "going through the motions" with attention day-in and day-out also leads to a deeply spirit-suffused worship. Some of the most spirit-filled liturgies I have ever attended have been with full incense and century-old chants at St Mary the Virgin, Times Square. It was Holy Order where we all knew our movements and places, responses and genuflections and the patterns were precisely what allowed the presence of the Spirit in the power that we felt.

To assume that the Spirit only works in the emotional and spontaneous is not only narrow and limited but patently untrue.

And my church has an altar call every Sunday do where we get to come down front, pray, and rededicate our lives to Christ; it's called the Holy Eucharist...

This is a gorgeous piece. As a recovering evangelical Christian, eager to escape all things even remotely evangelical in orientation, an altar call at Riverside would have terrified me. But reading this piece made me remember what I loved about my childhood religion--feeling something, being led by something, forgetting about the linens altogether.

Heads up: commenters are requested to use their full name. That's our policy. - eds.

I disagree, Derek. Emily points us not to the need for emotional and spontaneous worship, but for the need to be willing to edge on chaos occasionally during worship. How many liturgical churches would be flexible enough to allow for the skipping of a hymn? Not mine.

For how many liturgical Christians would this be the ritual equivalent of apostasy?

I don't particularly want to be a part of an altar call. And I have great love and respect for liturgy. But I would love to be a part of a church that, when we're moved to sing, to sing. And when we're moved to be silent to be silent, regardless of what the bulletin might say.

(ed. note: Kurt, we need your full name next time.)

Upon reflection, let me say what's really bothering me.

I appreciate that Episcopalians have things to learn from other liturgical traditions--including the Baptists. However, most Episcopalians--both lay and clergy--do not know Episcopal liturgy well enough to be able to understand how insights from other traditions will help us better understand and invigorate our own traditions.

In my opinion this is due to the fact that most current Episcopalians are converts from other traditions and that the necessary formation concerning what the Episcopal liturgy is and how it functions has not occurred.

Beyond singing a melismatic "Amen" in response to Derek's comments, I would offer this caution. Kurt writes that he would love to be part of a church that sings when "we're moved to sing." But in practice the singing won't happen when "we" are moved to sing; it will happen when the person presiding is moved to sing. And so we introduce still more opportunities for clericalism.

But then I'm an ex-Baptist and a ritualist, so naturally this post would make me nervous. I've also been a priest for about five minutes, so I can't really speak from vast experience of presiding at liturgies (three Eucharists and an Evensong so far).

I have to agree with Derek that pitting "sponaneous" worship as Spirit-filled over and against set worship as "dead" will not do. The regularity of the Office and Mass allows for deepening and a contemplative stance to the world, which is all about the Holy Spirit. Liturgy and regularity in patterns of worship then become a discipline. I notice a lot of hankering after "practices", but Christians don't just do practices, we do disciplines. Of course, that word carries some sense of duty and doing it even when we don't feel like it. But Christian life isn't just about how we feel today, it's about regularity of praise.

I was raised Pentecostal. I know something of the other end of the spectrum, if you will. While order can be deadly, so can chaos. A holy order in which all take their place is not a bad thing. In my most recent post at my blog, I wrote:

Liturgically, I’m a meat and potatoes kind of guy. Or is that bangers and mash? Oder wurst und kartoffeln? Meaning, I would prefer no great disruptions in year-in and year-out, decade-in and decade-out liturgical practice. At the very least, the liturgical order for a season should be stable—changing it from week to week will drive me nuts and drive me away. There is something about liturgical regularity that has nothing to do with rigidity but rather teaches us something about God's abiding grace and unending love.

I would add that abiding grace and unending love are the edge over which we are drawn in liturgical worship.

I've been preaching extemporaneously for years (not without preparation, but without notes, and with a good deal of anxiety much of the time). I remember powerfully the first time I put out a rhetorical question in a sermon, and someone answered me - loudly! Granted, it was a college chapel, so those present were already freer. Still, it brought me to a full stop. Indeed, I had to sit down, if only to laugh. The person who spoke, someone with much more experience being a Christian than I had at the time, was apt, and the interruption was not a disruption. We can survive a bit of charismatic sensitivity, even in our formative worship.

That said, my own concern with Ms. Scott's post, and something I fear we have already learned from the Baptists and need to unlearn, is corollary to Thomas's concern: that worship begins to center on the personality of the presider, and not on the content, much less the quality, of the liturgy. I fear there's already too much adoration on "the good presider, the good preacher," and too little on our own responsibility for reading, marking, learning, and digesting our own liturgical tradition.

Marshall Scott

Ironically, free Church traditions have developed their own structures for worship that tend to be as sacrosanct as any within other traditions. Yet structure, per se, does not exclude the fresh moving of the Spirit in liturgy. Instead, insensitivity and laziness, among laity anxious to complete their weekly duty in a timely manner and among those clergy who devalue their sacred duties, dampen the Spirit. Our worship in too many places rigidly adheres to a printed leaflet. Viewed differently, Riverside singing “Were You There” substituted one hymn for another, i.e., for the final one identified in the printed service leaflet. The Book of Common Prayer does not mandate the highly stylized, designed for speed and efficiency, distribution of Holy Communion that occurs in most congregations. The clergy and Eucharistic ministers, in addition to the words of distribution, may appropriately pause for a special moment with someone – I most often have witnessed this when a parent holds a young infant, but this time can also help the troubled, the grieving, etc. What better opportunity for pastoral caring than as a person receives the body and blood of Christ? Alternatively, some congregations invite those who want a prayer for healing to go to a second station after receiving. Many congregations use the same forms for the Prayers of the People and Great Thanksgiving every week, rather than enjoying the rich breadth of liturgical resources we now have available. On rare occasions, when moved by the Spirit (or what I hope was the Spirit), I have substituted one Eucharistic Prayer for another at the altar; comments – at least to me – have been unanimously favorable. For me, good liturgy has structure. Good liturgy then uses that structure to give life, communicate joy, and incarnate love.

As a church we're dead and dying in the pews. We do need some recreation, and openness to new forms, recovery of old, and - yes - not so much change as less sloppiness and less going through the motions.

So I would ask us to be open to what Emily has shared.

That said, one thing she wrote cannot be overemphasized as something we must be intentional about - "...leadership that is faithful and honest: that does not run rampant with the power of the pastor..." Charismatic leadership is both scare (meaning not it cannot be the foundation upon which to build a revival of a church) and dangerous (meaning it can easily be abused or turn the leader into the one worshiped).

I am married to a Meisner-Technique actor and acting teacher. This technique emphasizes being completely present in the moment and speaking truthfully as an actor. That's helped me a lot as a liturgist at Trinity Wall Street, where the script is pretty tight. I think this is partly what Emily is getting at. How do we breathe space and attentiveness into the liturgy that in our own idiom makes it possible for "the bottom to drop out"?

As an Episcopalian who used to do Sunday worship at the Riverside Church in the City of New York, I know many people who have avoided Riverside since the departure of James Forbes. I have been volunteering with the social justice groups: Prison Ministry/Family Advocacy for Incarcerated People and Maranatha (LGBT issues at Riverside). In its 75-year history, Riverside has not been known for liturgy. Harry Emerson Fosdick, its first senior minister, felt denominationalism would disappear. He was wrong. As a compensation for undramatic liturgy, people who went to Riverside got some of the best preaching and music in the country as well as social activism. This compensation was more than enough for me for several years.

Riverside was known as a progressive church. It was one of the first churches in Harlem to do funerals for people who died of AIDS and couples of mixed race were also welcomed. Because Riverside is also affiliated with the United Church of Christ, the congregation has been able to become an Open and Affirming congregation, which means they went through a process of study and formally committed themselves to the full equality, both civil and religious, of LGBTs. Same-sex couples may have their relationships blessed and are religiously married. The congregation has committed itself to promoting full civil marriage equality in New York State and the nation.

Dr. Braxton has continued this tradition of egalitarianism since his arrival at Riverside.

Nevertheless, some people have seen a lessening in the intellectual content of the preaching, from Dr. Forbes, whom Time magazine called one of the best preachers in the United States. The preaching I heard by Forbes managed to say a lot intellectually and yet also sound more pentecostal. Forbes could please different audiences in the same sermon, whereas Braxton seems more emotional than intellectual. He doesn't bring up a lot of facts in his sermons but simply talks about the so-called post-slave experience of African Americans in a context of liberation theology. The lens through which he views things is that of marginality, which explains perhaps why he has little difficulty supporting and working for the full equality of LGBTs.

But his preaching style seems very simplistic in that he tends to perform the acts mentioned in a Gospel passage as if the congregation couldn't read. For example, if the text says a disciple cut off the ear of a soldier, he puts his hand on his ear. This sort of pantomime is a far cry from the rhetorical brilliance of a Forbes or the focused political passion of a William Sloane Coffin. Forbes was a kind of transition figure at Riverside because he was the first African-American senior minister and he muted the political activism of Riverside considerably. He could take ten minutes to get to a point, preferring to go on and on about "the Spirit."

Braxton seems to be moving more in the direction of Dr. Forbes's spirit talk with his introduction of the altar call. As an Anglican I simply don't understand why they can't do a eucharist instead of the highly emotional altar call. The first week he did it, he asked people to come down and experience the "presence of God," sounding very much like a tv evangelist. The person would come to the altar and then speak to the congregation, which many people found very exploitative. Even worse for those of us from liturgical churches is that on the first Sunday of the month, when the service includes communion, the altar call creates a disjunction with communion, as if the sacrament were a mere afterthought when, from a liturgical perspective, it should be the highpoint. Fortunately he has now stopped asking the people who come to the altar to speak to the congregation but the service from my perspective seems to lack purposes. It is as if he were integrating the more informal Space for Grace Wednesday service with the more formal Sunday worship. I understand they are experimenting but it no longer seems to be an important church. Strangely, it seems the same people go to the altar every Sunday, which makes me question whether the altar call as such works. Where is the presence of God in this emotional display?

The pentecostal rhetoric betrays what used to be a commitment on Riverside's part to religious pluralism.

Yes, something is happening at Riverside but I don't see it as good because I know too many people who have left or have spoken of leaving the congregation.

I am continuing to volunteer with the social justice groups but have avoided worship at Riverside. Interestingly, this is a long tradition at Riverside, where many social justice people refused to attend services during Forbes's tenure because they saw him as betraying the emphasis on social justice that Coffin had maintained.

This is all very complex but I do want to say "Buyer beware." Jerusalem is not happening at the Riverside Church. Factionalism continues, with social justice people ignoring more emotional types, vice versa. Some people go to services to be challenged, while others go to be edified. Forbes managed to strike a balance that pleased many.

The congregation also lost a brilliant minister who did religious education.

The question is whether Braxton will be able to appeal to a diverse congregation.

My bias is for the preachers we used to have, such as Dr. Hough, retired President of Union Theological, who used to offer figures and statistics on poverty in the United States in his sermons. People used to say that Riversiders have a weakness for data. Today the emphasis seems to be more on something emotional, which some have argued represents a shift toward a more African-American congregation, but which I see as a dumbing down of the product. I know many African Americans who are not happy with the current regime.

It seems odd that a church across the street from Union Theological Seminary and Columbia University should offer such meager fare in the pulpit.

Maybe it is a symptom of the gradual withering away of mainline Protestantism as an intellectual force. Whereas before I felt I was getting poetry, today it feels more like Hallmark.

Gary Paul Gilbert

Just to echo the excellent criticisms so far, in my liturgy class with Marion Hatchett he argued forcefully that the reasons that the rubrics and forms of the Prayer Book exist is to protect the laity from the whims of the clergy.

Those of us who want the rubrics and forms followed are not just strange beings who for some reason prefer a "dead" liturgy. In my own journey, I prefer to think of liturgy as submitting myself to the mind of the church, of trusting that the forms that have been followed for centuries (and renewed throughout generations during the councils of the church) will shape me.

And they do.

For those interested, I have crafted a fuller response to the above article on my own blog:

http://www.jaredcramer.com/?p=1017

Many of us feel that liturgical worship is not obsolete. And not all who worship in liturgical traditions (Anglican, Catholic, Orthodox) are trying to escape painful experiences with evangelicalism.

Some of us actually find that the formality and restraint of liturgy is more stirring and transformative than outwardly emotional, sometimes melodramatic tendencies of other traditions.

Personally I don't feel that the Episcopal liturgy needs to be "updated" with altar calls, "liturgical dance", or other recent innovations. Honestly, even the "folk mass" guitars-and-tambourines thing turns me off.

I find that a formal structure creates a space in which subtle spiritual and emotional impulses can be listened to more clearly. Small things -- words, gestures, a chord change in a hymn -- take on greater significance. More "enthusiastic" and "chaotic" worship tends to alienate me, because I feel as if the noise and ruckus is drowning out the still small voices I am trying to discern.

I do understand that others find more fulfillment thru those kinds of worship, and I absolutely support their right to congregate with others who feel similarly. I don't claim that my preferences are correct for everyone.

But the Anglican tradition is a holistic one -- the elements all support each other. Spoken prayers and responses, music, movement, architecture, clerical vestments, and incense are all part of a tapestry. Trying to yank out threads or cut holes in the tapestry does violence to the unity of the whole.

Just to stir the pot a bit here, folks: While I am someone with fairly traditional liturgical tastes, I am also someone who is supposed to play some role in getting people to attend our churches. Can you honestly say, given our continuing loss of membership that we might not need to seriously re-examine what we do on Sunday mornings? Keep in mind that the Catholic Church would also be suffering serious membership decline were it not for immigration. Something is obviously up here, and I think we need to give some thought to whether the way we conduct or liturgy is part of it.

Jim, to be honest, I think the decline in membership has to do more with our "tend to our own little castle" mentality than the style of our worship.

I think that there a huge amount of people, especially in my generation (Gen X/Millenial) who are yearning for more ancient structure and substance. The solution is not letting go of the basic traditions and impulses that shape our worship. Rather, the solution is getting better about communicating who we are to those who are seeking and doing more to welcome them than just put up signs.

Jared, you may be right, but my feelings is that if there were swarms of people out there looking for liturgy they'd either find it (and some liturgical tradition woul d see a significant increase in its numbers) or they'd create it. And I don't see either of those things happening. That we don't do the job we should telling the world our story is a point we can agree on.

Actually, in the emergent church and other church plant settings geared towards younger generations, liturgy and ancient approaches to worship have come to play an increasingly powerful role. Notice the increased use of Taizé. Relevant Magazine (nobody's old person's club) had an article on the increasing appeal of liturgy earlier this year (http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god_article.php?id=7473).

friends,

Something a little odd is happening in this conversation, at least as I read it.

Emily simply didn't say that Episcopal worship or set forms of liturgy were 'dead' or that free church forms were better or somehow right. As we're arguing about which is better and defending liturgical churches against less structured and ancient protestant worship, we're responding to something in us, not what Emily wrote.

I hear Emily raising a challenging question for BOTH traditions that claim to be unstructured and traditions that are richly liturgical -

in either case are we making our form an idol, and how could our encounter with other forms and ways (whether our starting point is Baptist or Episcopalian) encourage us to be more open to the Spirit?

My work post-parish priesthood has me visiting a lot of different Episcopal congregations on Sunday morning, sometimes as an invited participant-leader, sometimes simply to visit and worship with another gathering of sisters and brothers in Christ. Watching, feeling, and listening for the Spirit has me convinced -
1. God's Holy Spirit is ALWAYS present moving through our worship, a powerful force, a flow of energy, a discernible rush of compassion, challenge, and love bigger than us,
and
2. We are ALL OF US frightened to one extent or another of what's actually stirring and I'm starting to notice in literally every liturgy I attend those momenys and ways that WE as a congregation or leaders (presider, deacon, cantor, organist, readers, intercessors) feel the stirring of the Spirit and unconsciously or nervously block or interrupt the flow of what's present that's bigger than us.

I don't think that's an indictment of any type or style of worship - so neither a problem with more structured or less structured, more improvised or more planned in advance, more ancient or more contemporary. In fact a lot of those dichotomies have begun to feel like another artificial construct to separate and protect us from God's presence and power with us.

What I'm noticing (including in myself) is when we cough or squirm uncomfortably, when we use humor with grace (whether in a sermon or the announcements or in response to a liturgical 'mistake') and when humor seems to become an end in itself, an anxious laugh that distracts or hides what is among us. When do professional musicians rein in or drown out people's singing?

Why do we imagine events we're doing together are so fragile that someone getting ready for the next event (walking to a lectern during a hymn for example) is irrevent or off when the pauses these breaks generate aren't contemplative silence, but simply moments of watching someone walk, settle and get ready to read - as though we're asking readers to declare, 'MY turn, MY time.'

Watch how a dinner party flows and the layered, simultaneous and shared responsibility of hosts, good friends, and strangers in the ongoing work of serving, keeping conversation going, helping keep everyone included, and see how little our liturgies (formal or informal) look like that.

Whether it's Baptist or Episcopalian, Eastern Orthodox or Mennonite, Quaker or Roman Catholic, our peril is to think of ourselves as beavers responsible for damming the wild river of the Spirit rather than fish in the river or trees by the riverside rejoicing in the onrushing power and life that comes to us through the moving water.

Earlier in commenting on this post I wrote we're dead and dying in the pews. At the time I wrote that I think I meant will someone please throw us a life preserver!

I've continued to follow the conversation. If we are to attract new members, I think it's clear we the people in the pews need to step a little livelier. Is the hymn unfamiliar to you? Sing louder! See a newcomer fumbling with the prayer book? -- help them out! We can't expect to grow if we aren't enlivened and enlivening.

We do worship, the work of the people, through liturgy. The cleric can have her back to us or not -- the worship is going to be dead if we that's the way we behave. (I like Donald's dinner conversation analogy.)

Each week now, our worship offers a Time of Invitation: a time for congregants to come forward and pray with clergy.

Why in the world would "coming forward and praying with clergy" be desired - when, as Derek mentioned above, we come forward at the Eucharist to pray and commune with Christ?

Why are the clergy (once again!) being made the central players in this scenario, just as another poster above pointed out would happen?

The church becomes more and more bizarre as time passes, I must say....

I was moved by this the piece, Emily, and appreciated you sending me to it after our conversation yesterday.

I also wonder if we can box God out because we are wedded to our structure. My pastor and I spend a lot of time thinking about liturgy and how preaching and music will connect in worship. But there have been Sundays when, in the middle of a sermon, I thought, "We really need to be singing another hymn, rather than the one printed in the bulletin." There is just something about how I am hearing the Word in that moment (or how I perceive that others are hearing the Word) that pushes me in a different direction. Or there is an energy and challenge in the sermon that needs to be followed by an African freedom song rather than a hymn accompanied by organ. I love both so this is not a question of which music is best suited to worship but more a question of whether our service allows a space for those spontaneous changes to happen. In my 10 years of service to the church, there has only been one occasion where I actually announced a new hymn on the spur of the moment. There have been many other times when I felt like I should. Am I squelching the Spirit? Or I am just indecisive? ;-)

I think planning and preparation are essential to good worship. But I wonder if there are ways to "build in" (though this may sound artificial or contrived) moments for Spirit - where we don't need to have a script. An altar call sounds like just that time. Opportunities for prayer around the Eucharist are another way that I have experienced God's presence in a powerful way and been allowed a space to deeply respond.

Yes, it can be abused. Yes, it can become rote, just like any other part of worship. But I think that we need to practice coloring outside of the lines a little and risk encountering God in ways that are not planned or programmed.

Dear Friends,

I'm excited and engaged by the lively conversation that my article has sparked. As a way of contributing further to the conversation, I'd like to pose two questions that I hope you'll take time to consider.

-How are both order and chaos present in diverse worship practices across the denominational spectrum?

-How might power dynamics, in particular those created by racial and cultural difference, be involved in our perceptions of other denominational worship practices?

A final question -- this one with a bit more commentary. What do we mean when we say "liturgical church?" I believe that all churches are liturgical, following an ordo or pattern, regardless of whether or how that pattern is written down. Liturgy is a craft, and I have seen that craft well executed and poorly executed across denominational boundaries.

I would encourage us not to slip into an "either/or" mentality. We can describe a certain denomination's worship as "emotional" or "spontaneous;" these words do not mean that worship in that tradition is not informed, biblically-based, progressive, well researched, or any number of other things. We can describe another tradition's practices as "orderly" or "contemplative;" this does not mean that worship in that tradition is not spirit-filled, spontaneous, changing, healing, emotional, or any number of other things.

There are no lines in the sand here. The Altar Call tradition in the United States, which reverberated back through England and then to Australia, has its roots in the Great Awakening. Altar Calls are practiced in Methodist and Disciples of Christ churches, in addition to Baptist churches, as well as a number of other denominations such as Pentecostal and Holiness traditions. The history of our liturgical practices is complex and intermingled. It concerns me to see any denomination stake a claim on "The Tradition." "The Tradition" is in fact, "our traditions." They are rich, multivalent, and diverse. I imagine that God rejoices in that kaleidoscope of color, music, prayers, and practices.

Thank you for reading, and for your comments.

In my experience, too often our beliefs about our liturgy tie us down instead of releasing us into an experience of God. Our service gets in the way of many newcomers and of long-standing churchgoers who choose not to take the popular path of "not paying attention" to certain aspects of the service.

Why do we recite the Nicene creed, as though we all literally believed every word? It distracts from the truly holy words we speak.

Why is inclusive language a special variant instead of the "default" in every service? I asked a bishop the latter question and was told, "Changing that would require a new edition of the prayer book. We already have so much conflict in our church. The timing is bad." Meanwhile, we turn people off.

Wow. This might be some of the most commenting on this site I've ever witnessed. I suppose I will share my ideas.

First, I am a recent "convert" to the Episcopal church, coming from a charismatic/evangelical background. I have since fallen in love with the Episcopal liturgy.

Second, I think that what all people long for is a place where they feel welcomed and an atmosphere that is conducive to worship. I, for example, do not find "praise and worship" music conducive to true worship. I usually get distracted. However, I can fully understand someone who is so inclined. People need to be welcomed, and they need to feel that.

I think it is important, however, that there is always some tradition, in some way. It helps the continuation of the Apostolic, Catholic church. It connects us in the present to all of the Christians who have come before us. We can express the faith in different ways (as Donald Schell pointed out), but I think we need to always somehow integrate what we have learned into our liturgy, be it contemporary or traditional.

The altar call seems to be in retreat at the Riverside Church. Dr. Braxton said today "One of the clergy will be in the galleries to minister to any who feel the need." No more "come and feel the presence of God." No more manipulation of suffering people in front of the congregation! Dr. Braxton disparaged statistics and instead criticized liberals for their lack of financial generosity as a prelude to a call for more money for his day school. He implied there is to be no criticism of corporations but rather a direct engagement with social problems. Such is a debatable approach but in a congregation which basically staked its business on excellent, passionate preaching, it seems tame, to say the least. It is not in the tradition of a Harry Fosdick Emerson, a Sloane Coffin, or even a James Forbes. Lots of emotion as a prelude to ask people to give him more money. No questions about how Riverside is now renting lots of its space to Columbia University and what kind of conflict of interest that raises as Columbia tries to gobble up West Harlem. I understand and sympathize with the complexity of a congregation which has to find money to keep its doors open.

Riverside is nonliturgical in that there is no prescribed rite they follow. It can vary from week to week, though the pattern is pretty formulaic. It is rather vanilla. This Episcopalian cannot abide it any longer now that the preaching and music seem to have become ho hum.

I have taken a chance and discussed the specific example given of spirit-based worship in order to help the more general discussion of how to do worship. I leave the general discussion to others. What I do know is that the example chosen was less than inspiring.

I understand it took Forebes a while to find his voice and maybe Braxton will too. But that is only more evidence that this sort of tradition depends on a strong personality in the pulpit, something which a more catholic tradition easily dispenses with.

Gary Paul Gilbert

I grew up in Southern Baptist churches in Oklahoma. We had altar calls at every service and revivals (services every night for a week or two) once or twice a year. All to get people to be "saved." What do you do once you're saved? Try to live without sin, and try to save others.

But people don't seem to go on feeling "saved," so much of the business at the front of the church (no altar, but a communion table in front of the pulpit) comes to "rededicating one's life to God" to recapture that emotional rush -- with diminishing returns over the years.

Getting people to make decisions after setting up an emotional situation is manipulation, well-intended or not. Perhaps it has a history, surely more in sales than worship ("Act now, offer may be withdrawn at any time, call before midnight!").

Liturgical churches see life as lived in community, supported by coming together in ritual. Presence of the spirit is assumed, not treated as a surprise or special event. Whether or not this communal experience actually is of "God" is another matter. Since talk of Life Eternal has become mostly metaphor, people increasingly are finding church unnecessary. Other forms of community are seeming more useful and rewarding.

Murdoch Matthew
husband of Gary

I want to reiterate what I said in my comment above, defending traditional liturgical worship: I think we can all support the right of others to practice different styles of worship. I do not pass judgment on non-liturgical worship as being definitely "improper" -- it just does not work for me.

On the other hand, I see some comments above describing liturgical worship as:

- Insufficiently willing to "edge on chaos"
- Not "flexible"
- Not "open to new forms"
- An obstacle to growing church membership
- "Block[ing] or interrupt[ing] the flow of the Spirit"

Again: I absolutely support anyone who desires to find an environment that is conducive to their spiritual growth. My experience is that this is a highly personal matter. One size does not fit all.

But just as those of us who prefer liturgy shouldn't make our preferences into a sweeping condemnation of other styles, those who find liturgy too confining will, I hope, refrain from universalizing their reactions into a broad judgment that formal worship is fundamentally problematic.

I do accept that it may truly be problematic -- for you! For me it works very well.

And of course, there are a lot of non-liturgical church options out there. Perhaps the ideal solution for those who find Episcopalian worship stifling is to look at some of the other rich and diverse traditions that our very pluralistic country offers, rather than trying to make this tradition into something it isn't.

I hope none of that came out sounding ungenerous or unfriendly. I do think that this is an intensely subjective issue. The "key" that fits into my particular "lock", liturgically and spiritually speaking, is not necessarily going to fit into my neighbor's... and vice versa.

Aleck,

I hope you hear this in the same respectful spirit in which you wrote. Something odd happened in the line of response to Emily's article. An Episcopalian wrote of her experience of a Baptist/UCC liturgy. What she wrote wasn't advocating that Episcopal churches ought to have altar calls. She wrote (quoting Urban T. Holmes, the late dean of our Episcopal Seminary at Sewannee and Aidan Kavanagh, a distinguished Roman Catholic liturgical theology) that liturgy lived when it verged toward Holy Chaos.

Of course the Spirit is always present - that's what sacrament means - God's promise to act when our tiniest gesture, words, and substance are open to receive. The question isn't whether the Spirit is present in 'liturgical worship,' but how and when we experience and are changed by God's active presence - so as Emily says,

"Urban Holmes wrote that good liturgy leads regularly to the edge of chaos, a regular flirt with doom. (Theology and Religious Renewal)"

The question is whether our formality OR informal spontaneity, our century old version of ancient OR century old traditions of evangelicals are genuinely open to power and presence beyond our control. If they're not, "formal" or "informal," or "traditional" in whatever version becomes simply constraint, idol or levee to hold back or veil God's presence.

Resistance in Emily's story is as much a part of Riverside's experience as it is in an Episcopal Church of whatever stripe or style. So is the possibility of holy Chaos.

Posted for Prof. Ruth Meyers:

This is an important conversation. Thank you, Emily, for provoking us to think about our liturgy. I write as one who is a cradle Episcopalian, raised with the 1928 BCP in a Morning Prayer parish. When I graduated from seminary, now using the 1979 BCP, I found myself in a Rite I Morning Prayer parish. The first Sunday I was there, we sang one of the canticles, in the language with which I had been raised, using an Anglican chant setting familiar from my childhood. That canticle struck chords deep in my heart, and I was transported to a home I didn’t know I had left. I don’t want to sing Rite I canticles to Anglican chant every Sunday, but that experience taught me about the power of liturgy to shape us as people of God.

Some of you have pointed out the difficulty with setting up, as one person put it, “a duality between ‘by the book’ and ‘spirit-filled.’” (I didn’t read that in Emily’s comments, though I recognize that others did.) Liturgy, as a form of human ritual, is by nature ordered. It “works” because it uses some repetitive or prescribed behaviors that serve certain purposes, like establishing community and communicating something of God. This is as true of “liturgical churches” like the Episcopal Church, that have a prescribed ritual, in our case from a Book of Common Prayer, and so-called “non-liturgical churches” like Baptist and Pentecostal congregations, who have the freedom to determine their worship each week. Even in such “non-liturgical churches,” the worship tends to follow certain patterns week by week, as some of you have said.

But, at its best, the ordered nature of liturgy exists in creative tension with freedom, or “holy chaos,” as Emily calls it. William Seth Adams has a wonderful discussion of this dialectic (not a dualism!) in his book “Shaped by Images.”

Austin Fleming proposes that we “prepare” for liturgy, rather than plan it (the book is entitled Preparing for Liturgy). In liturgical planning, we work to get every detail in place so that everything in the liturgy happens as we determine. In preparing for liturgy, we create a space where we invite the Holy Spirit to show up. I’m slowly retraining my vocabulary so that I think of “preparing” rather than “planning,” because I value the care and attention needed to craft good liturgy and because I want to remember always that liturgy is about holy things, and we are not in control of them.

When we are at our best, our liturgy brings out of our storehouse treasures both new and old. Our liturgical inheritance is a great treasure, and it offers access to the God of the ages. But tradition is never static, and openness to contemporary context and the movement of the Spirit keeps our worship vital. I don’t want to throw out the riches of our heritage. I do want our liturgy to continue to receive God in the experiences of our present age, and to speak to those in the world today who have yet to know the God of Jesus Christ.

As one who has taught many of those who are presiding at liturgy in the Episcopal Church, and one who delights in opportunities to teach and reflect with lay people about liturgy, I concur with the need for more liturgical formation in the Episcopal Church. The symbolic realities evoked by our liturgy are worth pondering again and again and again.