Politurgy

Not the Primary thing but the Primal thing

Discussion and debates abound concerning whether mission or discipleship or ecclesiology should have the primacy as we in the Church in the West try and work out what it means to bear faithful witness to Jesus Christ...

Frost and Hirsch among others argue that in our post-Christian, Christendom (etc) context we need to allow missiology to take priority over ecclesiology. Sneaking along quickly on the outside of this debate seeking ascendency at the present is discipleship as the primary idea.

As these three compete in a variety of discourses to pass the finishing line as the 'first' a lot of time and attention is given to each of them and in turn their relationship to one another. Of that relationship I would say that it is clearly necessary and complex and linear hierarchical gradings of significance are probably unhelpful.

I also think that for the sake of mission, discipleship, and the church we need to stop focussing on them because I think that they are the outcomes not the precurrsors of something more primal - a dynamic relationship with the living Christ whose name is Jesus. Oh to be sure we can say that this demonstrates that mission (missio Dei) proceeded the coming of Jesus but that is like saying God preceeded the coming of Jesus - it is an ontological sort of statement that does not really get us anywhere when we ask about what that now means for the practice of the Christian Church.

Christian mission, discipleship, and the church are outcpomes of that which is not simply primary - but primal - dynamic relationship with the living Christ whose name is Jesus. This is the one to whom we need to constantly turn as in the presence of the Spirit we seek to discern what he is saying to us in relation to the Scripture so that in our practices as disciples we can say 'this is that' which we read in the Sciptures and a foretaste now of the kingdom yet still to full come then. So connected we can engage together (church) in the lifestyle (discipleship) that enables us to bear faithful witness (mission) to Jesus Christ.

Such connecting and discerning is something that we are not very good at, we don't find it easy, it is demanding and time consuming, it involves the blood and tears of mutual appreciation, listening, service and sacrifice. So instead to bring us life we focus on the other things mission, discipleship, and church and talk much about them without in the long term necessarily seeing things change. Why? - because we are focussing on the outcomes rather than the source -or to be a bit more biblical in my metaphors - we are focussing on the fruit that we are trying to produce through our own sheer effort rather than the vine who lifes it in us.

I am concerned for mission, discipleship, and the church - because of that I think we need to learn and risk connection with the much more dangerously primal - the living Christ whose name is Jesus.

Swords into Ploughshares

Today's lectionary reading Isaiah 2:1-5...

gist of sermon...

 

On September 9^th 1980 eight people trespassed onto the General Electric Nuclear Missile facility in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. On site with small household hammers they damaged nuclear warhead nose cones and poured blood onto documents and files. The group became known as the Ploughshares Eight. They were arrested and charged with numerous crimes. On that day they essentially founded what is called the ‘Ploughshares Movement’. This is a movement committed to the ending of nuclear weapons including through the use of non-violent direct action.

They told reporters that as Christians they refused to worship at the altar of the pagan god, Mars, the gof of war. They continued: 'In our action, we draw on a deep rooted faith in Christ, who changed the course of history through his willingness to suffer rather than kill'.

Among the original Plougshares eight were two brothers, Roman Catholic priests and long-time peace activists Daniel and Philip Berrigan. At one point both were on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive list.

Daniel Berrigan in his commentary on Isaiah and commenting on todays lectionary reading writes the following:

“'They will beat their swords into ploughshares'. For most of us, there exist one or two commanding texts , words that beckon us from ‘paralysis of analysis,’ as Martin Luther King Jr., would say, words that beckon us towards simply ‘doing it’. To the Ploughshares community, this text of Isaiah has been a summons – a vigorous word, a word that sets the human in motion"’.

Whether we agree or not with the actions of Ploughshares and the Berrigans it seems to me that they got two things right about Isaiah 2: 1-5...

The 'word of the Lord' is mean to direct our paths (3) ...and we are meant to 'walk in the light of the Lord' with respect to peace...(5)

 

and so on...

 

An Elemental Response to an Elemental Eucharist

At Greenbelt this weekend with Stephen. Having a good time - though muddy. This morning was communion service. This is high point of the festival from the perspective of organisers indicated by the fact that they close down all other activities to encourage people to go.

It is a big event held at the main stage. I have not always enjoyed it in past. Large numbers require organisation and skill at creating 'communion' with one another in large crowd. The use of name 'eucharist' indicates a particular idea. Not in itself an issue but one indicator of the implicit Anglicanism of the festival despite the participation in various ways by others from other traditions.

This year the theme was 'An Elemental Eucharist' making connections with 'fire', 'wind' 'water', 'earth'. Suggestion in advertisng programme is that it would be different from what happens in churches and there would be no sermon, and people would be moving around.

I did not go - though observed from a distance. Danger of advertisng that something is different or creative is that you invite critique on that - the creativity and the performance. Also puts pressure on the organisers like those on the guy who had to arrange the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games have to deliver!

Obervations: there was an attempt to include too many things and other symbols in an act that has its own central symbols that push us to the core Jesus  with the potential of past, present, future, communal re-membering.

Furthermore while advertised as 'multi-voiced' this was yet a fundamentally controlled 'liturgy' by a number of voices. This is like thinking that there is great participation in a church because you have a worship leader who does stuff along with the 'minister' where in fact what you now have is one or two controlling voices with the views and opinions and genuine responses of the people struggling to break through.

I also don't get the - we are having no sermon thing as an idea of radicalism when and where the controlling liturgists fundamentally are doing what a sermon at communion can - help people find a common way in to this event rather than simply an individual participation.  

I would like these big communions to pull back - trust the actual 'elemental event' which is not found in the creativity of the performance or the surrounding liturgy but in human people gathering around breaking bread and poured out wine trying to make sense of what it now means for them to be responding ever anew to the Jesus past present and future who is revealling his self now in this group of people.

I was not there, how do I know what it was really like, how can I judge as an observor rather than participant. I am a Scot, not an Anglican  and might not get some of this. I am guilty as charged. Guilty - but exercisng my freedom not to have to agree to all that goes on and hopeful that for all who participated it worked for them.

From pulpit to lectern to Music stand

(Some time ago I said that in run up to Scottish Baptist Assembly I would try and post some guest things under heading of 'wee scotish baptist voices'  - well these voices have so far been silent but here Ian Birch speaks up...)

(Opinions are writers own...)

From pulpit to lectern to Music stand

I was recently at a service of Christian worship, and when
the preacher stood up to speak she was not invited to the pulpit, she not place
her script on a lectern, no, her pages were placed on a music stand, hastily relocated
from the worship band to centre stage - front. From this wobbly frame of metal
strips the word of the Lord was proclaimed to the gathered audience.

The sermon was very fine, but throughout the preaching I
kept wondering if there is anything significant about this recent custom, which
is now fairly common for us itinerant preachers, of being asked to preach from
a music stand. What are we to make of
this, if anything?

First there is a practical consideration. The flimsy,
lightweight construction of the music stand, designed to be portable and transportable
is barely adequate for the purpose, in my opinion. I have preached on occasion
waiting for the stand to collapse, or my notes to scatter in the wind. I do not
here address the question of whether the congregation would delight to see the
preacher silenced in such fashion.

Is a music stand up to the job, I ask? Well, it has put an
end to the ridiculous theatrical practice of thumping the pulpit and bellowing
‘belovéd’, which was characteristic of preaching I recall from my childhood.
But generally speaking I find it is not, and would prefer a simple but adequate
lectern.

Second, I wonder if there is something more significant
about the employment of a music stand as the preacher’s lectern. Does it imply
that the preaching is an intrinsic part of the worship, rather than what comes
after the worship, as is so often declared? Preaching does not come after the
worship, it is not apart from the worship, but continuous with our worship as
singing.

Here is a wee story from Donald Coggan, one time archbishop
of Canterbury, in his book A New Day for
Preaching:

‘In the course of my work as
Archbishop, I had occasion to go to a certain town which had as its main glory
an ancient church. The incumbent, with commendable vigour, had raised a large
sum of money to refashion the church, to restore it to something of its former
glory, and to adapt it it for greater usefulness under modern conditions. I was
to preach at A Eucharist at its rehallowing. The greatest possible care had
been put into the preparation of the service. Architecturally, the central
feature was the altar, central and resplendent. There could be no doubt that
the Church of England was a sacramental church, nor where it was that her
children should kneel to be fed. There was one focus. You could not miss it.

‘This is very fine, Vicar. You
have done magnificently. Now – you have asked me to preach. Where do I preach from?’ ‘They will
bring you in a little stand, Archbishop, when the time comes.’ And they did. A
poor, paltry thing it was, liable to collapse if by any chance I leaned upon
it, the sort of temporary contraption from which anyone might have scorned to
give out the notices of the week. This was to be the thing from which the
everlasting Gospel was to be proclaimed. As soon as the sermon was over, it was
taken awy into oblivion. And good riddance too!

I wonder if there is a danger of making the setting for
preaching so informal, even casual, that we diminish the divine-human encounter
we wish to take place in this activity. I only ask.