Sunday, March 29

Well, if you think last week's readings were rapturous, what shall we call this week's?

Chapter 14 is titled Words of Living W-a-t-e-r, The Liturgy as Poetic Reality that Transforms. As I told the group that morning, when I find something in a book I'm marking that is really good I write Yes. If it's even better I write Yes! And sometimes I'll even write Yes, yes, yes!. This chapter had a bunch of them. Although I must say that already in the previous chapter they did start popping up with some regularity, and really to one degree or another throughout the book.

Remembering: On page 112 Galli recalls the story of Helen Keller when she made the connection between the word and what the word describes. "Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten, a thrill of returning thought, and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me...I knew then that 'w-a-t-e-r' meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand...That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free!" p. 112

The thrill of returning thought, the mystery of language, that living word, revealed, awakened, these are words of life that reach back and connect us to the rootstock: "In the beginning was the Word." And reminded me of some words found in Psalm 22: "All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee." v. 27 Shall remember...

What a promise and what a delight to experience such revelation and such remembering. And to think how in the liturgy week in week out we rehearse this unfolding drama of redemption and do it in remembrance of Him.

"The liturgy can call up those thoughts and feelings 'far beyond us' because it traffics in biblical language...But even when the words of liturgy are not literally biblical, the words, like all truthful words, work on us over time, like a steady, unrelenting stream slowly reshapes the banks of a river. The words do something to us even when we're not paying attention." p. 114

The power of words, the wonder of language: "We human beings are, as the late Abraham Heschel insisted, the cantors of the universe," writes Richard John Neuhouse. "And language is our instrument." quoted on p. 117

And finally: "The words of the liturgy, of course, are more than a beautiful tablecloth and flowers. They constitute even the meal itself. This is the feast to which we are invited in the Gathering, at which the host speaks to us in his Word, during which we are sustained by the Eucharist, from which we are sent forth in the Dismissal to gather others into the community of the Trinity and the Church, who now together anticipate the great forever feast in the kingdom that comes." p. 118

We wrapped things up by praying together the General Thanksgiving from the Book of Common Prayer. Everything we had been talking about seemed to be captured, and released, in that great prayer.

As we were breaking up we noted how helpful even the Appendices of this book were, one a Liturgy Primer with definitions and explanations and another on the Christian Year.

We all agreed this had been a very profitable time together with a very helpful book. Methinks we may be revisitng it again sometime and inviting others to discover more fully and enjoy more thoroughly the wonder and power of Christian Liturgy.

Sunday, March 22

Recapping last week's session:

We went through Chapter 12, Living the Trinity, and Chapter 13, Drunken Sobriety.

Chapter 12: The liturgy reminds me that I've been made to love God "perfectly"...To love God perfectly means to love God fully, with heart, soul, mind, and strength. p.98

The God of the liturgy is a Trinity from beginning ("Blessed be God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit") to end ("The blessing of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit"). p. 98

Here Galli points out it is important to keep in mind that although we tend to think of the Trinity in terms of doctrine, it is essential, and this is where the liturgy really helps out, to experience "what is hidden in, with, and under the theology" of the Trinity, and that experience "will transform us." p. 99 We are transformed because we are invited, really ushered, into becoming a participant in the personal relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, a relationship of perfect love. And it is this experience that can "satisfy the basic yearning of the human heart, which has been created for communion." p. 101

The starting point for the Enlightenment was/is Descartes' proclamation, "I think, therefore I am." "The biblical, liturgical, Trinitarian starting point, by contrast says, "I love, therefore you are. You love, and therefore I am." p. 101 We did not discuss this difference in outlook in any depth, but its implications are significant: the one leads to a focus on the individual as the center and ultimately to excruciating loneliness and alienation, the other to a "profoundly communitarian ethos", a "reciprocation of love". pp. 101-102

"This profoundly communitarian ethos is woven all through the liturgy because the liturgy is profoundly Trinitarian. If we pray it often enough, it will begin to radically shape our lives. We'll start to discover that our primary duty in life is not to find ourselves, not to develop our gifts, nor to make sense of life. Instead we'll realize that we are called to love others so that they can come into existence, while they do the same for us." p. 102

In short we become, as Peter writes (II Peter 1:4), "partakers of the divine nature." p.104

Whew! Ain't that something! And guess what? It is delightfully true...

So can it get any better than that? Well, let's see...

Chapter 13: The liturgy helps us know God with imagination. Not only is it attractive to the mind and engages us intellectually, but it is attractive to the heart and draws us to participate in deeply symbolic acts. More than that it draws us into a knowledge that transcends mind and heart. "To be sure, this deeper knowledge can be enjoyed outside of liturgical worship, but in the liturgy we find poetry and theology and drama and mystery in a way that opens us up to transcendent knowledge in continually fresh ways." p. 106

"Liturgical imagination, though, means to apprehend that which is fully real but is incapable of being apprehended with the mind or heart alone." p. 107

sobrias ebrietas ("drunken" sobriety) -- both "ecstatic, rapturous" and at the same time "measured, ordered,dignified. It is an encounter with the Other which takes the heart out of itself and places it in another center." p. 108

And that to me is the wonder and the beauty of the Christian faith: both...and NOT either...or. Things from a human vantage point seeming to be mutually exclusive, or contradictory, or irreconcilable, are equally true in Christ. Both God and man. Both now and forever. Both flesh and Spirit. Both mercy and truth. Both perfectly just and the justifier of those who have sinned. Frankly the list goes on and on and on. And that's why I love this idea of sobrias ebrietas: drunken sobriety.

Unfortunately we did not find time to consider these things at length. But this chapter is well worth re-reading time and again. "Liturgical worship, because it traffics in words and symbols and holy actions that not only point to God but manifest him, is a unparalleled gift to people who want to know God in the bibilical sense, who want soul intelligence on top of the intelligence of the mind and heart." p. 109

One last quote: "when we enter into liturgical worship, we look to the Spirit, who has been sent by the Father to manifest his Son." pp. 109-110

Peace, 'til next time.

Sunday, March 15

What a glorious day, with the hint of spring, and, for me this upcoming week, spring break! I was sorry to miss this morning's get together, but it allowed me to pick up Brenda at the airport and hear about her service trip to Mission San Lucas Tolima in Guatemala. It is a remarkable work that bears all the signs of God's blessing, and lots of hard work for over 40 years.

Well, what about the wonder and power of Christian liturgy?

Since I did miss the conversation I will just add a few comments from my reading of Chapters 10 & 11.

Chapter 10: "Just when we're trying to transcend the body, the liturgy keeps pointing us back to it. Here we find religion that traffics in the body, that even celebrates the flesh." p. 84.

True enough; let's just be careful here with our understanding of words - flesh as in "incarnation", not to be confused with flesh as in "sinful flesh" or "walking after the flesh."

Flesh as in "When we visit a prisoner or give drink to the thirsty or put clothes on the naked, he says, we have met him spiritually and physically." p. 86

Flesh as in engaging all the senses in our worship of the Most High. p. 85

Flesh as in loving our neighbor as our self, not in word only, but in deed and in truth. 1 John 3:18

Chapter 11: Liturgy and learning. Learning in the "merry-go-round of community." p. 94

"One way to participate in this communal educational experience is to participate in liturgy. Here the education imparted is not primarily about grasping ideas - though it does include that. It is knowledge that comes by participation in the community of God." p. 93

Learning "things that cannot be taught." p. 96

Upcoming conversations: Chapters 12 & 13 next week, followed by Chapter 14 and wrapping up the week following, including an "instructed Eucharist" during the 10:15 A.M. service.

Sunday, March 8

"But now....."

This brief little phrase recurs often in Scripture and it is the focus of this week's readings in Smells and Bells. Well, at least one of several.

A new sense of time - Chapter 7: We are invited to consider that the liturgy "is an experience of the kingdom in which the past and future coincide in joyous present...We are remembering a blessed past, anticipating a glorious future, looking expectantly now in the face of our Master." (p. 66)

A new sense of place - Chapter 8: We are invited to "conceive of the liturgy as a journey into the kingdom ...It is as if the places we call heaven and earth have merged, for as we approach the Eucharistic table, we have ascended into heaven. Or maybe it's that heaven has descended to earth. Or both...." (pp. 74-75).

A new sense of waiting - Chapter 9: Nothing to achieve; simply to receive. We are invited to consider that the liturgy "is the place where we wait for Jesus to show up. We don't have to do much. The liturgy is not an act of the will. It is not a series of activities designed to attain a spiritual mental state." He shows up in the reading of Scripture; he shows up in the preaching; he shows up in the Eucharist. "This is not something we can achieve as much as simply abide in." (p. 79)

In various ways, during our conversation, I think it was clear to all of us that we can easily slip into rote participation in the liturgy and miss the sense of the blessings described above. But we also noted that we are learning much by talking about what is happening as we worship, and as we enter into the service with intentional focus on such dimensions of the liturgy and with mindfulness of the present moment, we do indeed experience more fully those very things.

"But now....."

Chapters 10, 11 and 12 for next Sunday, March 15.

Sunday, March 1

Session II was pretty wide-ranging.

We kicked things off with my reference to our church's website and its on-line learning page and a few relevant resources available there. In particular I mentioned the Liturgical Year link and how helpful it was for understanding things like the calendar cycle and the colors of the liturgical year.

What had struck me when I re-read the material posted there was how, in the early church, the liturgical year focused on Passover and Pentecost: in short, the death and resurrection of Christ, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Over time layers have been added, but the core of the Christian life is rooted in the cross, the risen life and the gift of the Holy Spirit to believers.

Chapters 4, 5 and 6 touch on the 'otherness' of God (Chapter 4), the mystery of God (Chapter 5), and the relevance of God and His church (Chapter 6). In each case, Galli argues that liturgical worship helps bring meaning and depth to each of those areas:

1. The liturgy is where union with the Other (high, unapproachable, incomprehensible; sacred, holy, set apart) is realized in extraordinary ways, and we become partakers of the divine nature. pp. 44 ff.

2. Since God is incomprehensible, authentic worship of this God must, at some level, remain incomprehensible. pp 49 ff.

3. The liturgy begins as a real separation from the world...We are invited into an older and wiser culture: 'ushered in'. pp. 56, 60, 63.

Our conversation around these and other topics was wide ranging, including spending time talking about a question raised by Fr. Gary, "What does it mean to be 'intimate' with God?".

Sunday March 8, we will use Chapters 7, 8 and 9 as our departure point as we continue our Lenten journey exploring the wonder and power of Christian liturgy. See you then; be sure to add your comments, especially if you can't make it!

Sunday, February 22

We had a good discussion today, touching on various aspects of the introduction and first three chapters of Mark Galli's book. Joining the conversation today were: Nancy and Stan Nevins, Marilyn King, Julia Smith, Jane Petrie, Laurie McKim, Brenda Laney, Fr. Gary, and myself. One interesting fact that emerged was the variety of worship backgrounds we all had grown up in: Pentecostal, Methodist, Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, Baptist, and Episcopalian, and the fact that we all felt so 'at home' in a liturgical worship setting.

We talked some about the basic structure of a liturgical service: Gathering, Word, Sacrament, Dismissal, and noted how easy it is to overlook the Gathering and the Dismissal portions while focusing on Word and Sacrament. It's an understandable tendency, but we all agreed that being mindful of the Gathering and the Dismissal was important, both in terms of welcoming each other, especially newcomers, and in terms of being sent forth with strength and courage to meet the challenges of the upcoming week as servants of God.

We touched on the value of the liturgical calendar and how it changes the way we experience time and perceive reality - "the meaning that is infused by the dance between time and eternity."

And finally, we spent a good bit of time commenting on how liturgy draws us into community: both the eternal community of Father, Son and Holy Spirit ("as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever") and the community of the local church, where we are drawn out of our independence and individuality into something larger than ourselves and where, at the same time, we recognize that even at our best we are deeply flawed.

"If God-as-Trinity is the core reality of the universe, that means that the core of reality is community." p. 31.

Everyone agreed we are off to a good start. We will prepare for our conversation next Sunday by reading the next three chapters of the book. Meanwhile feel free to add your comments to our blog.

What do we mean when we use the word, 'liturgy'?

It is easy to use a word without an agreed understanding of what we mean when we use it. I think that is possible with this word, liturgy.

Here are a few thoughts to consider:

fr. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy

As a religious phenomenon, liturgy is a communal response to the sacred through activity reflecting praise, thanksgiving, supplication, or repentance.
[...]
The word comes from the Classical Greek word λειτουργία (leitourgia) meaning "public work". In the Greek city-states, it had a different sense: some public good which a wealthy citizen arranged at his own expense, either voluntarily or by law.
[...]
Not infrequently in Christianity, a distinction is made between "liturgical" and "non-liturgical" churches based on the elaboration and/or antiquity of the worship, but this obscures the universality of public worship as a religious phenomenon. Thus, even the open or waiting worship of Quakers is liturgical, since the waiting itself until the spirit moves individuals to speak is a prescribed form of Quaker worship, sometimes referred to as "the liturgy of silence." Typically in Christianity, however, the term "the liturgy" normally refers to a standardized order of events observed during a religious service, be it a sacramental service or a service of public prayer.

From Mark Galli in Beyond Smells and Bells:

When I refer to "the liturgy" in this book, I am referring to the public Sunday service performed by liturgical and mainline churches. I refer to it in the singular because the shape of the service is remarkably similar in all these traditions (see Appendix B). p. 14

What do you think of when you hear the word, liturgy?