quote:

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Originally posted by Mark Betts:
I have seen similar things over on this side of the pond as well. It may appeal to young people (and wannabe 'young' people) but I think many may feel they have outgrown such a worship style after a few years and go elsewhere. I'm afraid I find such services patronizing and unfulfilling, although I may have enjoyed them for a while back in the day.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
But maybe the (divine?) purpose of these churches is to draw in and christianise young people; once they've been converted and acculturated, then they can move on to more sedate, 'mature' forms of Christianity, and their places can be taken by a new generation.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Conversely, perhaps we should be grateful for churches that are dominated by the elderly, because sooner or later we'll be among that number, and presumably we'd prefer to be in churches that focus on meeting our specific needs and catering to our tastes....

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Betts:
I have seen similar things over on this side of the pond as well. It may appeal to young people (and wannabe 'young' people) but I think many may feel they have outgrown such a worship style after a few years and go elsewhere. I'm afraid I find such services patronizing and unfulfilling, although I may have enjoyed them for a while back in the day.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Maybe it's just too soon to expect this kind of transformation of places like Willow Creek (presuming that this is a good thing, of course). Are they into the second generation yet? I.e. do they have young men born and raised in this church, and ready to take over? The third?

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No, but having grown up in a baby boomer orientated church that grew out of a youth group, they tend not to settle in Willow Creek, and go off to a newer younger church.
 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 
What I think the article fails to address is how far this juvenilisation of the church is merely a reflection of exactly the same tendencies in the wider society. Given that, it's hardly a surprise that the church has gone the same way, and to some extent it's entirely appropriate. The challenge for the church is surely to provide the structures that can enable people to grow into maturity when they are ready.

An important element of the 'Seeker Friendly' approach to church is that SUNDAY ISN'T FELLOWSHIP. The true fellowship of the church occurs on another day, in small groups - providing an institutional structure to enable personal relationship to grow - and in the interactions between church members that should be happening at other times. Unfortunately this is a radical challenge to the tradition of church that equates Sunday services with EVERYTHING, and doesn't give priority to other forms of fellowship. This is as a result of the forms of church life being set when society was radically different, when there was plenty of potential for people to have fellowship naturally during the week. However these days it isn't happening; instead a lot of people don't interact with their Christian sisters and brothers except on Sunday.

So it's in that context any particular church needs to be assessed: is it providing the means of support for people to move forward as things hit them, causing them to grow as the NT suggests 'Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. 4 And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.'
James 1:2-4

The other issue is to raise is to question how perfect the previous model was. Yes, people came along to church out of a sense of duty, but was there anything more 'real' going on then than there is now. To assume the past was perfect and the present is totally flawed, whilst attractive, is bunkum. The fact that the expectation was the faith would fade - as it has done in Europe - is surely an indicator that it wasn't as healthy as the writer suggests.

And that is FAR more than enough
 

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Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 
ISTM that, with the loss of several generations of churchgoers, there was a necessity for new ways of church to cater for babies / children / adolescent Christians (which may not be related to their physical age!). There was a hope that those who embraced the new ways would naturally migrate to 'mature' traditional church in time, but it didn't often happen.

I think that the reasons for that may be:
a) social cohesion with the worship group
b) an exclusivity which may be encouraged by the leaders
c) familiarity
d) a perceived lack of welcome by traditional church congregations

All is not lost. New young churches have broken away over the centuries, to become the Methodists / Baptists / Salvation Army / Quakers.....
 

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Posted by PaulBC (# 13712) on :
 
I spent 25 years in evnagelical churches 18 in a baptist gropup thatwent very praise & worship, signs & wonders. By the last 5 years the hymnals were in boxes, the worship songs , I can not call them hymms were happy clappy and if you weren't running around happyh then you had a spiritual problem. The preaching barely rememberable .Grow negative and it finally packed it in. I returned to the Anglican fold.
But I am left wondering just what was I doing those 18 years ? As for the conections between people ? Very superfical .But thats the way of many evangical churches .And authority pastor rule was order of the day and no one to appeal to eithert.
If I sound a bit bent out of shape it's cause I ended up feeling an outsider .Ks not the church a family ? We need to show that bgift of agape love otherwise maybe open a golf course.
 

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Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by PaulBC:
I spent 25 years in evnagelical churches 18 in a baptist gropup thatwent very praise & worship, signs & wonders. By the last 5 years the hymnals were in boxes, the worship songs , I can not call them hymms were happy clappy and if you weren't running around happyh then you had a spiritual problem. The preaching barely rememberable .Grow negative and it finally packed it in. I returned to the Anglican fold.
But I am left wondering just what was I doing those 18 years ? As for the conections between people ? Very superfical .But thats the way of many evangical churches .And authority pastor rule was order of the day and no one to appeal to eithert.
If I sound a bit bent out of shape it's cause I ended up feeling an outsider .Ks not the church a family ? We need to show that bgift of agape love otherwise maybe open a golf course.

---

quote:

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Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I wonder whether we're all in danger of looking for a place where we feel that we belong with other worshippers, as opposed to looking for the place where God wants us to worship him?

Jesus said that foxes had holes and birds had nests, but there was nowhere for him to rest his head. He was an outsider. Following Christ isn't easy, is it?

---

 

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Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by CSL1:
I've thrice in the last half dozen years had personal encounters/debates with pastors who referred to themselves as "fathers" and laity as "children". This has the effect of devaluing the priesthood of all believers and encourages abusive, cultic systems.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I wonder whether we're all in danger of looking for a place where we feel that we belong with other worshippers, as opposed to looking for the place where God wants us to worship him?

Jesus said that foxes had holes and birds had nests, but there was nowhere for him to rest his head. He was an outsider. Following Christ isn't easy, is it?

---

Rubbish - whatever else the church is supposed to model, it's supposed to model true relationships, and that is what we get clear hints of in the NT. The fact that we've settled for the crap that passes for fellowship in churches these days is very sad. The attempt above to suggest that it should be normal is downright dangerous.

Jesus sent his disciples out two by two as a minimum. His disciples were a close fellowship. They built close fellowships when they established churches. Unfortunately we've seldom experienced it - so settle for far less. Frank Viola in 'Reimagining Church' makes the point that the NT refers to us meeting (Acts 2:46) and encouraging one another (Heb 3:13) DAILY, whereas most of us don't see our sisters and brothers more than once a week... We're 'too busy'.
 

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Posted by CSL1 (# 17168) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Ephesians 4:11 comes to mind, in which Paul says the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers are to 'equip God's people for works of service', not merely to do works of service themselves.

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quote:

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Originally posted by irish_lord99:
In a recent (and lengthy) article in 'Christianity Today', one Thomas E. Bergler describes what he views as the juvenilization of American (Evangelical) Christianity. He posits that the American Evangelical church has essentially adopted a youth group-like atmosphere since the success of youth ministries way back in the day.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Pete Ward in "Growing Up Evangelical" suggests that each adult evangelical culture (in Britain) is derived from the youthwork culture of the previous. So a similar thesis has been advanced here, too.

---

This comes through in worship planning, even in my non-"evangelical" church. The Boomers always favor the songs that, it always turns out, they knew from Sunday School in years past. They seem to forget that, at worship in a Lutheran church around here in the mid-20th century, they were not singing the campfire revivalist songs that their Sunday School music leader chose, they were singing out of the old Lutheran hymnals.

To change gears, and to piggyback on the mention of Willow Creek earlier, I'll mention that I heard Robert Schuller (of Crystal Cathedral) fame once preach that he was often surprised when the members of his church did not eventually move on for more spiritual growth. He openly acknowledged that he had a seeker sort of place. Of course, this is the part of the 35-minute sermon that got cut out when they shortened it to 15 minutes for TV. (I had been expecting a feel-good sermon of platitudes, and instead was floored with a well-written, excellently-delivered, scholarly sermon.)

[ 31. July 2012, 00:37: Message edited by: Martin L ]
 

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Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
Here in Lutherland the neverending-youth-group model for church isn't as widespread as perhaps elsewhere in Christendom...but at least in my observation it's baby-boomer pastors and lay leadership, not children or youth, who push the "praise" agenda. They think it's cutting edge.
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
I thinks its a bit of a shame that contemporary worship services (for want of a better term) are being equated to shallow content and infantilising leadership style. There is no per se correlation between the two: traditional "Vicar knows best" styles are just as disempowering as anything offered by churches who go in for "praise services". In fact, more so.
 

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Posted by Macrina (# 8807) on :
 
It's funny to read this as it casts my own current situation in a new light for me. I've spent the past four months in an evangelical Anglican church. In the past I've basically been broadly catholic in my theology and Orthodox as my official label.

Right now I am going to the evangelical church on Sunday nights and during the week because they've been so welcoming and have formed my new social circle since moving to a new area. The Orthodox church where I feel most theologially and spiritually at home is incredibly insular and greek and I haven't had anything like the same sort of response from the people there. I'm naturally quite a shy person and people have talked to me but it's all been in a 'coffee after church' way rather than the more informal 'come and meet up for a drink' Anglican style.

I find the evangelical worship okay, but I can't rate the sermons. I feel like there's no meat to it. When I pray I still find myself praying the old Orthodox prayers that I grew up with mixed in with learning to talk to God as a real presence in my life in a way I've only thought about since I went to visit it Anglicans.

I think what evangelical churches do very well is community and that has stuck out massively for me in my own personal experience.
 

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Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :
 
I spent something over thirty years working in youth ministries and I don't recognise the suggestion that youthworkers as a group are interested in either fostering or perpetuating an adolescent church culture. Seeking to encourage a greater accessibility has the purpose of encouraging folks to get to "square one", not encouraging them to stay at "square one". Is there a Christian anywhere who believes our destiny is to stay as we are?

I think LutheranChik has a good point. Most young people who come into Christianity, by whatever means, are not looking for that kind of misunderstanding of where they are at. In the UK, for a young person to self-identify as Christian is not exactly going to gain them peer-group credibility. I've heard their stories. For many of of them, it's a serious and self-aware step, deserving to be treated seriously.

But Jolly Jape's point is good too. The equation of contemporary worship with trivial approaches to faith is also misplaced.

There does seem to me to be a lot of stereotyping in this thread.
 

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Posted by Pyx_e (# 57) on :
 
I take the point the OP is making and it is not wrong (imho). However sometimes it feels to me those who have "grown up" are simply one step further but just as stuck.

A deeper and more complicated liturgy does not maturity make.

We seem to have lost the idea that we all need to "grow up" all the time. It never stops, it never ends. It ill behooves anyone to pick sawdust from the eye of others until they are sure their own plank is removed.

How is your maturity? Are you still burning with passion for God? Are you daily letting go of the things of this world? Is sainthood your aim?

So you grew out of enjoying worship and have adjusted to liking boredom, since when was worship style been a mark of maturity?

AtB Pyx_e
 

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Posted by Niteowl2 (# 15841) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pyx_e:

How is your maturity? Are you still burning with passion for God? Are you daily letting go of the things of this world? Is sainthood your aim?

So you grew out of enjoying worship and have adjusted to liking boredom, since when was worship style been a mark of maturity?

AtB Pyx_e

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quote:

---

Today many Americans of all ages not only accept a Christianized version of adolescent narcissism, they often celebrate it as authentic spirituality. God, faith, and the church all exist to help me with my problems.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pyx_e:
We seem to have lost the idea that we all need to "grow up" all the time. It never stops, it never ends. It ill behooves anyone to pick sawdust from the eye of others until they are sure their own plank is removed.

How is your maturity? Are you still burning with passion for God? Are you daily letting go of the things of this world? Is sainthood your aim?

---

quote:

---

Is there a Christian anywhere who believes our destiny is to stay as we are?

---

quote:

---

Some say that the vast majority of Christians never get beyond the Sunday School level of understanding. And that's in your average, MOTR church!

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quote:

---

Originally posted by LutheranChik:
To me, it seems that we need to be helping individuals and households develop a domestic spiritual practice and giving them tools to study the Bible and basics of our theology on their own time/at their own pace.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
Agreed completely. It's not about the church (by which I mean the institution) providing the teaching for people, it's about people being excited about God so they want to become more fruitful spiritually, and then the church leaders / staff merely directing that process.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I wonder whether we're all in danger of looking for a place where we feel that we belong with other worshippers, as opposed to looking for the place where God wants us to worship him?

Jesus said that foxes had holes and birds had nests, but there was nowhere for him to rest his head. He was an outsider. Following Christ isn't easy, is it?

---

Rubbish - whatever else the church is supposed to model, it's supposed to model true relationships, and that is what we get clear hints of in the NT. The fact that we've settled for the crap that passes for fellowship in churches these days is very sad. The attempt above to suggest that it should be normal is downright dangerous.

Jesus sent his disciples out two by two as a minimum. His disciples were a close fellowship. They built close fellowships when they established churches. Unfortunately we've seldom experienced it - so settle for far less. Frank Viola in 'Reimagining Church' makes the point that the NT refers to us meeting (Acts 2:46) and encouraging one another (Heb 3:13) DAILY, whereas most of us don't see our sisters and brothers more than once a week... We're 'too busy'.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
My point was that looking for a church which will suit us, in which we think we'll fit in (or be able to compromise so that we do) is not the same thing as going where God wants us to be. Often when we do the latter, we don't feel as if we 'belong', like Jesus. In fact, sometimes people may be unkind to us, as their idea of relationship is on their terms only.

If we persevere, God may work through us, but it will be to his glory, not ours.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm against an unthinking acceptance and am rather glad to live in a more questioning world, one in which folks are less inclined to give too mjch credence to 'elders'. But maybe many folks have gone too much the othet way?

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quote:

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Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
I've seen very little conscious desire, let alone intentional action, to imitate those more mature in the faith.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Barnabas62:
It's not a matter of years, Marvin. I think it means "more like Christ". Which might also require more definition!

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Yes, that's all I meant - more like Christ or, if you prefer, living a life characterised by the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:20-whatever-it-is.
 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 
I think part of the problem is that there is a prejudice against modern worship songs that assumes, without evidence, that they lack content. It is interesting to compare All glory laud and honour which is the height of respectability, with There is a higher Throne', whilst Abide with Me and I can only imagine seem to be cut from the same cloth. You may not like the STYLE, and the fact that the new generation lets their emotions show - but the contents really aren't so different.
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Ender's Shadow, the end of the world must be nigh! A wholehearted
 

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Posted by Bax (# 16572) on :
 
I think this an interesting discussion and raises important points.

However, personal tastes and/or temperament should not get confused with the essential argument here.

E.g. the fact that I like plainsong that has been around for 100s of years does not make me "mature"

or the fact that you use eclectic guitars and never use a worship song that is more that 5 years old does not make you in touch with contemporary society.

Any form of church with any true form of worship should take us beyond ourselves and help us to meet God, in church and in our neighbour (for instance) and not just make us feel good about ourselves. The different traditions have different risks associated. As I see it, none are "the right way" in opposition to others (although some might be wrong...)

If this particular tradition of Christianity (evangelicalism in the USA) has fallen into a trap, that does not mean "that's the end of it then, that tradition is now wrong" but rather like all churches it needs to grow and see where it has gone wrong and what needs to be done to make things better.

If I may say so, the foundation of protestantism at THE Reformation (with stress on "The", implying that this was a once for all thing & now in the past) is itself a trap. All churches need to be constantly "reforming" to a certain extent, while not loosing touch with the tradition.

As has already been pointed out, plus ca change....
 

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Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I'm against an unthinking acceptance and am rather glad to live in a more questioning world, one in which folks are less inclined to give too mjch credence to 'elders'. But maybe many folks have gone too much the othet way?

---

Double-edged sword, isn't it?! I'd hate to live in a culture where I was expected to automatically obey someone older than me. But in my (admittedly limited) experience of associating with Christians, I've seen very little conscious desire, let alone intentional action, to imitate those more mature in the faith.

Having said that, I've also come across very little explicit teaching about this, either in sermons, programmes to link people up with mentors, or the idea I mentioned above of sessions on things like patience, gentleness etc. It seems most people (church leaders and non-leaders alike) are content to leave spiritual formation to chance, almost.
/Glass half-empty whine.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
I think part of the problem is that there is a prejudice against modern worship songs that assumes, without evidence, that they lack content. It is interesting to compare All glory laud and honour which is the height of respectability, with There is a higher Throne'

---

quote:

---

You may not like the STYLE, and the fact that the new generation lets their emotions show - but the contents really aren't so different.

---

quote:

---

originally posted by SvitlanaV2

I've come across ministers and lay preachers who have mentors, but it's not something that they seem to promote to their congregations at large. I wonder if, subconsciously, some clergy in different kinds of churches are actually a bit wary of their congregations becoming spiritually mature, and potentially surpassing them in this way? I once read an article about Anglican clergy in Wales, and it said that the trend for involving the laity more in the running of churches was actually making the clergy more possessive of the spiritual roles that they felt distinguished them from the laity. That's quite telling.

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
My point was that looking for a church which will suit us, in which we think we'll fit in (or be able to compromise so that we do) is not the same thing as going where God wants us to be. Often when we do the latter, we don't feel as if we 'belong', like Jesus. In fact, sometimes people may be unkind to us, as their idea of relationship is on their terms only.

If we persevere, God may work through us, but it will be to his glory, not ours.

---

Fair point, but it was your reference to 'worship' that triggered my reaction; it suggested that what's important is how well the liturgy is performed and nothing else. Given your broader explanation I accept your point. I personally would rate that element quite low - but I'm aware it is important to others; we need to be careful it doesn't become the only test.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I sat and stood with a newly baptized and very broken, broken-hearted friend in our ´charismatic Evangelical´ congregation and while everyone else was singing me,me,me, I,I,I love you ever so-oh-oh especially as you died for me,me,ME songs, I turned the words round as if Jesus and our Dad were saying that THEY loved him and patted his heart every time.

Seemed to do less harm.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I sat and stood with a newly baptized and very broken, broken-hearted friend in our ´charismatic Evangelical´ congregation and while everyone else was singing me,me,me, I,I,I love you ever so-oh-oh especially as you died for me,me,ME songs, I turned the words round as if Jesus and our Dad were saying that THEY loved him and patted his heart every time.

Seemed to do less harm.

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quote:

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Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
One often imagines that newly baptised people benefit from the convert's zeal, that they still feel very blessed and energised by God. Yet the alternative, less often expressed, concern about new believers is that their faith is actually at a very fragile stage, that high numbers of them walk away after a fairly short time.

So, I can understand why you were worried about your unhappy friend, but I also think it's sad that he flew past the 'zealous' stage so quickly that he now feels unable to sing songs about God's love for him.

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
They weren´t songs about God´s love for him.

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
They weren´t songs about God´s love for him.

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quote:

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Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
...For example, if all the songs we sing are 'I love you Jesus', 'You are good to me' then I think we'll develop the sense that faith is personal more than communal, and about our feelings more than our actions.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by LutheranChik:
Here in Lutherland the neverending-youth-group model for church isn't as widespread as perhaps elsewhere in Christendom...but at least in my observation it's baby-boomer pastors and lay leadership, not children or youth, who push the "praise" agenda. They think it's cutting edge.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by irish_lord99:
church has become more about 'me' than anything else.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Betts:

quote:

---

Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
...For example, if all the songs we sing are 'I love you Jesus', 'You are good to me' then I think we'll develop the sense that faith is personal more than communal, and about our feelings more than our actions.

---

But there are far too many modern worship songs which are just like this. "Shine Jesus Shine" is just one example. "In Christ Alone" is another, 'just me and Jesus' song, even though I do like it.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
This was a man, 40, who´d lost his parents and his son, has been off heroin for three years, had come to us through our street outreach, had fallen helplessly and it seemed reciprocatedly in love with "one of us", who then dumped him due, in part, due to big E-vanglical ministerial counsel.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I´m astounded at the prescriptive generalizations here.

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To be fair, you didn't give us much to go on initially, so people were bound to make assumptions. Now you've fleshed out the story it's clearer what the problem was.

For what it's worth, I prefer hymns (or worship songs) that talk about God's love for us, rather than our love for God. But it's best if there's a mixture. In my denomination hymns are normally chosen to match the themes of the sermon.

[ 04. August 2012, 10:51: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
 

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Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :
 
SvitlanaV2, I should be conciliatory and cool I know, but ... big E is the only hope, I know, IF it transcends itself. Comes down from its own constricted colon.
 

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Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 
Everyone fights from their own corner.

Congregations are made up of individuals, each with a personal relationship with God, who have come together for communal worship and fellowship.

I was 'converted' years several years before I found out what it was to feel blessed and energised by the Holy Spirit. What I needed immediately after that time was not the same as I needed before it, nor was it what I need now in order both to help me to grow in faith and to facilitate my worship of God.

Is worship only for me? Do I expect worship on my terms? Certainly not. But if my needs are not included in what is offered, it follows that unless I go elsewhere I will not grow in faith. It may rather become dulled or shrivel.

If churches aim only for Christians at one stage of faith, whether infant, juvenile, adult or mature or anything in-between, they're not including the whole family and can't expect to see anything other than they currently see in their congregations.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
At the risk of being a party-pooper, I've just looked up the lyrics of the songs that Ender's Shadow cited and can't see how they bear any comparison with the older ones he's cited in any way, shape or form. They come across as pretty trite stuff to me.

Perhaps I'm missing something ...
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
At the risk of being a party-pooper, I've just looked up the lyrics of the songs that Ender's Shadow cited and can't see how they bear any comparison with the older ones he's cited in any way, shape or form. They come across as pretty trite stuff to me.

Perhaps I'm missing something ...

---

Really? Well I don't care much either for "I can only imagine" or for "Abide with me". As tunes they are neither to my taste, and both seem to use sentimentality of expression, the difference being that AWM is sentimental in a victorian way, whilst ICOE is sentimental in a 21st century way. I suppose the authenticity of the experience described in AWM (the author wrote it whilst dying of TB) must mean that shades it, but it's a close run thing.

However, it seems, to me, pretty unconvincing to accuse a song of triteness when, like "There is a higher throne" the lyrics are lifted pretty well word-for-word from Revelation. "All glory, laud and honour" is pretty much a straight retelling of the events of Palm Sunday, and, as such is reasonably serviceable (though I dislike the tune, which doesn't seem to me to resolve satisfactorily,) but I would have thought that a poet like yourself would have found the imagery included in TIAHT would have raised it far above the prosaic story-telling of the older song. Simply put, it just lifts my spirit.

Which all goes to show that taste is in the eye of the beholder, to mix my metaphors.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sure, 'Abide with me' is very sentimental. I don't mind sentimentality, as it happens. I come from South Wales, we enjoy mawkishness. Heck, I've even been accused of it by fellow poets at times ...

But a patina of age does give a certain respectability to sentimentality. And besides, I'd challenge anyone to suggest that the modern mulch that Enders Shadow citing was anywhere near as well written as 'Abide With Me.' AWM is by no stretch of the imagination a classic work of literature - but it 'works' within its own terms of reference.

As for 'There is a Higher Throne', well, I've never sung it nor heard it sung, to my knowledge. But I suspect I could find it on You Tube if I could be arsed.

Are you seriously suggesting that the following stacks up as poetry, though:

'And there we'll find our home,
Our life before the throne;
We'll honor Him in perfect song
Where we belong.'

This isn't anything about subjective taste, it's about you being a plonker.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I'll add a before a Host quite rightly calls me on that one ...
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
As it happens, I've just watched a performance of it on You Tube and my conclusion is:

- It's a pretty tune.
- It's hangs together as a song in its particular genre.
- It's got pretty but not particularly demanding lyrics, which isn't to diss it as it works on its own terms.

But I suspect it shows how low the bar is when it comes to contemporary worship songs that it is somehow cited as being highly moving and profound.

It's ok, but that's about as much you can say about it.

We were singing songs about worshipping before the throne and using verses from Revelation way, way back in the restorationist scene in the 1980s. Move along folks, there's nothing to see here.

It's a song in the contemporary worship song style, no more and no less than that. And probably just as 'disposable' in the longer term.
 

---

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :
 
Abide With Me was sung by the Paras on the green at Arnhem as they waited to be shot by Willi Bittrich´s men.
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Well, Gamaliel, the choices were neither mine nor yours, But Ender's Shadow's. I just gave my opinion that I found TIAHT personally moving. You didn't, that's fine. The point that I was answering was the comparability of old and new. Specifically, you thought that there was no comparison. I expressed an opinion that one of the older ones (AWM) was probably slightly better than its modern counterpart. The other modern song I thought was a lot better than its traditional equivalent. You disagreed, though you hadn't at that time, even heqard it. The culmination of this compelling argument was that I was a "plonker" .

There is an old saying, that there are two types of fool, the one who says, "this is new, and therefore it is good" and the one who says, "this is old, and therefore it is better." I think that is a good maxim to take note of. Not all old hymns are as good as "And can it be" or "Thine be the glory", any more than all modern songs are as bad as "The Lord has given a land of good things" or "Oi Oi we are gonna praise the Lord".

I'm not sure why you have this, what seems to me, chronological snobbery about worship music. So what that Restorationists were singing about standing before the throne of God in the 70s. Does that mean we should never aqain write songs about the subject? I, personally, don't care when a song was written, as long as it expresses something genuine in an idiom to which people can relate. I love "Come down, O Love Divine" (15C), "When I Survey", "And can it be" (18C), "To God be the glory" (19)C, "Lord, for the years" (20C) and "The wonder of the Cross (21st C). It never occurs to me to look at when a song was written in assessing its worth.

[ 07. August 2012, 09:36: Message edited by: Jolly Jape ]
 

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Posted by bib (# 13074) on :
 
I used to belong to a middle of the road Anglican church and was very happy with everything about it. When a new minister came who had teenage daughters, the services changed to cater only for the daughters' whims. The minister announced that he was only interested in youth at the church and that the function of the older members was to supply the funding. Needless to say, many members of the congregation left. I have found a new church that gives pastoral care to all and caters for everyone's needs.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
A few comments, Jolly Jape.

I like the hymns you've cited too, and I'm not suggesting that 'old' automatically = good and modern automatically = 'bad'.

I was also teasing you. Hence the use of the term 'plonker' - not one I would use in any other context than teasing someone.

Also, there's some baggage here as I'm a recovering restorationist and one who is gradually floating higher up the candle and away from evangelical forms of worship and ditties.

I don't object to your admiration for There Is A Higher Throne. I was teasing. I'm just saying that it's very 'ordinary', that's all, a fairly standard example of the contemporary worship song idiom and one that's been done many, many times before.

I think it's axiomatic that the kind of ballad-style or MOR soft-rock/country music approach of much modern contemporary praise songs are going to have a wider appeal than Byzantine chant, say, or the Sarum Rite. The problem is, that those of us who prefer a bit more meat and gristle are almost invariably accused of snobbery.

If I listen to Bach, Allegri, Tallis and so on in my 'spare time' - as well as punk, jazz, blues and so on - then why should I have to put up with sub-standard Cold Play style music at church?

It might be an age thing. Contemporary worship songs used to move me at one time, they don't any longer. I'm now 51. If you want to remain an adolescent that's up to you ...


 

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Posted by Jemima the 9th (# 15106) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
It might be an age thing. Contemporary worship songs used to move me at one time, they don't any longer. I'm now 51. If you want to remain an adolescent that's up to you ...

---

As well as the age thing (I'm 36, if anyone's counting ) I think there's also a "thing" about the style of music within the contemporary style. If you see what I mean. Some contemporary songs are vaguely Coldplayish; the one that starts "Now unto the King who reigns over all" (Matt Redman, I think) springs to mind. I don't much mind Coldplay, though I'll never be a huge fan.

Most of the other songs used frequently in more modern services in our church are musically more Westlife ballad / Adele-like wannabe - and I'd count I can only imagine in the latter category. I loathe Westlife, and love Adele but will never sing like her, and I wonder if that style of song is good for congregational singing. I find it very hard to keep up - a problem I'd never have with Abide With Me.

Even as a newly converted adolescent, I didn't much like most of the worship songs we sang because the style of music was not my bag, and it still isn't. It took years to dislike some of the lyrics

Now if there were some worship songs that sounded like the music I like, I'd probably like them more. Oh for a service that began with Nick Cave's Get ready for love. (Also a song about God as it happens. Ish.)
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 

quote:

---

originally posted by Gamaliel

I think it's axiomatic that the kind of ballad-style or MOR soft-rock/country music approach of much modern contemporary praise songs are going to have a wider appeal than Byzantine chant, say, or the Sarum Rite. The problem is, that those of us who prefer a bit more meat and gristle are almost invariably accused of snobbery.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
Only, I suggest, when you go beyond saying "this is the sort of music I find helpful" to "If you don't find this music helpful, but prefer (by your own admission) more accessible genres you are a superannuated adolescent". That does seem like snobbery to me. And, to be quite honest, some traditional hymns are pretty awful too, and more of the awfulness has been discarded over the years.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by chris stiles:
To a large extent my objection to contemporary worship is not so much about the music used, it's the fact that generally its use is accompanied by an adoption of the aesthetics of contemporary performance. This is hugely unhelpful in my opinion.

---

Sometimes it feels as though we're trying to follow a performance - a sing-along-a-showtunes, and the songs do not help here - unpredictable and changing rhythms, verses differing in length etc.

Some of this is a function of the way we receive the songs to play them - I can only assume they're transcribed from performance. (And on a personal note, I'll bet none were written by pianists! Mutter mutter)

If your group has time & expertise to fiddle with them, they can be adapted to make congregational singing easier.

Some of the difficulties may be how the music group handles the songs too - personally I dislike instrumental bits, but that's probably just my gripe.

Sorry if I'm continuing down a tangent.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Jolly Jspe, a lot of my posts are ironic and intended to wind people up to a certain extent - and also contain a tongue-in-cheek more-post-evo-than-thou or wannabe-Orthodox-than-thou element - a certain amount of self-parody. I'd accept that this isn't always obvious though, particularly on a cold PC screen.

I'm a lot more accommodating in real life.

In this instance, I knew you were a 50-something so I wanted to wind you up about your appreciation for songs that appeal to 20-somethings ...

No harm was intended.

I'm with Chris Stiles on this one, it's not so much the music or the words (although these can be execrable, but not in the examples you've given) but the aesthetic style that comes with it so very often.

I'm not holding the Orthodox up as exemplars (unless we all want to sing songs that are 1,000 years old - and why not, come to think of it?) - but a priest did tell me once about a cantor who sang in Greek taverna style in church - imagine a Greek pub singer I suppose (Demos Roussos? ) only to receive a dig in the ribs from one of the old 'ya-yas' for his pains ...

I'm certainly not against all contemporary worship songs and choruses, although it is the impression I like to give here at times ... all part of my on-screen persona. Come on, admit it, we all have one ...

I think Jemima is onto something - it seems to me that whatever style of worship is our preference it is ALL a form of learned behaviour or an acquired taste. I had to LEARN to appreciate worship choruses back in the day - when I first encountered them in the early '80s I thought they were slushy and sentimental. But I persevered and got 'into' them.

The same would be true of Byzantine chant or an RC High Mass or whatever else - you have to learn the ropes and accommodate yourself to it because none of it really comes naturally to any of us.
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 
Very few of our melodies are 1000 years old, and of course the troparia of various saints can't be from a date any earlier than that of the saint's beatification (or slightly before, I guess, since they would have it all ready for the 'official' service). I'd guess most of the melodies in the Slavic churches go back less than 200 years.

And verses of uneven length are de rigeur for Orthodox hymns. Our hymnody is not at all based on syllables or feet. It's essentially freeverse.
 

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Posted by Anyuta (# 14692) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:
Very few of our melodies are 1000 years old, and of course the troparia of various saints can't be from a date any earlier than that of the saint's beatification (or slightly before, I guess, since they would have it all ready for the 'official' service). I'd guess most of the melodies in the Slavic churches go back less than 200 years.

And verses of uneven length are de rigeur for Orthodox hymns. Our hymnody is not at all based on syllables or feet. It's essentially freeverse.

---

actually, I think much of Znamenny chant goes back to the earliest days of Orthodoxy in Russia--about a thousand years. The Russians started modifying the Byzantine chant they inherited almost right away, and the various styles of Znamenny chant arose within a century of that time (or so I understand). many of the very oldest variations are still used by the Old Believers.

of course, the more elaborate music we often hear in Russian churches were written by well known composers such as Tchaikovsky, but the older chants are still frequently used in many churches, particularly those who are not blessed with a great choir.
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 
Absolutely, although Znameny doesn't make up the majority of Russian melodies, which as I said are mostly less than 200 years old. But I take your point about churches without great choirs.

And even the older melodies will often have newer harmonizations.

[ 08. August 2012, 01:37: Message edited by: mousethief ]
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Gamaliel, of course I know that you're a wind-up merchant , and certainly wasn't offended. Actually, I'm fairly close to unoffendable, on my own behalf, at least. That doesn't stop me responding to posts with which I disagree, though I guess that could make me seem as if I'm "disgusted, of Tunbridge Wells" from time to time. I'm a big boy, I can take it . I do, though, think that my board persona is pretty much how I perceive myself in real life. Of course, we none of us really know how we come across to others, but I don't really see much point in creating a persona which is different to my natural self. It sort of makes the debate less authentic to my mind. I struggle enough making myself understood, I think I would find the extra layer of confusion counter productive.

Chris, I certainly think you have a point about the pitching of modern songs. In general, they seem to be written by tenors, which leaves the poor ladies in the congo screeching to try and hit the notes in their natural register, an octave above the blokes. Funnily enough, with the exception of Chris Tomlin, who writes so high that his songs need to be transposed at least a fifth down before the average congo can sing them, American writers seem to pose fewer problems than the likes of Redman and Hughes. I'm convinced that one of the reasons that the music of Stuart Townend is so popular is that it is prefectly pitched for comfortable singing by a mixed congregation.

I'm not sure, though, I've come across much of a performance ethos in worship leading. OK, the big conferences use lights and a big PA rig, but part of that, at least, seems to me to be due to practical constraints. You need lighting to be able to see what's going on, and that means lighting for television.

I've been on quite a few occasions, to what is probably the closest thing to a Church of England megachurch, Holy Trinity Brompton. The worship there doesn't seem like a performance to me. Of course, there are necessary elements of performance, vocal projection, etc, but that is as true of the preacher as of the worship leader. There is a debate to be had about where to draw the line between legitimate, confident leadership, and "showing off", but I don't think that contemporary worship is any more prone to the latter than are other areas of upfront ministry.

[ 08. August 2012, 09:49: Message edited by: Jolly Jape ]
 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 
Anyone who is seriously criticising the 'performance culture' of modern charismatic churches needs to compare it with that demonstrated by Cathedral choirs; they similarly struggle with this allegation...
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
@Jolly Jape - please don't misunderstand me. I haven't adopted a screen persona that is vastly different to my own - simply a more exaggerated version.

I have a twin brother and someone once observed that he appeared to be a more exaggerated version of me - in terms of mannerisms, Welshness of accent etc.

My Ship-persona is similar. It's Gamaliel, alright, but Gamaliel+.

As for the performance elements in contemporary worship leading. I think you must have led a sheltered life, for all your 59 years. Either that or you're completely undiscerning - which, I must admit, isn't the impression I get from your posts. Although your gooey admiration for 'There Is A Higher Throne' did give me pause ...



I would accept, though, that the ra-ra-ra posturing and working-up-the-crowd thing is more of a feature of non-Anglican charismatic spirituality than its Anglican counterpart - but I've seen 'performance' elements in both. I'd also suggest that it is less pronounced and more subtle (but present nevertheless) in the Vineyard and other 'gentler' charismatic outfits which have been a big influence on the Anglican charismatic evangelical scene.

I suspect that you mightn't have been to any meetings/services that were outrageously 'out there' in a whipped up sense. I have. Hence my wariness about much of this stuff.

Even though there might not be much by way of obviously outward manipulation, I think there is something subliminally sentimental and slushy going on in a lot of these songs. An Orthodox friend once observed that you could achieve the same effect as you'd get in a charismatic gathering by getting up and singing 'Mull of Kintyre' over and over and over again.

I suspect he's right.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
The difference with cathedral choirs, though, Enders Shadow, is that everyone KNOWS and accepts that there is a performance element there. No-one is being lulled into a false sense of security to believe otherwise.

When you attend a cathedral service you know you are going to get a highly trained choir and a rather choreographed service. That's the whole point. They make no attempt to cover up the 'joins'.

By contrast, with the contemporary worship-song scene there's a kind of studied mateyness and faux spontaneity and informality about the whole thing. They all know that by playing certain notes and chord sequences they can achieve particular emotional effects and induce particular responses - heck, back in the day you could tell when they were about to go into 'singing in tongues' mode an some of the choruses (such as 'I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee, I exalt Thee Oh Lord' (For Thou Oh Lord ...') were almost designed to end on a kind of crescendo in order to lead neatly onto what cynics called 'the tongues verse.'

That's what's so nefarious about much of the contemporary worship scene. It's like a bubbly warm bath and creeps up on you before you've realised that you've been 'had'.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
In the interests of balance, though, and apologies for a post so swiftly on the heels of the last, I would point out that the issue I have with Cathedral style worship isn't the performance element - which has to be there - but the fact that the choirs can often be pissed.

A former Anglican cathedral chorister, now an Orthodox reader and cantor, told me that at high days and holidays half the choir would be half-cut.

And very few of them, he said, were in any way 'catechised' into appreciating or believing what it was they were meant to be singing about.

There - that's as Puritanical as I'm going to get on this thread. Enders Shadow would appreciate the judgementalism I've just displayed though ...


 

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Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
Anyone who is seriously criticising the 'performance culture' of modern charismatic churches needs to compare it with that demonstrated by Cathedral choirs; they similarly struggle with this allegation...

---

It's perfectly possible to argue against the performance culture of modern charismatic churches, without arguing for the performance culture of Cathedral choirs.
 

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Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
Anyone who is seriously criticising the 'performance culture' of modern charismatic churches needs to compare it with that demonstrated by Cathedral choirs; they similarly struggle with this allegation...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
That's what I was thinking!

Maybe modern charismatic churches, like cathedral choirs, are best enjoyed in small doses.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
I've been on quite a few occasions, to what is probably the closest thing to a Church of England megachurch, Holy Trinity Brompton.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
So, what is the style where you are, Chris?

I would imagine a fairly MOR hymn-prayer-sandwich approach. Would that be in the right zone?

---

Have I ever been a card carrying member of the Communist ..? Sorry, wrong forum.

Actually, you'd be surprised - for various reasons I am currently at a church which is heading in the performance driven direction. Having gone through this a few times, I'm less and less patient with it.

Previous church was a hymn/prayer sandwich with a somewhat confused attitude to the liturgy (one or two random bits of it stuck in as a sort of pick and mix). We changed church because we moved, not necessarily because we liked this or that.

Again, it's not about style - I think that debate would be a different one. It's about the aesthetics of performance - I don't think having the singer front and centre, band on stage, with the projector screen as focus is necessarily conducive to anything other than a weak imitation of a sing-along session, featuring the band of your choice playing their greatest hits.

For the record, I like and play classical music, I like and play contemporary music (though tending towards the soul/rnb/jazz side of things rather than coldplay). I can think of multiple aesthetics that are enjoyable that I wouldn't necessarily consider to be proper aesthetics for worship.

[ 08. August 2012, 12:08: Message edited by: chris stiles ]
 

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Posted by ken (# 2460) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Betts:

quote:

---

Originally posted by South Coast Kevin:
...For example, if all the songs we sing are 'I love you Jesus', 'You are good to me' then I think we'll develop the sense that faith is personal more than communal, and about our feelings more than our actions.

---

But there are far too many modern worship songs which are just like this. "Shine Jesus Shine" is just one example. "In Christ Alone" is another, 'just me and Jesus' song, even though I do like it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
Anyone who is seriously criticising the 'performance culture' of modern charismatic churches needs to compare it with that demonstrated by Cathedral choirs; they similarly struggle with this allegation...

---

That's what I was thinking!

Maybe modern charismatic churches, like cathedral choirs, are best enjoyed in small doses.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
I do think there needs to be a distinction drawn between "event" worship, and what happens on a week by week basis at our home churches.

---

quote:

---

I think arrangements where the band is "centre stage" are really quite uncommon.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by chris stiles:

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
That's what I was thinking!

Maybe modern charismatic churches, like cathedral choirs, are best enjoyed in small doses.

---

You believe that it's either one extreme or another then?

What sort of worship does your church put on? Cathedral or concert hall?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I think Chris is right, the internal layout of older Anglican churches militates against the band being 'centre-stage' but I know plenty of Anglicans who would make it so, given the chance.

---

Hmph!! I know of a church in Leicester who sawed their alter in half, so that they could pull the two bits to either side to make room for the worship band, who of course took centre stage!
 

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Posted by Mark Betts (# 17074) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:
No they aren't! "Shine Jesus Shine" is mostly about Jesus, not about the singer. And mostly about the world and the church communally. Might be a bit soppy, but its soppy in a channelling-the-temple-worhsip-apocalyptic-tradition sort of way. Not at all "Jesus is my boyfriend".

---

quote:

---

...The Creeds start "I believe.." not "I like to think...".

---

quote:

---

Also, quite seriously, I don't particularly like the worship style or liturgy at our church. If I had my way it would be quite different. But so what? That's not why I am a member of a church.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
In the interests of balance, though, and apologies for a post so swiftly on the heels of the last, I would point out that the issue I have with Cathedral style worship isn't the performance element - which has to be there - but the fact that the choirs can often be pissed.

A former Anglican cathedral chorister, now an Orthodox reader and cantor, told me that at high days and holidays half the choir would be half-cut.

---

I am told there is an old Russian proverb to the effect that "The Devil enters the church through the choir."

Allow me to point out that the choir at our little church is hardly a cathedral choir. We don't have nearly the commitment to practice that would require! We sing well, but basically because all the people in the congo who can carry a tune join the choir. And we still have our off moments, and have a heck of a time all starting together at the same time. So, hardly a performance-driven, look-at-me kind of group. Sometimes we wish they wouldn't look at us. And sometimes Father sticks his head out one of the Deacon Doors and barks orders at the choir director.
 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Betts:

quote:

---

Originally posted by ken:
No they aren't! "Shine Jesus Shine" is mostly about Jesus, not about the singer. And mostly about the world and the church communally. Might be a bit soppy, but its soppy in a channelling-the-temple-worhsip-apocalyptic-tradition sort of way. Not at all "Jesus is my boyfriend".

---

I think we're talking cross-purposes here. I don't actually know any "Jesus is my boyfriend" type songs. I was suggesting that they were "just me and Jesus" rather than about the communion of the Saints, or simply put, corporate worship

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mark Betts:

quote:

---

...The Creeds start "I believe.." not "I like to think...".

---

This is interesting, because it is the one place in the liturgy when we must speak as individuals. I remember in the evangelical church where I grew up, they originally printed "we believe" in the worship sheets, but this had been patched over with "I believe" - obviously wisdom must have prevailed!

---

quote:

---

originally posted by Mark Betts



I think we're talking cross-purposes here. I don't actually know any "Jesus is my boyfriend" type songs. I was suggesting that they were "just me and Jesus" rather than about the communion of the Saints, or simply put, corporate worship

---

As has been pointed out, neither "In Christ Alone" nor "Shine Jesus Shine" are "just me and Jesus" songs (not that personal songs of intimacy are a bad thing anyway, at least as part our resource library for sung worship). SJS is, apart from one repeated hook line, wholly in the first person plural, essentially a communal prayer for God to reveal Himself before the nations.

But I was just wondering how your preference for the Apostles Creed fitted in with your expressed opinion that our worship should be communal. It doesn't surprise me that an evo church might replace "We" with "I", though I do find it disappointing, but surely this is in itself an expression of a "just me and Jesus" approach to the faith.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I agree with you re the Creed, Jolly Jape.

Although I find myself cringing at the term, 'personal songs of intimacy'. I know what you mean, perhaps its the rather goo-ey phrase 'songs of intimacy' that raise my hackles. Sounds too much like billing and coo-ing.

I s'pose my take would be, and you may be irritated by the implication that 'older is better' again, is that the initial outburst of songs which directly addressed the Almighty - rather than simply singing 'about' Him, as with many traditional hymns (in the West at least) - was probably 'a good thing.'

However, as the genre has evolved it has become rather saccharine and sentimental. This tendency was perhaps been there for some time, Andrew Walker the sociologist cites 'I come to the garden alone ...' as a particularly cloying example of 19th century 'Me and Jesus' sentimentality.

Although there appears to be less direct congregational participation in the Eastern liturgies, at least the wording tends to be in the form of prayers - 'To Thee Oh Lord ...'

And, yes, from observation, when the worshippers go into the Creed and to the confession bit ('Of thy mystical Supper, Oh Christ our God ...') before they receive communion it does suddenly 'feel' - to a visitor like myself - that things have suddenly switched to individual from corporate mode. We need both aspects, of course.
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Gamaliel, for a welshman you're soo....English!!
 

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Posted by Mark Betts (# 17074) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jolly Jape:
As has been pointed out, neither "In Christ Alone" nor "Shine Jesus Shine" are "just me and Jesus" songs.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I suspect there was more to the Great Schism than the filioque clause, Mark Betts.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I suspect there was more to the Great Schism than the filioque clause, Mark Betts.

---

Well, duh. It was the pastry.

---

Ha! Now that's funny!

(though I do feel compelled to point out that that photo is not actually the Hagia Sophia)
 

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Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I think Chris is right, the internal layout of older Anglican churches militates against the band being 'centre-stage' but I know plenty of Anglicans who would make it so, given the chance.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by irish_lord99:
(though I do feel compelled to point out that that photo is not actually the Hagia Sophia)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

---

Originally posted by irish_lord99:
(though I do feel compelled to point out that that photo is not actually the Hagia Sophia)

---

Um, what do you think it is, then?

---

Hmm. I may have been led astray by this page which is whence I stole the picture.
 

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Posted by irish_lord99 (# 16250) on :
 
It's a mosque from the same area of the city, I recognize it. Someone just got confused.

The Hagia Sophia is much bigger, painted red on the outside, and has a minaret at each corner.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I've seen the two buildings confused in plenty of books and articles ...

Are those minarets missile silos?

'Kubaan Missal Crisis of 1063' ... like it.

It's a closer pun in US English than in British English, of course, though, where we pronunce 'missile' to rhyme with 'stile' (or 'style') ...



But we still get it ...
 

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Posted by irish_lord99 (# 16250) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Are those minarets missile silos?

---

There is actually a joke in Turkey about a German general that decided not to attack Turkey during WWII because he saw all the 'rockets' ready to launch throughout Istanbul.
 

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Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I do find that much contemporary worship is taking on a chat-show style, though ...

It's all down to context. For some reason I don't object to it as much in Baptist or independent churches as I do when it takes place in an Anglican setting. The Vineyard influence seems pretty ubiquitous in New Wine circles. I can just about cope with it if it took place in a Vineyard church but when it all takes place down your local parish it doesn't sit very well with me at all.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Of course.

But what I'm saying is that a lot of New Wine influenced parishes are wannabe Vineyards.

Is outrage.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
But the content is very thin indeed and with all due respect to our good friend South Coast Kevin, the Vineyard isn't particularly noted for the depth of its theology.

---

Funnily enough, I don't think I'm in much of a position to confirm or refute this, really. I've been part of the same Vineyard church for over 10 years now, but have had little experience of other Vineyard churches or the wider Vineyard movement.

However, I do recognise in my own church what you call a snake-belly low view of the Eucharist! Our approach would probably be disturbing or upsetting to many people from a more high church / liturgical background. Not that we (IMO) trivialise the remembrance of Jesus' death and resurrection, but the sharing of the bread and wine (juice) is done in a very low-key, informal way, reflecting the general ethos of our church.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Which is fair enough, South Coast Kevin, if that IS the general ethos of your church. Some/most evangelical Anglicans would probably insist that it is/should be the general ethos of theirs - but one the whole I'd suggest that the view of the eucharist across the board within Anglicanism is (or should be?) somewhat higher or more 'realised' than it is in Vineyard or most Baptist circles.

Please don't get me wrong, I wouldn't diss the Vineyard's approach in its own context - and I've been involved with Baptist churches as well as restorationist house-church ones and wouldn't denigrate or criticise the way communion is conducted in those settings - it fits the context.

No, what I'm wary about in terms of the Vineyard influence on the CofE - is that it is leading the charismatic wing (or the New Wine part of it at least) in a lot 'lower' and less liturgical direction whilst also opening it up to what I'd see as more dubious practices such as so-called 'words of knowledge' and the kind of dumb-ass prophecies that characterise so much of independent charismatic evangelicalism these days ...
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Funnily enough, Gamaliel, my experience is that Evo Anglican churches have moved somewhat higher up the candle (albeit from a very low base) over the past decade. What is, perhaps, even more surprising is that the Charos have been leading the charge, if charge it can be called. Most evo vicars now vest, in a way that was out of fashion in the early nineties, candles are commonplace, and, on the whole, the approach to Holy Communion seems to be that it should ideally occur at least weekly, and that there's more going on there than just remembering that Jesus died for us. Gosh, many of them have moved from trying to re-invent the wheel on a weekly basis, to having a liturgy, now that said liturgy includes sufficient flexibility to no longer be "one size fits all".

None of which has much bearing on whether or not we make space for words of knowledge or prophecy in our services. Anglicanism has always adopted and adapted, whether to very sacramental or very pragmatic streams of thought, and I can't see that changing any time soon.

Personally, as you know, I'm very much in favour of the discerning exercise of spiritual gifts, including word of knowledge and prophecy, because it seems to me we should use all the tools that God gives us, and not refuse those which we find inconvenient, embarrassing or otherwise "naff". That doesn't stop me believing in a "real presence" in the eucharist, or loving Wesley's hymns, or anything else.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I wish I knew where these mythically wonderful Open Evangelical and slighty higher-up-the-candle parishes are. I've not come across any.

From what I've seen, all the vicars who go regularly to New Wine tend to chuck out vestments altogether, dress in chinos and checked shirts (or worse, hooped jumpers) and affect a studied casualness.

Where are these regular eucharists and non-re-inventing-the-wheel-liturgies of which you speak?

If anything, I've noticed a rise 'up the candle' if you can put it that way, in charismatic Baptist circles rather than evangelical Anglican ones. Candles, T-lights, Northumbria Community liturgies and spiritual directors at the local nunnery seem to be de-rigeur in certain post-evangelical/mildly Vineyard-y Baptist churches.

Perhaps it's because I live further out in the sticks. Here there's a choice between charo-lite and catholic-lite with traditional Anglicans either putting up with either or migrating to the parish churches in the countryside for some proper liturgy.

As for so-called words-of-knowledge and prophecy. If I hear someone say something like, 'There's someone here and it's like they're in a dark wood ...' I'll take one of the candles, light it, and shove it where it may give some much need illumination ...


 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:

As for so-called words-of-knowledge and prophecy. If I hear someone say something like, 'There's someone here and it's like they're in a dark wood ...' I'll take one of the candles, light it, and shove it where it may give some much need illumination ...

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Which is fine, but imagine you are the one who feels they are in a dark wood, and maybe you would have different thoughts. God communicates with a person in a way that is meaningful to that person. If you find it trite or naff, that's your problem. It wasn't intended for you.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Bollocks.

The people coming out with this trite nonsense in our parish are earnest, well-meaning but highly super-spiritual.

They'll gather together before the service to pray and then someone will say, 'I believe there'll be someone in the service today who feels like they're in a dark wood ...'

Something so vaguely naff that it could apply to virtually anyone at some stage or other. Then they'll pass that onto the vicar and he'll 'announce' it in the service and invite whoever feels it applies to them to come forward for pray at the end of the service.

If you think that this equates to a 'word of knowledge' rather than something an overly earnest individual came up with out of their own head before the service then you have even less discernment than I thought.



I mean, there was one a few months ago, 'There's someone here who feels stressed at work ...'

Well, blow me down ... whoever would have thought ...

If they'd said, 'There's someone here who spent two and a half weeks in Croatia in 1992 where they met a German chiropodist called Herman who passed on an important telephone number which could help with a strategic aid programme in Africa. They've forgotten that number but it is XYX 1567892 ... if they ring it this afternoon then hundreds of lives could be saved ...'

- I might be inclined to take more notice.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sorry to double-post, Jolly Jape, but your question seems to imply that you have already accepted that the 'contribution' about 'someone feeling like they were in a dark wood' was de facto a 'word of knowledge' and that it was somehow divinely ordained that there would be someone there to whom it applied and who would be helped in some way by responding to it.

Let's unpack that, shall we?

Firstly, I would suggest that it implies a fairly low level of discernment. Anything that pops into someone's head can be seen to be a 'word of knowledge'.

Secondly, what are we really expecting to happen? That the person who feels like they are in a dark wood goes forward for prayer and says, 'I feel like I'm a dark wood.'

So the person praying with me prays that they would stop feeling like they were in a dark wood and that things would become clearer for them. And they go home feeling a lot better and no longer as if they are in a dark wood.

I mean ... c'mon ...
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
And what happens if nobody goes forward for prayer in response to the 'word of knowledge'? As happened in the instance I am relating.

Does that mean:

1. There wasn't anyone there who felt like they were in a dark wood in the first place?

2. There was someone there who did feel like they were in a dark wood but they didn't respond to the 'word of knowledge' and went home still feeling that way?

3. There are some rather earnest but somewhat silly people around who come out with so-called 'words of knowledge' like this that any of us could concoct and make-up if we had a mind to.

There could, of course, be other explanations.

My money, at the moment, is on number 3.

Now why do you think that is?

I suggest it's to do with the thread title and that we all need to 'Grow up' a little bit.
 

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Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Bollocks.

The people coming out with this trite nonsense in our parish are earnest, well-meaning but highly super-spiritual.

They'll gather together before the service to pray and then someone will say, 'I believe there'll be someone in the service today who feels like they're in a dark wood ...'

---

Gamaliel, would you be happier about this sort of thing if it was never called 'prophecy', a 'word of knowledge' or whatever? If, instead, it was simply presented as someone's feeling that there'll be someone in the forthcoming service who would appreciate some prayer and encouragement regarding, e.g., their work situation?

Get rid of any hype, let people decide for themselves whether it's from God or not, and simply use it as a way of sharing one another's worries. Would that work for you?
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
It would work better, but wouldn't resolve all of the problems I have with it.

If I felt as if I were 'in a dark wood' or had work problems and so on there are plenty of options I could take to resolve the issue. I could go out and have a skinful, which wouldn't resolve anything ... I could talk to friends, family, church members, a vicar, a priest, a minister ... I could ask for prayer, I could pray myself, I could go to the doctor, I could sign up for some kind of counselling ...

All sorts of stuff.

What I don't get, and neither do I see a great deal of scriptural evidence for, is that the idea that part of the purpose of a church service is to bring issues like this out into the open or to people's attention so that they can receive prayer or whatever else.

For a kick-off, I don't believe that many of the people who go onto these prayer rotas and are 'trained' to pray with people have any real aptitude to do so nor do I think they are properly qualified. If someone needs counselling they need proper professional help and support, not some self-appointed busy-body with a so-called prophetic gifting ...

I'm not saying there isn't a place for people praying with one another, listening to each other's concerns and so on and trying to help each other out. But I really don't get this use of church services (or personal Bible reading come to that) as some kind of Mr Fixit personal horoscope service.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
The thing is, South Coast Kevin, in ANY church service there is going to be someone who would appreciate help, support, prayer, concern for their particular issues or problems - be it recurrent migraines, a work or family situation or anything else. Why does it have to be 'foretold' in advance - and in such vague and generic terms?

That's what I don't get. We don't operate like this in any other aspect of life. I mean, you don't get ready for work tomorrow thinking, 'Ah yes, I foresee that at 11.25am I will receive an important phone-call and if I'm messing about with Twitter at 11.23am I won't be in the right frame of mind to deal with it. I know, I won't go on Twitter until after the phone call ...'

I mean, life isn't like that. That's what I mean by 'growing up.' This isn't a mature spirituality, it is an adolescent one. At 59 Jolly Jape should be ashamed of himself ...


 

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Posted by South Coast Kevin (# 16130) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
If I felt as if I were 'in a dark wood' or had work problems and so on there are plenty of options I could take to resolve the issue. I could go out and have a skinful, which wouldn't resolve anything ... I could talk to friends, family, church members, a vicar, a priest, a minister ... I could ask for prayer, I could pray myself, I could go to the doctor, I could sign up for some kind of counselling ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
...I don't believe that many of the people who go onto these prayer rotas and are 'trained' to pray with people have any real aptitude to do so nor do I think they are properly qualified. If someone needs counselling they need proper professional help and support, not some self-appointed busy-body with a so-called prophetic gifting ...

---

Yeah, there is a danger of getting in to the area of counselling which, I agree, is inappropriate without proper training. But I think there's a whole lot of good that can be done without encroaching on the territory of full-on counselling.

It's the hype that does much of the damage, in my view. I'd prefer we avoided language like prophecy and word from the Lord, and for goodness' sake let's not have any of that giving messages in King James Version language! It should feel natural, I think, or 'naturally supernatural' as I've seen it described. God can work through us as we are; he doesn't need us to put on a serious voice or change the language we use.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sure, but I think it goes deeper than that, South Coast Kevin. I'm not talking about hype or King James language necessarily - although I would be against those (in this context).

I think it's axiomatic that if you build in any mechanisms of this kind into a church service then the people who are most likely to 'respond' are those who are vulnerable or most susceptible. This isn't necessarily wrong in and of itself but what it tends to do is create a 'dependency culture.' I know from one of the more balanced participants in the 'prayer ministry' rota at our parish that it's generally the same people who 'come forward' again and again.

There'll be a lot going on in all of that, human need, a need to 'belong' to reach out for support and so on - all very valid and necessary things. As to whether it's got anything to do with 'prophecy' and 'words of knowledge' and so on as we read about in the NT is a very moot point.

I'm not saying I'm against theandric responses and activities within church services - sermons and the eucharist, prayer times and all manner of other things can be examples of that. Nor am I dismissive of the idea of thaumaturgy in general, nor 'prophecy' and special insights and so on.

No, I just think that certain styles of church service and practice encourage an over-realised expectation of such things and that most of what passes muster in such circles isn't really the genuine article. Sure, there will be exceptions, there will be genuinely surprising works of God - but I wouldn't class the announcement of something vague and woolly such as the likelihood that someone in the service will be feeling like they are 'in a dark wood' falls into this category at all.

It is trite, it is cliched, it is naff - it is also potentially harmful.
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Hmmn, where do I begin , Gamaliel?


Firstly, let us suppose, for the sake of the debate, that "words of knowledge", as I'm using the term here, are, at least in some cases, originating in God. You seem to accept that this is at least possible. I think we can agree (correct me if I'm wrong)that they are not dictated by God. We are not "posessed by the Holy Spirit" in the common meaning, but rather we sense that God is trying to communicate something, and seek to deliver that in as faithful a way as possible. I think we can probably also agree that we see through a glass, darkly, as it were. It follows, then, that there is a synergy (in our hypothetical genuine word of knowledge) between our interpretive actions, and the Divine initiative. That is to say, there will be something of us in even the ideal "word". Of course, first and foremost, there is language. We don't, in general. these days think that God is an Englishman, but the "word" will be expressed in English, of necessity. So, if we have no objection to this step, can we also agree that language structures familiar to the giver (or receiver) of the word, but not necessarily familiar or natural to the onlooker, would also be acceptable. Is it really strange that a "word" given by a giver who has, perhaps, immersed themselves in the language of the AV for maybe 40 years, should reflect that. Of course, you might argue that this is really evidence that the giver has made it all up, but, given that they have to use some language, is that a fair conclusion. Of course, it might not be to our taste, but can we really use taste as a means of discernment. It seems a little patronising to do so.

It does, sometimes, come across as if your primary problem with charismatic practice (which you seem to accept in theory) is one of aesthetics. Things are "naff" or "trite" or any one of a number of other pejorative terms. Well, some of them, I'm sure, are, but I don't think that is a valid reason to reject them. They could be trite but true, after all! Of course there are the "someone is at stress at work" type of words. There are also some which are incredibly specific, and most, I guess, are somewhat in between. There are also naff and eloquent presentations of the gospel, but it doesn't mean we should abandon evangelism because we're embarrassed by the naivete of some evangelists.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Well, what you are describing is a form of human/divine synergy or co-operation - which is what I was driving at with the use of the term 'theandric' (yes, I had to look it up, I admit ...)



And I don't have a problem with that.

The AV language thing is a bit of a tangent that South Coast Kevin introduced and not really what I'm addressing here.

What I am suggesting - and please don't misunderstand me here - is the constant expectation that God is going to speak to us through special words and revelations, strange coincidences and providences and so on and so forth strikes me as a rather immature and adolescent approach to faith. It may sound patronising that there it is. C S Lewis said that 'miracles are for the immature.'

Now, I'm not saying that they don't happen, or that it isn't possible for the Lord to speak through people - the Cure D'Ars, St Seraphim of Sarov and others seem to have operated that way, if I can put it like that.

No, what I'm squeamish about is the very prevalent view that one can encounter in charismatic circles that God is forever out to 'fix' things for people supernaturally and that this is some kind of platform for evangelism. So there's an expectation that there'll be visitors or occasional church attendees who'll suddenly be confronted by some deep truth about themselves via a 'word of knowledge' - and that whatever the issue they're dealing with will then be 'fixed' through a prayer session immediately after the service.

Like as if things are as simple as that.

Like as if there are any visitors there in the first place - I've seen 'words' like this given when there's hardly anyone present.

And so on.

It could be that my default position on these things sounds one of scepticism. Well, perhaps it is. But ask yourself why.

Some of the worst offenders I've seen for this sort of thing are the hangers-on around a particular retired bishop that thee and I have discussed in the past.

Need I say more?

I could expand.

I really don't understand why we are expected to give credence to the random ramblings of a bunch of single-track mind enthusiasts who gather to pray before a church service and then pass on their putative 'words' and so on to the vicar before the service begins.

Why the heck should we give any room whatsoever for their enthusiastic and open-ended predictions and projections?

Why not call as spade a bloody shovel and dismiss it for the arrant nonsense that 99.9% of it undoubtedly is?

If you want 'words of knowledge' I could write you enough to last for the next six months. It's easy. Here are a few:

'There's someone here who feels like they're in a dark wood ...'

'There's someone here who feels stressed at work ...'

'There's someone here who is concerned about their teenage son/daughter/other relative (delete as appropriate) ...

'There's someone here who is going through a hard time ...'

Need I go on?

It's not the aesthetics so much as the non-specifics. Anyone could make up this stuff. I just have.


 

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Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
Yes, we used to have people like that at my former CofE church - I was quite surprised that they were given so much credibility. But I didn't mind humouring them until they started on the choir and why it had to go. Which was also given credibility.

Tolerance is fine as long as it works both ways.

At the same church, I got an interesting insight into the staying young mindset - when asked why I no longer went to the family service, I replied that our family had grown out of it and preferred the other services. (Our sons were over 7 by that stage, and had joined the choir.) The reply came back, 'But the Family service is the best service at this church, my aim is to see them all become like that one'.

While I was prepared to accept there was a need for a (non-Eucharistic) simple Family Service, it would have been awful if that was all that was on offer. How limiting.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
By way of mitigation, though, I would add that there is a thriving older people's group at our parish and that the mid-week informal communion services for the elderly and folk from the local OAP homes - who are given lifts by volunteers - are going really well.

So the cult-of-yoof isn't endemic ... although I would still maintain that there was a pretty adolescent spirituality around on the whole - as evidenced by the credence given to so-called 'words of knowledge' which are clearly anything but.

'Words-that-I've-just-made-up-out-of-my-own-head-and-because-of-my-own-superspiritual-and-over-egged-approach-to-faith' might be the better term to use.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I used to be somewhat critical of people who didn't attend 'family' style services in the Baptist church we were part of when we had young kids. Now my kids are older I no longer attend family services myself.


 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
All right, all right, Gamaliel! We've got the message
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
message deleted
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Ooops, that was a response to a deleted message, for the confused!
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Well, the thread is about 'growing up', Jolly Jape and us older folks can get a bit repetitive ...


 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 
I have to agree with Gamaliel here; words of knowledge should be pretty specific. It's interesting to look at the examples in the Old Testament: Samuel's word to Saul was:

quote:

---

When you go from me today, then you will find two men close to Rachel’s tomb in the territory of Benjamin at Zelzah; and they will say to you, ‘ The donkeys which you went to look for have been found. Now behold, your father has [a]ceased to be concerned about the donkeys and is anxious for you, saying, “What shall I do about my son?”’ 3 Then you will go on further from there, and you will come as far as the [b] oak of Tabor, and there three men going up to God at Bethel will meet you, one carrying three young goats, another carrying three loaves of bread, and another carrying a jug of wine; 4 and they will greet you and give you two loaves of bread, which you will accept from their hand. 5 Afterward you will come to [c] the hill of God where the Philistine garrison is; and it shall be as soon as you have come there to the city, that you will meet a group of prophets coming down from the high place with harp, tambourine, flute, and a lyre before them, and they will be prophesying. 6 Then the Spirit of the Lord will come upon you mightily, and you shall prophesy with them and be changed into another man.

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quote:

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“Why is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out as well.”

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quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:
and consider also the word of Peter in today's reading:

quote:

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“Why is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out as well.”

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Acts 5:9 - and Sapphira drops dead.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I think the issue for me is that whilst I do accept and believe that God can work in these ways, the plethora of vague and generic 'words' and the lack of accountability and follow-up acts rather in the way that things work out in the story of the Boy Who Cried 'Wolf!'

It desensitises us to those occasions when God really does do something like this ...

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Definitely a major issue. Thanks.

Leo - I'm sure it's fascinating that it is a parallel with Adam and Eve; the question is: "Did it happen?"
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Does it matter whether it did or not?

Or whether it happened somewhat differently and the disciples interpreted it the way they did?

Do we believe that Herod was really struck by an angel and eaten by worms and died? Or is that just a first century way of saying that he died of a hideous disease which was attributed to God's wrath?
 

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Posted by Ender's Shadow (# 2272) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Does it matter whether it did or not?

Or whether it happened somewhat differently and the disciples interpreted it the way they did?

Do we believe that Herod was really struck by an angel and eaten by worms and died? Or is that just a first century way of saying that he died of a hideous disease which was attributed to God's wrath?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I think the issue for me is that whilst I do accept and believe that God can work in these ways, the plethora of vague and generic 'words' and the lack of accountability and follow-up acts rather in the way that things work out in the story of the Boy Who Cried 'Wolf!'

It desensitises us to those occasions when God really does do something like this ...

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Definitely a major issue. Thanks.

Leo - I'm sure it's fascinating that it is a parallel with Adam and Eve; the question is: "Did it happen?"

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by leo:
I suspect it didn't.

I don't treat the Bible as a history book but as a story book(s). Stories convey much more truth.

---

OK - so what's your problem with it? Is it that you don't believe in the possibility of God acting like that? What is the basis for that belief? Is it because you want to reject the possibility of God acting in judgement? Or is it that you don't think it is 'likely'? Again, what is your basis for concluding that. Does that arise from the Humean argument that 'I've never experienced it, so it's just a story that some primitives made up?' Or is there a better basis to your approach?
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 
It isn't a problem. It is a belief about the nature of Holy Scripture as a multi-layered set of texts, as has been taught by the Church for many centuries before the Enlightenment period when literalism crept in.

I could develop this but the thread is about the churches pandering to the immature so it is a tangent here.
 

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Posted by Janine (# 3337) on :
 
Pity us poor literalists, bound to certain patterns of behavior by our inconvenient beliefs.

I have also seen immature "tantrummy" behavior from people who insist adamantly that little in Scripture is to be taken literally, and who wander in to a traditionally liturgical church for their spiritual topoff, rather than a (supposedly) more freestyle (possibly evangalical) setting.

People vary -- and people are very much alike. Depends on what you're getting at.

I've seen people who claim to be totally unconnected to ancient formal worship formats (or at those least a few hundred years old, anyway) -- yet those same folks have set up a concrete Shibboleth out of their non-denom formats for assemblies and study.

It's difficult for a human being to live free. Habits and patterns are so comfortable.
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Janine:
Pity us poor literalists, bound to certain patterns of behavior by our inconvenient beliefs.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by leo:
It isn't a problem. It is a belief about the nature of Holy Scripture as a multi-layered set of texts, as has been taught by the Church for many centuries before the Enlightenment period when literalism crept in.

I could develop this but the thread is about the churches pandering to the immature so it is a tangent here.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by leo:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Janine:
Pity us poor literalists, bound to certain patterns of behavior by our inconvenient beliefs.

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Well, yes, since you can't eat meat unless it has been slaughtered by kosher butchers - see Acts 15.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Janine:
People vary -- and people are very much alike. Depends on what you're getting at.

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quote:

---

It's difficult for a human being to live free. Habits and patterns are so comfortable.

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Yup!

Granny Weatherwax, is that you?

(A beloved character in Terry Pratchett's books, Janine. PM me if you want to know which ones.)
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Of course patterns and habits are comfortable, we are wired that way. That's why every single church or tradition we could name has set patterns and habits.

How could it be otherwise?

@Ender's Shadow: I don't see how it makes any odds difference we take the Ananias and Sapphira story literally as to whether we regard God as a nice old codger who lets us get away with everything. It strikes me that if we do take it literally then it raises equally - if not more - difficult questions. For instance, why doesn't God zap TV evangelists and other charlatans who fleece the flock, why does God apparently let any of us get away with our misdeamnours - why haven't you or I been struck down dead 15 times over already ...

As it happens, I do believe that God judges and I do believe in the 'final reckoning' - however that is to be understood.

However, as someone of a literary bent and who understands a little of how narratives and stories, metaphors and so on work then it is clear that there are literary elements in the Book of Acts. It isn't a newspaper report. That doesn't mean that I don't believe it's based on fact, that the people who appear in Acts weren't real historical people nor that Luke is lying when he appears himself in the narrative at times - the 'we' passages.

All I am saying is that Acts belongs to a particular genre, a kind of first-century 'novel' if you like - only 'faction' would be the closest approximation we have today - or something like Truman Capote's 'In Cold Blood' - a non-fiction novel. Capote's book was based on real events, of course, but there are still disputes about the actual course of events to some extent - or at least his approach to them.

Is Shakespeare's Richard II historically accurate? No, it isn't. Does it tell us things about Richard II, kingship and power that a 'straight' history wouldn't? Yes it does.

The problem I have with the uber-literalists is that they are treated these texts in a way in which they weren't intended to be taken. They ignore the particular genre - be it Gospel or 'history' (in the Acts and in the OT history sense).

When was the last time you saw someone drop down dead in church? When was the last time you saw an autocratic leader struck down by an angel and eaten by worms and die?

You haven't. What you may have seen, though, are people becoming croppers as a result of foolish actions, leaders such as Gadafi and Ceaucescu deposed ...

And all of it points to 'final judgement.'

Am I making any sense?
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 

quote:

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originally posted by Ender's Shadow

Let's try again: Theology is a science because it seeks, like the natural sciences, to establish hypotheses about the nature of God from the data that is available. However if you merely deny that the data is valid, then you are able to construct any hypothesis you want. There must however be a basis on which you choose to make your determinations as to what data is valid, and what's not - unless you want to dismiss the possibility of God as an ontological reality at all, or at least adopt the Sea of Faith's position that it is impossible to say anything with any certainty. So Leo - are you adopting that Sea of Faith position - or do you accept that some of the data presented in the bible about God is for real? If so, how do you decide?

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This all sounds a bit Modernist, ES. I doubt that any of the many practitioners of Theology from Paul onwards as far as sometime in the late 18th or early 19th century would find you definition made any sense at all. Surely, following that somewhat monochrome agenda is exactly the sort of category error that has led to the "Liberalism" of which you are so critical. There is a saying (originating, I think, from some Orthodox saint, though Father G or Mousetheif may correct me) that a theologian is one who prays and one who prays is a theologian. Not true in absolute terms, perhaps, but it does capture an important distinction between theology and natural sciences; that it is essentially relational.

This fact fundamentally alters the evidence criteria employed in the study. There is something more at work than 2+2=4 here.

We must be careful not to stray into the land of deceased equines here, but it is worth noting that the Bible does not claim for itself the reductionist type of truth which you seem to think so important. Everything in the book is true, and some of it actually happened.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
@Janine

I've been pondering your point, a bit further:

'Pity us poor literalists, bound to certain patterns of behavior by our inconvenient beliefs.'

My take is this, there IS of course, immaturity around on all sides of this one - liberals, conservatives, any-other-approach-there-might-be.

I certainly wouldn't set out to claim that is ONLY 'immature' churches of a fundamentalist flavour that demonstrate these kind of behaviour patterns. Far from it.

What I would say is that it ill-behoves liberals or those with a more nuanced or somewhat 'mystic' approach (I'd put myself more towards the latter camp than the former) to look down their noses on their more literalist brothers and sisters.

Equally, I would maintain that it ill-behoves the more woodenly literalist (and there are gradations of woodenness from spongy corks to rigid planks and fossilised wood as hard as iron) to take a pride in their own ignorance.

There's a vein of populist anti-intellectualism in some evangelical and charismatic circles - and what intellectualism is allowed tends towards the more Modernist and propositional kind that Ender's Shadow has exemplified on this thread. I'm 100% with Jolly Jape here.

Mark Noll is good on this - 'The Scandal of The Evangelical Mind.'

The current evangelical and fundamentalist mindset derives from 18th century rationalism to a great extent - even when it is reacting against it. It's a product of the Enlightenment, for better or worse, just as much as Deism is.

I'm not suggesting that we go back to a pre-Renaissance, pre-Reformation sensibility necessarily - at least not in terms of pre-literacy, pre-democracy and so on.

But I am saying that we need to appreciate the poetic, the 'mythic' (in the true sense of that term) and the mysterious. These things seem flattened out, to me, in the more literalist settings - it can become a 2D rather than a 3D faith.
 

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Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :
 
It can indeed (as I just had an argument with some idiot who seems to think string theory is in opposition to the Christian faith! ). But it seems to me that "treating the Bible as a storybook" and falling back on a "multilayered" view of the text is very often used to evade the uncomfortable bits of Scripture. On the Ship, for example, when anybody asks about a difficult/troubling passage, someone else is sure to pop up (within the first four posts!) and dismiss the problem entirely, because "we all know X didn't really write that"/ "it's just a bit of pious fiction designed to teach a moral truth" / "God wouldn't REALLY do that."

It gets a bit old. I understand this is a case of abuse, not use, of the concept. It's just that it's such a freaking common abuse, and it drives me batty when I'm struggling with something and people pop up to airily assure me that I'm making a big deal over nothing.
 

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Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
It can indeed (as I just had an argument with some idiot who seems to think string theory is in opposition to the Christian faith! ). But it seems to me that "treating the Bible as a storybook" and falling back on a "multilayered" view of the text is very often used to evade the uncomfortable bits of Scripture. On the Ship, for example, when anybody asks about a difficult/troubling passage, someone else is sure to pop up (within the first four posts!) and dismiss the problem entirely, because "we all know X didn't really write that"/ "it's just a bit of pious fiction designed to teach a moral truth" / "God wouldn't REALLY do that."

It gets a bit old. I understand this is a case of abuse, not use, of the concept. It's just that it's such a freaking common abuse, and it drives me batty when I'm struggling with something and people pop up to airily assure me that I'm making a big deal over nothing.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Ender's Shadow:

quote:

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Originally posted by leo:
It isn't a problem. It is a belief about the nature of Holy Scripture as a multi-layered set of texts, as has been taught by the Church for many centuries before the Enlightenment period when literalism crept in.

I could develop this but the thread is about the churches pandering to the immature so it is a tangent here.

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Let's try again: Theology is a science because it seeks, like the natural sciences, to establish hypotheses about the nature of God from the data that is available. However if you merely deny that the data is valid, then you are able to construct any hypothesis you want. There must however be a basis on which you choose to make your determinations as to what data is valid, and what's not - unless you want to dismiss the possibility of God as an ontological reality at all, or at least adopt the Sea of Faith's position that it is impossible to say anything with any certainty. So Leo - are you adopting that Sea of Faith position - or do you accept that some of the data presented in the bible about God is for real? If so, how do you decide?

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quote:

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Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did.

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