I really should learn to think before I speak some days, especially when it comes to theology. I seem to have this ability to make one line statements that although there is grounding for them within my head, that grounding isn't expressed in the any shape or form in my statement, or in any supporting argument I try to cobble together afterwards. In the past few weeks, I have done this twice when in conversations regarding liturgy.
So let's take yesterday's one-liner: "None of our liturgy is theologically-based!"
Really!!! What was I thinking? Not what came out of my mouth, that's for sure! Of course there is theological basis to liturgy, if there wasn't why are we still arguing over the words that are said in the Eucharist and the meaning they express. In my dissertation I have written that within my own tradition the way we teach doctrine to the masses is primarily through our liturgy. Liturgists and hymn-writers over the centuries have wrestled with theology in an attempt to lead the people of God in worship that gives glory to God and will edify them. So why did I come out with such a throw away statement?
Someone raised the question of the 'Lord's Prayer' and why we think it is an important element to be included in our liturgy. None of us present really had an answer other than saying that it was the prayer that Jesus taught us so it must be important. But it hasn't always been there religiously in our liturgical structure and for the person who raised the question, in the church tradition they had grown up in it had never been or perceived to be an essential part of their liturgy.
My only answer is history. Now, I could be making this response because my dissertation, which just happens to focus on liturgy, is heavily weighted on the side of Church History. But as I have looked at and mapped the change in the liturgy of my own tradition since the Reformation, there have been moments during our history where we have thrown most of what we would call liturgy out of the window as we have rebelled against the establishment. It has been events that have happened in the church local, national, and universal that have driven liturgical change. I'm not discounting theology's role in this, because engagement with Scripture and theology has happen which have caused liturgical movement. But how often to we actually theologically question what is in the basic liturgical structure that many of our churches follow? How often is our response to the question "why do we say one type of prayer here and another type there", "just because-that's how we've always done it".
I am finding myself riling these days when I hear people using the response 'it's because I'm a non-conformist' to why they do or do not do something. Yes, maybe the non-conformist movement does has the feel at times like 'throwing the baby out with the bath water' because we can, but there were theological reasons behind it initially. People took time to theologically reflect on the situation before they made their response.
So I guess that is where my one-liner came from. To me there is a sense that we don't always theological think through our liturgy anymore, we just do it this way because that is how it has been done for generations. Our liturgy has become more historically-based, although it has its roots in theology, just theology that is forgotten.
