Solemn Vows

Josh and Abby asked Jack to use the Book of Common Prayer wedding service, and I was struck by how few references there were to feelings (love, joy, etc), and how many there were to "solemn vows". Truly, for all the joy and smiles and laughter, it also was a solemn occasion, as Josh and Abby vowed lifelong commitment, and all in attendance vowed to support them in that commitment.

A related item… Wes Callihan had this article in his Scholegium newsletter today.

COGITEM -- Liturgy as a Language

Our pastor recently remarked that there is a liturgical reformation occurring (he's thinking primarily of reformed protestant churches) and it set me thinking about why that should be so. One reason surely is that liturgy is a language that allows us to express ourselves. If you have never learned to play the piano, you cannot simply sit down to one and express the innermost depths of your soul with great overhand swings at the keyboard, Rachmaninoff-style, no matter how passionately you feel like the desire. But if you've studied and practiced and learned the language of piano-playing from those who have gone before, you can express yourself with great freedom. That freedom came from submission to a tradition, the tradition of How To Play The Piano. If you have never learned to speak Spanish, you cannot suddenly start communicating freely with the person next to you on the bus in Guadalajara; but if you've studied and practiced, then you can express yourself. You are freed from the bonds of ignorance and enabled to do something that you never could before, because of your submission to How Spanish Is Supposed to Be Spoken.

In the same way, the liturgies of the Christian Church are a language which, if learned and submitted to, allow us to express ourselves in worship to God in the great communion of the saints. Where did we get the idea that "worship" can be whatever we want it to be? We can't just say anything we want and expect our seatmate on the Guadalajara bus to understand us, and we can't just bang on the piano a la John Cage and expect the audience to understand what we feel, and so we can't expect to do just any old thing in church and expect it to be meaningful. Liturgy is a language that has developed (in many dialects, certainly, but one language) in the Church over centuries and if we learn it, submit to What Worship Is, we participate in a language others have for centuries and still do speak and so we join with them in worship, and we can express ourselves with much more freedom than if we just bang on the keyboard.