wfn.org | Candler professor looks 'beyond the worship wars'

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Sept. 10, 2001 News media contact: Thomas S.
McAnally7(615)742-54707Nashville, Tenn.     10-71BP{378}

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By Elaine Justice*

ATLANTA (UMNS) -- Congregations across America may be grappling with
traditional versus contemporary worship styles, but faithful followers don't
have to choose between centuries-old hymns and the latest Christian
chart-toppers, says the Rev. Tom Long of United Methodist-related Candler
School of Theology. 

In his recent book, Beyond the Worship Wars, Long says he discovered "a
third way" of worship that can't be classified as traditional, contemporary
or even "blended."

"There are congregations who have discovered how to be faithful to the great
liturgical traditions of the church, but do it in a way that is alert to the
new cultural environment," says Long, who is the professor of preaching at
the school of theology related to Emory University. "These churches have
created a new thing in the earth, a form of worship that is authentically
Christian, theologically rich and magnetic to a seeking, restless,
individualistic, de-institutionalized culture."

Starting with the thesis that every congregation in America is struggling
with the issue of how to worship, Long went looking for a variety of
churches that are successfully negotiating the so-called "worship wars."
Included in his study were churches large and small, some predominantly
black, some white, some Hispanic, some urban, some suburban. The
congregations encompassed both Catholic and a variety of Protestant
denominations. What they all have in common, he says, is an ability to
remain both vital without catering to pop culture and faithful without
clinging to the past.

Long identifies similarities among "vital and faithful congregations," and
features those qualities prominently in the slim volume, which is meant to
serve as a resource book and discussion catalyst for pastors and laity
alike. 
 
"In the last decade or so, church leadership consultants have noticed that
when a congregation is in crisis, the problem often is not that the minister
and other leaders are at loggerheads," says Long. "The problem is in
worship."

Yet he doesn't approach the worship issue from a standpoint of diagnosing
what's wrong. "We have built our understanding on the basis of sick
congregations that are dysfunctional," he says of the traditional approach
to church leadership and worship studies. "My thought was, let's study
healthy congregations and see what they are doing that can be replicated by
other congregations." 

Long notes that he and other colleagues studying religious practices are
finding that "the creativity and energy in American Christian life has moved
out of the seminaries and the denominational headquarters and into the local
grass-roots parishes." This creativity is embodied, he says, in imaginative
pastors, who have responded to the drastic and often negative changes in
American church culture by stepping back and rethinking what it means to be
and do church. 

In the congregations Long studied, virtually all of these leaders were
strong, which came as the biggest surprise of the study. "I wanted to find
democratic pastors who honored the ministry of laity by sharing power. This
is a myth I carry with me from the '60s of what good congregational
leadership is like," Long says. 

What he found was a new kind of leader. "They are strong and aggressive, but
they don't use these qualities in self-serving ways, but to empower people,"
Long says. "They're also willing to generate some hostility; all of them
did. None of them avoided conflict."

Long, named one of the nation's top preachers by Newsweek magazine, didn't
find many similarities among sermons and preaching styles in the churches he
studied, nor did he experience any fiery oratory. "It's much more like the
host at a wonderful dinner party of friends who stands up and says the right
thing in the middle of the process," he observes. 

Among the "vital and faithful" congregations Long studied, he noted they:
7	make room in worship for the experience of mystery,
7	make efforts to show hospitality to the stranger,
7	make visible the sense of drama in Christian worship,
7	emphasize music that is both excellent and eclectic,
7	creatively adapt the worship space and environment,
7	forge a strong connection between worship and local mission,
7	maintain a relatively stable order of service that the congregation
knows by heart,
7	move to a joyous festival experience toward the end of the service,
and
7	have strong, charismatic pastors as worship leaders.

"I tried to put myself in the shoes of a visitor," Long says of the churches
in the study. "These churches knew me by name, connected me with others and
provided an environment in which I could offer myself to God. People are
hungry for that."

Long says he has "two levels of hope" for his book. First, he wants it to be
useful for churches seeking worship renewal, that would aspire to be vital
and faithful congregations. "This is something I want lay folks to talk
about in their churches," he says. 

"My more ambitious goal," he adds, "is to change the paradigm for
ministers." 

# # #
*Justice is assistant director of university communications at United
Methodist-related Emory University in Atlanta. 

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