Let's begin with an
image that is perhaps key to what David Walker is trying to tell the
church with this book, the fact that “For many of us, membership is
characterised by the National Trust subscription. We join as a sign
of general support for the aims of the organisation. We are happy to
part with a modest financial contribution towards its work and are
glad to be able to visit its properties once in a while when the urge
takes us. We may even purchase modest mementoes of our visits to take
home or give to our friends. But only a few of us aspire to be
regular volunteers.”
The challenge is
many of the findings David Walker presents run counter to the way
that we would like people of behave and feel.
Most of those
wrestling with the future of the church and its mission are “regular
volunteers” and we want people to respond to the church in a
similar way because we assume that we are “normal” but for most
people that is probably not going to happen. The question is how we
engage with that wider group who have faith, and even feel a
connection to the church, but who don't see belonging in terms of
being on the rota...
For example, in his
surveys David Walker finds that a significant number feel “It
wouldn't be the same to attend a service in another church.” with
very strong support for statements about attachment to the building,
therefore he concludes that “Place was evidently an important, if
not the primary, aspect for the vast majority” of those responding.
We would like people to be footloose, therefore if we close a church
and consolidate resources, we see no reason for anyone to complain –
we are offering the same God therefore the venue should be
insignificant – but all the evidence suggests the opposite.
Walker finds that
“Having the same service, at the same time and place, is of huge
importance to our sense of belonging through regular activity.”
This should be no surprise, because while some are clearly over
protective about “their” pew, we can also see a similar sense of
dislocation found in the workplace when you are forced to hot desk,
it comes from a deep seated inclination – we should not blame
people for being creatures of habit, but we might need to help people
manage the desire for the familiar in ways that give space for
welcome of the newcomer who treads on their toes.
And frustratingly as
we embrace an ever increasing range of worship resources Walker also
find that “People who come to church once in a while are more
likely to prefer to find something that hasn't changed too radically
from the last time they turned up.” The addiction to variation that
Common Worship encourages flies in the face of this need, allowing us
to be new every morning – perhaps Common Worship is better used to
allow different churches to find their distinct voices, but having
found that voice they should speak consistently with it.
Linked to this
message “the survey results suggest that the church would be
advised in its teaching and preaching ministry to focus on adding to
the content and meaning with which individuals fill out traditional
terms rather than seeking to replace them.” People find a comfort
in the familiar words, but they may not have embraced the richness of
meaning that can be found within them. In this respect the debate
about the use of the Nicene Creed jumps to my mind, if people
struggle to understand the Creed, they we should seek to share its
meaning better not replace it with intelligible but essentially bland
alternatives.
I think that David's
research encountered those that are generally (and perhaps
arrogantly) termed “dechurched”, they were making connection with
their past engagement with the church. There is an increasing number
of people that have no past with the church to draw on, and so some
of assumptions have a limitation in that respect. However in terms of
outreach, if we want to maximise our impact, the “dechurched”
will be the easiest to reach, church was a habit, lost but not
rejected. Let's perhaps get them more engaged before we set ourselves
the harder task of getting the “unchurched”? And it could be a
win-win situation, as “in preparing fresh, challenging and
interactive forms of worship, the use of rather more traditional
material will enhance the worship experience for both occasional and
regular churchgoers.”
The recently
reported rise in attendance at Choral Evensong speaks to this
dynamic. As someone who returned to regular church going, as a
student, via Choral Evensong, I think one of the keys to why it was a
positive experience was that it allowed you to feel without demanding
you to “think” (and nothing to do with the aesthetic appeal of
the gentlemen of the choir). As a student, and now as a civil
servant, so much of life involves having a head full of words and
mental gymnastics so to say I come to church to “be” rather than
to “think” is not to identify as a troglodyte. Lord save us from
unthinking Christians – but worship does not need to be Bible study
or theological seminar, it needs to be an encounter with our
transcendent yet immanent God. So for all the richness of the hymns
of John Bell, and their folksy language, they often require the
intellectual side of your brain to be engaged and so pass me by –
in contrast to something like Taizé where the chant becomes you,
words of praise can become as instinctive as breathing.
Overall I enjoyed
this book because it was basically talking about people like me, but
we are all on a spectrum, if you are somewhere else on the curve it
could well be a book filled with frustration – we are not right and
wrong, we are just different and yet thankfully equal in the embrace
of God's love.
As a ps I will
mention that when he reflects on his vocation David suggests that he
was called to ordination in part “because of my weakness... I
wasn't sure I was up to the demands of holding a secular career and
being a committed follower of Jesus Christ at the same time.” and
interesting and playful idea...
