How Does Corporate Worship Impact Pastoral Care?

The thoughts shared below were delivered at an informal gathering at the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. Roman Catholic ordinands from Maynooth seminary joined our own students for an evening of fellowship and dialogue around the theme of pastoral care and liturgical worship. The meeting was conceived and convened by CITI’s inter-seminary representative, Abigail Sines.




Accessed from vannw.org.

Abi has asked me to share a few thoughts on the link between pastoral care and liturgical/corporate worship. The first thing I ought to say is that I’m not a liturgist – I primarily teach Missiology and do not have a liturgical background. Indeed, my PhD is in Systematics where the focus of my work was the Augustinian theology of Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI. However, I do teach a module on Pastoral Studies and there we have explored the link between liturgy/ritual/corporate worship and pastoral care. It’s on that basis that Abigail has asked me to participate briefly tonight.


You are probably aware of this already, but Anglicanism is not a monochrome tradition. There are three recognisable theological streams or ways of thinking within Anglicanism that have been traditionally designated Catholic, Evangelical and Liberal. Of course, the distinction is not as absolute as that, in that many Anglicans combine elements of two or three of these in their own spirituality or faith perspective. However, within Anglicanism, there are styles of worship which can more definitively reflect just one of these traditions. Most of you will be aware that some expressions of Anglo-Catholic worship can look and feel very like Roman Catholic worship (show powerpoint). However, for the sake of giving you a sense of the broadness of Anglicanism, and some exposure to the less Catholic parts of our denomination, I shall include in my comments tonight some reference to Evangelical/charismatic style worship which sometimes has its own very unique way of linking corporate worship to pastoral care.


Before jumping ahead of myself, though, let me say that tonight I am offering just three reflections to help set the ball rolling. The first reflection is that there can be a perceived conflict between ‘pastoral care’ and liturgy/corporate worship. Those most engaged in the debate tend to caricature the other position and trumpet its irrelevance. The American Lutheran scholar, Elaine Ramshaw, whom I think has written one of the key books on ritual and pastoral care, summed up the conflict very well. She wrote,


We all know too well the truths that give rise to these counter-accusations. Ritual can indeed be formalist, distancing, insensitive to the specificity or pace of the individual’s needs, intent on enforcing a procrustean pattern. Equally sadly, even ‘pastoral’ counselling can be privatised, narrowly focussed on the needs of the moment, insufficiently grounded in the depths of the tradition, tone-deaf to mystery.[1]


This observation highlights two things for me. 1. Liturgy can be markedly ineffective in delivering pastoral care. There’s a joke told on the Alpha course about a young boy who was brought to church for the first time. He found the service somewhat uninspiring and took to looking at the church’s in-door decoration to pass the time. Spotting a plaque which recorded the names of soldiers who had died in the two World Wars, the boy asked his father what it was.
‘Those are the names of those who died in the services,’ the father replied. ‘Well, did they die in the Morning Service or the Evening Service?’ asked the boy.


Worship led in a perfunctory way by the priest or minister, or in a way that simply does not connect with the pastoral concerns of those who come seeking meaning from their worship experience, does little to minister to pastoral need. The whole media-dominated world that young people grow up in today means that worship that does not seem to connect, or do anything for the participant, will more easily be written-off. That no doubt is at least partially the problem of the person going to worship, but it does not minimise the fact that in a rapidly de-churching age, it is very bad news for the church.
The other observation is that pastoral care of the individual is not always best done in the domain of one-to-one pastoral nurture. Walter Brueggemann in an essay entitled ‘The Transformative Power of the Pastoral Office’ argues that ‘pastoral care is essentially a liturgical enterprise.’ Interestingly, that American Lutheran theologian whom I’ve already cited, Elaine Ramshaw, reaches the same conclusion. The argument is that worship can provide a new way or a different way of understanding reality, a set of symbols around which people can reorganise their lives. While that is a theoretical stance, there’s a fascinating article by Paul Anderson entitled ‘Giving glory to God is good for the giver’ which talks, using real-life examples of how involvement in liturgy/corporate worship, can have a profound pastoral impact. One example he gave was of a young man who did not have serious psychological problems per se, but who was just too focussed on himself. It was said of him that he regularly turned conversations toward his concerns and would serve others only when it was convenient for him. However, after a few months involvement with the church it became apparent that his attachment to self had significantly diminished. That he paid more attention to others, spoke around their agendas rather than his own, and generally showed a lot more concern for their interest and needs.


What made the difference? The answer the young man gave was that ‘By praying daily and worshipping weekly, I became more aware of my self-centredness.’ The comment Anderson makes is that ‘Sometimes struggling people will find help only when they begin to look outside themselves towards heaven. Worship, because it focuses outward, can bring a healthy corrective to narcissism, as it did for my young friend. One cannot truly worship God and be fixated on one’s self.’
So worship and liturgy can be ineffective in meeting pastoral needs, but they can also have a huge impact by transforming the worldview of the worshipper. That’s my first reflection.
The second reflection is that pastoral care is achieved in a worship context when the way the worship is conducted and experienced, bonds the members together in community. Community, togetherness, a sense of unity in worship is innately healing. Ramshaw argues that worship can be enacted in such a way that it genuinely does create and nurture community. The key is active participation. The more widely and actively people participate in a ritual, the more they experience it as their own, as part of their identity, the more they will be connected to others and connected to the God whom they seek to worship.


Her observation is that what is really needed is a church community which corporately performs this ‘work of the people’. Enthusiastic participation in the hymn singing and liturgical songs, active engagement with the intercessions, and the Peace shared in an attitude of openness towards fellow worshippers and so on, will all help to make real community possible in the context of worship.
How is that kind of communal involvement achieved? From my own personal standpoint, it’s achieved not via the anonymity of the priest in the worship context, but by the lead that he gives. The notion of truth through personality is quite key to making worship pastorally relevant, I believe. Having ministered in unchurched England, I’m aware that the lack of community in worship is a huge pastoral deficit. When people are not used to church, it’s pretty vital that they experience through the worship leader and the community of faith already present, something of the reality of the God whom they’re being invited to encounter.


This leads me to my third and final reflection. It’s based mainly on personal experience within a charismatic/evangelical parish in England. Worship combined with music and led by those who are genuinely worshipping themselves, can sometimes have a profound and unusual spiritual impact. Take the example of Vaughn, (rugby player, entirely unchurched and not his real name), who found himself weeping profoundly at the end of a service and realising that he had ignored spiritual questions which he should have been addressed. The church responded by offering a six week evangelism course followed by a Confirmation course. Vaughn engaged radically with it and not only got confirmed but ended up becoming the church warden a few years later.


There’s an odd little text in Paul (1 Corinthians 14:24-25) where Paul describes the church community prophesying (whatever that may be) and the unbeliever having the thoughts of his heart laid bare. The response of that person, claims Paul, is that he will recognise that God is really among them. While it’s not the same scenario, it is still a depiction of a reality experienced in worship which helps the unbeliever to recognise the presence of God.


I am aware of the downside of this approach, but to me there can be an experience of God in corporate worship, particularly the more charismatic variety, which enables people to sense his presence and know something of his reality. The Catholic lay theologian, Ralph P Martin, in his book The Worship of God suggested that the act of praise is a ‘dialogue, involving the interchange of the divine initiative and the human response. Worship pulsates with a two-beat rhythm expressed simply as ‘we come to God’ and ‘God comes to us.’ The charismatic renewal, for all its excesses, helped create something which enabled people to enter into that kind of dialogue with God.


Some questions for reflection


1. Do these thoughts in any way echo your own experience within Catholicism?


2. The Eucharist has not been mentioned directly, what role might it play with regard to fostering pastoral care?


3. Does the idea of ‘truth through personality’ place too much responsibility on the leader of worship?


4. How might worship become more accessible to someone who was de-churched or unchurched?




[1] Elaine Ramshaw, Ritual and Pastoral Care (Philadelphia: Augsburg Fortress, 1987), p.14. }

Group Processes in Church

 

This is the final post in the Christian Practice in Church module (Pastoral Studies) and its theme is group processes in church. All of what we might want to say about this subject is premised on one indisputable fact: people when functioning as part of a group behave differently than they would as individuals . Thus the post will offer insight on how groups function and the ways in which this may impact on church life. Drawing on the work of Fraser Watts, Rebecca Nye and Sara Savage in Psychology for Christian Ministry we shall explore three major group processes: conformity (i.e. group conformity); social identity (the group as a badge of belonging and what that does to individuals); and group discourse (how particular religious groups – Roman Catholic, Anglo-Catholic, Liberal, Evangelical, Charismatic and so on – have their own form of religious discourse which influences not only how they view the world but how they understand the things of faith). These will shed substantial light on how group thinking can determine aspects of congregational and denominational life.

Conformity

 

 

Conformity takes place when individuals in a congregation or a group change their own viewpoint to agree with the outlook of the majority of the group to which they belong, even though no overt pressure to conform has been exerted. It is a very natural group process. To conform leaves one feeling accepted in a group, to not conform leaves one feeling vulnerable and unsettled.

The power of conformity was well illustrated in a psychological experiment devised by Solomon Asch. Members of a control group were shown a large image on one sheet of paper, and then four smaller images on a second sheet. One of these smaller images was the same as the original large image and participants were asked to match the two images. In the first experiment everyone undertook the exercise individually and only 0.7% of errors were made by this first control group. Thus 99.3% of the answers given were accurate.

The second group of subjects, the experimental group (there were seven of them), were asked to sit in a semi-circle and to give their judgment out loud in the group. In actuality, six of the subjects were undercover confederates, secretly instructed to give certain answers. Only one subject was a real subject, and that person was placed second to last in the line.

The question of interest was: ‘what would the ‘real’ subject do when everyone else gave a wrong answer?

37% of the answers given in that environment were erroneous, even though, if the subjects had done the same experiment on an individual basis, the margin of error would have been negligible. Thus Asch’s experiment revealed that conformity is quite widespread. It is not unusual for people to change their opinions, even distorting their own judgment, when they are at variance with others.

Below are some of the main factors which Watts, Nye and Savage suggest influence conformity.

1. How large the group is.

The more people share the opinion, the more that opinion is likely to seem right.

2. How important the group is to you.

A group of people who are important to you will have more normative influence; it matters whether they reject or accept you.

3. The person’s own concern with being liked.

Personality does have an effect; some people are more sensitive to this than others. Woman are shown to conform more in face-to-face situations.

4. How ambiguous the stimulus is.

The more ambiguous (or mysterious) the stimulus is, the more people will rely on others to tell them what it’s all about.

5. How expert/authoritative others are perceived to be.

The opinions of people judged inadequate to the task can more easily be ignored.

6. Whether or not there is a dissenter in the camp.

A dissenter who offers you social support is a powerful ‘shield’ against the pressure of a majority.

Psychology for Christian Ministry

Given the above set of findings, it is not surprising that churches are viewed as having many of the factors that lead to a high level of conformity. Often they are made up of a large group of people. Usually, the opinions of fellow church members matter quite a lot to those who take their role in church seriously. A sense of belonging is also very important to church members as is an awareness of spiritual need and the desire to find acceptance. Moreover, the stimulus (God) is fairly ambiguous and mysterious, and clergypersons or church leaders are considered to be the experts. Dissenters in church groups are often side-lined or demoted. It is not surprising, therefore, that many people feel it is best to conform in churches, not simply in essential matters of faith, but also in non-essential matters such as the way one talks, dresses and acts.

Group membership badges

Most church cultures display what has been termed GMBs or Group Membership Badges. These are ways of demonstrating that one belongs in that type of church or that one shares that type of spirituality.

Exclamations such as ‘Amen’, ‘Hallelujah’, ‘Praise the Lord’, ‘Glory’ are ways of signalling Pentecostal faith. The vocabulary is a badge of belonging. Similarly, in evangelical/fundamentalist churches the use of terminology such as ‘saved’ or ‘born again’ communicates an insider mentality. In Roman Catholic churches manual actions such as crossing oneself or genuflecting can function as a badge of membership. Other churches display their GMB’s simply through a marked absence of ostentatious language or gestures. Not raising one’s hands in the air can be just as much a GMB as raising one’s hands. What other people do or do not do in church can put an invisible pressure on church members to do likewise.

However, conformity does not just relate to types of vocabulary or liturgical actions. Groups of people also tend to develop unwritten, yet pervasive, sets of norms. In some churches, the unwritten norms are (1) Be nice; (2) Always smile; (c) Never say ‘No’; (4) Pretend everything is okay.

Other church norms might include (1) Behave with decorum; (2) Religion is a private affair; (3) Everything should remain as it is.

Challenging conformity

Jesus on trial. Accessed at myyearofjubilee50.blogspot.com

Most of these norms are not divinely mandated – they are the product of group interaction. The problem is that they take on a religious significance and become a badge of spirituality for those who adhere to them. Watts, Nye and Savage argue that our Christian heritage provides us with the means to challenge conformity in churches. They cite the Gospel’s description of Jesus standing against the groundswell of enthusiasm that followed his healings and miracles. With stringent requirements (e.g. ‘Unless you are willing to carry your cross’) and bewildering, sometimes offensive statements (‘Unless you hate your father and mother, you cannot be my disciple’) Jesus made it difficult for people to follow him unless it was out of a conscienced moral choice. It is the view of Watts, Nye and Savage that the church needs to follow suit and offer the following suggestions for curbing unhealthy conformity in church settings.

* Talking about it - Conformity is so ‘normal’ it can be invisible. Talking about it blows its cover.
 

* Discuss as a church - What are our norms of behaviour, our GMB’s? Are they the norms we want?
 

* Creative changes - As habits and traditions ossify, group norms are more fervently adhered to. Making creative changes in church practice can help break up conformity to social norms.
 

* Theology of grace - Unconditional love strengthens people to know their own worth, and to have the courage to disagree when appropriate.
 

* Admitting weakness - Clergy can be perceived as authoritative, always right, or not brooking consent. Admitting limitations reduces an over-reliance on the leader’s opinion.
 

* Welcoming dissent - Leaders need to reward integrity. One dissenter in the group can be enough to give the others freedom
 

* Conscienced choice not conformity - Seek to influence the people through conscienced choice (minority influence), rather than conformity (majority influence)

For centuries, the church has been able to rely on widespread conformity to vaguely Christian norms - going to church, being seen as avoiding the grosser sins, giving to charities etc. Majority influence has been pervasive but its weakness is that it often results in mere outward actions that can be ‘seen by men.’ Conformity, the influence of the majority, can change outward behaviour, but not necessarily inward conviction. However, we have reached a point where the church is no longer in a position to command majority influence. There is less and less a shared Christian worldview that provides a plausibility structure to support the church’s claims or expectations.

This diminution of the church’s majority influence can very easily be perceived as bad news, but the thing to remember is that it is possible for a minority to exercise influence over a majority. A study by Moscovici and Lage in 1976 found that a minority, although few in number and lacking the kudos of the majority, can turn the tide of majority influence and ‘convert’ inward convictions by their approach and way of being. It is that kind of influence which we would want the church to exert on people. This is achieved, claim the authors, by the church proposing a clear position on the issue at hand; being unified in their position; and, most importantly, holding that position consistently over time, even in the face of a hostile majority.

Questions to consider

* Has someone you know changed their behaviour or thinking radically to conform with his/her Christian group?

* What are the ways in which you tend to conform in your church or group?

* What would happen if you stopped conforming this way?

* What is valuable in conforming?

* Can conformity be easily distinguished from real ‘conversion’?

* Does our denomination act as an effective minority influence within the two jurisdictions? Why or why not?

Social Identity

Nazi storm-troopers. Accessed at xtimeline.com

The pressure to conform is one example of how we can be influenced by our social circumstances. Another way we can be affected is other people’s view of us becoming part of our own sense of identity.

This can be illustrated in the early years of life and the relationship between a child and her parents.

‘A child’s parents are perceived in god-like proportions; their attitudes and pronouncements towards the child are like powerful statements of fact. As we go through life, we are all reflected back in the mirrors of others’ feelings and responses. We internalise these attitudes and they

become, over time, part of our identity, although its origins are social in nature.’ (Watts, Nye & Savage)

Crucially, the kind of group to whom we belong also plays a part in forming our social identity. This is evidenced in questionnaires where an individual often answers the question ‘who am I?’ with reference to the particular social groups (family, church, class, employment, college, and so on) of which he or she is part. However, there is more to this than simple identification. Our initial perception of the group to which we belong (the in-group) will tend to be positive whilst our perception of an out-group will be negative. Watts et al highlight the tendency to exaggerate both the amount of similarity within certain social groups as well as the dissimilarity between groups. In terms of the former, this is especially the case with how the out-group is perceived. Bad qualities or attitudes are imputed to all members of this group. Likewise, the differences between the two groups are over-emphasised with little attention given to the similarities.

Watts, Nye and Savage offer examples of how these social identity processes (especially the negative perception of outgroups) has damaged church life and church relationships.

Evidences of social identity processes in churches

1. Overt and covert criticism of other churches and denominational practices. (This is a difficult area as admittedly there are unresolved theological disputes between churches, and these cannot simply be dismissed out of a desire for ‘political correctness’. Inter-group discrimination in this sense is evidenced when the focus is only on the areas of dispute, and the areas of commonality is overlooked, or ‘poisoned’ by association. Indeed, the real difficulty is that theological disputes become intertwined with social identity processes, and the two become indistinguishable).

2. Dialogue between churches or groups becomes impossible because the markers of group membership (GMB’s) are considered as a mandatory ‘entrance fee’ before dialogue can even begin.

3. Leaving a church or a group becomes an evidence of ‘backsliding’ because of the group’s assumed superiority.

4. Ending groups or initiatives becomes difficult because of the investment people have made and the esteem needs the group fulfils. Ending equals ‘failure’ and loss of self esteem.

5. Dialogue with other Christian groups is handicapped because of the chasm of misunderstanding (partly a result of the oversimplification of the outgroup, and lack of factual information through selective exposure to belief confirming information).

6. The unity of the church seems to be an impossibility, because it is more pleasant to enjoy the distinctives of one’s own group, and to receive the enhanced positive self-esteem of one’s own group membership confers. To pursue the super-ordinate goal of Christian unity means foregoing some immediate self-esteem benefits.

Questions to Consider

* Begin to think about in-group preferences within your own church or group. Without awareness of in-group preferences we cannot take responsibility for their consequences.
 

* Examine biblical examples when groups overcame the natural desire for negative group bias (e.g. the decision to include Gentiles on an equal basis within the early church).
 

* Change is difficult when we believe that, by it, we have much to lose. What are the benefits to your church/group in maintaining an implicit ‘superiority’ over other churches/groups? Would membership fall off if your church/group was not the ‘best’?
 

* Efforts at ecumenism may backfire if relying on mere contact to bring about unity. Mere contact can simply intensify perceived differences between groups. Can you think of any instances where this has occurred?
 

* Reflect on whether there are mutually negative perceptions between churches/groups in your area.
 

* Reflect on the relative importance of the major commonalities versus the major differences between Christian groups/churches.

Discourse



Martin Luther King. Accessed at xtimeline.com

Pope Benedict XVI. Accessed at catholiclane.com

Billy Graham. Accessed at refdag.nl







 

We have considered conformity and social identity and now we proceed to the final section of our post: religious discourse as a group process.

Without attempting a convoluted description of what that term means, it may suffice to say that it is premised on the belief that the language we use shapes the way we interpret reality (i.e. those things we choose to think about and emphasise determine our world view.)

When we look at spoken (or written) language with that notion in mind, we can start to ask what is happening in this discourse? Why is this aspect of reality being emphasised, and not that one? How is this discourse persuading me to think? Charismatic, liberal, evangelical, fundamentalist, Roman Catholic, and other expressions of Christianity all create their own discourses (using language to depict reality in a certain way.) Moreover, each specific religious discourse has the effect of making thinking some thoughts easy and ‘self-evident’. At the same time, it can make thinking other thoughts more difficult, either because there are not the words or concepts to describe them in the discourse that is being employed, or because those thoughts have been denigrated in that discourse.

Religious discourse and social identity

Discourses also serve to reinforce social identities, underscoring the values and truths which are key to the particular religious community. For example, liberal religious discourse focuses on the theme of justice and the liberty and rights of the individual in the here and now. Roman Catholic discourse might focus on the need for a final and undisputable authority with regard to doctrine and morality.

What follows now are two examples of Christian religious discourse which tell us much about the values and convictions of certain ‘versions’ of evangelical and charismatic Christianity (see attached documents). These are not made up discourses. Take some time to read the material.

Thoughts on evangelical and charismatic discourse

The church historian David Bebbington conducted an historical survey of evangelicalism in Britain and identified four main traits common to evangelicalism. It is interesting to note that the sample discourse displays all four characteristics.

Conversionism (the desire for radical and decisive personal transformations)

Biblicism (the Bible as central and authoritative)

Activism (an emphasis on action in the world)

Crucicentrism (a strong focus on the event and meaning of Christ’s crucifixion)

But there is more involved in the outworking of this particular discourse. The speaker seeks to establish the identity of evangelicalism, draw firm boundaries around it and uncompromisingly assert its values and norms. He does that, as happens in most discourses, by certain rhetorical devices. Most pertinently, he creates black and white contrasts designed to make the listener overwhelmingly convinced of his own position.

Of course, evangelical discourse is not alone in trying to persuade its listeners. This is the goal of any persuasive communication. Evangelical discourse, like other discourses, achieves the aims of establishing identity, persuading hearers to make a decision, presenting reality in a certain way, and legitimating itself.

Let us now look briefly at the example of charismatic discourse cited.

According to Watts et al, charismatic discourse has four main characteristics: emphasis on the subjective and experiential; concreteness and anthropomorphism; emotionality and warmth; and a focus on the miraculous and the supernatural. We see them below contrasted with evangelical discourse.

Evangelical discourse                                                     Charismatic discourse

conversionism                                                              subjective/emotional validation

biblicism                                                                  concreteness/anthropomorphism

activism                                                                             emotion and warmth

crucicentrism                                                                                 miracles

 

                                                                    

 

In contrast to evangelical discourse, which invites listeners to make a decision based on ‘rational’ criteria, charismatic discourse invites listeners into an experience, an experience of God that is subjectively validated. Statements about the outcome of the mission are experiential rather than empirical, and sound rather vague (eg. ‘God showed up in power’) Objective criteria or any solid proof, are not required.

There is concreteness and immediacy of expression (eg. ‘We spoke, we prayed and God showed up in power … God’s power flowed through them’; also, God is presented in anthropomorphic terms: ‘Lord you have spoken to us and to others and you have said …’).

Emotionality is another feature of charismatic discourse. Things are often described in terms of highs and lows. Conversion to the ideas being presented happens not so much through concrete choice as friendliness and emotional osmosis.

Although not as apparently adversarial as evangelical discourse, charismatic discourse legitimates itself and presents itself as unassailable through its identification with God’s activity. Evidences of the miraculous run throughout. What is important is that God is the one seen to be active, not humans.

Baptist theologian Nigel Wright observes that there are few categories or terms within charismatic discourse to describe natural human processes. The world is presented largely in terms of spiritual forces. Complex realities (such as the political and economic situation in Nicaragua) are presented in terms of spiritual dualism: God versus the powers of darkness. ‘You are part of the battle force that is building God’s Kingdom in Nicaragua and throughout the world.’ With so few basic categories of thought, it is easy to overlook natural or social causes of events. For example, human realities such as poor planning are not taken into consideration as they don’t fall neatly into the two extremes of ‘God’ versus ‘Not God’’. The summary of the trip was ‘This is not us, it is God.’

Questions to consider

* How would you describe the discourse of your church or theological group?
 

* What is this discourse trying to achieve? Often the explicit aims are lofty, such as the ‘salvation of souls.’ What are the implicit aims?
 

* How does your discourse evaluate itself and others? ‘How does it construct ‘we are good and they are bad?’
 

* How might your discourse be perceived by those outside? Does it exclude them? Can they understand it, or does it sound bizarre?’
 

* Hypothetically, if the speakers of the two excerpts of evangelical and charismatic discourse were in dialogue, what points might they disagree upon?
 

* Just because discourses are not neutral does not mean they are wrong and untrustworthy. It does mean that they exert influence, and we need to be aware of their potentially oppressive nature. What are the ways in which religious discourses can ‘oppress’?
 

* Could we ever be free of the explicit aims of discourse? Is it possible for the way we speak and write to be completely neutral?

Conclusion

The following two citations from Watts, Nye and Savage offer a fitting conclusion to the journey we have taken.

‘It is important to note that we are not reducing church to a mere nexus of social psychological processes. The spiritual intertwines with the human. Nevertheless, it is to be expected that social processes occur in church.

Conformity, ingroup preference, and discourse both enable and constrain church life. In valuing human freedom, it is important for the church to speak openly about the constraining effects of conformity.’

‘Jesus’ use of parables was a masterful bid against the constraining effects of discourse (e.g. The Good Samaritan). Jesus used language in order to make people think for themselves, rather than to legitimate his own position. In following Christ, churches need to become self-aware and responsible in their use of language, and to encourage creative modes of thinking that challenge the inevitable effects of conformity, our sense of social identity and negative expressions of our group discourse.’

How Adults Learn: Methodology

 Welcome to this final post on Adult Learning where we will be focusing mainly on the methodology of Adult Learning.  A comment to bear in mind for this session is the observation made by Pont in Developing Effective Training Skills that there is no definite correlation between teaching and learning. 

How learning takes place

Norma Cook Everist (2002) maintains that “[h]ow we teach teaches as powerfully as what we teach” (103), that “[t]he method a teacher uses does not just convey content; it becomes the experience”.  She suggests as an example of this, that to teach gifts within the body of Christ through the exclusive use of lectures subtly implies that learners have no gifts of their own with which to teach the community.  Be aware, therefore, that your style of teaching can colour the whole experience of learning.

 

Rev. Dr. Tim Keller, a premiere contemporary communicator. Accessed at gospelcoalition.org

 

In the previous post I suggested that every session should have clear learning objectives.  The reason why this is vital is that when those objectives are worked out we can better guage which methods will best achieve the objectives. Before exploring this question more directly take a few minutes to consider the following questions.

Exercise:  Reflect on the variety of methods which are used to teach adults. 

Which of these methods do you use most? 

Which do you tend to avoid because you are less comfortable with them?  

What has been your best and worst experience of adult education?

Key factors in selecting appropriate methods: Below is a checklist of the vital things to bear in mind as you plan a teaching interaction.  The accompanying diagram matches methodology with a range of different teaching objectives.

• objectives - learner outcomes
• the nature of the information or skill to be learned 
• facilities, equipment, and resources
• learners’ characteristics and backgrounds
• desired level of interaction
• available time

 

Learner Goals/Objectives	Applicable Teaching Methods
Knowledge: Goal is to gain an awareness of and internalize “new” information and make generalizations about experiences.	Lecture/presentation Panel discussion Symposium/conference Visuals: films, slides, etc. Resource Person (subject matter specialist) Tours Field trips
Understanding: Goal is to gain an understanding of “new” information and apply the newly gained information to current problems or situations.	Group discussion Demonstration Problem solving activity Case study
Skill Attainment: Goal is to learn “new” ways of performing a skill through guided practice.	Demonstration Exercise/practicum Role-play Simulation Computer-aided instruction
Attitude/Value Modification: Goal is to modify or adopt “new” feelings or beliefs by experiencing greater success with the “new” versus the “old” feelings or beliefs.	Panel discussion Group discussion Debate Role-play Case study Simulation Lecture/presentation

Implications:

Learning is enhanced through variety and the use of many teaching methods.

Attention and motivation are increased

There is greater retention of new knowledge/skills 

As Pont reminds us, learners retain about

10% of what they read

20% of what they hear

30% of what they see

50% of what they both hear and see

70% of what they say

90% of what they say and do

But it is also about the facilitator/teacher

The characteristics of the teacher influence the learning outcomes as well. Below is a selection of gifts and qualities which make for a good adult educator.

Adult educators ...

• view themselves as participating in a dialogue between equals (how do we know this is happening?) 
• are open to change and new experiences/seeking to learn from them. 
• are genuine in entering into personal relationships with learners rather than consistently adhering to the prescribed role of the teacher (how is this quality expressed by the teacher?) 
• accept and trust the learner as a person of worth (what has helped you feel that a teacher views you in that way?)
• have empathy (nonjudgmental understanding, both intellectual and emotional) for the learner's perspective (how is this best expressed?)

A final caution
 

Before we preview the exercises that will happen during the weekend, the following point needs to be reiterated.  Whilst presenting information to a large group in a lecture format is helpful because you can give the same information to everyone at one time and provide factual information, there are many disadvantages, and these need taken note of for your own ministry:

• they are over-used- therefore producing passive, dependent learners
• they are predictable- student interest and creativity dies
• lectures are compelling for the lecturer
• lectures provide only one point of view
• lecture engages only the ears 
• they proceed at one pace, which is determined by the lecturer. This is unlikely to suit everyone
• because interaction is one way, feedback is difficult
• “They are a strain on the weak, short-term memory capacities of adult learners” (Pont 2003:91)

Exercise in groups

For each of the following methods, describe a situation in the life of the Church, when it might be appropriate to use it:

Lecture. 

Demonstration

Discussion

Case Study

Role-play

Mentoring

Journalling

Problem solving

Group Task:

In groups of three or four produce a teaching plan for a thirty minute presentation on one of the following two themes. Drawing on what you have learnt about Adult Education explain which methods you would use and why? What outcome/s would you seek to achieve? Who you would involve? What media you would use and how you would elicit a response from the congregation.  Assume that your listeners have some familiarity with the theme of the presentation and that this is not the only time the subject has been addressed in Church.

Scenario 1. You wish to set up a support programme for new immigrants living within the parish boundary. This may involve the teaching of English and/or the provision of social activities for the socially isolated.

Scenario 2. You wish to promote the creation of a Fresh Expression of church or church plant in a school within your parish. This will involve recruiting a team of volunteers from the congregation and also the curate devoting most of his or her time to this project. 

Concluding Question:

In what ways will your practice be different because of today?

Liturgy & Pastoral Care

 The purpose of this post is to explore the relationship between liturgy and pastoral care. One of the most relevant texts in this regard is Elaine Ramshaw’s publication, Ritual and Pastoral Care.  In this study she makes the claim that “the paradigmatic [or model] act of pastoral care is presiding at the worship of the assembly”. (13)

 

Liturgical theologian, Elaine Ramshaw. Accessed from btfo2009.blogspot.com

An insightful pastoral incident

She gives a clue as to why she takes this view when she cites in the opening page of the book an incident involving a pastor she knows who had the practice of celebrating the eucharist weekly.  The incident to which she refers happened in a church where he had recently begun to minister.  It had come to his attention after a month or so that a particular woman in the congregation never received Communion.  However, about three months after his installation the woman for the very first time came forward and partook of the bread and wine.  When the minister talked to her afterwards she confirmed that this was the first time that she had gone to Communion since he had taken over and moreover, that she had not been to the table for many years.  Long ago she had gone through an acrimonious divorce and felt that her anger at her husband and her inability to forgive him had been an obstacle to her coming to the Lord’s Table.

‘But’, she went on to explain, ‘the way you celebrate is so hospitable, it made it difficult for me not to come.’  ‘Through every tone and gesture’, Ramshaw says, ‘my friend made it irresistibly clear that the whole service led to that table sharing where the community was united, so that finally she just couldn’t stay away.’ 

Her purpose in telling that story is that she saw it as an excellent illustration of the way pastoral care can be accomplished in and through ritual action. Now this is where our discussion has particular relevance to the essay on funerals. Ramshaw acknowledges that discussions about pastoral care in recent times have usually given ritual short shrift. That is, it has been down-played or even dismissed as an expression of pastoral care. In Ramshaw’s words, 

The public liturgical role of the pastor has often been dissociated from the ‘private’, individualized, counseling role that is considered the essence of pastoral care. However, she entirely disagrees with that perception of ritual. In her view it is the paradigmatical act of pastoral care. I am going to cite the full quotation and I am sure you will gain a greater sense of the point that she is trying to make.

'It is my conviction that the paradigmatic act of pastoral care is the act of presiding at the worship of the gathered community, and that this priority in no way contravenes the importance of the one-on-one, ‘private,’ counseling-oriented dimension of pastoral care or the psychological insights that today inform that dimension. Rather the pastoral act of liturgical leadership supports this as well as other dimensions of pastoral caring, giving them the focus and experiential quality that clearly defines them as ‘pastoral’.'

Part of what Ramshaw is saying here – is that when pastoral care in the more ‘one-to-one’ sense is complemented by the meaningful use of ritual,  the pastoral experience can be imbued with a sense of community and even of the transcendent.  Imagine, for instance, a pastoral retreat where the participants share the eucharist together in an informal celebration that allows them to express their care for each other and their common worship of God.

Interestingly, the perspective of this American Lutheran theologian was present in the thought of a German Catholic liturgical expert of a previous generation,  Fr Josef Jungmann, who similarly believed that liturgy, when it was actively engaged in, could have profound pastoral effects.  Addressing the First International Congress of Pastoral Liturgy at Assisi in 1956, and speaking specifically about the historical impact of the liturgy, he underscored his point by reminding his audience that, ‘The living liturgy, actively participated in, was itself for centuries the most important form of pastoral care.’

Activity: Spend a little time reflecting on an experience of liturgy or ritual that was beneficial pastorally in your own life? What made the experience a good one? 

The pastoral function of liturgical worship

Typical mainline worship service. Accessed at gracelutheranlibertyville.org



Given the positive place that some theologians give to liturgy as a means of pastoral care, I want us to think very concretely about ways in which church services can function pastorally and about why this is so.  To do this task more effectively it will helpful to address the question,  ‘What is worship?’ 

1.Worship as Service to God:  Many Christian communities have understood worship to be a service to God, a duty which his people perform as an act of obedience to the One who is the source of their life and salvation. The word worship carries with it the idea of ascribing to God the worth that is His right.

In many of our traditions we pray that God will accept our worship as a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, and this language of sacrifice is another way of talking about worship as service. Just as in the OT sacrifice was a sign of devotion to God, today when we talk about worship as a sacrifice it is operating in a similar way- a sign that we offer all that we have and are to God.

A potential difficulty or anomaly here is that while service or obedience to God is crucial to worship – our efforts in this regard do not earn us God’s favour.  They neither diminish nor increase the love that God has for us.  Ironically, though, our worship or service will do us good.

2.Worship as the mirror of heaven. For many Christians worship is an attempt to capture the worship of God which takes place eternally in heaven. Ceaseless praise is our ultimate human destiny. In giving ourselves over to worship now we are preparing ourselves for our ultimate vocation.  Of course, saying this, it must be acknowledged that we still have no real idea yet of what heaven will be like. We do, however, in a meaningful act of worship receive a glimpse of the Kingdom and are strengthened in our desire to live for that Kingdom and bring it into being.

3. Worship as affirmation: Many Christians believe that the primary focus of worship is to affirm, support and inspire Christians. Living the Christian life is challenging - but in worship we touch again the ground of our belief, and in do doing so are able to renew the struggle against the classic enemies of faith – the world, the flesh and the Devil. However, even this interpretation of worship has hidden difficulties. It is a markedly ‘insider’ affair with little attention being given to those who may as yet be outsiders. It is also a very comfortable understanding of worship which assumes that it is simply about being affirmed and never being shaken or challenged.

4. Worship as communion   In worship we make our relationship with God and with the Christian community visible. In this view worship forms and sustains essential relationships.  There is a recognition that we were created for relationship by God, and to express that relationship in every way possible is both God’s deepest desire and our highest calling. When he writes to Christians in Corinth, Paul is concerned that they understand that worship is meant to strengthen the Body (1 Cor 14: 26). Willimon puts it like this “If the community does not worship, it is not a Christian community. If worship does not upbuild and sustain the community it is not Christian worship” (1979:20)

5. Worship as proclamation:  Seen from another vantage point, the heart of Christian faith is to proclaim the good news of God in Christ. Worship is the public place where Christians gather to make that public proclamation and witness.

1 Peter 2:9 “You are a chosen race a royal priesthood a holy nation Gods people, in order that you might proclaim the mighty acts of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light”

Of course, a potential difficulty with this as the predominant model of worship is that worship must also be about listening as well as speaking. Moreover proclamation can end up sidelining God in favour of the target audience who are the recipients of the proclamation.  It was Tozer decades ago who identified that forms of worship, especially Evangelical worship, were in danger of displacing God as the central focus in favour of the sermon.  

Activity: Which of these definitions of worship are most significant in your understanding of worship?

Let us re-cap what we have been saying about the link between worship or liturgy and pastoral care. When human beings worship, God meets with them and they encounter him. As they offer all that they are to God, certain that nothing is beyond God’s knowledge or interest, he meets them and ministers to them.  In other words, God is at work through services of worship to care for His people, to remind them of His love and to challenge them to commitment or service. There is thus, at least potentially, a dynamic, closely integrated relationship between worship and pastoral care.  Of course, liturgy can also be repetitive and lifeless, but there is the promise of something more when real engagement takes place. 

The experience of worship functioning as pastoral care

Here are just a few examples of worship functioning as pastoral care. McDevitt, Dosen and Ryan (2006) describe a situation in 2005 where 23 schools in the Archdiocese of Chicago had to be closed down. This action affected 500 school teachers and over 4,000 school children and there was huge angst and pain for those affected.  The archdiocese was concerned that resources were made available to help the children cope with their feelings of loss.  A key part of all that was done was an act of worship which included prayer and reflection on the theme of the wounded healer.  There was also an invitation for each participant to offer a prayer of blessing for another person at their table.  This act was no mere sharing of pain but rather it was each one involved allowing his or her own experience of being wounded to soften his or her heart toward the other in his or her woundedness.  The opportunity for participants to minister to one another was a powerful closing to the day and something that helped the children and teachers profoundly.

A second example is a service of naming and thanksgiving for a child who had been stillborn many years before. The elderly lady for whom the service was conducted had never seen her baby (it had been taken to the incinerator by a nurse) nor had there been any acknowledgment that the child had had an identity. Although the vicar who took the service was not deeply engaged – the ritual which involved naming the child brought profound emotional release and healing for both the woman and her husband.

  

A third example which I want us to spend some time reflecting on,  in class involves a service developed by the Methodist Church in Ireland for use with those who had been victims of the Troubles.  The activity outlined below will be undertaken during the weekend session.

Activity: Take a copy and in groups examine how it might function pastorally, suggesting ways in which God might use that service to minister His care to suffering individuals.

Glebsch and Jaekle say that pastoral care has four main functions. These are healing, sustaining, guiding and reconciling. While there are many means through which these functions may be expressed, the point of this post is to affirm and utilize the fact that worship is one channel through which pastoral care may be offered.  Elaine Ramshaw in her book examines the basic human needs which she believes are met by ‘healthy ritual practice.’ 

Prayer for healing. Accessed at wau.org

 

 

1. A need to establish order: We all need stability, order and the reassurance of continuity in our lives.  Anyone who doubts that that need has only to observe a toddler for a week.  

Even though little children show great creativity and spontaneity, it remains true that they have an insatiable need for ritualization. The story must be read with the same words, the same inflection, and the same ritualized question–and-answer exchanges. The passion with which children insist on sameness shows their need for order, stability, and the reassurance of continuity in human interaction. 

And what is true of the toddler, is true of the pensioner and, true indeed, of everyone else. We need to know what is stable, what is reliable,  what is not subject to the pressures that make everything else around us change. Worship, especially services of worship which follow a particular pattern, can provide continuity and order in a rapidly changing world.  

Ramshaw tells us that the mistake of many pastors is to read all resistance to liturgical innovation as rigidity, and to mock the conservative impulse. The reality is that the need for order and continuity is fundamental to the way that liturgy or ritual works. Thus when people say, ‘We have always done it that way,’  it is not simply unwarranted resistance to much needed innovation, it can be the expression of a felt need for continuity in a rapidly changing world. ‘If my life has been turned upside down by redundancy, or divorce, or my children leaving home, it is still the case that in my experience of ritual or liturgy I am secure and there is a sense of order.’ Ramshaw argues that anyone who does not have deep respect for that hunger for continuity should not be meddling with other people’s ritual practice. 

However, Ramshaw is not advocating that nothing should be changed or that the ideal mindset is blind adherence to rigidly fixed liturgical forms. In her view,  absolute rigidity is a perversion of the purpose of ritual.  There is, and needs to be, scope for innovation and development but the introduction of change in ritual practice should be gradual and respectful of the need for continuity of practice. She sums her view up in these words, ‘[Healthy ritualization provides] the stability of a dependable context within which variance can delight.’ 

2. The need to reaffirm meaning: Another function of ritual is that it can communicate meaning.  Ramshaw puts it like this,  ‘…all ritualization communicates some sort of meaning, even if that meaning is as simple a message as ‘I will act as expected of me in this situation.’ What is invariably the case with formal rituals is that they carry the core meanings of the social group performing them, the meanings which determine that group’s world view.

Symbols in ritual make a tremendous impact.  Whether it be the cross on the wall of a church, or the act of giving bread and wine, or the veneration and reading of the Sacred Text,  individuals express the deepest meanings they know, and often meanings that are deeper than they consciously know, in their expression of ritual.  Ramshaw has a wonderful summary statement that tells us much about how ritual functions for us.

The human need to make sense of experience is universal and fundamental. Faced with the biggest questions of life and death, love and evil, the origin and destiny of the universe, we cannot pin down an answer in logical formulas. We turn to symbolic expressions of our trust in that which grounds the goodness in our experience and shapes the tradition in which we make our meanings.

3.The need to bond community: A third function of ritual is to bond community.  Indeed, following Durkheim, many sociologists and anthropologists have seen social bonding as the central purpose of religious and civil ritual.  Shared symbols and shared action focused on those symbols are thought to bond a community together through both the appearance and the experience of acting as one.

However, Ramshaw is aware that there is something problematic about making that claim for the church context and its ritual. She states that many churches seek to build community through community-building activities and programmes, but that they do not recognize that the sacramental or the worship life of the Church as the primary place to build community. As she puts it, ‘A congregation may form geographical ‘clusters’ or plan elaborate social events and never consider how its ritual life contributes to community.’

And that point is illustrated in the way that certain things can be done. She asks, what does it mean that people are initiated into the community in private services with only immediate family present? Or why in certain churches is the eucharist only celebrated four times a year when it is meant to be the sacrament of unity.  Her point is that there should not be a sharp dividing line between the ritual and the ‘social’ life of the church and that our instinct should be to find ways of uniting or combining them. As she puts it,

The point intended here is not an opposition between ritual and nonritual dimensions of community-making, but rather a reminder that whatever else we do together, the core of our communal identity is enacted in worship.

It is Ramshaw’s view that ritual can be enacted in such a way that it genuinely does create or nurture community.  The key is active participation. The more widely and actively people participate in a ritual, the more they experience it as their own, as part of their identity, and the more connected they tend to feel to the other participants.  The worse case scenario is where people go to church to simply hear the preacher and merely to tolerate the rest of the service. That is bound to make any accompanying liturgy or ritual action ineffective for creating community.

What is really needed is a church community which corporately performs this ‘work of the people’, enthusiastically participating in the hymn singing and liturgical songs,  actively engaging with the intercessions, sharing the peace with warmth and openness towards their fellow worshippers, contributing creative skills to the decoration of the church, taking on roles as readers or intercessors, contributing a singing or musical gift, and so on and so on.  When ritual or liturgy has that level of participation, then real community becomes possible.

Activity: reflect on a church setting where worship, liturgy or ritual helped create a sense of community?

4. The need to handle conflicting emotions: Ramshaw notes that one of the greatest threats to order, meaning and community in human life is the disruptive impact of ambivalent or conflicting feelings. Our love can be coloured by jealousy,  our caring by resentment, our respect by envy and our sympathy by disdain. As fallen creatures we are limited in our virtues. The old Reformed theologians deployed the very unappealing phrase ‘total depravity’ to sum up this paradox in our natures. The phrase was never meant to mean that we were as bad as we possibly could be. It meant that every aspect of our being without exception was coloured by sin. No part of us escaped the virus, so to speak. We were in that sense ‘totally’ depraved.

It is Ramshaw’s contention that there are two ways in which the use of ritual helps us to handle this conflict or ambivalence in our feelings.  The first way is by reinforcing the preferred positive emotion and the second by containing the expression of the unwanted, conflicting emotion.  The rituals of our churches, like many formal ceremonies, use the first method of dealing with ambivalence extensively, emphasizing and reaffirming the appropriate emotional attitudes.  Think about the Confession and the Peace as ritual acts which nurture positive attitudes and feelings. 

However, church rituals, according to Ramshaw, are much less successful at providing occasions to express conflicting emotional attitudes. This is sad because the Bible itself, particularly the Psalms and the Book of Job, gives much more freedom of expression than any of our normal liturgies do. Freedom to be angry, even with God. Freedom to question. Freedom to lament that which has been lost. Interestingly, the worship song by Matt Redmond (Blessed be your name) probably allows more freedom to express loss and pain than most of our set prayers. (Play You Tube of Redmond’s performance of this with the London Community Gospel Choir).  Ramshaw’s words are very opportune at this point in summing up ritual’s capacity to help us deal with our feelings of ambivalence,

In theological terms, we need to remember that biblical faith is not defined by suppressing one’s doubt and protest, but by addressing one’s trust and doubt and praise and protest to God as if it mattered supremely to do so.’ (p.33)

5. The need for life cycle rites: It’s at this point in the lecture that I want us to think about how liturgy or ritual aid ‘rites of passage’, particularly funerals, as these are the most painful and tragic of all rites of passage. 

However, before I talk specifically about funerals it may be helpful to say a bit more about what we mean by ‘rites of passage.’ The term was coined by the anthropologist Arnold Van Gennup in his book of the same name, first published in 1909.  For him, rites of passage were rites or ritual actions which accompany the passage of a person from one social status to another in the course of his or her life. The typical rites of passage are those that accompany birth, the attainment of adult status, marriage and death.

Arnold Van Gennep. Accessed at massivnews.com

Accessed at press.uchicago.edu

 

When Van Gennup looked at rituals related to such crises as death he saw three phases in these ‘rites of passage’: separation, transition, and reincorporation.  William Willimon believes that if we analyse the formal and informal rituals that surround death, we can group them around these three parts of a rite of passage. When a loved one dies, the bereaved experience a feeling of separation. The dead person is not there in his familiar chair nor at the dinner table in the evening, and the living begin the painful process of separating themselves from the dead.  The rituals that surround the wake, viewing of the body (should this happen), the graveside service, even the actual lowering of the coffin and sprinkling of soil on the lid, can all be visible, acted means of coming to terms with the separation of death.  To avoid such separation (perhaps by neglect of the rituals) is to postpone a necessary first step in the grief process and to run the risk of prolonging the pain of grief.

The second part of the rite of passage that surrounds death is the process of transition.  The person going through grief often experiences a time of limbo where their whole life is on hold and the world seems to stop. The person is dealing with what anthropologist Victor Turner calls ‘liminality’, the ordeal of moving across one of life’s significant boundaries. One day a man is married, the next day he is a widow. 

In the midst of this transition phase, the funeral service can play an educative function in helping the bereaved come to terms with the loss. Here the church says in effect, ‘When death comes these are things that we believe.’ As Willimon puts it, ‘The scripture readings, prayers, and hymns, all focus upon the values and beliefs that the Christian community uses to interpret the meaning of the crisis of death.’  Thus death is put in some meaningful, ultimate context.

Finally, there is the third stage in the process which is reincorporation. The mourners are separated from their loved ones who have died and are separated out for a time of special attention in which the community works in formal and informal ways to help the mourners make a painful transition. The goal of these actions is to enable the mourner to re-enter the mainstream of life. This is a crucial stage and will determine whether the future is bright or one which echoes the excessively morbid final decades of Queen Victoria’s life. The practice in many English parishes of holding memorial services for all those buried in the previous year often offers an opportunity, through ritual and homily, to encourage the bereaved to move on with their lives. Indeed, the habit of participating in ritual can also help to re-establish other necessary habits and patterns. Ramshaw suggests that we can learn a lesson in pastoral ritual from the Russian Orthodox Church, who have a two-part ritual for the dead: an evening service of mourning and eulogy followed by a vigil, and a morning mass of the resurrection. Thus loss and hope are held together in the church’s ritual embrace.

Activity: reflect on ways have you experienced funerals meeting pastoral needs?

6. Human need and theological integrity:  Finally, having now looked at the various human needs which God may choose to meet through worship, we need to talk explicitly about the theological problems which ritual can provoke. Elaine Ramshaw suggests that the power of ritual to communicate meaning is vitiated when ritual is known to lie or contradict experience.  She highlights three kinds of dishonesty which threaten ritual’s credibility as a carrier of meaning.

The first and most blatant type is for the ritual to make statements about the participants which are at variance with their real-life situations.  She cites the rhetoric of free choice in the Confirmation service when often it is parental or peer pressure that has been brought to bear on the teenagers being confirmed. Another example might be the funeral where, in terms of the ritual, there is a strong presumption of faith on the part of the deceased but the congregation knows that this was not the case. 

A second problem is the untruthfulnes that can happen when the worship leader imputs certain feelings to the congregation. For example,  expressing certain feelings of devotion which sum up part of the congregation’s state of mind, but which alienate the rest of them. Liturgical scholars call this the mistake of subjectivization, and they object to it not only because it risks inaccuracy and alienation, but also for the more theological reason that it focuses prayer on the praying person’s state of mind, rather than on the work of God.

The third common cause of ritual dishonesty is the manipulation of forcing people on the spot into ritual statements which they may not be inclined to make. An on the spot renewal of marriage vows, example!

Activity: reflect on where have you seen dishonest ritual take place?

7. The desire for liturgical markers or liturgy to mark life-cycle changes.

What do you think is happening when a couple with no church links come asking for the baby to be baptized? 

What human needs are being expressed in those requests?

Why do people feel that liturgy or ritual can meet that need?

What might your responses be as a minister to requests for ritual at significant moments in a person’s life? For example, a request that a couple’s stillborn baby be baptized?