Revitalizing Lethargic Liturgy
John Killinger
Even within the confines of a traditional service, and without adjusting the rubrics at all, we can introduce changes that can revitalize the tone and tenor of the service.
—John Killinger London theater audiences have been entranced for some time by Peter Shaffer's Lettice and Lovage, a comedy starring Maggie Smith. Smith plays the part of a guide in a rather unexciting National Trust home. Bored with the job, she begins spicing up her presentations with highly imaginative concoctions about the families that lived there and the royalty who visited them. One fanciful story involves Queen Elizabeth I, who is said to have tripped on the stairway and been caught in midair by her host, who was subsequently knighted for his deft act! I couldn't help thinking, the day after seeing the play, what the woman played by Maggie Smith could do for some of the unimaginative worship services I've sat through or even led. She'd spark a one-woman liturgical renaissance. Having only recently moved back to an academic setting after several years in the pastorate, I'm quite aware that we ministers are not that free to invent our material out of whole cloth or to introduce it without general consent among our congregations. There is, nevertheless, a great deal we can do to enliven the worship offered up on most Sundays by our parishioners. For big changes, such as placing the offering after the sermon (where by both theology and tradition it properly ought to be, if I may say so), it is undoubtedly best to work through a worship committee and perhaps even obtain a mandate of the congregation. I've known pastors who shortened their tenure by acting presumptuously in shaping or reordering the liturgy, even though the congregation appeared to be largely ...
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