Theologian Mary Collins helps frame our conversation with the following:

Transcription

1 LTRGY 851: Worship and Spirituality Spring 2019 Tuesdays, 2:30-5:30 Ron Anderson / Course Description: The intent of this course is to explore, by way of reading, written reflection, and conversation, the relationship between the communal liturgical practices common to a variety of Christian traditions and the interior dimension of our lives with God. Some of the questions to be addressed include: What does worship have to do with spirituality and spiritual formation? How does the public intersect with the personal? What is the place of time, language, embodiment, and the arts in such liturgical formation? Theologian Mary Collins helps frame our conversation with the following: Rituals are about relationships; religious rituals are about ultimate relationships -- about a people's origins and destiny and their true identity and purpose even in ordinary life. People learn who they are and who they are becoming before God in their very physical positions and their assigned roles in sacred assemblies, by what they themselves do and say, by what is said and done to them and for them, by the transactions in which their participation is either prescribed or proscribed. This learning, because it is ritual learning, is pre-conscious, not consciously available to the liturgical participants. It is nevertheless taken into their identities and is formative of the world view from which their behaviors flow. Liturgical participation provides a basis both for dialogical catechesis and for more systematic doctrinal instruction. [Mary Collins, Worship: Renewal to Practice, Washington, D. C.: Pastoral Press, 1987, 259.] All of this is to say that liturgical practice provides a means for both persons and communities to know who and whose it is as well as who they are becoming before God. Without reducing liturgy to yet another program of the church, we find in it a way of knowing and learning about self, world, and God. Course Learning Outcomes: By the end of this course you will: 1) identify and describe key components of a liturgical spirituality; 2) describe in written form how worship has formed you; 3) review and analyze proposals concerning the relationship between worship and spirituality as made in select essays and texts; and 4) construct in written form your own understanding of a) the relationship between worship and spirituality and b) how worship forms persons and communities in a Christian spirituality. Required Texts: Teresa Berger, ed. The Spirit in Worship Worship in the Spirit (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2009). ISBN: $ We will use chapters 1, 3, 4, 8, 9, 12.

2 Michale Jagessar and Stephen Burns, Christian Worship: Postcolonial Perspectives (Oakville, CT: Equinox, 2011). ISBN: $ Gordon Lathrop, Saving Images: The Presence of the Bible in Christian Liturgy (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2017). ISBN: $ Craig Mueller, Any Body There: Worship and Being Human in a Digital Age (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2017). ISBN: $ Gail Ramshaw, Reviving Sacred Speech: The meaning of liturgical language: Second thoughts on Christ in sacred speech (Akron, OH: OSL Publications, 2000). ISBN: $ Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir s Seminary Press, 1973). ISBN $ James A. K. Smith, You Are What You Love (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2016). ISBN: $ Other required readings on Moodle E. Byron Anderson, Worship: Schooling in the Tradition of Jesus, Theology Today, 66.1 (April 2009): E. Byron Anderson, Praying the Eucharist and the Life of Prayer, in Jason Vickers, ed., A Wesleyan Theology of the Eucharist (Nashville: Foundery Books, 2016), John F. Baldovin, The Liturgical year: Calendar for a Just Community in Maxwell Johnson, ed., Between Memory and Hope: Readings on the Liturgical Year (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2000), Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Day Together in Life Together and Prayerbook of the Bible, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, vol. 5 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995), [Available online Annie Dillard, An Expedition to the Pole in Teaching a Stone to Talk (HarperCollins, 1982), Joris Geldhof, The Philosophical Presuppositions and Implications of Celebrating the Liturgical Year, Studia Liturgica (2010): Dagmar Heller, A Spirituality of Time in Times of Globalization, Studia Liturgica (2010): Debra Dean Murphy, ed., Liturgy: Spiritual But Not Religious, Vol (Taylor and Francis, 2015). David Lonsdale, The Church as Context for Christian Spirituality in The Blackwell Companion to Christian Spirituality, ed. Arthur Holder (New York: Blackwell, 2005), Kathleen Norris, Psalmody in The Cloister Walk (New York: Riverhead Books, 1996), Peter Ochs, Morning Prayer and Redemptive Thinking, in Liturgy, Time and the Politics of Redemption, ed. Randi Rashkover and C. C. Pecknold (Grand Rapids, MI: Phillip Pfatteicher, Toward a Definition of Spirituality, The Source and Summit of Faith, and Daily Prayer: Hallowing Time in Liturgical Spirituality (Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press, 1997), 1-11, 12-31, Phillip Pfatteicher, Journey into the Heart of God: Living the Liturgical Year (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013),

3 Don Saliers, Liturgy and the Truth about Human Suffering in Ordo: Bath, Word, Prayer, Table (Akron, OH: OSL Publications, 2005), Robert Taft, What Does Liturgy Do? Toward a Soteriology of Liturgical Celebration: Some Theses, Worship 66.3 (May 1992): Robert Taft, Christian Liturgical Psalmody: Origins, Development, Decomposition, Collapse, in Psalms in Community: Jewish and Christian Textual, Liturgical, and Artistic Traditions, ed. Harold Attridge and Margot Fassler (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003) Graham Ward, A Christian Act: Politics and Liturgical Practice in Liturgy, Time and the Politics of Redemption, ed. Randi Rashkover and C. C. Pecknold (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2006) Assignments: 1. Complete all assigned readings in preparation for class each week. 2. Complete occasional written response papers related to the assigned readings and provide an oral summary of those papers in class. Guiding questions for the papers are detailed below in the course schedule below. Each paper must be words in length, double spaced with 1 margins, and use 12 pt. Times-New Roman font. All citations must follow the note/bibliography format set out in the Chicago Manual of Style. All papers will be submitted in Moodle. 3. Participate each week in Evening Prayer. Although this class is designed as a seminar in which we develop a conversation with one another and explore the traditions/perspectives represented in the readings and in particular liturgical traditions, we must worship to be formed by it. Therefore, part of our work each week will include celebration of evening prayer. 4. Complete a final paper (due one week after the final class session) A preliminary report on your research is to be presented at the final class session on May 11. The paper is due May 18 (for graduating students the paper is due May 11). As with other class papers, the paper must be double spaced with 1 margins, and use 12 pt. Times- New Roman font. All citations must follow the note/bibliography format set out in the Chicago Manual of Style. The paper will be submitted using the Turnitin link on the course Moodle page. PhD students: A final paper of words that draws together the conversation and insights of the semester in light of your own questions and issues and that develops through additional research an interpretation of a) the relationship between worship and spirituality and b) how worship forms persons and communities in a Christian spirituality. MA students: A final paper of words that draws together the conversation and insights of the semester in light of your own questions and issues making use of the required texts and in which your articulate your understanding of a) the relationship between worship and spirituality and b) how worship forms persons and communities in a Christian spirituality. 3

4 Class Sessions 1. February 5 Worship and Spirituality? Lonsdale, Church as Context Taft, What does liturgy do? Ward, A Christian Act 2. February 12 Worship and Spirituality? Berger, et. al., The Spirit in Worship, chaps. 1, 3-4, 8-9, 12 Pfatteicher, Toward a Definition of Spirituality 3. February 19 Worship shaping Spirituality Anderson, Worship: Schooling in the Tradition of Jesus Dillard, Polar Expedition Pfatteicher, Source and Summit of Faith Saliers, Liturgy and the Truth about Human Suffering Response paper 1: How has worship formed you? 4. February 26 Spirituality without worship? Murphy, et. al. Liturgy: Spiritual but not religious Schmemann, For the Life of the World, March 5 Worship in a digital age Mueller, Any Body There? 6. March 12 Spiritualities of Time Baldovin, Calendar for a Just Community Geldhof, Philosophical Presuppositions Heller, A Spirituality of Time in Times of Globalization Pfatteicher, Journey into the Heart of God, Ramshaw, Sacred Speech about Time (chap. 6 in Reviving Sacred Speech, 82-99) 7. March 19 Daily Prayer and Psalmody Bonhoeffer, The Day Together Norris, Psalmody Ochs, Morning Prayer and Redemptive Thinking Pfatteicher, Daily Prayer Taft, Christian Liturgical Psalmody Response paper 2: How might these practices of time, prayer, and living be brought to bear in our own places of work, worship, and life? March 26 Spring Break 4

5 8. April 2 Shaped by the Word Lathrop, Saving Images 9. April 9 Sacramental Spiritualities Anderson, Praying the Eucharist Schmemann, For the Life of the World, Response paper 3: Read/pray a eucharistic prayer each day this week. Use the same prayer each day. Write a reflection on your experience with this. Key questions to address include: What did you choose and why? What personal resistance did you encounter in beginning this? What did you discover at the end of the week? How might this exercise inform your continuing engagement with the Eucharist? Some sources include: The United Methodist Book of Worship The Book of Common Worship (Presbyterian) The Book of Common Prayer (Episcopal) The Book of Worship (AME) Baptism and Eucharist: Ecumenical Convergence in Celebration Janet Morley, All Desires Known (Anglican/Feminist) 10. April 16 Words, Images, Symbols Ramshaw, Reviving Sacred Speech 11. April 23 Breaking Words, Images and Symbols Jagessar and Burns, Christian Worship: Postcolonial Perspectives 12. April 30 Worship, Spirituality, Ethics Smith, You are what you love Response paper 4: What does it mean to shift from speaking about worship and spirituality to worship, spirituality, and ethics? What is the connection between the three? What does habit have to do with it? 13. May 7 Concluding Conversation: Worship and Spirituality Final Paper: Although due next week, be prepared with notes or a draft to present and discuss your conclusions. 5