Sacraments and Seasons

Sacraments and Seasons Marney A. Wasserman When our children were growing up, we celebrated baptismal anniversaries as a family. There was a special evening meal, baptism stories were retold, prayers were offered for that child, and a small gift was given appropriate to a growing faith. But the part that all of our children looked forward to the most was the water candle. We had one of those old glass candles, popular from the 1960s, that called for filling a glass container about three-quarters full with water, then pouring a layer of oil on top, and floating a candle wick in a clear plastic disc. For each baptismal anniversary, we got out the water candle and allowed the child who was the honoree for the evening to color the water. They would stir in red food coloring, or blue, or some of each. They could use a little or a lot, they could mix colors or swirl them, or they could even decide to leave the water clear (though none of them ever did!). Over the years, there were lots of different experiments, some more successful than others. But all five of us always looked forward to seeing what color the baptism candle would turn out to be. And the colors always added an element of vitality and surprise to our sacramental family festivities. To wonder, as this article proposes to do, about the relationship between sacraments and seasons, is to encounter a whole host of questions about color and texture and meaning, about the words and the signs of our sacramental celebrations, as we enact them through the full cycle of the liturgical calendar. Is the Lord s Supper in any way different when the table is draped in purple instead of in green? Should it be? Does a baptism celebrated on Easter take on a different meaning in congregational experience than one in October? Is that a good thing? Might there be some reason to use a different kind of bread, because it s Advent? Or to set the dates for baptism by the church s seasons, rather than by the family calendars of those seeking to be baptized? We could do some fruitful wondering about these and other related questions. There may be sacramental implications embedded in the church s cycle of seasons that are worth our exploring. We may discover both possibilities and pitfalls in a sacramental practice that varies with the liturgical calendar. What do the church s seasons have to bring to the celebration of its sacraments? Sacraments at the Center These may seem frivolous questions in one sense, or perhaps to some, even blasphemous ones. Why should it matter what color the table cloth is or when the baptism occurs? Baptism and the Lord s Supper are sacraments, instituted by our Lord for the church yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Whether they take place in Advent or in August, they consist of the same basic components bread, wine, water, and words carefully passed on through the ages from one generation to the next. There is an important truth here that we must not lose sight of. We have inherited from the church a sacramental pattern that is important to uphold, Sunday to Sunday and season to season. Still, within that basic pattern there is room for variation in the words of our sacramental prayers, in the ways we serve the bread or pour the water, Marney A. Wasserman is pastor of Trinity Presbyterian Church in Tucson, Arizona. 1

in whether or what we sing as we come to the table and the font. If we take care with these things then why not also attend to the sacramental possibilities in the church s liturgical calendar? Color, texture, light, image, movement, melody, singing, rhythm, mood these may be just as powerful conveyors of sacramental meaning as the words we repeat and the elements we use at the font and the table. Our Directory for Worship affirms that, material realities can be a means for expressing suitable praise and thanksgiving to God, 1 and further identifies the richness of color, texture, form, sound, and motion 2 all as elements that contribute to our worship. So as the church gathers around what liturgical scholar Gordon Lathrop has called the central things 3 word, water, wine, and bread perhaps we may be helped to unpack the full range of meanings contained in these central things, through the thoughtful use of some of the other peripheral things that vary with the seasons. Color, texture, light, image, movement, melody, singing, rhythm, mood these may be just as powerful conveyors of sacramental meaning as the words we repeat and the elements we use at the font and the table. Sacramental Seasons The first and most obvious place to start may be to wonder about the notion of sacramental seasons. Are there days and seasons that are particularly appropriate for celebrations of baptism or Eucharist? The Presbyterian Planning Calendar certainly identifies some of these, primarily in the festival seasons of the church year. There are fifteen days marked with either a chalice, a dove, or both pointing us to fourteen dates for the Lord s Supper (eight of them Sundays), and ten for baptism (including seven Sundays). If we explore sources regarding the worship of the early church in its first five centuries, we see a markedly different pattern with the Lord s Supper celebrated much more frequently as an every-sunday celebration (more than fifty-two chalices) and baptism celebrated considerably less frequently, limited to once a year at the Easter Vigil with the possible additions of Pentecost and Epiphany (only one to three doves). The majority of today s Presbyterian churches probably find themselves somewhere in between these two patterns. But it would be fair to say that in our time there has been significant movement toward reclaiming some of the ancient practices. We see the waning of the Christendom church that lasted for sixteen centuries and the emerging of a much more missional church, which means we are seeing the church with new eyes and noticing the astonishing similarities between our own times and the earliest centuries of Christianity. Like our first Christian ancestors, we are a church that finds itself living in an unchurched culture and having to be quite intentional about expressing to others the profound grace of the good news we know, as well as very clear about defining the lifestyle commitments and boundaries that are a part of following the way of Jesus. These far-reaching changes in the course of our history necessarily affect how the church celebrates its central liturgies of Word and sacrament. Even more, they reveal with renewed clarity that the Word and the sacraments are the primary resources God gives the church to respond to new and changing times. Over the past thirty years, a gradual increase has been taking place in the number of Reformed churches that break bread at the Lord s table every Sunday, or are moving in that direction. 4 The church s liturgical seasons provide one helpful way to work toward the goal of more frequent communion. Trying a season of weekly Eucharist for the Sundays from Ash Wednesday to Pentecost, for example, would allow a congregation to experience that pattern for a significant period of time without having to commit to a permanent change. There would be an opportunity for experience-based reflection on such common stumbling blocks as: Won t weekly communion make it less meaningful? Will it make the service too long? Is it really worth all that setting up and cleaning up? Even more basic, a session might begin by using the liturgical calendar and the Revised Common Lectionary to choose the dozen or so Sundays on which the Lord s Supper will be celebrated rather than just going with the first Sunday of the month. In addition to providing a more satisfying connection between Word and table for those Call to Worship 2

Sundays, the pattern itself can remind the church that we keep time differently from the world around us. While the most common practice among Presbyterians is still monthly communion, increasing numbers of churches are finding themselves hungry for more more bread and wine, more Christ, more depth, more community, more nourishment for living the good news, more equipping for ministry. As we add more communion Sundays to more of our congregational calendars, we will encounter a growing need and opportunity for thoughtful variety in the ways we celebrate the sacrament and practical simplicity in the ways we serve the bread and wine. At the same time, a smaller number of our congregations has been moving toward reviving an ancient pattern of preparation for baptism called the catechumenate. 5 It is a pattern of apprenticeship, to use a more widely understood term, that invites thoughtful exploration and claiming of a Christian way of believing, along with the disciplined practice of a Christian way of living, all within the context of prayerful accompaniment by the congregation and its members. Because this intentional pattern of preparing for baptism occurs over a period of weeks or months, it raises the question of how baptism best fits into the liturgical year. Specifically, it invites the church to reclaim the ancient Lent-Easter festival season, with its emphasis on our dying and rising with Christ as the primary occasion for baptism and baptismal preparation. With our long-held Reformed tradition of infant baptism, it seems unlikely that Presbyterians will have an interest in celebrating all baptisms on Easter (and we could probably have a lively conversation about whether or not that was a desirable goal!). But let me lift up two connections between the sacrament of baptism and the church s seasons that I believe are worth claiming. First, for the sake of the world we live to serve, the church in our time is badly in need of a way of inviting people into a life with Christ that is intentional and thoughtful and that integrates Christian faith with Christian practice. Allowing the seasons to help us shape a serious pattern of baptismal preparation, for adults seeking to embrace a new faith and a new way of life as followers of Jesus, could be an enormous gift to the world around us. (Imagine beginning even very simply with a companioning program that invites seekers into friendship and structured faith conversations with a church member over a number of weeks. 6 ) Second, allowing the rich sacramental imagery of the Lent-Easter season to infuse all our worship from Ash Wednesday to Pentecost would be a good gift to the church helping us to remember that we are first and foremost a baptized and baptizing community, living out in our own everyday lives the dying and rising of Christ. Seasonal Sacraments As we think about the relationship between the church s sacraments and its seasons, the questions we need to consider run in two directions. We ve looked at the first one: Are there certain days and seasons that may be more appropriate for sacramental celebrations than others? The second one is this: Should our sacramental practices of Baptism and the Lord s Supper vary in any way according to the seasons of the church year in which they occur? We ve considered some of the opportunities in a sacramental view of the seasons; let s wonder now about the possibilities we might find in a seasonal approach to the sacraments. Consider a church where during Lent the entire mood of the liturgy is a deep, penitential purple. It s more than just a change in the color of the chancel paraments and clergy vestments. There are crowns of thorns hanging on the walls of the sanctuary with purple and lavender and gray and black fabrics hanging elegantly down from them. There is a floral arrangement of dried reeds and grasses and prickly brown branches sitting starkly on the bare chancel floor. On the communion table is a plain cotton table cloth of dark purple, overlaid with a coarse burlap runner; on these sit a pottery chalice of wine and a plate of unleavened matzos. The Kyrie Eleison that is sung after the confession of sin is set in a minor key and played in a slow, somber pace. The baptismal font, a wide glass bowl on a simple wooden stand, reveals an abundance of water, and at the bottom of the bowl an assortment of small seashells, which the congregation is invited to take home as an aid in reflecting on the meaning of their baptism. In this sanctuary, Lent is not just visible, it s palpable, visceral, experiential; it s sacramental that is, the people who gather here see it, hear it, breathe it, taste it, feel it, from the opening call to worship to the closing benediction. It s important that we pause long enough here to consider how seasonal variations like the ones 3 Sacraments and Seasons

The best possibilities for varying the sacraments seasonally are not in order to add something ornamental on top, but rather to call attention to something essential and already present within. I ve just described function in the experience of a worshiping community. Are they merely decorative? Or do they serve to point us to the deep layers of meaning embedded in our sacraments? I invite you to consider that the reason for engaging variations like this one is not to spice up our otherwise staid and routine sacramental celebrations. Rather, it is to draw out of our sacraments their hidden depths of meaning so that the church may more fully encounter the living Christ at the font and at the table. The best possibilities for varying the sacraments seasonally are not in order to add something ornamental on top, but rather to call attention to something essential and already present within. We re learning that sensory elements can support the spoken word, helping us to more fully hear it, that using all of our senses in the church s worship can enrich the encounter we have with God there. But always, the seasonal elements we employ need to be integral to, and grow out of, and lift up, and serve the central meanings already present in the Word, the water, the wine, and the bread. The way we celebrate the Lord s Supper during the forty days of Lent could help us recall the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, as we seek to embrace our own baptismal dying to self and sin. By contrast, the way we celebrate the Lord s Supper during the fifty days of Easter could help us experience the joy of eating and drinking together with the risen Christ. For example, the way we celebrate the Lord s Supper during the forty days of Lent could help us recall the sacrifice of Christ on the cross, as we seek to embrace our own baptismal dying to self and sin. By contrast, the way we celebrate the Lord s Supper during the fifty days of Easter could help us experience the joy of eating and drinking together with the risen Christ. Crucified Savior, risen Lord one and the same person whom we encounter in different seasons around the same table. If Lent gives us opportunity to dwell on one set of meanings, Easter can give us an opportunity to lift up a different set of meanings, both of them true and the church s faith may be deepened by that enlarged horizon of sacramental experience. Coloring the Lord s Table So how do we do this? How do we set the elements of the holy meal alongside the possibilities of the current liturgical season in such a way that the congregation gathered to eat and drink together on any given Sunday may encounter the living Christ, be transformed by his story, and be encouraged to go deeper in their quest to know and love and serve him? There are, of course, lots of possibilities. We can vary what we say in the Thanksgiving, what we sing during the distribution, how we serve the bread and wine. Will we partake in our pews or by coming forward? kneeling, standing, or sitting? eating and drinking, or dipping bread into cup? Who will serve the people? Who will prepare the table or bake the bread? Where will the seasonal colors be used? How will the table be appointed? the chancel? the sanctuary? And beyond all of these enticing particulars, there remain the guiding questions of pastoral judgment that those who plan for the church s worship must address. How much variation is wise, how much familiarity is needed in the sacramental patterns of a given congregation? How do the spiritual fruits of sacramental participation grow? What follows is simply a start, a handful of suggestions, possibilities, questions to which I encourage you to add your own ideas and to apply the wisdom appropriate to your setting. In the Easter festival cycle, are there ways to make evident the contrast from Lenten fasting to Easter feasting, Lenten simplicity to Easter finery, Lenten silence to Easter singing and alleluias? Call to Worship 4

Maybe we could go from burlap and matzos to brocade and bread made from the finest flour, or from a spare earthenware cup and plate for Lent to an extravagant Easter table filled with breads and sheaves of wheat, grapes, and silver goblets. Might it be fruitful to locate the confession of sin after the preaching in Lent, allowing the Word to lead us to the Lord s table in pointed penitence in this season? Or if the font is ordinarily on the chancel, might it be located at the entrance to the sanctuary or on the way to the communion table for Easter a sign of baptismal grace and obedience? Both the Easter cycle and the Lord s Supper help us unpack the central Christian mystery of Christ s death and resurrection. Let me repeat that: They unpack the paschal mystery of Christ s death and resurrection. So some element of contrast between Lent and Easter Eucharist might really help a congregation sense the possibility that our Lord s Supper is not only a solemn Lenten memorial of his death but also a glad Easter celebration of his resurrection. Rich and sensory seasonal details might even begin to give our churches permission to actually experience the Lord s Supper as the joyful feast of the people of God! 7 Quiet Lenten meditation as the communion trays are passed down the pews might give way to Easter dancing and singing in the aisles as we come forward to eat and drink at the Lord s table. On the fiftieth day of Easter, we might get playful with a bit of Spirit-filled chaos praying the Lord s Prayer in several different languages simultaneously or representing a Pentecost diversity of cultures in the breads on the communion table and the fabrics gracing the sanctuary. Singing is probably the best way to get to the holy joy of the Easter table it s not frivolity or gaiety but deep, resounding, unstoppable, shared joy that we Both the Easter cycle and the Lord s Supper help us unpack the central Christian mystery of Christ s death and resurrection.... So some element of contrast between Lent and Easter Eucharist might really help a congregation sense the possibility that our Lord s Supper is not only a solemn Lenten memorial of his death but also a glad Easter celebration of his resurrection. Maybe Advent is an especially appropriate time to bring to the Lord s table food offerings for the poor alongside the bread and wine for communion. need to sing together from Easter to Pentecost as we invite all who worship with us to meet the crucified and risen Christ in his church! The Christmas cycle points us to the other central Christian mystery, the mystery of incarnation a God who is with us and for us and dwells among us. During Advent, we experience Immanuel primarily in absence, in the pain and sinfulness of a broken world, in the longing for peace of peoples both ancient and contemporary, for a world that s new and whole and good and right. So maybe we could bake an Advent communion bread with milk and honey, to give God s people a sweet and lingering taste of the promised land for which we hope. Or maybe Advent is an especially appropriate time to bring to the Lord s table food offerings for the poor alongside the bread and wine for communion, or to hold an agape feast after worship is over so the abundance we know at the Lord s table can be spread before the hungry in our communities. And if there is ever a good time for that ritually redundant practice of holding the bread until all have been served, perhaps it s in Advent, when the act of waiting upon one another to eat may serve to remind us of the kingdom of God for which the world still waits. While we re at it, maybe we also could wait to indulge the bright and joyous carols of Christmas until we have sung, in solidarity with a hurting world, the deep and desperate longing of Advent. In Advent, the session might invite the church s youngest members to serve the bread and wine, 8 acknowledging that God s reign turns world orders upside down and shows itself when a little child shall lead them. 9 And during the twelve days of Christmas, perhaps the almost excruciating intimacy of a God who is born among us could be experienced by gathering around 5 Sacraments and Seasons

the Lord s table in intimate groups of six or eight, passing loaf and cup from hand to hand, feeding and blessing one another by name. Throughout the Advent-Christmas-Epiphany season, can we pay special attention to the suffering of the world in our prayers? Might we invite soldiers home on furlough to help us pray for peace around Christ s table? a peace for which surely they long, in ways the rest of us can scarcely imagine. Even in the long, green time between festival seasons there is room for variation. Only here, instead of marking the place of a particular season in the year, we are attending to the place of Sunday as the first day in the week. In ordinary time, the distinctive character of a particular Sunday will be defined more by the Scripture texts that are read than by the themes of a season. So the Great Thanksgiving may appropriately make use of images from the day s readings, helping to tie Word and sacrament together; and preaching can point to the Lord s table, which unites us. The summer Sundays after Pentecost may be slower times in the church s life, when families could be given an opportunity to bake the bread, or prepare the table, or serve the elements. And the congregation can be encouraged to enjoy the steadiness of familiar sacramental patterns and rest into them, confident of the God they reveal. Getting Sunday Wet Getting the significance of Sunday front and center is important for the ways we set both sacraments alongside the Word of God in our weekly worship. The Lord s Day is the basic building block of the church year. Before there was Christmas or Lent or even Easter in the annual cycle of the church s seasons, there was Sunday the first day of the week, the day to celebrate the Lord s resurrection by gathering at the table with the risen Lord. That s why it makes sense to get Word and table back together on each Lord s Day. That also explains why we need the font visible and full of water not just on the occasional Sunday we have someone to baptize, but on every Sunday so that as we gather week by week to hear the Word and break the bread, we also see clearly before us our baptismal identity as the church and our mission as a baptizing community. The sacrament of baptism may be celebrated infrequently, but the theology and ecclesiology of baptism undergird everything else we do on Sunday mornings. In the ancient church, the Lord s Supper itself functioned as a reminder of baptism it was celebrated weekly as the repeatable part of baptism. 10 These days, on every Sunday we too need regular reminding that whether we are baptizing, the baptismal identity and vocation of the church are central to the Lord s Day. It is important that we get Sunday wet! In practice then, how do we do that? What do we need to consider as we think about church seasons and the sacrament of baptism? We ve already seen that we might encourage at least some of those requesting baptism to wait for a Lent-Easter season and schedule our baptismal preparation opportunities during that segment of the church year. And we may emphasize more broadly in our Lent-Easter liturgy and preaching, the baptismal identity and calling of the church. But even when we ve done that, we will still (thankfully!) have baptisms to celebrate at other times and plenty of additional Sundays when the scriptural texts for worship prompt us to reflect on the baptized life. What else can we do, Sunday to Sunday and season to season, to keep Sunday linked to the missional promise and challenge of our common baptism? Let me offer a start at just two possible answers to that question, both of which I have explored more fully in another article published in Call to Worship. 11 First, parts of the weekly Service for the Lord s Day may be fruitfully led from the font, making use of the water. Just as it is appropriate to read Scripture and preach from the pulpit or to Before there was Christmas or Lent or even Easter in the annual cycle of the church s seasons, there was Sunday the first day of the week, the day to celebrate the Lord s resurrection by gathering at the table with the risen Lord. That s why it makes sense to get Word and table back together on each Lord s Day. Call to Worship 6

offer prayers of thanksgiving and intercession from the Lord s table, it makes sense to lead the liturgy of confession from the font, lifting or pouring water so the community can see and hear it. This weekly act of confessing our sin and hearing the assurance of God s grace sounds a clear echo back to our baptism, when we first received this sign of divine forgiveness, when we were washed in the waters of grace and anointed for a lifetime of service. Other good possibilities include leading the invitation to discipleship, or the charge from the font, or even the entire gathering rite so that the service itself moves from font to pulpit to table and back again before we are sent out once more to serve the world. From season to season, leading such weekly acts While we are baptized only once, we pass through many other occasions that are baptismal that is, they invite us to re-engage our baptismal identity and commitments. Confirmation, reaffirmation of faith, transfer of membership, ordination to church office, installation, commissioning for service in church or community. of worship from the water in our midst can help a congregation stay in touch with the centrality and importance of baptism for daily living as followers of Jesus. Second, it s important to recognize that while we are baptized only once, we pass through many other occasions that are baptismal that is, they invite us to re-engage our baptismal identity and commitments. Confirmation, reaffirmation of faith, transfer of membership, ordination to church We miss an important opportunity if we fail to identify the relationship to baptism that is inherent here. office, installation, commissioning for service in church or community all these are occasions in which baptized disciples of Jesus stand before the community of faith to make public commitments to new ministries and maturing faith. We miss an important opportunity if we fail to identify the relationship to baptism that is inherent here. Reformed liturgies for each of these occasions, in the Book of Common Worship (1993) and the Book of Occasional Services (1999), make that baptismal connection explicit in the prayers. Even better, they are designed to be conducted at the font so that the centrality of baptism for Christian living is not only verbal, but visible and embodied. Similarly, we might consider that wedding vows could be spoken at the font, recalling the primary covenant with God that is the foundation for the marital covenant. And at funerals, the church may provide a white pall to drape the casket and pray the prayer commending to God one whose baptism is now complete in We might consider that wedding vows could be spoken at the font, recalling the primary covenant with God that is the foundation for the marital covenant. And at funerals, the church may provide a white pall to drape the casket and pray the prayer commending to God one whose baptism is now complete in death. 12 At every turn, the baptismal possibilities embedded in our worship emerge. death. 12 At every turn, the baptismal possibilities embedded in our worship emerge. All these acts, which occur at significant transition points in the life of the church and the lives of its members, are fundamentally baptismal. They grow out of and connect us back to the life-defining event of our baptism into Christ and his church; and they invite us to live our baptism day-by-day and year-by-year as disciples following the way of Jesus. When these acts of worship are conducted from the font and the 7 Sacraments and Seasons

connections are made that link them to baptism, then the whole church is helped to see itself as a baptized and baptizing community a people gathered, formed, and equipped by our baptism to serve the world in Christ s name. Letting the seasons shape our sacramental life is a matter of significance and seriousness for the church. When we rediscover in practice the critical and central link between the sacraments of baptism and Eucharist and the paschal season of Lent- Easter-Pentecost, then the very identity and mission of the church is reoriented to the understanding that we are a resurrection people, nurtured in gratitude at a table of abundance and joy a people who in the end, as John Burkhart says so pointedly, must baptize or die. 13 When we can engage in thoughtful, careful, fresh, beautiful, faithful variation of the peripheral things that come and go with the church s seasons, then we can help people experience the wide and deep range of meanings that lay waiting to be unpacked in the sacramental things at the center of our common life. The church s seasons give us room to shape the liturgy of Word and sacrament in ways that help worshiping congregations taste and see the goodness of God in all its fullness. This is experiential, embodied meaning that engages all the human senses in the service of a sacramental encounter with God that is located in the present tense. We must look back to the past, for sure, but we need deeply to encounter the risen Christ made known among us in the here and now in water and words, wine and bread, in all the rich color and imagery and texture and light and sound and When these acts of worship are conducted from the font and the connections are made that link them to baptism, then the whole church is helped to see itself as a baptized and baptizing community a people gathered, formed, and equipped by our baptism to serve the world in Christ s name. taste of the church s revolving seasons so that we may ultimately be drawn forward in hope toward a future that is everything our loving God promises it will be not just for us but for the whole world. We affirmed at the beginning that the sacraments are central to our life together and that the seasons provide the church not just a chance to change the décor, but a vital opportunity to draw out of the sacraments their various layers of Christian meaning. Perhaps we can go even a step further and say that the calendar of the church s seasons, along with the cycle of Scripture readings from the Revised Common Lectionary that supports it are primary tools for the renewal of sacramental practice in the church. Seasonal variation of sacramental practice offers a way of renewing our central signs, for the present time in the life of the church that avoids the twin difficulties of sacraments made dull and routine, on the one hand, by unbending sameness, and on the other hand, of sacraments obscured by so many overlays of trite and reckless experimentation that they become unmoored from the Word in which they are founded. In this missional time of the church, it is important that we stay rooted in the formative patterns of the ancient church while at the same time inviting passionate engagement with the faith in new ways for a new generation of believers. The church s seasons can help us enlarge our understanding of the central mysteries of the Christian faith and deepen our sacramental practice in ways that help make Christ real and present to those who come hungry and thirsty and longing for a new life. Call to Worship 8

Notes 1. Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Part II, Book of Order, 2007 2009 (Louisville: Office of the General Assembly, 2007), W-1.3030. 2. Book of Order, W-1.3034. 3. Gordon Lathrop, What Are the Essentials of Christian Worship? (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1994). See pages 7 and 26 among others. This essay presents in summary form the understandings more fully articulated in Lathrop s Holy Things: A Liturgical Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993). 4. To learn about other Presbyterian congregations pursuing this path, contact the Office of Theology Worship and Education, or visit the website for Invitation to Christ: Font and Table (www.pcusa. org/sacraments). Resources available through this site include the Rev. Fred Anderson s set of four articles entitled Moving Toward Every Sunday Communion, which also was published in the newsletter of the Association for Reformed & Liturgical Worship. See also the article by Chip Andrus in Call to Worship, Vol. 43.1 (summer 2009). 5. A list of Presbyterian congregations involved in the original Catechumenate Project can be obtained from the Office of Theology Worship and Education in Louisville, Kentucky. 6. In the congregation I serve, we have designed a program called Compañeros, which equips members with eight weeks of conversation starters on such topics as prayer, Scripture, forgiveness, gratitude, vocation, and service. I m happy to share a copy with interested colleagues in ministry. Contact me at marneywass@gmail.com. 7. Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Book of Common Worship (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1993), 68. 8. Book of Order, W-3.3616d. 9. Isaiah 11:6. 10. Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Invitation to Christ Font and Table: A Guide to Sacramental Practices (Louisville: Office of Theology & Worship, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), 2006), 27. 11. Marney A. Wasserman, Leading from Pulpit, Font & Table, Call to Worship: Liturgy, Music, Preaching, and the Arts (40.4), 2007. 12. Book of Common Worship, 921. 13. John Burkhart, Worship: A Searching Examination of the Liturgical Experience (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1982), 138. 9 Sacraments and Seasons