Your Tribe
We don't go into our different denominations too much here. I think that is good. I believe it is because we already realize we are from different backgrounds and our goal is not to win each other to 'our' side.
I'm gonna break with the just a bit, but for good reasons, I think.
I've grown up and still 'reside' in the Church of Christ tribe. Like any other denomination, there are good and bad things associated with our heritage. I stay, at least for now, because there are others like me in the CoC that don't want to leave 'immediate family' but would still like to encourage questions and conversations about all of the God stuff. Servants are needed everywhere.
One thing I embrace about our heritage is our affinity for a cappella music. In 'big church' we don't sing with any instrument, other than our voices. Yes, some in my group have held that up as the only way, the gold standard, but I have my issues, too. I love instrumental music, don't get me wrong, but a cappella music is in my DNA.
Anyway, all of that for this, last night several of us got together in one of our homes and sung some good old songs. Songs I remember singing as a kid. I loved it.
I realized Church of Christ folks aren't the only ones that do this, but it is something particular to us.
I started thinking about other folks and wondering what it is you do that might be more specific to your tribe's walk that you love.
What is it about your tradition that you love and embrace? We talk too much about what we don't like in our groups. What do you like? What is it in your gatherings that you really look forward to?
I'm gonna break with the just a bit, but for good reasons, I think.
I've grown up and still 'reside' in the Church of Christ tribe. Like any other denomination, there are good and bad things associated with our heritage. I stay, at least for now, because there are others like me in the CoC that don't want to leave 'immediate family' but would still like to encourage questions and conversations about all of the God stuff. Servants are needed everywhere.
One thing I embrace about our heritage is our affinity for a cappella music. In 'big church' we don't sing with any instrument, other than our voices. Yes, some in my group have held that up as the only way, the gold standard, but I have my issues, too. I love instrumental music, don't get me wrong, but a cappella music is in my DNA.
Anyway, all of that for this, last night several of us got together in one of our homes and sung some good old songs. Songs I remember singing as a kid. I loved it.
I realized Church of Christ folks aren't the only ones that do this, but it is something particular to us.
I started thinking about other folks and wondering what it is you do that might be more specific to your tribe's walk that you love.
What is it about your tradition that you love and embrace? We talk too much about what we don't like in our groups. What do you like? What is it in your gatherings that you really look forward to?
posted by Bart at 12:23 PM
7 Comments:
I'm Episcopal. My first thought is I love our tradition of having communion every Sunday. But really, one of the best things that I like is in our liturgy we use a lot of prayer with gesture. And we do it together as a community. The kneeling, bowing, crossing ourselves add that little sumptin' sumptin' that I miss when I go to a different type of worship.
Bart,
Last night at the Acappella (which is the name of a actually singing group) concert here in town, I remembered how special and important a capella music was/is to me. Though I love worship with instruments. The a cappella tradition encourages participation and communal identity like nothing I have ever experienced. I think it's great that the kids at my church worship with intruments and a capella, but at the same time feel sad that they have lost much of their a capella heritage. Of course, this is an denominational issue that others would care little or none about. But I'm sentimental and would love for my kids to know the worship of their grandmother and their great-grandmother. But I don't want them to have the hang-ups about it either. Anyway, now I'm rambling. I just returned to town after traveling and speaking most of the summer.
Blessings...
In my CoC congregation's move to instrumental music, we've lost the vocal 4-part harmony that used to stir my soul. Remember the bass leads, like on "Going Afar"?
LindaBee, showing my age
My wife and I talk about this all the time. She's Episcopalian, but we went to a CoC college. We both miss it so much that you inspired me to write my thoughts.
My roots trace from the Charismatic Renewal movement inside the Roman Catholic church to the Episcopal church, a Charismatic Episcopal Church, and now into the Methodist Church. So I really can't talk about my long history with a certain tradition.
That being said here are some of the distinctives I dig about the United Methodist Church:
*) Its history and heritage as a revival/renewal movement. Methodism began as a revival/renewal movement and retains some of that structure (i.e. moving most pastors every 3-5 years) and retains some of that willingness to be renewed.
*) A ballence of personal piety and social activism. The methodist church has a history of getting on the right side of issues as a institution quicker then most. Slavery, Segregation / Civil Rights, Women as Pastors, etc. However there is also a strong wing of the church that beleives in the importance of personal piety in religious life. Methodism seems to be a place where we strive for internal and external change.
*) The influences of Protestant theologies of grace, Catholic mysticism and piety, and the beautiful liturgy of the Episcopal church.
*) An heirarchy that can prevent the worst abuse without stifling all discussion.
I've been thinking about this... I have a sort of church mutt background also. I think the 'tribe' I like best is this kind, the kind where all traditions sort of come together. I love bible study groups - smaller ones especially because hearts seem more open and honest. I've mostly attended Churches of Christ because I married someone who 'grew up' in the C of C, and before that it was mostly "fellowship" type churches (which are just like the Church of Christ except with a piano!) and before that it was Lutheran churches, and the thing I like most, no matter what the name says on the sign out front, is when we actually study the bible.
I know that's not a tradition, so to speak... Maybe a tradition I like (and this may not be denomination-specific) is when it's felloship time, like potlucks and the coffee and cookies after the service... not for the food, really, but for the fellowship :)
I grew up in the Episcopal Church, which certainly placed me in a minority growing up in small town, Mississippi. Growing up I had a priest who was also a cantor, so we sang through the entire liturgy. I thought everyone did it this way and was surprised the first time I heard the liturgy spoken. From that experience I appreciate the sense of wonder and awe, the beauty and the mystery communicated by the ritualistic style of worship. I also appreciate the sense of reverence in worship (the sanctuary was a holy place; when you entered for worship you prayed silently as you waited for the service to begin; kneeling, bowing, and genuflecting all added to the sense of the sacred).
In high school I began attending the United Methodist Church because I got involved with the youth group. Though it was quite different, there was enough familiar in the service that I made the transition fairly easily. Of course this makes sense as both Methodism and Episcopalianism are rooted in the Anglican Church, but I didn't know that at the time.
I joined the United Methodist Church after 5 years, but didn't really know why I was a United Methodist until I studied John Wesley and the Methodist movement in College and Seminary. Nate mentioned in his post about the balance of personal piety and social activism in United Methodism. For this the UMC ows a great debt to John Wesley. Few throughout the history of the church have been able to balance these two aspects of the Christian faith which typically have polarized the Christian church, especially in the modern era, as well as he. This is demonstrated in the fact that both liberal and conservative Christians can point to John Wesley as a hero or champion of their causes, as well as the wide range of movements, from charistmatic/pentacostal/holiness churches, to social activists from abolitionists to the Salvation Army to civil rights, to the various "Wesleyan" churches up to and including United Methodism. I see the same striving for balance of these two aspects of faith in the Emerging church.
Wesley's emphasis on and understanding of grace, as well as his emphasis on God as loving father first and foremost have also greatly shaped the United Methodist Church. He also gave us the gift of accountability... something which we have held onto very well in some respects, and which I think we are recovering in other areas. In this regard, while it certainly can be stiffling at times, I think the accountability that comes with the hierarchy of the United Methodist Church is worth the cost. At the same time there's also a great deal of freedom within the United Methodist Church. Each local expression of the United Methodism is often truly unique.
So what's my tribe? I guess it's United Methodism with an extra dash of Anglicanism.
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