Search Results

Surveying the worship practices of churches, this chapter exposits a year-long study of congregational worship services, concluding that the racially isolated nature of American churches (both evangelical and nonevangelical) is unintentionally encouraged by an overriding desire to avoid potential conflicts on Sunday mornings. The homogeneity of American churches is reinforced not only by the substance of worship services but also by the patterns of those gatherings. This chapter suggests that churches interested in becoming racially diverse must pay attention to the unarticulated desire for corporate unity that undergirds most worship services.

This chapter considers how traffic with demons was so etched on some ritual forms of traditional Roman worship that either new rites had to be developed or the symbolic content of old rituals reframed for the early Christian church. The clergy sought to save meaningful and familiar ritual forms when it seemed possible to redirect the symbolic content. However, some behaviors were so thoroughly saturated with messages counter to Christian truths that they could not be reformed. Christians thus created a new kind of space where demons dared not tread. The enclosed hallowed space provided a clean slate on which a new story could be written in the language of ritual. Here, Christian worship aligned itself in form and tone with traditional somber customs of Roman worship, but the symbolic content making up the pagan rituals was redirected, and the aspects attractive to demons were filtered out.

This chapter focuses on the Secret Gospel, which is shown to have three liturgical elements (nocturnal initiation after a preparation period, resurrection themes, and a linen cloth). The discussion, however, stresses that the three elements have no major role in 2nd century Christian worship, such as in Alexandria. Baptisms here are closely connected to John's baptism of Jesus and are celebrated on January 6, the day of epiphany. This leads to the conclusion that the 2nd century gospel should show Epiphany themes. It also states that the Easter and resurrection themes imply the Secret Gospel appears to be more like an early Christian worship that was visualized by Anglican liturgiologists, and less like second-century Alexandrian worship.

This chapter considers Smith's claim of receiving a new understanding of worship after listening to the different Byzantine hymns in Mar Saba. It shows that Smith believed Jesus' initiation rites were planned to have the same hypnotic and repetitive effect—noted to lead to a state of “disorientation”—as the Byzantine hymns. The discussion also looks at Smith's insincere account of his experiences at Mar Saba and explains how his understanding of trance possession and development of the changed states of consciousness have made Smith's representations seem ridiculous. Finally, the chapter covers comparisons that Smith made of early Christian worship to mental illness, “enthusiasm”, and “shamanism”.

This chapter focuses on the social dimensions of the theological controversy in Alexandria, following closely the efforts of rival churchmen to make ordinary Christians their partners in the dispute. It is here, as churchmen interacted with one another and with their congregations, that we begin to see the rise of a new type of church leader—brash, enterprising, and combative.

When converting from one form of Christianity to another, Samoans describe some relationships they had to Christianity as cultural and other relationships as acultural. Conversion can encourage Samoans to distinguish between being cultural and being moral; it provokes comparisons that are also critiques of Samoan culture. This chapter discusses how contemporary conversion requires that Samoans attribute culture, morality, meaning, and meaninglessness anew to various forms of Christian worship. In doing so, they generate reflexive explanations of their personal transformations. The analysis focuses on Samoan migrants who join evangelical churches, rejecting Catholicism or more established Protestantism. It argues that they are rejecting the reflexive stance to a moral order that their Samoan church congregation encouraged along with fa'alavelave (Samoan ritual exchanges). Instead, they are adopting a different stance to a Christian moral order, one they consider more valid. Both fa'alavelave and neoliberal forms of capitalism will structure certain reflexive stances as moral. People are transitioning between these two different reflexive stances. They are moving between orientations to moral orders; they are not moving between two fundamentally different moral orders.

This chapter takes a look at the doctrine of the Trinity in historical perspective. It presents some guidelines by which to test inclusive language reformulations of the doctrine of the Trinity. It argues that the triad “creator, redeemer, and sustainer” will not do as a substitute for the older language of “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”This does not mean that such language cannot be used in Christian worship, but only that it cannot be used in such a way as to give the impression that it is trinitarian language.

This chapter demonstrates how, in the early Arian controversy in Alexandria, there was a subtle but fundamental change in the nature of church leaders' response to theological disagreement. Challenged by their rivals and driven by a new certainty that they possessed the truth, church leaders embarked on a disruptive quest to prove their orthodoxy and discredit their opponents. Persistent confrontation, combined with a determination to undermine fellow churchmen, replaced the former attempts to find consensus. The chapter argues that this change resulted from the need to achieve greater precision in defining the truth about God, which altered one's relationship with one's belief and encouraged a deeper sense of devotion to rival conceptions of the deity. These developments hindered efforts to reach compromise.

This chapter tells the story of Mill as a young, polemical Benthamite and Utilitarian filled with zeal to reform the world. It follows him as he made friends (especially George John Graham and John Arthur Roebuck), founded societies and clubs, and felt the thrill of being the uncompromising champion of a radical ideology. It discusses his defence of, and interest in, the controversial plebeian freethinker Richard Carlile. Later, Mill himself would view this as a period of his life when he was a fanatic ‘sectarian’ with a ‘narrow creed’. If John Stuart Mill ever was an atheist, it was at this time in his life.