Drunken Sobriety

We gathered as we usually do on the evening before Easter Sunday. We began in darkness, as the Christ candle processed toward the front of the church. We listened to a series of Scripture readings, rehearsing the story of salvation, punctuated by traditional prayers and moving hymns. The service slowly moved toward a climactic moment that we all eagerly anticipate: The Easter Acclamation.

During Lent, we had been fasting. We had remembered our sins. We had just rehearsed the Last Supper on Maundy Thursday, and the Crucifixion on Good Friday. Now, as the vigil progressed, I could almost taste the new life in Christ that was about to be proclaimed during the acclamation, when the priest shouts: “Christ is risen!” and the congregation thunders back, “The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!”

In our congregation, just before the acclamation, one of our men sings “He’s Alive” (written by Don Franciso, made famous by Dolly Parton). Given our make-up—lots of college students and 20-somethings—and our ethos—charismatic Anglican—we enjoy a few whoops and some cheering as the song comes to its climax. This year, between the cheering generated by “He’s Alive” and a malfunctioning microphone, when the priest began the acclamation, nobody heard. After trying again, he gave up and just joined in the cheering and started ringing his bell—after which the usual holy pandemonium of bell ringing and cheering broke loose.

I was downcast! I couldn’t believe we hadn’t said the acclamation. I didn’t realize until that moment how much I had looked forward to that little liturgical response. It is for me the moment in the year when the resurrection of Christ becomes ever more deeply rooted in my soul.

Such is the nature of liturgy and ritual. The simplest response can drill down deep into us, so that at certain times and seasons we hunger and thirst to hear it, to participate in a congregation that chants it together. It can make or break our year.

A move toward informal and spontaneous worship is clearly a world trend (as witnessed by the growth of Pentecostalism), yet at the same time, the majority of Christians in the world today are Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans, and high-church Protestants in mainline churches. The liturgy—whose basic outline is the same in all these traditions—remains the staple of Sunday worship and daily prayer for millions for a reason: It allows people to enter into an enduring story that makes sense of life, and allows them to enter into communion with God in a way that touches body, mind, and soul. So it’s no surprise than an increasing number of even low-church evangelicals are exploring liturgical worship, as noted in the recent cover story in

, “The Future Lies in the Past.”

The liturgy is attractive to the mind. There is a coherence, an internal logic, an order to the service that can engage us intellectually.

The liturgy is also attractive to the heart. Who could not be moved by the pageantry, the flickering candles, the rich tapestry of color, the communal chanting of ancient prayers, and the participation in deeply symbolic acts?

Continued on page 2: Liturgy is no magic bullet, of course... »