Gifts of music have been central to Christian worship throughout history. Biblically, we are called to widen our circles and welcome everyone to the table. Early Christian worship was diverse and reflective of the cultures of its people. Vatican II and the changes it brought about for Christendom challenge us to create worship that is accessible for a variety of people and within their contexts. The Nairobi Statement on Worship and Culture challenges us to incorporate cultural gifts from other cultures. We know, as Christians, that in order to expand our circles of compassion and create peace and understanding between a diversity of peoples, the cultures and concerns which represent these diverse groups must be given space within our communities. That said, there are challenges associated with changing worship formats and authentically presenting music that is unfamiliar to a congregation. These are challenges that we can meet and that Christendom should meet if we intend to continue creating meaningful worship for diverse congregations.
Christians throughout history have sought to accommodate a diversity of followers and make welcome many people to the table. Jesus challenged his followers to open their definition of neighbor and welcome those to the table who society was inclined to exclude; part of extending these metaphors into contemporary worship is to create worship that is meaningful and welcoming to a variety of people. Selections of church music that reflect only one dominant culture are comforting to many but also serve to exclude individuals who may not share the dominant cultural roots of our congregation. The writings of Paul show us that Paul sought to challenge the paradigms of his contemporaries and change rules regarding diet and circumcision that were alienating to those who were not born into Jewish contexts. Today we recognize that such radical inclusivity is part of what grew the early church. Musical selections that represent only "high culture" or a particular tradition can be exclusivist and serve to turn people away from a church. Like Jesus and Paul, we need to widen our welcome; one way to do that is to provide musical selections that can speak to a diversity of cultural contexts and the experiences of a variety of economic and educational backgrounds; even folks with Western, Anglo roots may be very unfamiliar with classical or high culture selections if they didn't have the economic privilege of exposure to these types of music. We all want to feel at home in our churches.
Christian Churches throughout history have recognized music as an important element of worship. James White articulates music as one of the seven main categories of Protestant worship. Vatican II acknowledged the challenge of creating worship that allows for active participation from laity. Part of that process began by Vatican II was to incorporate music that was more accessible to parishioners by instituting the folk mass, which incorporated folk music. There are many beautiful songs that are easy to learn and can help those in the pews who are normally asked to bend to meet the dominant cultural context feel more at home and welcome in our church. They can also help those in our dominant culture to experience and learn about the different ways in which others celebrate and experience God and Christ. The Nairobi Statement on Worship and Culture challenges us to not only celebrate our own cultural roots, but to celebrate and utilize the gifts and genius of other cultures. While it can be easy to remain within the walls of our own contexts, Christians are and have been worshiping in many places and in many ways; learning and experiencing the beauty of the gifts that other cultures have brought to an experience of God and Christ can help us to grow our own experiences. Music can be a primary and accessible way for us to faithfully meet the challenges of the Nairobi Statement on Worship and Culture.
There are many challenges that accompany incorporating unfamiliar music into worship. We can meet these challenges by surveying the strengths of our congregation and researching the musical selections we choose to use. We want to make sure that we don’t present material from other cultures superficially. Before we begin to blend more variety into our musical selections, we should research selections that might speak to similar issues as we deal with in our own worship. Finding pieces that resonate with sermons and scripture selections will help to ensure that our music choices don’t feel out of place. We also need to make sure that our inclusion of new material is not appropriation. We should survey those in our church to see if there are hymns or music pieces that people would particularly like to hear: music that they grew up with or that they miss from their past church. We should also ask if these individuals would be willing to help contextualize this music for those of us who are unfamiliar with it and help us to learn how such music is presented in their home context. We want to avoid presenting music in ways that exoticize it and we want to make sure that we go beyond the surface of our musical selections. While we want to challenge our congregation, we also want to make sure that they feel invited and not pressured to learn about and participate in experiences of music unfamiliar to them. I think that if we involve people from our congregation in this process and do our research, we can can begin to widen our selection of musical choices in ways that are authentic and meaningful.
Jesus and Paul began a challenge of widening our circles from the beginnings of the Christian movement. Throughout history, Christians have sought to meet this challenge by seeking participation and cultural diversity in worship. Vatican II and the Nairobi Statement on Worship and Culture and two wonderful examples of Christians trying to create authentic worship that can speak meaning to a variety of peoples. Both of these examples highlight music as a meaningful way that laity participates in and experiences worship. While there are many challenges that come with changing worship patterns, as well as challenges that come with efforts to incorporate diverse cultural material authentically, we can meet these challenges with research and by inviting participation and input from our community. As followers of Jesus, it is our ongoing goal to welcome people to his table and to create meaningful worship experiences for everyone.
No comments:
Post a Comment