Alternative Worship
This entry is a poor exuse for an essay in response to the article “God’s Mission and the Christian Assembly: The Search for an Alternative Practice of Worship” by Thomas H Shattauer, published in “Dialog: A Journal of Theology” on June 1, 2011. This author argues that contemporary worship is not so much about an alternative to tradition, but to conventionality. Conventionality means – especially in Mainline American context – institutional Christianity. In other words, the “alternative” in alternative worship is about an alternative to the Sunday morning sitting in pews sermon/reading focused service augmented with studies and committee-organized efforts. The question posed by alternative worship isn’t “how can we get rid of tradition”, but “how can we continue Christian practice and make new traditions?” In this framework, the question of how to maintain the institutional church becomes less…
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