RELG 312: Christian Worship

Course Schedule:

Subject to change. Some reserve readings will also be available online on this course's WebCT site.

OL = online, RR = reserve reading

Unit I: Early Christian Worship and Twentieth-Century Recovery

Topics:

paradigms of worship in the Old and New Testaments
the development of weekly worship and Christian initiation in both Eastern and Western Christianity to the sixth-century
how the "Liturgical Movement" in the twentieth-century has sought to recover theologies and practices of worship from this period

1. Wednesday, January 31

••In class writing exercise: What ideas about worship do we bring to this class?

Ideally, what is worship? (Theologically)

Ideally, what different things or activities do we do in worship? (Practice)

Take 15 to 20 minutes to write. Will hand in.

Then, share ideas chart them on paper.

2. Monday, February 5 Martyrs of Japan

Theme: What is Christian Worship?

Assignment: Introduction, front matter and most of Chapter 1, p. 1-39
Isaiah 6:1-8
Luke 24: 13-35
I Corinthians 10-14

Answer 1 or 2 and 3

These three texts have all played an important role in shaping our understanding of Christian worship.
1. Isaiah 6:1-8 and Luke 24:13-35 have frequently been employed as laying out the model or pattern of Christian worship. What pattern do you see in each? What qualities or activities of worship are discussed in each? What are the similarities and differences between the two? You may make a simple comparison chart for each passage and then write a summary statement identifying important similarities and differences. Try to relate these two passages to the different words for worship that White discusses (pp 25-28).

2. Although it may not seem like it at first glance, I Cor. 10-14 is one of our best windows into the worship a first-century Christian community. Paul focuses on the major issues or abuses. Reading "between the lines," describe what the ritual (or worship) life of the early Christians looked like.

3. What other biblical passages, if any, do you think are important to your understanding of Christian worship?

3. Wednesday, February 7

Theme: What we know: Christian Worship from the New Testament to the Second Century

Assignments:

Documents, selections from NT

Didache editor's introduction and liturgical section (chapters 7-16) in Early Christian Fathers, ed. Cyril C. Richardson (New York: Macmillan, 1970), 161-166, 174-179. Selections from this are also found in White, Documents.. See Index.

Justin Martyr, First Apology (c. 155)

chapters 61, 65-67. OL and RR or White, Documents , 147-148, 184-186, 19

Introduction , (Word in early church) 151-158, (initiation in early church) 203-211, start eucharist chapter (229-262)

4. Monday, February 12

Theme: Christian Worship in Third and Fourth Century

Assignments:

White, Documents, (selections on early church from Word, Initiation, and Eucharist chapters) 100-103, 143-164,180-193

Hippolytus, Apostolic Tradition of Hippolytus (c. 217), selections in Documents, 151-156, 186-188, 25-26, 82-83, 79-81 (230-231) The eucharistic prayer only is available on line at http://www.sonnet.co.uk/credo/euch2.html

Begin to discuss medieval rites

Liturgy of the Roman Rite (as standardized c. 1570) Three formats choose one:
http://www.sonnet.co.uk/credo/missals.html (English translation in parallel with Post-Vatican II Rite)
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/9190/tridenti.txt (1962 Latin text with English translation)
Pages 52 to 91 Thompson, Bard, ed. Liturgies of Western Church. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1961. (Latin text, English translation, and introductory essay) RR

Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom(c. 600)
http://www.ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/liturgy/liturgy.html

5. Wednesday, February 14 Cyril and Methodius

Theme: From the Early Church to Twentieth-Century recovery

Virgil Michel, O.S.B. "The Liturgy the Basis of Social Regeneration, " Orate Fratres 9 (Nov. 2, 1935): 536-545 RR

Vatican II, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (1963), http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19631204_sacrosanctum-concilium_en.html
also in Documents of Vatican II, ed. Austin P. Flannery (Costello Publishing Company, 1974), pp. 1-40. RR

Post-Vatican II Catholic Liturgy
http://www.sonnet.co.uk/credo/missals.html (In parallel with Tridentine Latin mass).

6. Monday, February 19

Theme: The long hand of Hippolytus

Other contemporary official reforms.
Methodist, Anglican, Lutheran, others (TBA)
"Holy Communion: Setting One" Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), pp 56-76
"Service of Word and Table" United Methodist Hymnal (1989), pp. 2-11
"Holy Eucharist, Rite II" Book of Common Prayer (1979), pp. 354-369 also at http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/

Discussion of field visits--bring draft of field reflections.

Unit II: Time and Matter in Christian Worship

Topics:

the development of the "Christian Year" in the early church and its use today
the other events which structure the temporal cycle of Christian worship in America today
the tension between material objects and spiritual worship in Christian worship and theology, especially in regard to images, the sacraments, and dress
the role of space and architecture in Christian worship

7. Wednesday, February 21

Theme: Space and Time--Class meets in Beeson Chapel

Begin class in Beeson Chapel

Introductory Church year lecture

Introductory Architecture lecture

Documents, 39-74

Introduction, 73, 81-109

Friday, February 23, Polycarp --Field Essay Due

8. Monday, February 26

Worship space field trip:

First United Methodist Church, Cathedral Church of the Advent (Episcopal), St. Stephen the Martyr Catholic Campus Center, Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Church, Dawson Memorial Baptist Church (if time allows).

Martin Muller, Letter on the position of the Tabernacle, Our Lady of Sorrows Church RR

George Washington Kramer, The What How and Why of Church Building, (selection)

Ralph Adams Cram, Church Building, (selection) RR

Edward A. Sovik, Architecture for Worship, (selection) RR

Rowe, Kenneth E. "Redesigning Methodist Churches: Auditorium-Style Sanctuaries and Akron-Plan Sunday Schools in Romanesque Costume, 1875-1925." In Connectionalism: Ecclesiology, Mission, and Identity, edited by Russell E. Richey, Dennis M. Campbell and William B. Lawrence, 117-134. Nashville: Abingdon, 1997. RR

9. Ash Wednesday, February 28

Theme: follow up on field trip.and Images or Iconoclasm

John of Damascus, On the Divine Images, 7-70; or http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/johndamascus-images.html

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book I, Chapter 9-12 (OL and RR)

10. Monday, March 5

Theme: Sacramentality

Introduction, 175-201

Documents, (on Sacramentality 119-144)

11. Wednesday, March 7 Perpetua and her Companions

Theme: Protestants and Sacraments

Documents, (Initiation) 164-179, (Eucharist) 193-213

Introduction (Initiation) 211-228, (Eucharist) 252-262

Baptist Faith and Message Statements (selections)

Herschel H. Hobbs, What Baptists Believe (Nashville: Broadman, 1964), 82-85 RR OL

R. Wayne Stacy, "Baptism," 153-174 and G. Thomas Halbrooks, "Communion," 175-190 in A Baptist's Theology ed. R. Wayne Stacy (Macon, Ga.: Smyth and Helwys, 1999). RR

J. J. Taylor, "Why Baptist and Not Episcopalian," in Baptist Why and Why Not: Twenty-Five Papers by Twenty-Five Writers and a Declarationof Faith (Nashville: Sunday School Board, Southern Baptist Convention, 1900), 105-108. RR OL

Jack Hayford, "Remembering What to Remember," chap. 13 of Worship His Majesty (Dallas: Word, 1987), 179-198 RR

For further reading: Essays on Baptism and Close communion in Baptist Why and Why Not, 151-204 RR

Friday, March 9 Gregory of Nyssa --Essay due on Images and Sacramentality

12. Monday, March 12 Gregory the Great

Theme: Sacraments continued and "Is Marriage a Sacrament?"

Unfinished business from above
Documents, 225-229

Introduction, 276-286

Catechism of the Catholic Church, Part II, Section II, Article7, para. 1602-1617, 1621-1624, 1638-1642

White, Sacraments of God's Self Giving, pp. 85-88 RR

Other?

13. Wednesday, March 14

Theme: Ordering Time The Christian Year and other Models

Introduction, 47-80

Documents, 17-38

Fred Winslow Adams, Proposed Christian Year (1935) Via WebCT site

Other?

Assignment: Chart the major cycles of your religious year and week. How do the traditional festivals and seasons fit into if at all. Consider the cycles of your work and leisure as well as the activities of your religious community.

14. Monday, March 19 Joseph -- Mid-term exam

Unit III: Proclamation and Persuasion in Worship

Topics:

the place of Bible reading and preaching in worship, especially in the following movements: sixteenth-century Reformation, eighteenth-century pietism, and nineteenth-century evangelical revivalism; twentieth-century "seeker services"
the pervasive influence of revivalism on American Protestant worship
critics and defenders of revivalism
a typology of preaching styles