Gathering for Worship: When Liturgy meets the Potluck?
Last week, without much fanfare, I finally received from Kelly what was meant to be first my birthday gift, then Christmas, then anniversary, and finally it's late arrival meant it was just, well, a random gift. But a good one at that. What she has been trying to get me for some time, but which has taken its time getting here due to trouble with vendors, is the new prayer book published by the Baptist Union of Great Britain in 2005. Gathering for Worship: Patterns and Prayers for the Community of Disciples is a helpful planning resource that is directed mainly towards worship and practices in the Baptist/Free Church tradition. But it also has the promise to be an ecumenically useful worship book for Christians of all traditions, and in fact it is one of the resources placed on reserve at the Duke Divinity School library for the Introduction to Christian Worship class taught by Ed Phillips (United Methodist). I have even found a favorable review by a British Roman Catholic who believes that Gathering for Worship provides complementary forms of worship and devotional practice as well as catechetical or semi-catechetical reminders of the purpose of certain ritual acts.
Actually, the main problem that this book has will not be convincing other Christians but Baptists of its usefulness. Ours is a tradition that is traditionally suspicious of traditions, especially services that are too tightly planned and which contain written prayers that some rightly fear can become merely rote delivery. However, the unintended consequences of this laudable pursuit of spiritual worship have been a diminishing of liturgics as a necessary and vital arena of sustained theological reflection, a disconnection with some historic and meaningful prayers and worship patterns, and certainly in some cases a laziness masquerading as “following the lead of the Spirit.” Gathering for Worship reflects a small but hopefully growing liturgical renewal among Baptists in order to recover, in our own particular way, worship as a carefully thought-out corporate discipline that can be imbued with multiple layers and resonances in both what is said and done. This renewal expresses itself in various ways, from the adoption of the Church Year and lectionary (at minimum among Baptists in North America we have witnessed a large-scale appropriation of the season of Advent) to litanies and responsive prayers to fuller liturgies for the Lord's Supper. It is not surprising that British Baptists, who seem to have less qualms about so-called “Catholic” practices, are leading the way with the publication of this book.
Thus like most such books Gathering for Worship has plans for acts such as Communion and Marriage and prayers for various seasons of the Church Year and various moments of spiritual meaning. Unlike most such prayer books, of course, it has a Baptist twist: the baptism rite is only for disciples who have made a conscious, verbal affirmation, there is a rite for presenting and dedicating infants, and there are various commissionings of ministers alongside ordination. The book also presents sections of prayers for occasions not marked by the Church Year, such as The Weak of Prayer for Christian Year. Unlike the Book of Common Prayer, a prime example of books with more of a so-called “catholic” or at least mainline bent, Gathering for Worship does not contain a catechism, rites for the daily office, rites for the other five “sacraments,” or any lectionaries.
Here I may hit on what I think are some of the weaknesses or deficiencies of the book. I highlight these with a caveat. Given that Baptists have tended to stick up their noses at structured liturgies, it is an accomplishment that such a service book even exists, let alone that it contains prayers for seasons of the Church Year. So these are not strong criticisms. But I do pine for the day that a Baptist prayer book does contain a daily office plan (it's Scriptural! - Psalm 55:17, among others) so that it can be useful for families, informal gatherings of disciples, and individuals in the rhythm of worship between Sundays. Providing the lectionary would also be useful for pastors and churches seeking to follow its discipline. Perhaps also because the book's continued production is contingent on its acceptance in Baptist circles – it is, after all, not required like the BCP – it only appears in one form, which is a good-sized hardback edition. A leather-bound edition would make it more flexible and so easier to use in the midst of corporate worship and a smaller edition would make it easier for personal use. But for now this problem can be answered by using the CD that provides PDF files of the entire text of Gathering for Worship.
Ultimately, Gathering for Worship is not comprehensive in the way that the BCP strives to be, and it is not as fit for personal use, either. It may be misleading to call it a “prayer book” since its beneficial use will largely be restricted to corporate worship. It is a “service book” primarily. However, in that respect it is a sure winner, providing both traditional and contemporary forms and touching on a number of theological themes and imagery. I am most excited about exploring its seven patterns for Communion, and I will describe more about them in a future post. If nothing else, let me say this as endorsement: I used Gathering for Worship to say a prayer in worship this past Sunday, and it is only the beginning of much use that I expect to make. This is a remarkable achievement on the part of the British Baptists.
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