Not Getting an Amen
Can I Get an Amen?
A friend sent me the picture recently, saying the squirrel reminded her of childhood years attending a church with her grandmother, and the preacher up front shouting, “Can I get an Amen?”
Not many Amens shouted in Episcopal worship these days, although the church means for the Great Amen that concludes the Eucharistic Prayer to be enthusiastic and vigorous: AMEN.
Not many hands in the air either.
When Episcopalians go to seminary, where we go and what we study is decided by the bishop who is sponsoring us (this is the Episcopal Church, and episcopal means governed by bishops, so most of us are not loose cannons). As a kindness to me because it was close to our home in Harrisburg and I could commute and would not have to move my family, my bishop (Diocese of Central Pennsylvania) sent me to the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. But he specified that I must take certain courses at the Episcopal Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Virginia (commonly called VTS); and my final semester of seminary was in residence there, with a room in a residence hall, and commuting weekends between Harrisburg and Alexandria.
While at VTS, I found out that Truro Parish in nearby Fairfax, a quiet, rustic small town church where Linda and I had been members nearly twenty years earlier, had since under a new rector (John Howe, who later became a bishop here in Florida) become a hotbed of renewal, and that they had a Prayer & Praise Service every Friday evening. Intrigued, I determined to go and did so once, to my -- then -- horror. It was standing room only. There was a loud band up front, some 800 Episcopalians and others crowded into that large church singing and shouting, hands in the air, “words of knowledge” bursting spontaneously from one or another member of the congregation “speaking in tongues” followed by someone across the room standing up and rendering with the gift “interpretation of tongues” (1 Corinthians 12:10).
When Episcopalians go to seminary, where we go and what we study is decided by the bishop who is sponsoring us (this is the Episcopal Church, and episcopal means governed by bishops, so most of us are not loose cannons). As a kindness to me because it was close to our home in Harrisburg and I could commute and would not have to move my family, my bishop (Diocese of Central Pennsylvania) sent me to the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. But he specified that I must take certain courses at the Episcopal Theological Seminary in Alexandria, Virginia (commonly called VTS); and my final semester of seminary was in residence there, with a room in a residence hall, and commuting weekends between Harrisburg and Alexandria.
While at VTS, I found out that Truro Parish in nearby Fairfax, a quiet, rustic small town church where Linda and I had been members nearly twenty years earlier, had since under a new rector (John Howe, who later became a bishop here in Florida) become a hotbed of renewal, and that they had a Prayer & Praise Service every Friday evening. Intrigued, I determined to go and did so once, to my -- then -- horror. It was standing room only. There was a loud band up front, some 800 Episcopalians and others crowded into that large church singing and shouting, hands in the air, “words of knowledge” bursting spontaneously from one or another member of the congregation “speaking in tongues” followed by someone across the room standing up and rendering with the gift “interpretation of tongues” (1 Corinthians 12:10).
Ordained before graduating seminary, I was a deacon at the time, a staid liturgical traditionalist, and when my bishop found out that I was appalled by the antics of the renewal movement, he insisted I become more rounded by attending the upcoming Episcopal Renewal Conference at Ridgecrest, NC, summer 1983. It was so transforming that my conservative rector accused me of coming back a holy-roller.
In the months after that, using a program I brought back from the Episcopal Renewal Conference at Ridgecrest, I introduced “Shepherd Groups” at our church in Pennsylvania. It was quite successful while we were there. Every member of our large parish was assigned to a neighborhood “Shepherd Group” of six to eight people, that met in the "Shepherds'" homes for sixty minutes each Monday evening with Bible study guidelines that I prepared and distributed to the “Shepherds” who were the group leaders. We had about fifty "Shepherd Groups" as I recall, and I stayed at home by the telephone to take calls or questions during the Bible studies. Every Tuesday morning I met with all the Shepherds for Eucharist in the sanctuary -- pouring wine that I purchased at a winery here in the Florida panhandle while teaching my two defense acquisition management courses at the University of North Florida to take back to Harrisburg just for this -- then after Eucharist I cooked bacon and omelets for them in the church kitchen and each Shepherd Group leader briefed on how their Monday evening groups had gone. After we left and moved to Florida, the program died out for lack of leadership; but it worked beautifully while we were still at that parish; including that members of Shepherd Groups often sat together for worship on Sunday mornings: this was especially good for incorporating new members into the life of the parish. It was a lot of work, but enormous fun, and great fellowship. At churches we have served since then, I have discussed the idea of Shepherd Groups as a way of building up the body of Christ, and been met with blank stares.
Holy Nativity has programs and small groups gazoo, several things for everyone, and does not need Shepherd Groups. However, struggling small Episcopal parishes, including some in Bay County, could find shepherd groups a marvelous way to spread the gospel while building a church. A key problem is, it takes strong leadership, loving dedication and serious commitment, and most folks are too busy with life to be bothered doing anything spiritual and religious during the week, much less organizing and leading and guiding to success, and sticking with it.
Besides, to raise the curtain of honesty, most folks are satisfied with their little churches, love the smallness and intimacy, and prefer to keep them just as they are. For all the lip service about church growth, most folks really don’t want to grow or change, and resist change -- because it's a lot of trouble and because "change" challenges and threatens many things and people and positions and ministries within a parish. This makes “church growth” just a phrase for the members to say to each other and something to assure the bishop that there is a Church Growth Committee. But the bishop is never fooled.
In stewardship season, nothing could be more powerful than a parish decision to commit to small groups and get it moving. But it would be a tremendous nuisance and bother compared to simply asking for pledge cards to be turned in.
Can I get an Amen?
No? Ah, well.
Tom+
Thanks, Missie, I love the pic!