A mistake we must suffer with for too long. . .

A while ago I was driving in Norfolk, NE, when I finally noticed that the circle building of a Lutheran congregation was gone.  I wish I could say that the congregation go rid of a structure unsuited for its liturgical purpose and now enjoyed one that was befitting its purpose as a house of God.  That would not be the case.  A congregation which had suffered with a round structure useful neither for the Divine Service or the singing of hymns or preaching was now suffering with another structure -- a warehouse converted from a beer distributor to a place of worship.  Though I appreciate the irony that any German Lutheran should in having a site constructed to house a beer distributorship become a church facility, the execution, however well intended, was not

 good. It was cheap, available, and industrial but it did not encourage the eye to the heavens nor did it give to what took place within the sense of nobility that liturgy deserved.  

So it was with some interest I read of a Roman Catholic congregation in Plattsburg, MO, which was in the process of getting past its own round worship space in pursuit of a form more historic and certainly more friendly to what was taking place within its walls.  They, too, decided that the round building was not salvageable as a worship space and so they constructed a space suitable for its liturgical purpose even though they knew it would be a journey and that the process as not going to happen overnight.  So they put themselves to work and this is the outcome.

Their old building was certainly a building set in its time but did not age well.  They certainly sought the options available to rehab the old space into something more usable but undoubtedly found that the cost of such an endeavor was greater than building something new.  Perhaps they turned the old into a fellowship space.  Who knows?  But at least this space with its minimalism, horizontal focus, and art that was also its bare bones gave way to a rather traditional space.  It was undoubtedly costly.  The cost of our mistakes is rarely inexpensive.  This is particularly true of buildings that are with us longer than those who design them.  In any case, they have embarked on a road not simply to remake but restore.

My plea here is to the architect who receives the commission of the congregation as an invitation for his or her own self-expression.  Don't be stupid.  This congregation looked to you to provide them something that would service the purpose and the need and you gave them something that not only wasted their money but was a disservice to its purpose.  Do the research.  Find out what happens within the space you are called to design.  Honor the purpose even if it might mean dissuading the people of a dream built more upon a whim than its more ancient and laudable purpose as a House of God.

And to the building committees and pastors of these congregations, think twice about novelty.  Learn from the past.  As Churchill noted, we shape our buildings and then they shape us for generations.  Take time to learn what happens within the Divine Service before you ask for preliminary design concepts and took the structures near you that have excelled in their purpose as a place for the people of God to gather around the Word and Table of the Lord.  Beauty is not an enemy of worship but a tool employed in service to the Gospel and to the people who have come to be nourished and transformed by that Word of God.  Unless the eye is drawn upward, the heart and mind won't be either.  In our own age as in other epochs of the history of Christianity, we suffer more when we forget this than when we dare to construct buildings that point us to God.

From living and chosen stones. . .

Part of a good collect is getting what we pray for correct.  Honestly, there have been so many times in which a prayer was prayed for the opening of this or the blessing of that and I was not sure what I was praying for so I was hesitant to add my Amen to the prayer.  Some of it is due to the in artful wording of the prayer itself.  Some of it was due to the fact that the one leading the prayer had not bothered to read it beforehand and simply did a very poor job of reading the words and thus rendered what might have been clear rather cloudy.  Some of it was due to the fact that the person leading the prayer did not appreciate careful or eloquent language and expressed such disdain in the way he read the prayer.  

Collects are not simple and yet they are not elaborate either.  The collect directs the attention of those praying heavenward not only by what is prayed but how it is prayed.  It is the same reason we continue to appreciate the outdated but eloquent language used for the Our Father or the Twenty-Third Psalm -- they are uplifting in the way the words are used as well as what is said.  These are definitely practiced prayers.  The collect was chanted or sung in part because this was an aid to the person praying the collect so that the words would unfold from the mouth in such a way that the meaning of the words was rendered more clear to those who were hearing and who would be expected to add their Amen to the words.

Just as heaven, according to the Revelation of St. John the Divine, will not be plain but well ornamented with the most precious earthly materials as ordinary, so the language of heaven will reflect this nobility.  Though some might not appreciate this, the vast majority of people do.  Think, for example, of the way we are attracted to the ancient and noble rituals that turn a prince into a king or a royal wedding.  The billions who tuned into such televised affairs were not looking to see or hear something plain but that which was lofty -- words and actions that hearkened back to the days when it was universally believed that divine providence sat the man or woman upon the throne.  If we would be interested and curious of such things in an age in which a monarch and the monarchy were more imagery than substance, why would we think that worship is the place where the collect should be replaced with Father God, we just wanna. . .?

Below is an example of a mission collect which draws our attention away from the decision moment so often described in conversion to the actions of our almighty God in choosing and chiseling the living stones He uses to build His heavenly temple.  At the same time it is a humble prayer preserving not only God's work in building His Church but also keeping His Church to the day when the earthly becomes the heavenly and Jerusalem on earth becomes Jerusalem the Golden.

O God, who from living and chosen stones prepares an eternal dwelling for Your majesty, increase in Your Church the spirit of grace You have bestowed, so that a people faithful to You may always increase in the heavenly building of Jerusalem.  Amen.

Another year of grace. . .

Now Greet the Swiftly Changing Year

Now greet the swiftly changing year
With joy and penitence sincere.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

 Remember now the Son of God
And how He shed His infant blood.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

This Jesus came to end sin’s war;
This Name of names for us He bore.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

His love abundant far exceeds
The volume of a whole year’s needs.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

With Him as Lord to lead our way
In want and in prosperity,
What need we fear in earth or space
In this new year of grace!

 “All glory be to God on high,
And peace on earth!” the angels cry.
Rejoice! Rejoice! With thanks embrace
Another year of grace.

God, Father, Son, and Spirit, hear!
To all our pleas incline Your ear;
Upon our lives rich blessing trace
In this new year of grace. 

This marvelous hymn is from the Slovak line of Christianity (Moravia in particular) and was introduced to English speakers in 1969 in the LCMS Worship Supplement.  Jaroslav Vajda drew upon his own childhood memories in East Chicago, Indiana, as the family gathered around the piano at midnight before the congregation took it up on New Years' Day.  As is typical, fifteen stanzas were compressed into seven but what really his me is the repeated last line -- another year of grace!  It occurs to me that many of us find it hard to sing with gusto such a sentiment at a time like this.  Maybe we have been troubled by the fear or dread of the future for a long time.  The hymn so wonderfully draws us out of our angst and into the knowledge of Romans 8 and its poignant question:  If God be for us, who can be against us?  We struggle to believe those words.  We want to but our knowledge of all the things that are wrong in the world and in our lives are too much for us and we tend to surrender our hope to the dread.  How sad it is!  Whether the world is looking up or things are going to hell in a hand basket, God is with us.  We live under the banner of His love, by the power of His grace, confident of His favor, and with hope toward the eternal future Christ has prepared for us.  We ought to do more than provide lip service to this hope.  We ought to offer the world more than anxious thoughts.  We ought to be able to give answer to the hope in us -- if it is!  The gifts of God exceed not only what we need for the coming year but also what we dread.  So go ahead and sing the hymn.  Sing it loud.  Sing it strong.  Gratitude is the answer to our fears.  We live by grace just as we have been saved by grace.  Thanks be to God!  Another year of grace!