Some thoughts on Liturgy

To characterize or simplify liturgy as the actions of the people in their worship of God, I think, diminishes both. The Greek λειτουργία encompasses both our actions and our worship, creating a space, a moment, where the human and divine create or inhabit touch points, spaces in time where we connect across the infinite and find consonance and resonance with each other. Every moment within our lives is liturgy, that yearning for contact with the divine, those instances of feeling touched by something ineffable, of touching something beyond our plane of existence.

Likewise, holding music as something to enhance our worship or as something to entertain diminishes the act of the composer seeking to reach beyond her/himself, the musicians' goal of perfectly presenting the composer’s work, or the hearer’s desire to be transported beyond the moment.  It, too, is an act of worship, of reaching beyond one’s self to touch what is elusive and ephemeral.

Art, too, follows these same injunctions, as it also seeks to bridge between the finite and the infinite, creating spaces where crossover between the two can and will occur.

Too often we call what the structure of our worship simply a liturgy. Our work of the people in the worship of God on a given day at a given hour is that, but it is also the conscious focus of our energies and attention on seeking God, to reach out to God, and to be touched by God.

In every parish church, I believe that everything that is done, every moment of the day should be liturgy - the seeking, reaching, yearning for the palpable presence of God in our lives. To me, this means that every office and mass, every moment of the day should be our best efforts to cross the gulf that separates us from relationship and communion with our God.

Within the construct of our formal worship, there should be no action or event that has not been examined through a lens that seeks to determine its why and how, with an associated theological understanding. When we act in worship, we should always be reverent and joyful, and every action or activity should be done with integrity: maintaining the unwritten intent of the rite or celebration.

Opening the doors of the church should be de rigueur, with opportunities for everyone to partake of the space, the worship, the music, the art in its sacred space. The Daily Office, said or sung, invites us into God’s space. The mass affords a unique and intimate opportunity for communion with God. Concerts of voice and instruments invite and enable a different approach to the divine. Art opens yet another door to the infinite. Together, combining the enticement of our senses of sight, touch, hearing, smell, and taste, we create a microenvironment where human/divine interaction can and do occur with regularity.

It is through our liturgy of all forms that we create myriad opportunities for every person to find a pathway to the divine, to touch the face of God, and to carry that touch to every person around us. It is here that we find the incarnate God, both in worship and in our daily lives.