Chris is studying a post grad paper on church and change, and the last essay questions asks what to do in a congregation that is mostly over 50, but says that they want to change?
Across the whole parish, this is the youngest age profile, but there are still significant numbers of faithful older members, who like hymns and straightforward teaching.
There is more to contemporary worship than singing.
We had a couple who worship at another church over for lunch, and they admitted they quite like the way we packed 4 songs, a prayer of confession, prayers for others, prayer of adoration and a 20 minute sermon into an hour, compared with their regular diet which took longer and had less.
We are also experimenting with different ways of reflecting after the sermon, sometimes in silence, sometimes with a CD and powerpoint.
The changes we make are incremental ones, rather than large dramatic ones,but the challenge of leading worship for a congregation who need to change but don't want to is an ongoing tension.
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Theological reflections about worship as it happens with real people and real places, exploring the revelation and experience of God in community.
No comments:
Post a Comment