The heart of worship


Yesterday we reflected on works righteousness as if affects philanthropic giving. The statistics seem to suggest that large donors give generally not out of genuine concern for the needs of humanity, in particular the poor, but in order to be noticed. We give to see our names on a building, or to be placed in the top 10 list of donors to our university, or to make a lasting impact on the life of some nonprofit institution for which we will be remembered. (James 2:15-16: "If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,' and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?")

This same attitude dominates the life of our congregations, at the expense of what we need most -- the growing awareness within each of us of the light of Christ which burns at the center of our being.

In many parishes activity is perceived to be the main sign of life. (We have given up on growth as an indicator because it is just not happening in many small to mid-size congregations; anyway, we know that growth itself is not necessarily a sign of life.) What do you do at your church? Oh, lots is going on! We serve meals once a month in the local homeless shelter. We help at the food pantry and we are starting a fall clothing drive. We have great Christian ed every Sunday with guest speakers. We have many small groups, from knitting to quilting to scrapbooking to men's breakfasts. We are starting a parish nurse ministry. And on and on.

What about worship? Is that, too, a busy, noisy activity that we feel obligated to "do" each week? In most parishes worship is so inconsequential that it doesn't even get mentioned as something that defines the life of a congregation.

What is missing is the very heart of worship. The great 20th century mystic Thomas Kelly, who grew up as a poor farmboy in Chillicothe, Ohio, describes this as "internal practices and habits of the mind...unceasing orientation of the deeps of our being about the Inward Light, ways of conducting our inward life so that we are perpetually bowed in worship, while we are also very busy in the world of daily affairs."

Kelly urges "inward practices of the mind at deepest levels, letting it swing like the needle, to the polestar of the soul" so that the inward life "becomes the truest guide of life...." The Christ who is within us "urges, by secret persuasion, to such an amazing Inward Life with Him, so that, firmly cleaving to Him, we always look out upon all the world through the sheen of the Inward LIght, and react toward [all people] spontaneously and joyously from this Inward Center."

Let us ask how, or whether, our worship fosters this orientation. For if it does not, we find ourselves susceptible to a kind of reverse Jamesian accusation (see James 2:17): That works, without faith, are dead.


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