Liturgical Theology

URE FOR A LITURGICAL THEOLOGY : C URE

C RISIS RISIS

Drew Dixon | December 1, 2015

It has been said that there is a crisis in America. Over the past several years various surveys have shown that Americans have lost confidence in the Church 1; that the general public is becoming less religious2; and that even regular church attendees are losing robust theological understanding 3. Meanwhile, theological education has also been in crisis. Seminaries across America, and across denominational lines, have been facing dire economic struggles primarily because there has been a “declining interest in attending seminaries” causing seminary enrollment to fall.4 There are countless

causes for such a change in church involvement and educational enrollment. From the outside of these institutions, it could be the increase of secular values or the shift toward intellectualist philosophy. But perhaps from the inside, it could be seen as a widespread loss of liturgy or the apparent irrelevance of theology. These crises cri ses goes hand in hand. Churches have distanced themselves from historical liturgy and robust theology to be more “accessible” to the public and thus have lost their efficacy for

transformation. Theological scholarship has distanced itself from liturgical experience and thus fallen into disinterest. These crises stem from what Alexander Schmemann called a “rupture between theological study and liturgical experience.”5 A cure for the present crises might be found by drawing

together liturgy and theology the prayers of the saints and the papers of the scholars need one — the

1

Cathy Lynn Grossmann, “Americans’ Confidence in Religion Hits a New Low,” USA Today , 2015, http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/201 http://www.usatoday.com/stor y/news/nation/2015/06/17/americans-confidence-r 5/06/17/americans-confidence-religion-poll/2887225 eligion-poll/28872253/. 3/. 2 Pew Research Center, “U.S. Public Becoming Less Religious,” 2015, http://www.pewforum.org/2015/11/03/u-s-public-becoming-less-religious/. 3 Lifeway Research, “Americans Believe in Heaven, Hell, and a Little Bit of Heresy,” 2014, http://www.lifewayresearch.com/2014/10/28/americans-b http://www.lifewayresearch.com /2014/10/28/americans-believe-in-heaven-hell-an elieve-in-heaven-hell-and-a-little-bit-of-heresy/. d-a-little-bit-of-heresy/. 4 Libby A. Nelson, “The Struggling Seminaries,” Inside Higher Ed , 2013, http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/03/2 http://www.insidehighered.c om/news/2013/03/29/luther-seminary-makes-deep-cuts-facult 9/luther-seminary-makes-deep-cuts-faculty-and-staff-amid-toughy-and-staff-amid-toughtimes-theological. 5 Alexander Schmemann, Introduction to Liturgical Theology , 2nd ed. (New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1975), 9. 1

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another! The beginnings of this re-integration can be found in liturgical theology. For quite some time theology has “dismissed liturgy out of its thinking,”6 s o “t he present task of liturgical theology is to show that rite and liturgy implicitly were the basis for classical theology ” and that “ we cannot do theology without an ordered ritual and liturgical basis.”7 In this paper I will provide a brief overview of liturgical theology, identify its beginnings in two historic Christian theologians, legitimize its importance through recent philosophical and epistemological developments, and conclude with its implications for the Church and the Academy. WHAT IS LITURGICAL THEOLOGY ?

The formal study of liturgical theology has its beginnings in the 1960s 1960s in the work of Orthodox scholar, Alexander Schmemann. Catholic scholar Aidan Kavanaugh picked up this work in the 1980s, and his student, David Fagerberg has continued the tradition into the current era. 8 Fagerberg gives a simple and compelling description of liturgical theology utilizing Ludwig Wittgenstein’s metaphor of grammar. Wittgenstein insists that studying words and using words are quite different tasks. “To know the meaning of a word is not just to know its ostensive definition from the dictionary; it requires knowing how to play with the word in its language game.”9 Kavanaugh uses

a similar metaphor when he notes that though philologists study words and editors arrange them neither of them are engaged in our present word-exchange. He explains, “ These honorable activities represent not first but second order enterprises.”10 Fagerberg uses this metaphor to display that

6 Dorothea

Haspelmath- Finatti, “Theologia Prima: Liturgical Theology as an Ecumenical Challenge to Lutheran Worship Practice,” Dialog 48, 48, no. 4 (2009): 377.





theology has a similar order to it. Academic theology, like philology, is a second order enterprise. Liturgical theology, Fagerberg insists, is theology in the first order, which he calls theologia prima. By identifying liturgical theology as theologia prima , Fagerberg does not mean to dismiss theology in the second order, but rather to carve a place for liturgy — in in Schmemann’s words— as as a “genuinely theological discipline.”11 Fagerberg declares “there must indeed be a theological critique of

liturgy or else the dichotomy remains in place whereby liturgy has to do with esthetics (not theology) and theology has to do with doctrine (not liturgy).”12 However, he also insists that attention to liturgy takes priority over theology because “the former is claimed to be the foundation for doing the latter.”13 Fagerberg’s whole thesis is based on the ancient adage: lex orandi, lex credendi – that that the law of prayer

(liturgy) establishes the law of belief (theology). (theology).14 Throughout his discussion, Fagerberg makes an important distinction between liturgy in its thin sense and its thick sense. In its thin sense the Church crea tes liturgy as it decides which scriptures to read, which songs to sing, and so on. In its thick sense liturgy creates the Church as God forms people into a heavenly community. Dorothea Haspelmath-Finatti Haspelm ath-Finatti summarizes Fagerberg’s thick sense of liturgy this way: “Liturgy is the place of God’s self -revelation; liturgy is God’s act upon God’s people. Liturg ical ical theology is not about human ceremony, but about God’s transforming act.”15 In short, liturgical theology is the theology present in the actions of the gathered church. It is “theology that is liturgically embodied.”16 Fagerberg says that “the question liturgical theology wants

to ask is why the raw material of worship must be translated into a second order form before it can

11 Schmemann,

Introduction to Liturgical Theology , 11.





— returning be called theology,”17 and throughout his account he insists that — returning to the original language — a theologian who calls liturgy non-theological would be metaphor — b e as nonsensical as a linguist calling

a conversation non-linguistic. “That [parishioners] don’t use the jargon of academic theology does not mean the adjustment they make to their encounter with w ith the Holy One is non-theological, it only on ly means it is non-academic.”18 If liturgy is the work of the people , then liturgical theology is the theology of the people . UGUSTINE A UGUSTINE

E ARLY E XAMPLES

AND A NSELM NSELM:

One might ask, does any of this have any basis prior to the 1960s or is this all merely a liturgical extension of experiential phenomenology?19 The thesis of liturgical theology ( lex lex orandi, lex credendi ) finds roots in the writings of two prominent historic Christian theologians, both of whom were canonized as saints: Augustine of Hippo and Anselm of Canterbury. Augustine lived and wrote in the fourth and fifth centuries. Originally a secular rhetorician, he would come to be a bishop and one of the most influential theologians in history. history. In one of his lesserknown works, a commentary on the Gospel of John, Augustine wrote, “Believe so that you may understand.”20 This approach to theology would be quite foreign to the inverted modernist approach. In this statement, Augustine insists that faith establishes proper understanding in the same way liturgical theology insists that the law of prayer establishes establishes the law of belief . Augustine does not only teach this, but he also displays it. In what is perhaps his most famous work, Confessions , Augustine begins with a prayer: “You are great, lord, and greatly to be praised; great is your power, and infinite is your wisdom.” 21 From

17 Ibid.,

63.





here Augustine traces his life in a memoir-like fashion. Toward the end of the book, as Augustine approaches more traditionally theological content (questions of memory, time, and Trinity), he still leads with prayer: “Let me know you, my knower; let me know you even as I am known,”22 and, “I call on you, my god, my mercy, who made me and did not forget me, though I was forgetful of you.”23 Indeed, Augustine’s prayers establish his understanding.

Anselm lived in the Middle Ages (c. 1033 – 1109). 1109). Unlike Augustine, Anselm sought after a monastic education early in his life. It was during his education that he would read Augustine and undoubtedly be shaped by Augustine’s theological method. In one of his primary theological works, Proslogion , Anselm would expand Augustine’s words:

I do not try, Lord, to attain Your lofty heights because my understanding is in no way equal to it. But I do desire to understand Your truth a little, that truth that my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand so that I may believe; but I believe so that I may understand . For I believe this also, that ‘unless I believe, I shall not understand’ [Isa. 7:9].24 From this statement, Anselm would continue on — in in prayer — to discuss theological matters such as — to the existence of God and the nature of God. Augustine and Anselm insist that a posture of faith establishes proper understanding and they both demonstrate this by approaching theological reflection with prayer. Thus, we can see from Antiquity and the early Middle Ages that the law of prayer establishes the law of belief . SMITH

AND

HILOSOPHY MEEK : E MERGING P HILOSOPHY

Now that we have rooted liturgical theology in the writings of Augustine and Anselm, how might we see it grow out from there as a legitimate and important discipline today? The philosopher





James K. A. Smith and epistemologist Esther Lightcap Meek are helpful conversation conversation partners in this arena. While Smith does not specifically write about liturgical theology, his Cultural Liturgies series shares several common interests with the present subject. One may notice the obvious simila r interest in liturgy, but another commonality is the purpose for which he writes: “the renewal of the church and the Christian university.”25 Smith is addressing the same crises that we began with! He continues

on to say that this renewal “hinges on an understanding of human beings as ‘liturgical animals,’”26 which he describes in detail in the first chapter of Desiring the Kingdom (Cultural Liturgies Vol. 1). In order to describe what he means mea ns by “liturgical animal,” Smith walks through a brief history of philosophical anthropology.27 He begins with a model that he calls cal ls “The Human Person as Thinker” whose motto is “I think, therefore I am.” Smith describes this model as “a broadly ‘rationalist’ or ‘intellectualist’ picture of the human person,” saying “it entails a sense that persons are defined by

thinking and is often allied with a sense of o f functional disembodiment.” Smith critiques this “rationalist, cognitivist anthropology” as “overly intellectualist” and explains that it can be seen in Protestant worship that fixates on “‘messages’ that disseminate Christian ideas and abstract values.” From this critique, a new model emerges which seeks to “recognize the degree to which

thinking operates on the basis of faith .” .” Smith calls this model, “The Human Person as Believer.” Its motto comes from the lips of Augustine and Anselm: “I believe in order to understand.” In this model “what defines us is not what we think…but rather what we believe , the commitments and trusts that world.” While Smith seems more favorable toward this model, he finds it too orient our being-in-the- world.”







similar to the first model is two ways: First, that it just moves “the clash of ideas down a level to a clash of beliefs,” and second, that it “still tends to operate with a very disembodied, individualistic picture of the human person.” So he seeks a third model. The model that Smith ultimately suggests is one that he calls ca lls “The Human Person as Lover” whose motto is “I am what I love.” This model sees humans not as primarily thinking beings or as religious beings, but rather as “most fundamentally oriented and identified by love.” It is from this

model, as Smith describes love, that he begins to discuss liturgy. Smith describes that, as loving beings, our love has an aim and a goal, or an intention and an end. The first two models seem to scratch at the surface of our aims and goals, which are located in our thoughts and beliefs, but Smith takes it a step further by suggesting that our love is shaped by habits and practices — things things that we actually do. By suggesting this third model, is Smith critiquing critiq uing Augustine and Anselm? Not exactly. While they each explicitly stated Smith’s second model, “I believe in order to understand,” Smith’s third

model draws attention to what it was that formed their belief — their their constant devotion to prayer. It lex orandi lex credendi was their practice ( lex ) that established their understanding ( lex ). Smith insists that these

“identity forming practices…subtly shape us precisely because they grab hold of our love.” 28 This is





to know.”30 This reversal is consistent with the reversal we have seen throughout, which insists that

prayer establishes belief and belief establishes understanding. In Meek’s epistemology, love establishes knowing. In a similar vein as Meek’s covenantal epistemology , Jacob D. Myers discusses a sacramental epistemology or, or, what he calls, an erotic (as in love, not sexuality) liturgical theology . He describes this erotic liturgical theology in in four steps31: The first step is, like Meek, to prioritize love. The second step is to

“approach liturgical phenomena as portals to divination,” which is what Meek describes as “inviting the real.”32 In this step, we see liturgy as the place of divine (“real”) encounter whereby we “[make] a

path for God to come to [us] by.”33 The third step is a “prayerful renunciation of the will to knowledge.” Like Meek’s “knowledge as subsidiary -focal integration,”34 this recognizes the passive

aspect of coming-to-know and receiving knowledge “as a gift.”35 Myer’s fourth and final step is simply “to love God more fully through liturgical expression.” He summarizes his erotic liturgical theology as

something that “leads me to sacrifice my intentionality so that God may give God’s self without force, coercion, or seduction.” This act of sacrifice is similar to Meek’s statement: “If love is the gift of the

self, and we love in order to know, then we give ourselves i n order to know.”36 Overall, this kind of epistemology, grounded in liturgical theology, recognizes the ways in which we are changed and transformed by our liturgical experience.





theology can act as a cure to our crises cri ses by returning attention to our liturgical foundation. Theological education apart from liturgy is bound to fail because love without liturgy grows cold. Similarly, the Church without an intentional liturgy will undoubtedly lose its vision for the very same reason. With this we will move into some practical implications of liturgical theology. S AINTS AND SCHOLARS:

T ODAY ’S T ASKS ODAY ’

When pastors prepare for the gathering of the saints, liturgy litur gy must remain at the core of their preparation. It is their task “to structure a worship service that will render what the church promises perceptible to the senses.”37 Liturgical theology “challenges the widespread assumption that ‘if we get our principles right then our liturgy will naturally follow in good order.’” 38 Smith critiques such approaches because “they fail to appreciate that we are liturgical animals shaped by practices that work on our cognitive unconscious.”39 If it is important for pastors to preach theologically sound sermons

(second order theology) then it is perhaps even more important for their worship services to provide formative liturgy (first order theology). What does this mean for those who are part of supposedly non-liturgical traditions? Brian Spinks addresses this very question in a paper in which he traces the legacy of liturgical theology from Schmemann’s Orthodox origins down a line to the Catholic (Fagerberg), Lutheran (Gordon Lathrop), Baptist (Christopher Ellis), and charismatic (Simon Chan)





shows a pastor that form and content are not two different d ifferent things. This knowledge will aid him or her in a growing awareness of how parishioners are being shaped by the service. Aside from displaying the importance impor tance of participating in the liturgy of the church, liturgical theology reminds the theologian, “The ultimate test of his theological model is not its theological correctness, but the ability of the praying church to recognize in its prayer the richness which the model promises.”42 Liturgical theology creates a different standard by which to evaluate academic — as theology: not by its powerful rhetoric or its persuasive logic, but — as Jesus taught us — by by its fruit (Matthew 7:16). The question is no longer “Is it right?” but rather, “Is it good?”

Liturgical theology has the potential to re-stabilize the present crises facing the Church and various theological institutions. The work of James K. A. Smith and Esther Meek suggests that there is perhaps, a trend toward this approach in theology and practice. May liturgical and theological creativity spring up in Churches and schools throughout the world! Lex orandi, lex credendi!





BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anselm of Canterbury. “Proslogion.” In The Major Works , edited by Brian Davies and G. R. Evans, 82 – 104. 104. Oxford: University Press, 2008.

Fagerberg, David W. Theologia Prima: What Is Liturgical Theology? 2nd 2nd ed. Chicago, IL: Hillenbrand Books, 2004. Grossmann, Cathy Lynn. “Americans’ Confidence in Religion Hits a New Low.” USA Today , 2015. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/06/17/americans-confidence-religionpoll/28872253/.

Haspelmath-Finatti, Dorothea. “Theologia Prima: Liturgical Theology as an Ecumenical Challenge to Lutheran Worship Practice.” Dialog 48, 48, no. 4 (2009): 374 – 79. 79. Lifeway Research. “Americans Believe in Heaven, Hell, and a Little Bit of Heresy,” 2014. http://www.lifewayresearch.com/2014/10/28/americans-believe-in-heaven-hell-and-a-littlebit-of-heresy/.

Meek, Esther Lightcap. A Little Manual For Knowing . Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2014. ——— . Loving to Know: Introducing Covenant Epistemology . Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2011. Myers, Jacob D. “Toward an Erotic Liturgical Theology: Schmemann in Conversation with Contemporary Philosophy.” Worship 87, no. 5 (2013): 387 – 413. 413. Nelson, Libby A. “The Struggling Seminaries.” Inside Higher Ed , 2013. http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/03/29/luther-seminary-makes-deep-cuts-facultyand-staff-amid-tough-times-theological. Pew Research Center. “U.S. Public Becoming Less Religious,” 2015. http://www.pewforum.org/2015/11/03/u-s-public-becoming-less-religious/.

Saint Augustine. Confessions . Edited by George Stade. New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 2007. Saint Augustine, and John W. Rettig. Tractates on the Gospel of John 28-54 . Vol. 88. The Fathers of the Church. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1993. Schmemann, Alexander. Introduction to Liturgical Theology . 2nd ed. New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary

Liturgical Theology

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