"The book requireth but orderly reading": In praise of 'boring' worship

... hugely inspiring worship ... dramatic liturgy ... awe-inspiring architecture ... The finest choral music in the world ... or making music with fellow musicians in a worship band has been even more profound. My sense of being led by the Holy Spirit in a common purpose has taken me to a level which one could only experience worshipping God.

The words are from a recent blog post examining experiences of public worship, entitled 'Boring Ourselves to Death'. While the above extracts emphasise experiences of the inspiring and the dramatic, the post also addresses quite different experiences in the Church of England:

That said, I’ve also been bored and, at times, deeply frustrated at what passes for worship. Sometimes, preaching has been dull, or liturgy has been badly led. Other times, music has been poorly executed. Occasionally, I’ve sensed a complete lack of joy or engagement from those leading or worshipping.

As suggested by the title, 'boring' worship is the target of the critique. 'Boring' is particularly identified with "a kind of nervous blandness", avoiding that which is "too Catholic, too Evangelical, too traditional, too modern, too different". That list is rather suggestive.  It appears to be an argument for the 'Catholic' and 'Evangelical' against, well, the 'ordinary' Anglican.  And, indeed, this is what we are told:

I’ve seen real joy in worship at charismatic evangelical churches – people just thrilled to be there together, praising God as a church family. I’ve heard great preaching in these churches ...

I’ve seen rooms full of people ... quietly overcome by the real presence of God in the sacrament during Exposition and Benediction.

Praise bands and lifted hands or Benediction and lace: these seem to be the options.

Now, that may be unfair.  After all Choral Evensong is also positively mentioned:

I’ve seen people flocking to Cathedral Evensongs to find peace and beauty – an oasis in a frenetic and busy world.

Except that Choral Evensong sits rather uneasily beside the implication that 'ordinary Anglicanism' is bland and boring.  After all, what is more quintessentially Anglican than Choral Evensong? 

Choral Evensong, of course, is the contemporary success story in the Church of England.  And there is something of the 'boring' to Choral Evensong.  

Let me explain what I mean by the use of 'boring'. It certainly does not mean badly led liturgy, bad preaching, or poorly executed music. Divine service should be reverent, meaningful, serious. When appropriate, there should be decent preaching. Newcomers should be welcomed. Relationships in the worshipping community should be nurtured.  

While the above article, however, appears to focus on the 'dramatic' and the 'inspiring', 'boring' worship is much more about the habitual and the routine, about rhythms which slowly form us over time, about ordinary, conventional forms - rather the the 'Weird' - nurturing piety and spirituality.

Habit and routine are key characteristics of 'boring' worship.  A recent philosophical exploration of habits stated:

even our most mundane habitual routines actually display a great deal of intelligence. Indeed, they are often intelligently context-sensitive and flexible in such a way as can support and structure our goals and projects.

Worship as 'habit' and 'routine', therefore, is not a negative, to be condemned as 'unthinking'.  It is, rather, an expression of the truth that 'grace does not destroy nature'.  Habit and routine shape human beings in the undertaking of those practices which sustain us in daily living. Without habit and routine, worship can fail to take root in us - it can become a diverting experience rather than a life-shaping habit.  There is a sense, then, in which worship needs to be 'boring'.

This wisdom has long been part of the Christian tradition.  It is seen, for example, in the Lord's Prayer. Reviewing recent studies of the poetic structure of the Lord's Prayer, Psephizo has noted "its rhythms [are] suggestive of how it was designed for memorising and repetition".  Something of this is reflected in the Didache's exhortation, "Three times in the day pray ye so" (8:11). It is seen too in how the Rule of Benedict ordered the monastery's life of corporate prayer, a routine and pattern to be sustained week by week.  Likewise, Cranmer's intention for the daily office embodied an understanding of habit and routine. The focus was on the daily reading of the Scriptures in the offices, over the year, and year by year:

For they so ordered the matter, that all the whole Bible (or the greatest part thereof) should be read over once every year; intending thereby, that the Clergy, and especially such as were Ministers in the congregation, should (by often reading, and meditation in God's word) be stirred up to godliness themselves, and be more able to exhort others by wholesome doctrine.

As Hooker asked of his opponents who rejected the reading of the liturgy and scripture in favour of extemporary prayer and preaching, "is not reading the ordinance of God?" (LEP V.22.13).  The practice of reading allows the mysteries of salvation to be unfolded over time:

As for those things which are at the first obscure and dark, when memory hath laid them up for a time, judgment afterwards growing explaineth them (V.22.14).

As for the Puritan criticism that the BCP allowed clergy not authorised to preach to 'merely' read the service, Hooker regarded this as one of the strengths of Common Prayer: "The book requireth but orderly reading" (V.31.3).  

Pattern, memorising, repetition, reading: these are the ordinary practices which allow 'boring' worship to shape, nourish, and sustain us over time. Not the instantly inspiring, the immediately dramatic, or the desire for an intense experience.

There is a sense in which this understanding of 'boring' worship also has an important cultural resonance. Commentator Andrew Sullivan has said that the "new epidemic of distraction is our civilization’s specific weakness":

If the churches came to understand that the greatest threat to faith today is not hedonism but distraction, perhaps they might begin to appeal anew to a frazzled digital generation. Christian leaders seem to think that they need more distraction to counter the distraction. 

The success of Choral Evensong is suggestive of the cultural resonance of 'boring' worship. According to a 2016 report on the popularity of Choral Evensong in Oxbridge chapels:

College chaplains have seen a steady but noticeable increase in attendances at the early evening services which combine contemplative music with the 16th Century language of the Book of Common Prayer ... Chaplains say the mix of music, silence and centuries-old language appears to have taken on a new appeal for a generation more used to instant and constant communications, often conducted in 140 characters rather than the phrases of Cranmer. 

The relevance of 'boring' worship also has significance within the life of contemporary Anglicanism in North Atlantic societies.  Smaller congregations; less clergy; multi-centre benefices.  In such an ecclesial context, the call for dramatic and inspiring liturgy seems to be, at best, rather unrealistic - and potentially very demoralising.  By contrast, 'boring' worship is well-suited to this ecclesial context: prayers read; a pattern which enables laity to easily lead the liturgy when required; no unwise expectations of the dramatic; a pattern of prayer, praise, and reading of Scripture which nurtures and nourishes over time.

Which brings me to the form of divine service which exemplifies 'boring' worship: Sunday Mattins.  It is a form of worship which contemporary Anglicanism surely must recover, not least in face of the practical challenges mentioned above.  Sunday Mattins is perfectly suited for lay-led Sunday worship, for worship in smaller parish communities, and, indeed, as a means of sustaining or planting an Anglican presence in contexts deprived of parish church and clergy.

It also builds on the lessons that can be learnt from the popularity of Choral Evensong: not "more distraction to counter the distraction", but a more contemplative liturgy, in which the reading of common, repeated texts slowly, over time, draws us into and sustains us in a vision of wisdom and human flourishing.

I imagine that the article cited at the outset might regard Sunday Mattins as a return to "nervous blandness", lacking vibrancy and creativity.  We live in a cultural context in which calls for vibrancy and creativity abound in vision statements for almost every organisation imaginable.  In which vibrancy and creativity is claimed for each new social media platform.  In which adverts for jobs which require the skills and commitment associated with routine, repetitive labour claim a need for vibrancy and creativity.  Perhaps nothing indicates a "nervous blandness" on the part of the Church more than the use of this language of vibrancy and creativity.

Sunday Mattins would reflect something quite different.  It embodies those habits, routines, and practices of worship which nurture wisdom.  It counters distraction not with more distraction but with the contemplative and the reading of ancient texts. It grounds us, through repetition, in the scriptures, prayers, and praises of the Christian tradition. 

No, we do not need to be seeking after vibrant, dramatic, inspirational worship.

We need a campaign for 'boring' worship, at the centre of which would be a call for regular Sunday Mattins.