Ordinangst is learning lots and lots about worship. Thankfully he took the advice of a wise old priest who told him that his muscular charismatic happy-clappy upbringing was not all there is to worship and that he should broaden his horizons beyond @mattredman and @Darlene wassername. Bravely, Ordinangst has been sneaking off to all manner of churches, some of which would definitely make @nickygumbel wince. It is a guilty pleasure – a bit like having a sneaky beer in Lent (Ordinangst is very proud that he has resisted doing this so far). Ordinangst has started singing hymns again (along with crossing himself a lot, praying for the dead and the Pope and beating his breast during confession) and has been surprised and delighted to find that God speaks to him amidst the incense just as much as he does during the fifth chorus of “your love is amazing”.
Here is a conundrum that is troubling Ordinangst. The Church of England has the most extraordinary body of hymns that have lasted for hundreds of years. There are some real pingers that remain fresh and current and and inspirational. So my question is this. Which, if any, of the modern worship songs will last as long as that?
Ordinangst absolutely loves modern worship. His Ipod is chokka with it. But it is strange to him that songs that he loves one month become frankly rather boring and then completely grating as the weeks roll on. Why is this? Could it be we sing too few songs too frequently and repeat them too much when we sing them ? It strikes Ordinangst that some worship leaders can stretch out a current “hit” for twenty minutes – not bad going when said “hit” sometimes only contains fifteen words. Or maybe modern worship songs are too simple (G major e minor C major D major…repeat till lunchtime) Blessed be your name (A major E major f#minor D major) is wonderful, but it sure ain’t the Allegri Miserere…
Or perhaps we treat modern worship as we treat pop songs. @timhughes’ new album is in the top fifty on Itunes having been released this week. Ordinangst has met Tim and he is a top guy and extremely talented and Ordinangst is very excited that with people like him around the message of Christianity may well break into the mainstream through the vehicle of his music. But do we treat songs from people like Tim differently because they are on albums with videos and our first hearing of his songs is likely to be in the outside world, not in church? Does that change our attitudes to the music and what it is there to do? Ordinangst wonders if maybe it is more about generating an emotional response from the congregation and less about the content and the subject. Do we now provide worship that the congregation likes (“ooh, I like this one, I think I’ll stand up and sing it – once I have finished this tweet!”) and meets the singer in their own needs rather than focusing on God in all his majesty?
As with all things Anglican, Ordinangst concludes that everyone is probably right. In an ideal world, Ordinangst’s church would have a bit of everything – Tim Hughes up front for a “set” and then the choir singing the Miserere antiphonally (wooh - let's hear it for Greek lessons) in Latin from the two galleries above the congregation. Now that would be cool……
No comments:
Post a Comment