Most recent additon: Feb 08
Is it true that Piepkorn approved of what we call “seeker services”? If what is meant is special services for the evangelization of the unchurched, the answer is Yes!
He also was no foe of experimentation. At the same time, however, he was "profoundly skeptical of 'informal'” worship services.
In October 1951 a pastor wrote to Piepkorn for help with a paper on the use of the Liturgy for evangelistic purposes that the pastor was preparing for delivery at a pastoral conference. Piepkorn replied:
“The subject is interesting and you should be able to do quite a lot with the evangelistic emphasis in the Confession of Sins, the Nicene Creed, the Common Offertories, the General Prayer, the Preface for Advent, Lent and Easter, the Agnus Dei, the Words of Institution and the Aaronic Blessing. At the same time, you ought to give due consideration to the fact that the Liturgy is part of the Church’s private culture and was never designed or intended for evangelistic purposes. The propaganda service of the early Church was the synaxis [the Service of the Word], not the Eucharist. The synaxis consisted almost wholly of lections and instructions—no prayers. In this connection let me commend to your reading Dom Gregory Dix’ The Shape of the Liturgy. My own feeling is that we should not try to make the Liturgy do too much. We should probably do better if we held special services (weekly or monthly, or daily for short periods) for the evangelization of the unchurched. . . . I have observed that parishes which scaled the Liturgy down in the interest of evangelization (abbreviating it, miscegnating it with ‘popular’ hymns, and eliminating the traditional ceremonial) have never been able to return to a really more adequate worship level. My own experience is that my people and I can do more with pagan and Protestant inquirers in a service designed especially for their needs—strongly educational and evangelistic, as informal as possible without vulgarizing the subject matter, and with plenty of give-and-take (achieved through such means as discussion, panel presentations, audiovisual aids, pulpit dialogue, and a question box). After they have been adequately instructed, then they can be brought into a normal Lutheran service and participate in it with spiritual profit.” ( Letter of October 16, 1951 to the Rev. D.)
At the same time, Piepkorn was “profoundly skeptical of ‘informal’” worship services. In November of 1952, he wrote in reply to another pastor:
“I am no foe of experimentation; I have done my share in my time, and please God, I shall keep on doing so. I am profoundly grateful for every valuable insight that I have been able to obtain from the experimentation of other people. After eleven years in the military service, during most of which I occupied a supervisory position where I was compelled to be present at literally hundreds of religious services of all denominations, I am profoundly skeptical of ‘informal' worship.
“. . . I have repeatedly insisted that one service a week in our churches is inadequate and that we ought to have a considerable variety of services to meet a variety of needs and, what is ultimately probably more important to accomplish, a variety of functions. Part of the problem, of course, is the size of our parishes. This is only one of many areas where we are paying what seems to me to be too high a price for uneconomically small parochial organizations. At the same time, I believe that each ought as a minimum to offer its membership at least one service a Sunday and other major Holy Day s in which the Blessed Sacrament is celebrated according to the order of service prescribed by our Church. If this were done, it would seem to me to be quite within the province of the pastor and the parish to engage in as much legitimate experimentation at other hours as the facilities of the parish permit.” --November 6, 1952 Letter to the Rev. S, City, State
As one who now usually sits on the other side of the pew screen and worships in many different Lutheran churches across the country, I have a few observations that are in keeping with what Piepkorn believed: None of us has the skills and wisdom to write liturgy on our own. Whatever we substitute may sound “fresh” and “personal” the first time someone hears it, but is likely to be trite if not banal, and become stale very quickly. For an example, I liked the phrase “let us lift up in prayer” the first time I heard it 10 or 15 years ago from a UCC pastor at a pastoral conference. After hearing it twenty times, however, it became trite, especially when used over and over again in the same prayer.
When I was in college some of my friends and I visited a local non-liturgical church. At one point the the minister said, "We have been sitting for awhile, so let's stand for the next hymn." Is that really better than simply making a slight upward motion of the hands?
At the 1973 Syodical Convention, a prominent member of Synod preceded his prayer with these words: "Let us quiet our busy minds and hearts and ..." This might be okay in a Convention, but used repeatedly in a worship service is it really better than "Let us pray"? Especially if repeated again and again?
Remember that whenever you are giving directions, the people are not worshiping.
If you move parts of the liturgy around from week to week, people don’t know when to expect them unless they look ahead, which also becomes a distraction.
Be careful that your worship service (WS) does not become a fellowship group (FG). Here are some differences:
>>Focus. WS: The presence of God symbolized by the altar.
FG: The leader.
>>Vestments: WS: Vestments that are adaptations of the clothing of Christ's time are used to hide the person and individuality of the leader, who acts in the stead of Christ.
FG: The leader uses clothing of his or her own choosing. This draws attention to the leader's personality and personal preferences.
>>Traditional elements of the WS are likely to be adapted to fellowship group purposes. WS: The Invocation invokes the presence of God and testifies to the fact that we are worhipping the Triune God.
FG: This is a good example of how chaning the "style" of worship also changes the "substance." In some cases the Invocaton is changed to a simple delclarative statement such as "We are here in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." That omits the invocation. In other cases the Invocation is reduced to a prayer similar to the "call to worship" of general Protestantism. In that case the clear testimony that we are worshipping the trinue God is left out or obscured.
Similarly, sometimes the benediction (= "blessing") is converted into a farewell until the next meeting. That leaves out the blessing.
>>Language and dress. WS: A range of formal to informal depending on the setting.
FG: Informal, attacting attention to the pastor's personal tastes and syle of dress. How many congregations think first, when the pastor first enters, something about the pastor's choice that day. E.G.Oh, today its that checkered suit, with a white shirt with an open collar, instead of the black sweater. What will it be next week? My point is that this is destructive of worship.
>>Directions. WS: The fewer the better, or minimalized such as just a palm up or palm down (no need to raise the entire arm) to indicate when to stand or sit.
FG: Oral directions from the leader for almost everything.
>>Acts of personal devotion such as the sign of the cross, or kneeling, or bowing the head at the name of Jesus and at other points. WS: Encouraged.
FG: Discouraged as too individualistic.
>>Laity who serve in the chancel: WS: Piepkorn recommended that this be restricted to persons old enough to act reverently.
FG: Children are fine even if they cannot act reverently. What they do often becomes more of a spectacle that an act of reverence.
>>Offering: WS: Those who receive it face the altar and step backwards.
FG: It is likely to be more like passing the hat, with the persons taking the offering facing the people as they go from row to row with their backs to the altar. Some guests or members who are not well off may feel embarrased by how little they put in with someone watching them do it.
>>Role of leader. WS: Minister acts in Jesus’ place and downplays individual “touches” and personalized ways of consecrating the elements or administering the consecrated elements or pronouncing the Benediction.
FG: In the effort to be very personal and because of the other factors mentioned above, much more emphasis is placed on the person an charism of the leader.
Fellowship groups are needed and good, but people need to worship, too (and learn how to worship).
Hymns: Piepkorn said that the lay people learn their theology from the hymns. Today hundreds of hymns are simply not being used anymore. It is not a matter of difficulty. Many of the "praise songs" that are being used are more difficult to sing. And their content is extremely limited. I fear we will pay dearly for this in the future.
Since adiaphora ("neutral things") are neither commanded nor forbidden by God, aren't congregations and pastors free to do anything they please as far as liturgy, vestments, etc. are concerned? Except in times of persecution, Yes.
But that is not the end of the matter. Article 15 of the Augsburg Confession states: "With regard to church usages that have been established by men, it is taught among us that those usages are to be observed [lehret man diejenigen halten; docent quod...servandi sunt] which contribute to peace and good order in the church, among them being certain holy days, festivals, and the like." (Emphasis added)
For example, after stating that vestments are "neutral things" and noting that there is precedence for clergy to wear street clothes for worship services since that is what the church's clergy did for the first three centuries, he added the following: 1) We no longer conduct our services in houses. 2) Modern street garments are ugly, ungainly and usually drab in comparison to the graceful garb of the classic era. 3)The floodgates would then be open to bad taste and "irrepressibly individualistic" clergy. 4) "By law or custom our society prescribes that the custodians of our culture wear formal vestments" (judges, diplomats, military personnel, police, firefighters, social leaders at "black tie" affairs), faculty in procession, etc. 5) The wearing of street clothes by clergy for worship services is contrary to the historic practice of the Church of the Augsburg Confession, and gives a false impression about the nature and beliefs of our Church. (CTM July 1959, 482-3]
Is is true that Piepkorn did not recommend the singing of hymns during the distribution of Holy Communion? Yes, because he did not believe that the singing of hymns was conducive to mediation.
If Holy Communion is so important, why isn't it mentioned in the Creed?
It is! In September 1960 Piepkorn wrote a letter to the British Lutheran stating: "With reference to page four of the July 1960 issue has anyone called your attention to the fact that the puplils of the Confirmation class there quoted were precisely right when they described the "the Communion of Saints" in the 'Apostles' [Creed]'as 'when Saints go to Communion?' Sanctorum communio refers to the Holy Eucharist, not to the Church, in its origin, and should be rendered as 'participation in Holy Things,' i.e. Our Lord's Body and Blood . . . This original and correct understanding of the term perpetuated itself in England down into the sixteenth century." Elsewhere Piepkorn documents this use of the term in the early Church Fathers.
Is it true that Piepkorn wore a clerical collar because he loved the attention he got while wearing one? That is an ad hominem attack made by a prominent Synodical official years ago and repeated three decades later in an April 2002 speech by another prominent Synodical official, who is no longer in office. His speech is available on another site on the Internet.
Isn't it contrary to Matthew 23:9 to call a priest or minister "Father"?
If followed literally, Matthew 23:9 forbids the use of the title even for biological fathers. In an article in the October 17, 1939, Lutheran Witness, Piepkorn wrote: "'Father' as a form of address for a clergyman is neither unscriptural nor un-Lutheran nor exclusively Roman. The usage is based on such passages as 1 Cor. 4:14,17; 1 Tim. 1:2,18; 2:1; Titus 1:4; 1 John 2:1; 3:l8. It has been in use not only in the Roman Catholic Church, but also in the Protestant Episcopal, Orthodox, and Far Eastern Churches, as well as in the Lutheran Church." Examples he gave included the Finnish Lutheran Church (bappi) and the Norwegian Lutheran Church (far, dialect for fader). Martin Luther was called "Father" thoughout his life, including on his deathbed. "The Titles of a Clergyman: II," Lutheran Witness, LVIII:21, 360.
What did Piepkorn believe about self-communion by the celebrant of Holy Communion?
He called attention to the fact that this was the custom of the Church of the Augsburg Confession (AC 24,34 German). It is explicitly called for by Luther's Form of the Mass of 1523: "Then, while the Agnus Dei is sung, let [the celebrant] communicate, first himself and then the people." (LW, American Edition, Vol. 53,29). Smalcald Articles II, 2, 8 condemns not self-communication but private masses. The practice of having another minister commune the celebrant is a relatively recent practice. Having a lay server do it is even more recent. In Piepkorn's words, "the most desirable way" for the pastor to receive is self communion. Volume 3 of The Selected Writings of Arthur Carl Piepkorn will reprint his 1947 (Holy Cross issue) Una Sancta article on this topic and a one page summary that he prepared in 1965.
Is it okay for a pastor to wear a pectoral cross?
Certainly. Piepkorn did. But he said that pastors should keep them out of sight unless they are bishops in the post-biblical sense of that term, because traditonally pectoral crosses are the sign of a bishop, and the Church of the Augsburg Confession is committed to following tradition unless there are compelling reasons not to (AC 15 German: "are to be observed," Latin: "should be observed"). Piepkorn used a black cord with his and kept the crucifix in pocket of his black clerical shirt.
What was Piepkorn's opinion about intinction?
He questioned whether it fulfilled the Biblical requirement, "Take, drink." Believing that it is more important for people to commune than to receive from the common cup, he said individual cups may be used, but he recommended the use of a chalice with a pouring lip to preserve the symoblism of the "one cup."
What did Piepkorn believe about the Absolution after public confession?
He believed that visitors who were not familiar with Lutheran doctrine might be confused by Absolution ("In the name and by the command of our Lord Jesus, I forgive you . . ."). He therefore recommended that unless the pastor knew the worshippers who were present, a "Declaration" of forgiveness should be used instead of Absolution. (The Lutheran Book of Worship and Lutheran Worship offer both on pp. 77 and 159, respectively.)
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