Religious Attitudes and Worship Styles

One thing I have observed over the years is that relatively few debates in church congregations center around serious theological issues. A few are about administrative and financial issues, but there is nothing like the order of worship to produce an angry debate. Some congregations spend years fighting over things like whether one should raise one’s hands during singing or not.

But there is an interesting theological point tied up in all these debates. From time to time those who prefer a less structured style of worship will accuse those who prefer formality of having a religious spirit. For those not into the charismatic vocabulary, you can translate “religious spirit” to “ingrained religious attitude.” Attribution of the state to a resident spirit or not is irrelevant to my point.

I have encountered this when I question certain activities in worship services that seem disruptive or unwise to me. I have been asked if I’m sure I don’t have a religious spirit. Of course having a “religious spirit” is pretty much the bottom of the heap in terms of spiritual maturity.

Yet at the same time, those who prefer the wilder form of worship often look back at the more traditional folks with very similar criticisms of their worship service. Repeating the Lord’s prayer is “vain repetition.” Preferring a weekly celebration of the Eucharist is “strange.” Multiple scripture readings as part of the worship service is excessive and boring. Following an order of service results in a service that is dead.

It seems to me that both of these sets of criticism depend on the externals. There are certainly arguments to be made in favor of one or another style of worship under particular circumstances for particular people, but the majority of these debates in churches are really about what makes one feel comfortable and what one enjoys. If those debating them could recognize that we would perhaps have a great deal more peace.

The problem arises because we identify what feels comfortable to us personally as “right” and what makes us uncomfortable as “wrong” when the best thing to do is to recognize many of these items as matters of taste.

There are some matters that are more than matters of taste, and for those the accusation of some kind of excessive religious tension, religious attitude, or a religious spirit simply makes it harder to discuss the matter rationally. The accusation of a religious spirit is, in my view, a manipulative technique to prevent one from examining the practices in question.

But if there is any sort of religious attitude involved, it seems to work pretty regularly on both sides.