I recently read Thomas Howard’s Evangelical is Not Enough: Worship of God in Liturgy and Sacrament
(Ignatius, 1984). Howard is emeritus professor of English at St. John’s
Seminary in Brighton, Mass. He was raised in a prominent evangelical family and
is brother to evangelical writer Elisabeth Elliot. In his 20s he became an
Anglican and at age 50 Roman Catholic. This book was first published in 1984 by
Thomas Nelson, a year before Howard swam the Tiber, so much of it is an
explanation of his movement to Anglicanism. A postscript describes his transition
to Rome.
Howard’s critique of
evangelical worship:
The center of the book is a critique of the vacuity of much
evangelical worship and liturgy.
In Anglican worship, he was impressed by the fact that the
vicar “hardly addressed the congregation directly during the act of worship… He
did not greet us, and he did not smile at us. No attempt was made to create a
feeling of familiarity or welcome” (45).
The experience “did not depend in the smallest degree on
atmosphere nor on the minister’s establishing any sort of contact with the
congregation. The notion of group dynamics would have seemed grotesque,
irrelevant, and embarrassing” (46).
He reacts against the evangelical tendency to focus on the
personality of the minister. According to Howard, “the less individuality we
have to cope with in the minister, the better” (60).
Howard observes that the “extempore prayers” of evangelicals
are “made up of stock phrases strung together,” suggesting that “spontaneity is
impossible sooner or later” (48). He adds that as an evangelical he had “little
appreciation for the whole Church as a praying body, with its own prayers
suitable for perpetual use” (49).
He later adds: “But I have wondered whether in its stress on
earnestness, and even fervor, evangelicalism has not to some extent
overestimated most of us” (76).
In contrast, Howard notes the appeal of ritual:
That ritual might actually be a
relief, and even a release, is almost incomprehensible to [evangelicals]. That
the extempore and impromptu are eventually shallow, enervating, and exhausting
seems a contradiction to these people, who so earnestly believe that nothing
does not spring from the authenticity of the moment is actually fruitful (96).
He concludes, “Evangelicalism, stalwart as it is, had in
effect left me with nothing but the Bible and the modern world” (58).
Some confessional responses:
There is much in Howard’s critique with which I resonate and
which we would do well to hear and ponder. I too have come to find much that
passes as evangelical worship to be superficial, vacuous, and sometimes even outright
silly.
Yes, evangelical ministers or “worship leaders” sometimes try
to act as “hale fellows well met,” liturgical masters of ceremony, more intent
on massaging the egos of the “audience” than leading them before a holy God.
There are, however, also some problems with Howard’s critique.
God’s people are his ekklesia. They
are his “called out” ones. And one aspect of corporate worship is the
assembling of God’s people (cf. Heb 10:25).
Yes, there are problems with much superficiality in
evangelical worship, but, from what I have observed, superficiality might also
seep into so-called “liturgical” worship. This is why many young persons who
comes from such traditions are often attracted to what they find to be more
personal, welcoming, and authentic in evangelicalism (even if, later on down
the road, they tire of its weaknesses and drift away).
Howard’s critique of
Reformed Worship:
Within the general critique of evangelical worship, Howard
also strikes out at what he perceives to be the weaknesses of Reformed worship.
He finds Reformed worship to be too austere, too cerebral: “It
is Buddhism and Platonism and Manichaenism that tells us to disavow our flesh
and expunge everything but thoughts” (37).
The “sparse and intellectual approach,” according to Howard, “treats
us as though we were disembodied intellects” (102).
He disavows a religion that says to us, “No. Sit still. Or
stand and sing…. But your main job is to think
about the event and hear a sermon about it. Don’t do anything” (146).
Some confessional
responses:
At one point, Howard draws an analogy to a birthday party,
noting that on such occasions we make much of ceremony (candles, cake, dimmed
lights, etc.), asking why we would expect less in worship (see 102). The
problem with this analogy is that a birthday party is not worship. It is not something
the Lord has commanded.
This is a general problem with Howard’s approach. Though many
of his critiques of broad evangelical worship are on target, his understanding
of the Regulative Principle is less precise. Perhaps this is because Howard was
more exposed to broad evangelicalism, even a Calvinistic tinted version of it,
but not Reformed confessionalism.
Christianity and its worship is about the renewal of the mind
(Rom 12:2), and it is about hearing the Word (cf. Rom 10:14, 17). Hearing is doing! He accuses Protestant worship of
being like Buddhism, but does not note that the RC liturgical tradition might just
as well be compared to the sensuality of Hinduism!
Along these lines, we might note that Howard is also less
secure in attempting to marshal Biblical arguments to support his shift in
views. For example, in an effort to support the idea of prayers for the dead
and post-mortem spirituality, he claims the Bible is largely silent, neglecting
obviously relevant passages like the Rich Man and Lazarus in Luke 16, among
others.
Final Thoughts:
In the end, though, I find Howard’s critique of evangelical
worship to be at times painfully accurate. I do not agree with him that the
answer is to embrace Rome. It is a shame that Howard did not dig deeper into
his Protestant, Biblical heritage, before making this move.
He raises an alarm, however, that we should heed. Evangelicalism,
for many, holds an initial appeal that often dissipates over time due to lack
of depth. It is like a sweet dessert that gives a quick sugary high but ends up
with a crash, emptiness, and hunger. Some leave it for nominalism or nothingness.
Others, like Howard, drift to the liturgical churches, whether Anglicanism,
Orthodoxy, or RC, looking for something with more heft.
Howard senses this unease: “Nonetheless, something is causing
thousands of stoutly loyal evangelical men and women to inquire into matters of
the greatest antiquity and gravity” (149).
The challenge for confessional ministers is to embrace,
teach, and embody a rich and soul-satisfying experience of Protestant, confessional
worship, regulated by Scripture.
Howard also raises another grave matter: ecclesiology. He jibes
that Pentecost was not “the birthday merely of a clutter of conventicles, all
jostling and jockeying and clamoring with a multitude of voices but no real
authority or unity” (150).
In his postscript (composed after his embrace of Rome),
Howard writes: “the question, What is the Church? becomes, finally, intractable….”
(157). He concludes: “Yes—I believe that the Roman Catholic Church is the Ancient
Church. I accept its claims” (158). We, as Protestants, must be able, charitably,
to explain the ways in which Rome does not reflect the ancient church, as
evidenced in how it is presented in Scripture and point out that it does not,
in fact, provide the authentic unity which only Christ may give (see John
17:20-22).
So, we must strive for a coherent and winsome theology and practice
of worship but also of the church. Evangelical is, indeed, not enough, But neither is Rome.
JTR
