The goodness of (profane) worship!

by Kerry Tankard.

Some of you may know of the Albert Hall in Manchester.[i] It was built to not look like a church and to attract the working class away from the pubs and entertainment venues in the city. It was intended not just for worship, but for entertainment, leisure, and education; an experiment in a New Place for New People, which closed in 1969. The 1990s saw Brannigans nightclub open in its basement, something some would imagine was about as far from the original Methodist intention for the building as possible. Then, ten years ago, work was completed to convert the building to a music and entertainment venue, creating “The Albert Hall” I know. I was there again in May, with 2500 others, to enjoy the Osees fronted by John Dwyer, who is not the late Christian ethicist and theologian John C. Dwyer![ii] The (profane) worship that took place probably appeared more driven by chemicals, for some, than the Holy Spirit, however I want to suggest that what took place reveals something worthy of our consideration.

The arrival of the band on stage involved not a hush stretching across the congregation, but a fervent anticipation, applause, whistles, and shouts, which I suspect is seldom the experience of God, as God greets gathered Methodists on a Sunday morning. Dwyer plugs his guitar in, checks the sound, presses an odd key on his nearby synth and approaches the mic. He greets everyone before guitar, bass, and drums begin their resounding assault. An eruption of joy becomes manifest. No soft introit, no sense of reverence, just a slam of sound against the congregation, and the bodies of the congregation against each other. The opening hymn, Lupine Ossuary, did not make it into Singing the Faith, and for good reason. It continues this way for over an hour and a half, the odd calmer track creating space for recovery, before everything builds to the final song, C, and its ecstatic cacophony. Sweaty, overjoyed, and feeling only some of my 53 years, I left this sacramental space and headed for a train. “Sacramental space”? I hope you are intrigued.

I am not alone in believing there is a transcendent character to music. It creates an exploratory space where heart, mind, body, and soul are all invited to explore and respond.[iii] It takes the whole self, not just some fragmented part of it, and invites it in. That quality is amplified, in my experience, in live performance and in a riotous community’s response to it. Those gathering are drawn to each other in the celebration of a common love of the music, and a hidden searching. The singing is liberated, the dancing (jumping up and down, and slamming around) is a celebration of materiality, and joy pours out as persistently as the perspiration of bodies. I realise this can look anything but sacramental, and some would see it as the worst of the profane, however I want to invite re-imagination and question the language of profane which I have dotted about intentionally above.[iv]

First, I reject the idea of anything being wholly profane. To suggest as much is to believe there is somewhere that God cannot be, that there are some things which exist wholly apart from God and God’s grace.[v] To believe that is to misunderstand the God revealed in scripture, and in Jesus, and who is the source of all that is, will be, or has been. There certainly was profanity but that is not all it was or could be. I suggest the gig had the potential to be open to God, and God was present, because God cannot not be there! Our willingness to embrace this truth leads to a reconsideration of every moment, and a recognition of the God who is always present and gifting life to us. This truth can redefine everything and is at the heart of a participatory theology.[vi]

Second, I want to suggest that what occurred, while not Christian worship, is a searching for meaning, a participation in divine possibility and generosity, even though that is not acknowledged or recognised. Human beings are fundamentally created to know and love God, to discover themselves as more than just an action, moment, or story. Music touches that possibility even if it does so only in part.[vii] What it re-reveals, in human beings, is a desire for something, something more, or beyond who they are. In live music they are seeking ‘the physicality of transcendence’[viii] and they participate in an analogous form of that divine transcendence, though it is seldom identified as what it is. The gig is a human attempt to create a transcendent moment, but it will not achieve it by its own nature. It will only be realised by its sharing in the creative life, which is part of who God is. It participates in God by virtue of being created, and then being creative; through it, God chooses to share something of Godself whether that becomes known or not. A rush to judgement which sees such events, even in their worst manifestations, as only profanity or idolatry, risks missing the human longing and transcendent possibilities that are intrinsic to them as part of God’s creation.

I am not suggesting that this is worship in all its fullness, depth, and meaning. There is a real danger that this search for transcendence is simply appeased by the event, rather than the body and spirit being w-hol(l)y satiated by the fullness of God. Rather than enabling people to know it is analogous of what is possible, it is mistaken for all that is possible. This doesn’t disregard its value, but honestly sets it against a wider context of meaning.

There is goodness in this (profane) worship. It is a goodness that is not complete but is worth celebrating and critiquing. Where Methodists sought to create holy gatherings of entertainment in their halls, I prefer the more incarnational model of going to the places of entertainment and seeking the holy there.

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[i] Cf. https://www.alberthallmanchester.com/the-history-of-the-albert-hall-manchester/

[ii] A quick review of Osees cover of Sacrifice will leave you in no doubt of Dwyer’s dislike of the Christianity he perceives and the God he rejects. https://genius.com/Osees-sacrifice-lyrics

[iii] See Danielle Anne Lynch, God in Sound and Silence: Music as Theology, (Pickwick, 2018) p.16 ‘[M]usic allows humans to explore and understand more of their predicament, as well as providing a bridge to understand the object of sacramental experience, God.’

[iv] These themes are considered in Christopher Partridge, The Lyre of Orpheus: Popular Music, the Sacred, and the Profane, (OUP, 2014).

[v] The reasoning of writers such as Henri de Lubac is significant for my approach here.

[vi] Cf. Hans Boersma, Heavenly Participation: The Weaving of a Sacramental Tapestry, (Eerdmans, 2011).

[vii] ‘It is the Orphic, liminal, boundary crossing power of music, the power to draw in the Other, to engender communities, to create affective spaces within which new meanings are constructed, that lies at the heart of the relationship between popular music, personal experience, and the sacred.’ C. Partridge, Op. Cit., p.3.

[viii] Clive Marsh & Vaughn S. Roberts, Personal Jesus: How Popular Music Shapes Our Souls,(Baker, 2013),p.82