Liturgical Art for Easter

A pastor friend of mine went on sabbatical a few years ago, and during that time he studied worship and spirituality. When he came back from sabbatical, he made the comment that returning to regular UCC worship at his church was difficult at the beginning. “There are so many words,” he said.  “We need more silence. We need other ways to connect with the Divine.”

I was a literature and writing major in college, a participant in forensics (debate) all through high school and college, and a person who is deeply touched by the dramatic arts. I love words. But I really understand what my friend meant. Worship in the Protestant tradition can become word-centered in such a banal way that it can seem that our words no longer refer to mystery and wonder.  We could use the same words, with the same inflection and tone, to describe toasters and kitchen tables. I know that’s harsh, but it’s how I feel about some Protestant worship. We do need other ways to connect with the divine, as my friend said.

We are going to attempt to do that in a special way for Easter and the Easter season of 2012.  Three members of our church will spend 3 days next week (October 25 – 27) studying with liturgical artist Nancy Chinn in Northern California. Nancy Chinn is one of the premier Christian liturgical artists in the United States. She works primarily with paper lace (cut paper), fabric, and paint. I first saw her work hanging at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, CA. Joan and I also saw some of her work 6 or 7 years ago at Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago. In both cases, the works were stunning and awesome. You can see examples of her work at www.nancychinn.com. 

Janet Pugh (who has adorned our church with art for many years), Jessica Taft (a new member who is also a UCC minister) and Eldonna Hazen will fly from Madison to San Francisco on Monday, October 24, and then drive to Little River in Northern California. They will have dinner with Nancy on Monday evening, work with her on Tuesday – Thursday, return to San Francisco Thursday evening and fly back to Madison on Friday, October 28. The immediate purpose of their visit is to design, and bring back the process for producing, a piece of liturgical art that will hang in our sanctuary from Easter Sunday through the Easter Season of 2012. (The secondary purpose, of course, is to learn how to do this on-site; so that our church might have liturgical art as part of its worship somewhat more regularly than we do now.)

I am looking forward to what they learn and bring back with them when they return at the end of next week. And of course I am looking forward to the liturgical art which is the end result of their trip. I believe that when they return, they will have a process which will involve others from our church in crafting the final product. We will have a brief commissioning service for them at the end of worship this coming Sunday, and we will certainly find a time for them to give a preliminary report on their week with Nancy Chinn, and their plans for our Easter Season, shortly after their return.