I’ve been thinking lately about traditions in the church. Not the core traditions of worship or liturgy, but matters of adiaphora – the things that can be changed from one place to another.
We attended the Fall Festival at our internship congregation today; seems that this is a tradition each year for kicking off their stewardship drive. The festival is a big lunch after church: hot dogs and bratwurst (cooked in beer and onions, of course, before they were grilled), plus an assortment of salads, side dishes, and desserts that members of the congregation brought to share. Now brats don’t say either ‘stewardship’ or ‘festival’ to me, but they do to members of this congregation – so what makes something a tradition?
Can it be just one or two occasions, or how many repetitions does it take? When is a tradition something that should be honored and continued, and when is it just an old habit that should be changed? And how can we tell the difference in the church?
I certainly don’t have the answers, but I do think it is important for a pastor-in-training to consider. After all, in a couple of years, I hope to be beginning my ministry in another congregation – which will probably already have its share of traditions. Some that I will want to embrace and unfortunately, some that I will very likely want to change. How does one go about learning the traditions of a congregation? And how do you begin to change them?
I suspect I will rely on my experience here during internship, and try to learn about and experience most (but probably not all) of the congregation’s traditions before I would attempt to make any major changes.
(I suddenly had the urge to go look for the lyrics to the song “Tradition” from Fiddler on the Roof! Interestingly, those lyrics only apply to the roles of the papa, mama, sons, and daughters of the Jewish family. Wonder what verses we could write for the Christian community?? The chorus, of course, would be: “The church, the church! Tradition!”)
All this has me thinking about the traditions of our home congregation – what has been the most meaningful to me at Incarnation, what I miss most after being away for over two years, and – especially now that our congregation has just this month merged to become part of two point parish with another quite different congregation – what I may never have the chance to experience in quite the same way again.
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News from Ray & Ruth Ann about life at Seminary. This web log was started as we prepared for a trip to Mississippi to spend a month with LDR (Lutheran Disaster Response), and continued when we returned to seminary. The blog went with us on internship, and now has followed us back to seminary for our senior year.
4 comments:
When we called our pastor about six years ago, he said that he looked forward to learning and living within the traditions of our congregation. That lasted from July until December.
The first sign of any concern came on the evening that we decorated the Christmas tree. Our tradition is to put up the tree and decorate it on the third Sunday of Advent...which we did. That's when the trouble started.
The pastor came into the church to give announcements and noticed that the tree lights were lit. After the announcements he unplugged the tree and it went dark.
One of the elder ladies of the congregation asked him why did he do that. His response....it's not Christmas; we don't light the tree until mid-night Christmas Eve.
He started a new tradition, in an abrupt way, and not to the liking of the congregation. Sad to say that this is still a point of contention every year.
Yes - we had a similar experience several years ago, but not quite as abrupt. It did cause us to ask about that particular tradition here at our internship congregation - when did they begin singing Christmas hymns, did they really celebrate Advent and then celebrate Christmas for 12 days (the tradition of the Church, not local customs), etc. It led to some interesting discussions.
The question does become, which of the traditions of the Church are to be kept, and which are to be let slide in favor of local traditions or customs (assuming they do not go against the teachings of the Church).
Either way, pulling the plug is a bit abrupt - a discussion during a worship planning meeting might have been more appropriate.
I think what I learned from our Chrismon tree lighting experience is to ask questions beforehand - rather than to wait and be surprised!
So while I will try to avoid changing too many things too quickly, I want to be prepared in advance so that I can calmly make changes from behind the scenes, with appropriate explanations, rather than dramatically "pulling the plug" on congregational traditions!
You are right on target ... the most important thing you can do at anew congregation is let them know that their traditions and history matter.
I have been here, at my first call, for about three months. There are many things here that are a part of the congregation's culture that I would never have known, had I not intentionally taken the time to listen. If you cannot respect the authentic faith of a congregation's history/traditions/culture, then the congregation will never respect you either. It is a mutual relationship.
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