I am posting my first observation below because this was my first visit ever to a Presbyterian church. I was raised in a Pentecostal environment where there is little structure or guidelines. My experience at FPC was a "culture shock."
Trust me, I will absolutely not be offended if you don't want to read. It is definitely not in line with my normal content on here. I just wanted to post it in case you were curious about my thoughts on my first Presbyterian experience, having been raised in a less structured spiritual environment.
Enjoy!
- Jerie
I arrived at First Presbyterian Church on Main street in Richmond, KY on February 13, 2011, around 10:50am, approximately 10 minutes before the start of morning worship. Richmond is roughly a urban area with just under 50,000 in population. Mostly notable for its large population of 18-25 year-olds, as Richmond is a “college-town,” housing Eastern Kentucky University. The average salary is just over $40,000, and the poverty rate is approximately 20%.
First Presbyterian Church is in the heart of Richmond, KY. I walked a few blocks from a parking lot, and went through the large wooden doors. A group of uniformed boy scouts, ages 10 to 18 approximately, lined the walls of the foyer, handing me a program as they greeted me through the door. Being the first of my group to arrive, I found a half-empty pew, and started to absorb my surroundings. As a whole, the church is absolutely, breath-takingly beautiful. The historical structure of the building combined with the loving community of “believers” inside it made for a very moving moment. The dark wood that covers the vaulted ceilings and floor was polished and pristine. The classic light fixtures rested steadily above our heads, dimly lit, but unnecessary, as the lightly colored stained glass windows allowed plenty of light inside on that beautiful sunny morning. The wall directly in front of me provided contrast to this sweet, light atmosphere as I took in the enormous, polished metal organ pipes that would soon boom the tuneful melodies of Johann Sebastian Bach and George Fredrick Handel, among others. Pride filled this church, at least in it’s structure. Not once did I come across a dust-bunny or spider web. I could only assume the same care, consideration, and pride would be portrayed in the members of First Presbyterian Church of Richmond.
In my first five minutes there, alone in the pew, I sat quietly. I imagine that mostly everyone recognized me as a visitor. Many people were in groups, quietly discussing details about their lives - about their children and grandchildren, about bible study that week, and what vacations they wish to take - I was clearly a newcomer, isolated in my wooden pew. I was starting to believe that either (1) visitors were so common they weren’t addressed anymore, or (2) visitors were so uncommon that they didn’t know how to receive me.
Finally, just seconds before other members of my group arrived, a few elderly women broke off from their conversations in order to welcome me. They wanted to know if I was a student at the local campus, reassuring their beliefs I was a visitor. Something in the eyes of the woman next to me looked as though she was genuinely interested in the details about my life. She took my hand in a friendly shake and held it there for a moment as she explained to me that I should sign the burgundy “guest book” at the left of me sitting in the pew, and pass it down to her for her to sign. She was obviously a member of the church, probably has been for many years, so I was confused as to why she also had to sign the book. It was probable that everyone there knew her by name. I filled out my name, address, email address and checked the boxes that said “visitor” and “college student,” and passed the thin burgundy book to my right. Another woman, seated in front me, turned around to greet me. She was dressed in a grey business suit. Through her glasses, she looked at me, almost apologetically, explaining to me that most college students attend the Wednesday night service, as though I would be dismayed in finding less people of my age group attending. All three women who shook my hand and welcomed me, either briefly or inquisitively, hosted a grey or white head of hair, and were dressed in business causal. I started to relax.
The organ began to gently play Bach’s “Prelude in G,” signaling to everyone to take their seats, the service was beginning. This part of the service is described as the prelude. Having never attended a presbyterian church service before, I had to do some research to discover the meaning and purpose in every portion of the service. I found this information on the website of Tates Creek Presbyterian Church in a downloadable document titled, “A Child’s Guide to Worship,” which defines clearly and in layman’s terms every portion of a standard presbyterian service. Fitting, I think, since I am a Presbyterian baby, in the sense that I am relatively unfamiliar with the structure of the service. The prelude, I found, has the purpose of signaling the people to take their seats and prepare for the service. This worked exactly as it was meant to do in the case of this sunday morning at First Presbyterian Church.
Next, the pastor, Dr. Curtis Christian, a warm and friendly man wearing robes and a green sash, welcomed the church and invited everyone to stand and welcome one another. I found this just a little unusual and maybe even slightly “silly” and unnecessary since most of us had done this prior to the service. But I shook it off under the consideration that he may be doing this because he noticed unfamiliar faces in the crowd, and wished those people to feel welcomed. After this warm gesture, he welcomed everyone in a well-recited explanation of the service and the purpose of the “guest books” I had encountered earlier. the purpose, he explained, is to have a “record of your worship with us here today.” It was like a thin burgundy religious time-sheet, I gathered.
Next was the introit. According to my copy of “A Child’s Guide to Worship,” this is a “call to worship” sung by the choir. Next was the call to worship, ironically enough. This is the part of the ceremony that uses scripture (God’s word) to call his people to worship him. Luckily for me, these verses of scripture (and my expected responses) were typed into the program. In my guide, the author writes, “Worship is active. We are to participate. The call to worship invited us to action.”
Next comes the hymn of praise. Our program tells us this is hymn #457, “I Greet Thee, Who My Sure Redeemer Art.” I follow the lead of everyone around me, and remove the blue hymnal from the shelf attached to the pew in front of me, and turn to hymn #457. Everyone around me started to sing. I gather this is something that everyone has to, or at least feels obligated to participate in, because I can hear a variety of voices. Looking around I can see everyone singing (or at least their lips are moving) and I can hear a few very proud women singing elaborately, a few in harmony to the melody. With this, I can also hear a few tone-deaf men, who either sing because they are passionate and want to show their dedication, or because they must. All of this is on top of a beautifully talented choir stationed in the front.
Next on the program is the call to confession and the prayer of confession. I don’t really need to consult my guide to understand that this part of the service is where the people of the church confess their sins to God and pray for forgiveness. At this point, I started to note a lot of significant similarities and differences from a typical Catholic Mass.
Next came the silent confession, congregational response (the choir recited Kyrie #572 - “Lord, have mercy upon us. Christ, have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us,” assurance of pardon (a reminder from the pastor that the Lord has promised to forgive us when we confess our sins), and then a charming section in the program they titled words with our young church.
Words with our young church is notable because the strong relationship between the educators and the children was so apparent. Joel Stanley, the director of Christian Education welcomed the children (up to the third grade) up to the front and had a discussion with them while the rest of us observed their discussion. It only lasted about five minutes, but it was charming to watch as Joel asked, “how are you different from a baby?” A small girl in glasses answered “We have more hair on our heads!” Someone else answered “We can do lots of stuff babies can’t, like make stuff.” Joel encouraged their answers, but cleverly and concisely moved the discussion to talk about how, as we grow physically, we should also be growing spiritually, and allowed for the children to chime in on exactly what growing spiritually meant.
The children were led downstairs to continue their discussions and studied, and the service progressed into the anthem. The anthem is a song, sung by the choir, that is often based on scripture. According to my guide, they can be prayers, stories, or songs of praise, and can have a variety of moods (happy, sad, etc.).
Next is the prayer for illumination. This is the pastors prayer (said aloud) that asks that the people listening will really take in and absorb what is coming next. What comes next is the reading of scripture by the pastor. That Sunday he, along with every other pastor in all of the presbyterian churches across the nation, read from 1 Corinthians 3:1-9, which talks about the church and its’ leaders.
The most relatable portion of the service came next - the sermon. Dr. Christian spent an appropriate amount of time discussing the scripture. What’s so neat is that his discussion seemed to correlate perfectly in what we were asked to observe. He even threw out terms like “interdependent.” Dr. Christian pointed out that although people will sometimes appoint “deacons” to lead the church, that God calls every believer to be deacons to the world. This message to “be a light” seemed to inspire the crowd. He tied in the same message introduced by the children earlier that we need to grow spiritually, and obtain mature faith. He said that the church will only become as great as it can be when the members inside it are as great as they can be. He encouraged the listeners to go out and encourage growth, support and nurture others, and that “living for yourself is not the message of the cross.” He goes on to point out that we are all brothers and sisters, that no one denomination of Christianity is better than the other.
After Dr. Christian’s sermon, the church joined the choir in another hymn. One that was not provided in the hymnal, just inserted inside the program. Shall we Gather at the River by Robert Lowry had a reverse side that was meant to be returned to the church because printed on the back of the hymn was a survey to the people. The church asked that the members fill out this survey asking them to rate (on a scale of 1 to 5) how strongly they agree or disagree to each query. First Presbyterian Church wanted to know how “singable” the hymn was, if they would like to see it included in the blue hymnal book, if they found the text meaningful, and if the text brought satisfaction to a “longing for healing and peace in days to come.”
Next comes the affirmation of faith. This was not included in my guide, but I can tell you that it is two paragraphs of text that was recited by everyone. It starts with “I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth...” and continues with the declaration of the things the members believe in.
Next is the congregational response, or the Gloria - a short song of praise. Then, something I was told does not occur every service, a Moment for Mission. The leader of the Boy Scouts and another man leading a $0.05 per Meal Offering mission, stood in front of the church and thanked them for their support, and asked that they continue so that the organizations of the church may grow.
Nearing the end, next was the Lord’s Prayer, the Choral Response (a big “Amen”), Offerings and Tithes, then the Doxology. The Doxology is another hymn of praise, usually portraying joy. Finally, in conjunction with the Postlude (like the prelude except people are exiting instead of entering), the church was dismissed.
Exiting the church was more difficult than I imagined it would be. I found this to be because the pastor made it his mission to shake the hand and speak to every person who walked through the church doors into the foyer. When he finally got to me, he grasped my hand firmly with his soft hands and, although he had never seen me before, said “Are you having a good day? I know I am!” as though we had known each other for a long time.
A few days later, I received an email from the First Presbyterian Church. They welcomed me to return, and invited me to attend services on Wednesday nights when they provide free dinners for those attending, emphasizing that this is popular for EKU college students.
Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by my experience at First Presbyterian Church. It was very similar, yet very different from the few things I understand about Catholic Mass. In my music literature class last semester, I learned that the Lutheran church came into being because a few members of the Catholic church felt they lacked something in the absence of interaction in the Catholic church. These leaders argued that the members of the Catholic church could not relate to the things that occurred there. One of the things they argued is that the hymns of the mass were sung in Latin and the church, even if they could understand Latin (which was rare), were not allowed to join. Also, women could not get very involved. This led to the formation of the Lutheran church, which had a choir, but strived to make church service more relatable. They used hymns for the church to sing together. Hymns that were tuneful and easy to follow.
The reason this Presbyterian service reminded me of this Lutheran lesson is because, in a lot of ways, the Presbyterian service was rigidly structured like a Catholic mass would be. At the same time, they make considerable effort to encourage interaction and feedback from the church, as was seen in the hymns and the survey that was inserted in the program. In the same sense, it was evident that this church was routed in tradition. I feel very cultured during this observation because I kept imagining all the the ancestors of people before these that had upheld the same practices, without much, if any, variation.
Given my experiences here, I feel confident in saying that First Presbyterian Church of Richmond is collective, or interdependent. It is remarkable how well this was easy to detect. Given that Dr. Christian actually addressed this in his sermon made this decision an easy one. They are very encouraging to the members of the church, but they want them to make the church, and the Presbyterian name, its very best.
Also, based on my experience were everyone followed the structure very strictly, I’m going to say that the portrayed a lot of tightness. That is, they adhered to the rules and guidelines of the procedure with little or no variation. This was most prominent in the reciting of the hymns and responses.
It is difficult to say whether First Presbyterian Church follows a masculine or feminine element. Most of the leaders (with the exception of the choir leader) were male, and the church seemed male-driven. This would cause me to lean towards masculinity. I did do some research to see if women were permitted to have power roles inside the Presbyterian church, and as far as I can tell, they are. First Presbyterian Church specifically calls attention to their three “Presbyterian Women’s Groups,” but this isn’t as pronounced as the Boy Scouts seem to be.
As far as power distance is concerned, I did not observe many variations in class. Everyone in attendance was dressed approximately the same. I parked in the wrong space and did not stay after as most member did - to meet downstairs for punch - so I did not get to see what kinds of vehicles were being driven. The only variation in appearance and luxury items was found in the Boy Scouts. Most Boy Scouts were in full uniform - the beige shirt adorned in badges and awards with khaki pants. I did notice a few of the boys were wearing worn blue jeans instead of khakis, but I don’t think this observation is distinctive enough to be significant.
It was clear that a large social identity was present in the members of the church. Many of the people were alike in making a whole part of the church. It was clear that the members here had a sense of belonging and purpose.
I was not able to closely observe the families of the church that were present, but from what I was able to witness at the “words with our young church” and the overall interdependence of the church, I would assume that the families here are family-focused rather than individual-focused. Along the same lines of this, sense the collective team was often emphasized, I would also agree that group cognition/learning is present and enforced. This stems from my observations that the church recognizes that group change begins with the individual.
With emotion type, I found a lot of expressions that could be accurate descriptions of my experience at First Presbyterian Church. Members were joyful, loving, and had pride in their church.
As witnessed in the sermon about “brotherly love” across denominations, along with the experience with the boy scouts and outreach programs, I would label this church as invested in the individual actions, in other words, relational motivation.
Also, given the appearance of the members, the routines of the boy scouts, the greeting and exiting habits, and practices throughout the service, I would say they are more similar to the conformity element than the obedience element.
Other than myself and my group, I did not witness any horizontal relationships. There were many families there, even a few generations of families. I was reminded a few times that more horizontal relationships were more prominent on Wednesday nights, but as for my observations on this Sunday morning, they were more invested in vertical relationships.
Routed in tradition and thriving on a successful structure, my experience at First Presbyterian Church was fascinating. The interdependent model of education and worship employed throughout the service consistently rang the mission statement of the church, “We exist... not for ourselves, but to love Jesus Christ, and to make Christ’s love known.”
1 comments:
This was so well written, I felt like I was there with you.
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