Now it’s official: The “Have Yourself a Megachurch Christmas” story is going to roll all the way through Dec. 25, which is the Feast of the Nativity of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (to get technical about it).
I think it is safe to predict the presence of the odd network and local news satellite truck or two on the lawns of the more prominent of these superchurches on Christmas Eve, with journalists interviewing the faithful as they enter about their views of the entire affair. Merry Christmas.
Who, I wonder, will be the first to broadcast video clips from the Willowcreek Community Church DVD that this trailblazing congregation is handing out for members to pop into their home entertainment centers on Sunday morning in place of gathering for corporate prayer, praise and, heaven forbid, something resembling the sacraments? (Photos from the church’s website.)
Wasn’t that a nasty way of wording the current situation?
You see, there are at least two stories of substance lurking behind this little media firestorm. The first is obvious and has now officially been locked into Holy Writ by Laurie Goodstein at the New York Times. Here it is right under the lead, with the headline “When Christmas Falls on Sunday, Megachurches Take the Day Off.”
Some of the nation’s most prominent megachurches have decided not to hold worship services on the Sunday that coincides with Christmas Day, a move that is generating controversy among evangelical Christians at a time when many conservative groups are battling to “put the Christ back in Christmas.”
This assumes, of course, that the moderate evangelicals who huddle in some of these megachurches are the same kinds of people who are out there on the front lines of the Christmas wars. This is highly unlikely, I think. But it is true that this particular battle has pounded a wedge into some cracks in the large, but terribly vague, world that sprawls around under that vague umbrella word “evangelicalism.” You cannot say this too often: Not all evangelicals think alike and act alike. Ask Jimmy Carter and Jerry Falwell.
The other story concerns the decision to cancel worship services at all.
Here, there are two entirely different attitudes at play and Goodstein (and many other reporters) are hinting at a division in doctrine between Protestants and ancient churches, but not really underlining it. However, Goodstein does write:
The uproar is not only over closing the churches on Christmas Day, because some evangelical churches large and small have done that in recent years and made Christmas Eve the big draw, without attracting much criticism.
What some consider the deeper affront is in canceling services on a Sunday, which most Christian churches consider the Lord’s Day, when communal worship is an obligation. The last time Christmas fell on a Sunday was in 1994. Some of these same megachurches remained open them, they say, but found attendance sparse.
This is only part of the story.
Churches that follow the ancient traditions of Christianity and, to one degree or another, honor its liturgical calendar, would never think of not gathering for worship on one of the most important Holy Days in Christianity — period. Sunday, or Monday, or Tuesday or whatever.
Christmas is Christmas. It’s the Christ Mass. You observe it in the early hours of the morning right after midnight and then come back on the day itself. This is part of what it means to be a church.
Or is it? What’s the larger question here and this whole episode helps point out the degree to which there are American churches, following the American calendar and its rites, and then there are, uh, churches that are part of the global history and community of Christianity in the broader, ancient sense of the word.
Here’s Goodstein again:
Canceling worship on Christmas Day appears to be predominantly a megachurch phenomenon, sociologists of religion say.
“This attachment to a particular day on the calendar is just not something that megachurches have been known for,” Nancy Ammerman, a sociologist of religion at Boston University, said. “They’re known for being flexible and creative, and not for taking these traditions, seasons, dates and symbols really seriously.”
P.S. For coverage of this story from the inside, click here for a new Christianity Today weblog essay.
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Comments (29) |
December 10, 2005, at 8:33 pm
I know I may be crazy, but this whole thing reminds me of the backlash over Hillary Clinton’s use of the old African proverb: “It takes a village to raise a child.”
For some people, nothing could be more liberal. For example, Rick Santorum’s book rebutting Clinton’s was called, “It takes a family: Conservatism and the common good.”
And so the Christmas celebrations these churches are encouraging are family celebrations, not communal celebrations. A community is very similar to a village and while it’s good, the family is more important.
Maybe what I’m saying is just too ridiculous so I’ll stop here.
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December 10, 2005, at 9:48 pm
I can’t confirm this, but I’ve heard that one American Orthodox Bishop has allowed for the traditional Sunday liturgy to be served Saturday evening. The discussion (but not the name of the bishop or jurisdiction) has come up on Live Journal.
I know the Antiochian Archdiocese allows for the Christmas liturgy to be served the night before - with no required service thus, on the day itself.
So while the story might be about the “megachurches” the reality is that it’s happening in other - not so interesting or newsworthy - places. I think the media’s inability - or unwillingness - to cover all the flavours of Christian faith (minus a once every couple of years Pascha story) is newsworthy itself.
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December 10, 2005, at 9:52 pm
With the Antiochian situation, you may be dealing with an isolated case or even with a mission in which the priest has to travel some distance.
But everyone knows the norm. A service that begins before midnight and finishes well after — in the early hours of Christmas morn. Then there is a Christmas Day service of some kind, as well.
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December 10, 2005, at 11:43 pm
[…] You’ve gotta read about what Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois is expecting its members to do because they choose to be closed on Christmas. […]
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December 11, 2005, at 12:16 am
tmatt,
Thank you for allowing your liturgical/ecclesial commitments to color your coverage of this trend/story.
My parents attend the Church of the Apostles in Atlanta. I am not sure that it is technically a megachurch but it is close. I was glad to see that, despite their distancing themselves from almost every vestige of Anglicanism, they are not following the lead of Willow Creek away from services this Christmas. Small favors.
I do not remember seeing an answer to my query regarding news coverage of the Orthodox Churches from your post:
http://www.getreligion.org/?p=1221
Blessings
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December 11, 2005, at 6:26 am
Actually, tmatt, not “an isolated case or even with a mission in which the priest has to travel some distance”: according to the Antiochian Archdiocese Liturgical Guide for this weekend (on their website at this URL http://www.antiochian.org/assets/asset_manager/528e90c7d27939368ed12703760c171f.pdf ) the practice this year is:
December 24, Saturday afternoon: Great Vespers is served, as we do on Good Friday.
December 24,Saturday evening: Orthros (Matins) and Liturgy of St. Basil the Great instead of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.
OR December 25, Sunday Morning: Orthros (Matins) and Liturgy of St. Basil the Great instead of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.
So there’s an entire Jurisdiction allowing for skipping Sunday as an option. Now, how it gets applied may, in fact, be relative to your isolated cases, etc. But the Liturgical Guide makes no such call.
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December 11, 2005, at 9:04 am
I’m not expecting a huge crowd Christmas morning at our Episcopal church. It’ll largely be empty, though I’ll be there, covering for the organist on the piano. There would certainly be an outcry if the church canceled the Christmas morning service, from people who will certainly expect services to be offered, but won’t attend them themselves.
Frankly, I think the whole thing is a bit silly. These churches will have a whole array of special Christmas services before Christmas. (Generally, evangelicals don’t celebrate Advent but jump right into Christmas after Thanksgiving, much like the shopping malls.) Their clergy will be exhausted at the end of it. Why shouldn’t they take the time off rather than holding a service no one will attend?
I myself prefer to be in church on Christmas morning. It seems the only appropriate way to start the celebration of Christ’s birth. But I certainly wouldn’t expect the rector to hold a service for just myself and my family. And generally, that’s just about what he’s been doing, along with a few others.
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December 11, 2005, at 4:53 pm
“But I certainly wouldn’t expect the rector to hold a service for just myself and my family.”
I think the above statement gets to the heart of the dispute between the ancient churches and the new megachurches. The megachurches view Sunday and feast day services as “for us.” It’s primarily about us and about what we can get out of it. If we can get more out of a family gathering, that’s what we do.
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December 11, 2005, at 6:37 pm
[…] MEGA-CHURCHES Closed for Christmas?! Easter also falls on a Sunday, but these megachurches manage to open for that …. (Various) […]
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December 11, 2005, at 6:50 pm
I think this represents a change in the way many evangelical churches handle Christmas. 20-25 years ago, many of them would not have a service at all if Christmas came during the week. They would just have their regular Sunday services, celebrating Christmas on the Sunday before. The change to having Christmas Eve services is actually a move in the direction of recognizing the liturgical year. How ironic for them to be dropping the Sunday service which used to be the only one.
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December 11, 2005, at 8:34 pm
My Greek Orthodox parish will celebrate Nativity Liturgy on the evening of the 24th, and have no service on the 25th. From what I understand, that’s the norm here and has nothing to do with lack of priests.
The Antiochian parish I belonged to in Los Angeles last year, which is served by two retired priests in addition to a full-time pastor, also had its liturgy for the Nativity on the evening (early evening) of the 24th and no service on the 25th. The Nativity service was very poorly attended, in comparison with an average Sunday. My guess is that we didn’t have another service on the morning of the 25th because so few people would have shown up. That’s probably the case with my current Greek parish as well.
Part of this may have to do with the fact that Americans usually go home for Christmas— traveling thousands of miles to be with family. Because we’re so far away from our regular congregations, there’s less motivation to up and go to an unfamiliar church for the Christmas service.
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December 11, 2005, at 10:48 pm
Since these churches (and few non-liturgical churches) have fast days, why would they have FEAST days, anyway - even Christmas?
It does seem odd that some of these churches aren’t “open” on Christmas, citing it as a *family day.*
I do remember attending Presbyterian church services on Christmas Day when I was in high school (20 years ago.) I just looked up that church online, and they are having “early” services on 12/25. Maybe it’s only the megachurches churches that are abandoning Christmas.
As a reporter, I’d almost want to explore whether this is a Neo-Puritan revolution, since they rejected the holiday as well. Although I suspect most are simply staying home from the religious part, and are still exchanging presents.
I don’t know if I mentioned this before, but my local paper (Union Leader) ran the AP piece about no services on 12/25 on the front page, but found NO local churches who are not having services!
Talk about stretching. I suppose they felt conservative New Hampshirites would be outraged at those folks in the midwest.
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December 12, 2005, at 9:05 am
Stephen A, I think you have missed the point. “Neo-Puritan revolution” indeed! The shock value in this is not that they aren’t celebrating Christmas services. They are, on December 24.
The shock is that they are closing the church on The Lord’s Day. No self-respecting Puritan congregation would ever have done that.
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December 12, 2005, at 10:08 am
tmatt
You make refernce to American Churches. It’s interesting to me that none of the GR crew are from tradtions that have their origins in this country. No one from any of the various tribes that emerged from the assorted Revivals and Awakenings of the 18th and 19th centuries much less anyone from a Willow Creek or California Jesus People background. You have an Orthodox, a Catholic, an Episcipalian and 2 whose tribes are rooted in post reformation protestant scholasticism.
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December 12, 2005, at 1:02 pm
But when is worship “ABOUT US” or “FOR US”? It is ABOUT AND FOR God and our service to God by gathering regularly to worship the Creator of Heaven and Earth. Why on earth would a family gathering trump this? A family gathering is more important than worshipping God?
Okay, that pretty much seals my place in church on Christmas for the rest of my life….
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December 12, 2005, at 4:36 pm
Of course, depending on how “protestant” you are, there may be no such thing as communal worship on “the Lord’s day,” which would be the sabbath, a day of rest.
For many (including, I believe, many in more liturgical traditions), the sabbath, or Lord’s Day, has never fallen on a Sunday (except by popular misconception). For them, Saturday is the sabbath, and Sunday is the first day of the week, on which we have traditionally gone to church. But for many protestants, remember, there’s nothing particularly compelling, certainly nothing authoritative, about church traditions.
The comparison to Easter reminded me of Passover. Recall, too, that this premier Biblical holiday is a “family holiday,” rather than a corporate one, a fact which needn’t make it any less worshipful, I’m told. The sabbath itself seems to have been designed as a downright private event. There were 13 people at the first communion, only a handful at the original advent, ascension, and so forth (not counting heavenly hosts), and it could easily be argued that these events were definitive, though intimate—or depending on your point of view, poorly attended. At any rate, with such models in mind, there’s no call to question the commitment to the greater good of those Christians who reserve some holidays, even the most holy ones, for more intimate observance.
Consider the emergent emphasis on returning to NT church practices: it’s not out of the question at all that a given church (home church, cell group, nonce association of Christians from diverse traditions) might reserve Christmas for family observances and worship together as a group whenever they please, and, as a separate matter, observe the sabbath when their work (and church!) schedules allow (or not at all, since others might consider the sabbath to be primarily a Jewish observance, like the prohibition on graven images, or the non-eating of lobster).
But presumably other protestant Christians observe a Sunday sabbath, and will arrange somehow to take God at what they see as his word and use a certain coming sabbath as a day of rest, despite the fact that it’s Christmas, and there are people who keep pressuring them to break sabbath and go to church.
I guess I’m saying it’s complicated. I understand a liturgical emphasis, even not having one, and any frustration aimed at those who try to cover liturgical traditions without taking the time to look up their calendar(s).
But there are those Christians who are happy to have the calendar, liturgical and otherwise, mean less and less, whose claims to such journalistic courtesy have no less merit.
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December 12, 2005, at 5:53 pm
The last half of my comment got cut off. Of course, worship is actually to offering of soemthing for God. In the ancient Churches, it is Christ offering Himself (body, blood, soul, and divinity) to the Father through the priest, who represents the congregation gathering with him. Since in Holy COmmunion we are incorporated into the Body of Christ, that means that we are offering ourselves up (or that Christ is offering us up) as well, through the action of the priest.
On this view, Mass should be celebrated even if there is no one else in the congregation.
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December 13, 2005, at 7:17 am
Jody, it certainly is complicated when you get it that wrong.
Christianity is communal, not private; the entire New Testament testifies to this. Ergo, meeting for worship in community is not optional. The fact that the communities that meet for worship are not always composed of hundreds or thousands of people doesn’t make worship a primarily private affair.
The Lord’s Day has always been understood as the first day of the week, the day on which Christ was raised. Christian communal worship settled on the first day of the week in the first century. That doesn’t mean it was limited to one day a week, of course.
This probably does depend on how protestant you are… which may in fact say something about protestantism to a catholic curmudgeon like me.
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December 13, 2005, at 11:14 am
I think the lack of a sacramental/liturgical life is the source of this problem. Churches like Willow Creek state that their theology is not one of tradition. I really cannot fathom how the Christian Church could have existed for 2,000 years without developing a body of Tradition, including liturgy, theology, canons, etc. Once you become divorced from the Tradition, anything goes. I advise these so-called Bible Christians to run the word tradition through a New Testament search engine - they would be surprised.
As for Orthodox Christian practice, I think current Greek and Antiochian practice may be different from other Orthodox churches. In my OCA parish, Divine Liturgy is celebrated early on Christmas Eve morning followed by a Vigil (Compline and Matins) that evening. Divine Liturgy is then celebrated on Christmas Day morning at the usual time. Perhaps the differnce is due to the different versions of the Typikon used by various Old World churches. The OCA follows the older Typicon of St. Savvas also followed by the Russian Church, while the Greeks follow the abridged and revised Typicon devised by Constantinople in the 19th century. Perhaps there may also be some Roman Catholic influence on the GOA and AOA not found in Greece or Syria.
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December 13, 2005, at 11:40 am
Dan, “wrong,” or different? I won’t provoke you with such things as how one squeezes three days and three nights between Friday evening and Sunday morning, or whether God or the church (or its 1st Century competition with the Mithraists) should get to decide which one is His day; frankly because those things are of absolutely no importance…to me. But there are a good many faith groups for whom they’re very important, some of whom disagree with you as to which one is the Lord’s day. (“Whatever that means,” many reformers would huff. “Shouldn’t they all be?”)
Of course, Christianity is communal; I think you’re arguing with somebody else, there. (But, as an aside: is my community as a Christian properly people like me who go to the same church, or Christ’s poor? Maybe a Christian’s Christmas is properly spent at a homeless shelter or bringing a poinsettia to a shut-in and visiting for a few hours. Which would please Christ more for me to do on “His day,” or on His birthday, or on the coincidence of the two: offering service to the least of these, or going to another mass, or attending mega-church and watching another sermon on the big screen? I suppose in the context of this discussion I should add to the former list dandling one’s children on one’s knees. Surely you don’t mean to join others in suggesting that this, the question of which would please Christ more, should be an easy question? For every Christian?)
I’m not suggesting that you do, but why assume, for others, that every important ritual need be observed among the larger per se “church community,” when we have so many biblical examples, and even instructions, concerning intimate, even family, ones? Again, apart from the piddly matter of what is likely a selfish, provincial, comfortable, and probably nostalgic attachment to my own ways, I really don’t care. But there are some faith groups who care a great deal, some of whom consider that any “church” (they probably wouldn’t call it that) that consists of more than a dozen or so people, two or three families, is unscriptural.
So my deeper question was, or was meant to be, how much deference do we owe those Christians whose trappings of the faith differ from our own? I’m leaning toward, “a lot,” even as regards (often reform-minded) mega-churches, especially lest our attention to the trappings of the faith dectract from its content. Protestants have their fair share of trappings people, please don’t get me wrong; but those people, too, are in the perpetual, strange danger of missing Communion, out of their pickiness about communion.
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December 13, 2005, at 11:48 am
Mark—
Perhaps. It may be also that the AOA and GOA have responded more readily than the OCA to the American (Protestant?) reluctance to gather often in community. It seems common for OCA parishes to have two or three times more services throughout the week than their brethren in other American jurisdictions.
At my Greek Orthodox parish in South Korea (the year before Los Angeles), we had the same services that you describe— a well-attended Liturgy on the night of the 24th, followed by a traditional Lenten meal, and met again for Liturgy on the morning of the 25th, again very well-attended and culminating in much feasting.
So this may have nothing to do with the Greek or Antiochian patriarchates in general, but rather with their parishioners in North America.
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December 13, 2005, at 4:38 pm
To R. Hargrave:
I agree with your last sentence, which also agrees with the last sentence in my previous posting. I think the Greek and Antiochian jurisdictions put a slight twist relative to their Old World parents, regardless of differences in Typicon with other patriarchates. Actually, our Christmas Eve is service is in the morning, not at night (that’s Vigil). I think this is a good way of accommodating young families and the elderly. The die hards attend the evening Vigil and the Christmas Day liturgy (followed by the big feast you mentioned). Although we all need to hold fast to the liturgical tradition, Orthodox and otherwise, there will always be some need to respond to modern needs. America and any developed country in the 21st century is greatly different from an agrarian society in the 4th century or even the 19th century.
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December 13, 2005, at 4:47 pm
Jody, your answer is a good one, but misses the crucial importance of straining our interpretation of Scripture and history through the sieve of tradition. At baptism we are committed to a particular tradition in a very real (and Polanyi-esque) sense… even the sola scriptura Christians have their own traditions of interpretation that one crosses at one’s peril.
Debates about “how one squeezes three days and three nights between Friday evening and Sunday morning” (a failure to understand how people counted “days” prior to the concept of zero or accurate timepieces) and anachronistic stuff about Mithraism (a 2nd- or 3rd-Century religion, while the Lord’s Day was established by about 100 AD) are, as you say, unimportant. But they do show the importance of listening to what the great cloud of witnesses has said before us.
“How much deference do we owe those Christians whose trappings of the faith differ from our own?” is indeed a key question. I sympathize with the poor overworked pastors, but was simply pointing out (in my first post in this thread) that they are being a bit liturgically incoherent. They have every right to be, of course. Furthermore, megachurches certainly don’t fall into the subset of Christians who “consider that any ‘church’ (they probably wouldn’t call it that) that consists of more than a dozen or so people, two or three families, is unscriptural.”
And you write as though there were an unbridgeable dichotomy between worshipping on the one hand, and tending shut-ins or time with family on the other. ‘Tain’t so.
Anyway, who ever told a pastor that the normal worship day was a day off? It might be for us non-clerical types…
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December 13, 2005, at 4:56 pm
Mark—
I’d misread your last sentence, first time round. Apologies.
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December 13, 2005, at 6:16 pm
Dan, excellent. I’d love to discuss the subject of ecclesiastical tradition and faith with you further, but I’m afraid I’ve already gone on too long, as well as pushed the discussion too far from the subject of the post. Another time? Thanks for hearing me out, and do have a joyous Christ-mass. {cue Tiny Tim…}
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December 14, 2005, at 10:33 am
Dan writes: “I sympathize with the poor overworked pastors, but was simply pointing out (in my first post in this thread) that they are being a bit liturgically incoherent.”
I don’t see that this is only about overworked pastors - but it probably is about overworked volunteers. A church like Saddleback or Willow Creek simply can not hold a single service without the efforts of literally hundreds of volunteers - from ushers to musicians to technical crews to custodians to ‘tape ministry” duplicators to parking attendents. Perhaps concern for these volunteers, already serving at multiple services in the days leading up to Christmas, has gotten lost in the furor over whether the lack of a December 25 post-sunrise service dishonors the Lord’s day.
BTW, in the Roman Catholic congregation of my youth attendance at a 5:30 PM Saturday service satisfied the FOLLOWING week’s obligation to attend Mass. In the privacy of the Sacristy, The priests used to call this the “Football Service”. Traditional? Hmmm….
Don’t get me wrong - I think the mega-churches should do whatever is possible to honor God on a Christmas Sunday. But perhaps the “dissing Tradition” angle is not the only one that deserves examination…
Have a Blessed Christmas!
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December 14, 2005, at 11:55 am
I went to Mass this morning at 7:30AM in our Chapel. Ten people were in the congregation with the Sacristan, the Lector(me) and the Priest, of course Jesus Christ was also present. There are usually two other daily masses. We come to worship God and pray for our intentions (usually others).
Our parish has 3,000 families, somewhat large for a Catholic Church. Sunday masses are held in the school hall while our worship center (church) is being completed. Perhaps several ushers, musicians and lay-perticipants in the liturgy also participate, but it is most certain that Jesus Christ is present and the center of our attention.
It is that way on sundays and Holy Days such as Christmas.
One of my favorite carols is “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day”, words by W. Longfellow, music by J. Marks. When I play and sing it, the words become a prayer from my heart and I want to be in church with God’s light streaming into my heart on Christmas Day.
How sad it is that the use of a DVD is rationalized as consideration for all the church members who are necessary to put on the service at the mega-church.
Perhaps some self-examination is necessary to see who is really at the center of Christmas as well as the rest of the year.
I stumbled upon this site by accident and enjoyed all the postings. Some seemed to be more on point than my rambling, but I felt I had to comment.
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December 15, 2005, at 12:56 am
“A church like Saddleback or Willow Creek simply can not hold a single service without the efforts of literally hundreds of volunteers - from ushers to musicians to technical crews to custodians to ‘tape ministry†duplicators to parking attendents.”
Is this really true? Do they really need ushers? Do they really need musicians? (Can’t they sing unaccompanied if the instrumentalists don’t show?) Couldn’t they do without tape duplicators just this one Sunday? And parking attendants?
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December 15, 2005, at 9:25 am
What Paul B said. Somehow or other St. Augustine was able to hold masses for huge congregations without ushers and parking attendants and such.
Anyhow, it ain’t about Christmas Day. It’s about not gathering for worship on Sunday.
I sympathize with the volunteers. Poor things. That whine cuts very little ice for Anglican choir or altar guild members, who probably do just as much work as the megachurch volunteers at Christmas and Easter.
The volunteers of my acquaintance (like me and my wife) do our share of griping and whining. Then we suck it up and go on.
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