Secularizing the Sacred: The Demise of Liturgical Wholeness

This book explores one of the great paradoxes of our era. Western culture has almost imperceptibly come to secularize the sacred, while at the same time sacralizing the secular. The authors endeavor to show the debilitating effects that this paradox has had on the foundations of Christian worship with special reference to the history of worship and in particular the Presbyterian Church in Australia. The authors show how the theological predilection for ‘minimization’ has become inextricably woven into the fabric of what we call ‘the theory of transformative subjugation’ which drives the rationale for religious secularization. The book argues that it is necessary to consider a serious reconstruction of theological education in which its framework is located in a specific Christian theory of knowledge which engenders the Lordship of Christ and encourages a spirit of transformative love and connectedness. It is only in this context that the theology of worship and the beauty and usefulness of liturgical forms can be appreciated.

Table of Contents:
Introduction Chapter 1 Socio-political Pattern in Early Presbyterianism in New South Wales Chapter 2 Defining the Practice of Worship in the Presbyterian Church Chapter 3 The Climax of Calvinist Liturgical Development in New South Wales Chapter 4 A Brief History of the Theological Aetiology of Liturgical Minimisation Chapter 5 Minimisation since 1977 in the Presbyterian Church of Australia Chapter 6 Towards an Epistemology of Worship Chapter 7 Towards a Reconstruction of Theological Education Conclusion Bibliography About the Authors

About the Author :
Dr. John Webster, Ordained Minister of the Presbyterian Church of Australia, served the Church in both N.S.W. and Victoria. He was the Minister of Leura, Caringbah, Bendigo, and Scots Kirk Hamilton. He has also been a member of the Theological Education Committee, Victoria for nine years. He has also been the Business convenor of the General Assembly, Victoria., and State Moderator, N.S.W.1999/2000. Professor Ronald Laura was educated at the Universities of Harvard, Cambridge and Oxford, where he completed his Doctoral Studies. He is Professor in Education at the University of Newcastle, Australia. He has published over 40 books including Empathetic Education (1999), the New Social Disease: From High Tech Depersonalization to Survival of the Soul (2008), The Paradigm Shift in Health (2009), and publishing in excess of 300 scholarly articles. He teaches in the School of Education, offering subjects in the Philosophy of Education, Leadership Education and Health and Fitness Education. He is the creator of the now world renowned exercise system called Matrix Quick Fit (MQF).

Review :
It is indeed a great attempt to argue that the epistemology of worship should be grounded not on the model of power and control, but on the model of love and connectedness. The role of theological education is to educate the sense of interconnections with God and nature, the sense of feelings, caring and love and love for humanity. These are the foundational issues needed to be addressed by modern educators. On the whole, the author has done a thorough research, both on the historical understanding of the liturgical minimization process and the discussion of the related theologies and educational theories underlying the issues. Well argued and rigorously presented outline of how the foundational elements present in the theological thought and liturgical expression of Calvin has been supplanted by a Zwinglian trend that has become the overarching force in Presbyterianism in New South Wales. This carefully orchestrated and politically engineered reshaping of the epistemology from primary virtues of love and connectedness to a technological, mechanical view based on power and control is forcefully documented. I was ordained as an Elder of the Presbyterian Church in 1985, after decades in the Methodist tradition, and have been deeply concerned by the progressive minimisation of the liturgical heritage of the Church described and analysed so brilliantly by the authors. I embraced the explicit symbolism and liturgy of my new Church from 1977, which deepened my spiritual understanding and was a defining moment in my Christian journey. I was impressed by the theological application of transformative subjugation and the notion of power and control. The authors insistence on the development of a specific Christian epistemology is critically important and a paradynamic shift which will impact on theological education for decades to come. The profound influence of Scottish Presbyterianism on the development of my own Sydney medical school, and of the current downgrading of the importance of many of their Christian traditions, hallmarks of the school, provide uncomfortable parallels to this narrative. I would commend this book wholeheartedly to anyone who values the legacy of the Church, and can think laterally to the implications for other disciplines facing similar challenges. This work is important because the writer indicates that there is little or no formal attention played to the subject of worship within the Australian Church and this is particularly the case in the Presbyterian tradition. This work therefore fills a gap in the historical literature.