St. Mark’s Lutheran

This is a staggering suggestion/operation. The United Methodist Church, or at least some within it (I don’t know enough about it to really answer) is modeling the development of the new liturgies upon open source software development. Knowing a little about both worlds (open source and liturgical) that idea is exciting and shocking at the same time. The high liturgist will rattle on all the time about the liturgy being the words and the voice of the people, but at the same time the official liturgy is usually controlled by a select group of hermetically sealed liturgists. If an ‘open source’ liturgy could actually be developed it might actually represent the ownership and buy-in to litugical worship that is so often lacking. I’ve often commented that ‘contempory worship’ is really just an amorphous term for worship that connects with our life, or more often that connects with my wife, husband, son, daughter or relative’s life who has left the church. The real secret of open source is that only the most committed and able actually consistently devote the time. The imagined democracy disaster rarely if ever happens. The people are amused with other activities. Open source is a mission activity, a service to the community. What emerges is good software designed and enacted by experts who care with the buy-in of others who know or who at least admit they had the opportunity to change. The question is if those ivory tower liturgists will put their money where their mouth is, or if they will balk at this. I will be watching this with great interest.

Tags: Culture //