As one should do when visiting Oxford, I’ve been spending some time in ancient English churches and college chapels. As British historian Nicholas Orme points out in his Going To Church in Medieval England (Yale, 2021) churchgoing as a religious and social activity here goes back at least to 313 AD when Emperor Constantine recognized Christianity as a lawful religion and allowed Christians to have public places of worship.
Much of everyday life for centuries has revolved around the parish church. Even today in some towns the bells in the church tower still summon people to worship each week. On Wednesday evenings one can hear the peals as ringers practice for the following Sunday.
Almost without exception one of the remarkable features is the furniture inside the nave, that long section of the building that divides the transepts on either side, forming the shape of a cross. Nearly every place of worship is furnished with pews. And, notably, on the back of the pew in front of where one is sitting there is a shallow shelf about 10 inches below the top of the pew. A Bible, a hymnal, and the Book of Common Prayer rest on this shelf. Worshippers thumb through each of the three to locate their proper place in the liturgy. They know the books well, which is sometimes painfully evident to visitors who don’t. Beneath the pew rests a place to kneel in the form of a kneeling bench or a raised cushion. The pews themselves may or may not have a seat cushion. Because worshippers stand often, kneel for part of the service, and sit for only relatively brief periods of time, a cushy seat is not entirely necessary.
Looking from the pew toward the front one typically finds a split chancel with a pulpit (or ambo) on the left side where the sermon is preached and on the other side a podium where Scripture is read. An Old Testament reading is followed by a Psalm which is followed by a New Testament reading. The fourth reading, this one from the Gospels, is elevated and then read from the center aisle while the people are standing together to receive the word. Even if the sermon is, shall we say, somewhat lacking, Scripture can accomplish its purpose.
Between the pulpit and podium is the altar which includes the table where Holy Communion is prepared. On the altar are gorgeous and valuable vessels and plates; the table-setting for a glorious feast. The congregation confesses, “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ is coming again!” The gospel is made visible in the Eucharist. Between the altar and the first pew is a rail with kneelers where communicants receive the bread and wine with thanksgiving.
Surrounding the entire perimeter are any number of plaques and displays that might commemorate former church members, those who served in the military, and great moments in the life of the congregation. Along with those memorials are delicate stained glass windows, most with images of the grand story of redemption from creation to consummation.
As I have given attention to these features I have become increasingly aware of the ways our furniture forms us, our imaginations, and our practices. The books, the kneelers, the altar, and the rails are visible reminders that the liturgy of these churches is the “work of the people.” Those Christians who receive the Word and Sacrament are not mere observers, but participants in nearly all aspects of the service. The furniture is itself sacramental, a visible token of a spiritual reality.
The late French social philosopher, Pierre Bourdieu, described “habitus” as those dispositions, attitudes, and values that form a person’s actions, perceptions, and ways of in-habiting the world. Our habitus is shaped by our culture, life experiences, and especially our regular practices. Practice makes habitus.
That our furniture has a formative influence on us is undeniable. In one culture, when we come into a room we take a seat on a sofa. In another culture, when we come into a room we sit on the floor. When we dine in a restaurant in the West, we typically sit in a chair with our feet on the floor. In the East it may be on a zabuton or cushion surrounding a very low table with our legs crossed. Some cultures use a knife and fork, others chopsticks or fingers.
Furniture is formative in our way of thinking about hospitality, meals, and even family life. The simple fact that there is different furniture, and different practices embedded in the rooms where the furniture is arranged, is one reason it can sometimes be so jarring to spend time in another family or culture. A formal dining room fully set with fine china for a 7pm dinner served in courses invites a completely different set of expectations, etiquette, and habitus than grazing from the kitchen island.
The furniture of the old churches and chapels formed the habitus of those who worshipped there regularly. They inhabited the space as participants, not observers. And they were not the only participants on any given Sunday. Being surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses from the past, they were part of the one holy catholic church, as they affirmed each week in the Nicene Creed.
Having sat in those pews and taken my part in those liturgies, I couldn’t help but think about the furniture of contemporary churches where I’ve worshipped. More often than not, the pews have been replaced by soft chairs made for sitting for long periods of time. There might be Bibles, but there are no hymnals and no prayer book. In their place is one large screen, or multiple screens.
Up front, there is a stage. It must be a stage (not a chancel) because it’s backlit by blue lighting and that’s where the drum kit and other musical instruments sit. There’s seldom a communion table anymore. When communion is observed once a quarter it comes in little self-contained packages with the factory-made wafer sealed just above the grape juice.
Fewer and fewer contemporary churches have a podium at all, much less two. A music stand or portable pulpit will do. What the 19th century London “Prince of Preachers,” Charles Haddon Spurgeon, once called “the sacred desk” has been replaced by a high-top flat table that holds the iPad the preacher will use for the message. The songs appear without musical notation on large screens on which the words are sometimes misspelled or don’t show up quite on time. The walls are blank and there are no memorials, no depiction of the biblical narrative, nothing to remind us of the past. It feels as if the church was organized last Sunday.
The liturgy is simple. Stand and greet your neighbor, enjoy a bit of a mini-concert sing-a-long, and listen to a longish sermon which may or may not be well-grounded in a biblical text. If the preacher doesn’t spend time in the text, contact with the Word is thin, because there are no lengthy Bible readings.
The furniture, its arrangement, and the way it is used invites us to imagine the work of the people to be less embodied and more about what’s going on in our heads.
I don’t mean to be unkind, but as I reflect on the contrasting furniture, I worry that the habitus of the contemporary service does not form participants who are sharing in “the work of the people,” but observers who have come to watch the show. Or at best, an audience who have come to hear the sage on the stage. The furniture, its arrangement, and the way it is used invites us to imagine the work of the people to be less embodied and more about what’s going on in our heads.
It’s true that the New Testament doesn’t tell us much about the shape of the Lord’s Day worship among early Christians. It took place mostly in houses. But we know that the liturgy was based on the patterns of the synagogue. Those patterns were more participatory and much less observatory than those in many contemporary services.
I am by no means saying that contemporary styles of worship are wrong or sinful. There is liberty for Christians to worship in different ways. But I do genuinely wonder how our furniture is forming us and our imaginations.
Image via pxhere
