God's Costume Drama
Sermon by the Revd Dr Brutus Green
Readings: Ezekiel 17:22-24, 2 Corinthians 5:6-10, Mark 4:26-34
We’ve recently had the beginning of a discussion about vestments at PCC. Vestments have a history of causing controversy in the Church of England. And it’s often fascinating.
So after Henry VIII’s death the extremist John Hooper returned from the radical reformation in Europe but refused a bishopric offered by the king. The Reformation was a very particular Brexit, and he was a Nigel Farage opposing the English bishops’ laissez-faire wearing of surplice and cope, which stank of European popery. The Church of England, which loves a compromise and unnecessary use of Greek and Latin, declared vestments ‘adiaphora’ – indifferent or unessential. Meaning, it neither forbade their use nor encouraged it. A position it maintains today. Hooper was vehement, though and, in his refusals of the king’s preferment and protest against vestments, justly got sent to Fleet Prison. Eventually he relented, preaching before the King in vestments, so they made him the bishop of Gloucester. All’s well that ends well.
Under Elizabeth I vestments remained in general use, but those radicalised by Europe protested, sometimes being deprived of their living. Around this time ‘puritan’ was coined as a term of abuse for such non-conformists. One such, Crowley, having refused his deprivation confronted 6 of the parish choir wearing surplices and drove them off for wearing ‘superstitious rags of Rome’. He was discharged by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who regarded anti-vestment feeling as rebellion against the queen, and put under house arrest. Under the Puritans anything colourful was set on fire, though curiously those superstitious surplices survived in common use; but Christmas, musical instruments in church and the theatre all went on the bonfire of vanities. By the time of the nineteenth-century, though, the positions were reversed, and it was those wearing vestments who were arrested. Five clergymen were imprisoned following the Public Worship Regulation Act of 1874. The House of Commons (championed by the other parish of Putney’s hero Oliver Cromwell), and unlike the House of Windsor and its forebears, has always had a puritan streak.
Since our discussion, several on our Church Council voiced a dislike of ‘drama’ in liturgy. I was slightly floored by this as drama has long been a significant theological category, championed in the twentieth-century by its greatest theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar in his epic five volume Theo-Drama.
Historically, it’s also worth remembering that English drama has its origins in liturgy – English plays began with the tenth century ‘quem quaeritis?’ dialogues, lines from the Easter liturgy meaning ‘whom do you seek?’ The response is: ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified, O heavenly ones’ – the answer to the angels at the tomb. But this text was the springboard for the liturgical drama and mystery plays of the medieval period that began English theatre.
But, more than this, liturgy is drama. I don’t mean ‘drama’, as in exaggerated emotion or reaction; Nor in the sense of false performance or similitude. If the line in our reading caught your attention, Liturgy is not like Home and Away. Drama is a form of social interaction. It’s engaged and engaging; It involves personal response; It involves the telling of a story, socially. It’s based in repetition. It looks to transform those involved. The word ‘cathartic’ is common today – a purging of emotion. It’s origin is in the audience’s response to Greek tragedy.
Drama shouldn’t be escapism or a spectacle. In its own terms you might say that worship is, following Brecht, a form of Epic theatre – Not about suspending disbelief, but about seeing the world as it really is. So in Brecht’s theatre, the actors will often speak to the audience, much like Phoebe Waller-bridge in Fleabag. Though to be clear – everyone’s behaviour in that series, if you’ve seen it, is terrible, especially the so-called ‘hot’ priest. But even in Shakespeare’s great soliloquies:, Hamlet: ‘what a piece of work is a man’
Macbeth: ‘… Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
Between the poetry and the drama, there is a truth in the expression of real experience, that drama articulates, pushes us towards, or reminds us of.
The Eucharist is structured and scripted. In the Church of England, I don’t have to swear to a doctrinal statement, or even that I believe in God, But I do have to swear to use the particular forms of the Church of England services. We’re led through penitence into absolution and praise. The stories are layered with Old Testament, Psalm, epistle, building up to the Gospel, all related thematically, as this morning in reference to the natural world and agriculture. The sermon interprets for today, hemmed in within the orthodoxy of the creed but reaching out through the congregation’s prayers. In the peace we gather in unity, forgiveness and offering. The Eucharist leads us through the story of redemption, the last supper, the invocation of the Spirit, the remembrance of the cross, leading to praise, communion and blessing. There is more detail, but each week the service leads us through these essential elements, in the expression of our spiritual life and worship. It isn’t spontaneous; It’s a scripted drama leading to the point of consecration and reception of grace. But for those of you who secretly yearn for more charismatic worship with bands and altar-calls, I can assure you there is nothing more orchestrated than worship at HTB or Hillsong. They are leading you on an emotional journey, only in a less obvious and more manipulative way.
The charismatic church will use drama through lighting, contemporary music and a carefully constructed song-list. The anglo-catholic through gothic vaulting, bells, incense, a complex dance of servers, candles, silk and choral music. Every church uses its own forms of drama, to involve congregations in the drama of worship. If they didn’t churches would simply be schools or lecture-halls. But the drama, here done well, here badly, is what engages the soul in seeking God. And in seeking God being transformed by God.
Now today we have a baptism. The form has not distinctly changed in two thousand years. It’s what gives it the weight of resonance: knowing your parents, your grandparents, your great, great grandparents said these words, affirmed these promises anew to each generation. Being a part of the Church of England, is not about believing this or that; Or feeling a certain way in church; It’s about joining in this liturgy: Which literally breaks down to ‘leit’ and ‘ergos’ The work of the people.
Today in baptism and communion; It’s participating in the drama with the people of God. Elizabeth I did not want to make windows into men’s souls, but she did make them conform to public worship. The Church of England’s services have never been adiaphora.
But it’s not just that services create a drama in which we’re all called to participate. They also immerse us in the drama of Scripture. So listen to the prayer over water in baptism: Over water the spirit moved in creation. Through water the Hebrews were freed from slavery In water Christ was baptized. In water we are buried with Christ, And share his resurrection.
We could say more. Noah is saved through water. Water has a rich symbolism of salvation, and as Emily and Kate come for baptism, they are being immersed in these narratives. They are joining this drama of salvation, Finding their part.
In a garden of Eden picture book, or scientific text book they can picture the Spirit hovering over creation; when they play with a colourful wooden ark, they can imagine being there, not with the unicorns. When they’re watching the prince of Egypt, they’re pushing through towards the promised land; When they come to the Good Friday children’s workshop, and our Easter Egg hunt, with warm up liturgy, they’re following the story, the passion play we’re reading in church, in hope of arriving at the Easter morning with Christ and the Easter Rabbit.
The truth is that the God’s story is a play. We even know the ending. We have our hour upon the stage. And doesn’t it go fast? But as well as finding jobs – a business development manager, or ballerina – And husbands or wives – Homes in Parkstead, Hawkesbury, Upton Snodsbury; we find ourselves each year running down to Bethlehem, entering the wilderness for 40 days, having supper in an upper room; praying in a garden at night; standing at the foot of the cross. Surprised by joy on Easter morning. It’s the drama that criss-crosses our lives, and in which Emily and Kate find themselves testing the water.
And it doesn’t matter what you wear. Costumes are all adiaphora – whether it’s copes or baptismal gowns. But the drama matters. Our telling the story together, passing it to our children, matters. And through the years, and rites of passage, this drama has the power to give shape and meaning to our own little dramas. The theatres may still be shut, and let’s hope Andrew Lloyd Webber stays out of prison, but let’s celebrate this eucharist; this drama of God’s salvation. Amen.