Exploring identities between the religious and the secular through the attendees of an ostensibly ‘Atheist Church’

The Sunday Assembly has a complex relationship with atheism and religion. It holds events which look and feel like religious worship, but uses this format to create a ‘godless congregation’. Described as an ‘atheist church’ by the media, members prefer to talk about inclusive communities. If the Sunday Assembly simultaneously embraces and rejects both atheism and religion, then how do attendees identify and describe themselves? We add to the growing literature exploring identities between the religious and the secular, presenting a qualitative study based on interviews with Sunday Assembly attendees. We interrogate three concepts: non-religion, the secular sacred and indifferentism to examine how the identity of Sunday Assembly attendees can be better understood. Our findings show that a significant number of attendees publicly identify as indifferent towards religion, while privately maintaining a more strongly non-religious identity, thus suggesting that for Sunday Assembly attendees, inclusivity is imperative.     

Salvation Events Left Unattended: An Inquiry into the Unconscious

In this essay I celebrate James E. Dittes’ impact on my ministry by reassessing three strategic moments in the church in Providence I served for thirty-three years: a dinner, a Sunday morning summer service, and the replacement of the church’s dome. I try to step outside of the heroic role assigned me back then, into a probing, however painful, investigation of the church’s, and my own, darker side.     

“I Was a Muslim,But Now I Am a Christian”: Preaching,Legitimation, and Identity Management in a Southern Evangelical Church

Established in 2005, “Life” is a suburban, nondenominational, evangelical church in Charlotte, North Carolina, with an almost entirely white membership, yet the lead pastor is an immigrant from the Middle East. As an ex‐Muslim ethnic Pakistani who was born and raised in Kuwait, Pastor Sameer Khalid does not “fit” into southern culture, and he did not convert to Christianity until he was enrolled in college in the United States. Ethnographic data from 14 months of fieldwork reveal how Pastor Sameer uses weekly sermons to negotiate racialized stigmas, emphasize his common religious identity with the congregation, and make his immigrant background a distinctive religious resource for the church. More specifically, while all pastors require legitimation of their charismatic authority, this research focuses on the dynamics of performance through preaching within the Sunday morning services of this congregation, a performance that negotiates this lead pastor's ethnic and religious identities and accentuates his strategic use of institutionalized evangelical narratives to subvert Islamophobic threats and buttress legitimation of his pastoral identity.     

An introduction to the phenomenology of religion

This article examines how a secular lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer (LGBTQ) community choir in New Zealand negotiates a relationship with sacred repertoire, and the church in which the choir is located. A mixed-methods study included semi-structured interviews with 26 current and past members, musical directors and a church representative. Themes that emerged included tensions between religion and an LGBTQ cultural secularism, intersections of reconciliation and affirmation and the identity constitutive uses of space. Findings suggest that although, as LGBTQ-identified people, secularism is an important identity, sacred music is pleasurable. The choir provides church-like functions, through a sense of community, ritual and an environment for spiritual reflection and the practice of values. The church location offers reconciliation for those with Christian backgrounds. Benefitting each other, the choir gives St. Andrew’s legitimacy in its identity as an LGBTQ-inclusive church, and the church space has a queering effect on the presentation of the choir.     

The Ontology of Musical Works and the Role of Intuitions: An Experimental Study

Philosophers of music often appeal to intuition to defend ontological theories of musical works. This practice is worrisome as it is rather unclear just how widely shared are the intuitions that philosophers appeal to. In this paper, I will first offer a brief overview of the debate over the ontology of musical works. I will argue that this debate is driven by a conflict between two seemingly plausible intuitions—the repeatability intuition and the creatability intuition—both of which may be defended on the grounds that they are reflective of our actual musical practices. The problem facing philosophers within this debate is that there is no clear way to determine which of the two conflicting intuitions is more reflective of our musical practices. Finally, I offer discussion of an experimental study that was designed to test participants' intuitions regarding the repeatability of musical works. The evidence presented there suggests that the participants broadly accept the repeatability of musical works, but in a much narrower way than philosophers would likely accept.     

A Case for Christianizing the Christian Church

In this article I argue that the work of evangelism must take place both within the church and outside the church. The evidence of decline in the church – particularly in the West–is not matched by the vibrancy of the church in the global South. In both regions however there is a demonstrable lack of depth in the quality of Christian discipleship. It was this issue which I sought to address in my work in the Uniting Church in Australia by addressing the need for catechetical programmes targeting young people in the “migrant” churches of our denomination. Before long it became clear that there was a desire from the whole church – both adults and young people ‐ to explore their faith and practice more deeply. The task is to “evangelize the baptized” (Arias), which prioritizes evangelization and catechesis. Evangelism is how the church with its good news of God's reign attracts people out there in the society by word and example. Evangelization takes place within the church and is the initial stage by which persons are led step by step to a first commitment to the Christian life of faith.     

Coalition – creation – church*

Taking the recent UN Report about extreme poverty in the UK as a point of departure, this article analyses and assesses William Cavanaugh’s political ecclesiology. Drawing on the interpretation of Martin Luther’s concept of creation in Scandinavian Creation Theology, I argue that creation destabilises the distinction Cavanaugh draws between what he considers to be church and what he considers not to be church. I account for creation as a web of vulnerability in which all creatures are vulnerable to both creature and creator. In contrast to Cavanaugh’s strong and stable church, I advocate for what I call “coalitional church”: a church that can enter into coalitions with Christians and non-Christians in order to call for conditions under which vulnerable life is liveable. The public and political task of churches is not necessarily to fight the state, but to hold the state accountable to its citizens, whether they are Christian or non-Christian.     

Contingent faculty: More than a tribe of nomads

In this essay I review the advantages and challenges of contingent faculty service from a perspective which crosses programs, but chiefly from within one academic institution, a church‐related but independent theological seminary. I anecdotally relate certain “value‐added” potentialities which accrue for students and instruction when an adjunct faculty's primary institutional connections are outside the academic environment. I cite benefits to the student, school, and instructor. See companion essays published in this issue of the journal by Hoon J. Lee, Adam Wirrig, Bradley Burroughs, and Kyle A. Schenkewitz.     

‘A Garland in Place of Ashes’:1Transformative Spirituality and Mission in the Post‐Modern and Secular Contexts

In this paper I aim to explore not what is the so‐called ‘post‐modern and secular context’ but how the church responds to it, which is predominantly to blame it for ‘decline’. Yet it may not be decline, it may be something else altogether. I am reflecting on a western/UK context, but within this are theological assumptions that characterize the wider church. So, having made some remarks on how to approach decline I will then explore some transformations of spirituality and mission that are responses to the post‐modern and secular context. Underlying this is an attitude to ‘spirituality’ which is not about how we worship or our experience of the ‘ethereal’ but is about our ‘capacity for life’. But, I want to maintain that nothing new or transformative can emerge until the church stops resenting and despairing of the context and change we are experiencing. Further, I am not convinced the church in the UK or the West is able to adapt to the strangeness of this new context and will seek always to bring it back under church control. But, I will then offer a post‐modern image for transformative spirituality and mission that could leave its mark on the church.     

Emotional expressiveness during worship services and life satisfaction: assessing the influence of race and religious affiliation

The purpose of this study is to see if an emotional expressive worship style is associated with life satisfaction. Our study model contains the following core relationships: (1) blacks are more likely than whites to worship in conservative Protestant congregations; (2) members of conservative congregations and blacks will attend church services more often; (3) blacks and conservative Protestants are more likely than either whites or members of other congregations to openly express their emotions during worship services; (4) individuals who express their emotions during church services will be more likely say they worship in a highly cohesive congregation; (5) people who worship in highly cohesive congregations will generalise this sense of connectedness to people outside their place of worship; and (6) those who feel closely connected with all people will experience a greater sense of life satisfaction. Finding from a nationwide survey provide support for each of these relationships.     

The ordo of care

What is the relationship between practices of care towards people living in marginalized life situations and liturgy? This article addresses this question by exploring the liturgical theology of Gordon Lathrop as the theoretical starting point for analysing a practice that would conventionally not be described as “liturgy”, but “ethical practice”. At the heart of the liturgical theology of Lathrop is the idea that the ordo of the Sunday service is organized by juxtapositions and broken symbols. In this article, Lathrop’s theology is brought into a hermeneutical dialogue with empirical material constructed from the Church of Our Lady, Trondheim, Norway, a Lutheran medieval church located in the middle of the city of Trondheim. Since 2008, the church has been run by the Church City Mission as an open church for all who need an open and hospitable sacred space in the city centre, especially people who live in marginalized life situations. The article demonstrates that when working inductively with an empirical material, Lathrop’s concepts are too narrow and hermeneutically closed. In order to be theoretically sensitive to the experiences of people who live in marginalized life situations and the ethical practices of care, liturgical theology has to reimage its understanding of space.     

Communal Reconciliation: Corporate Responsibility and Opposition to Systemic Sin

Recent events have given rise to considerations of systemic sin and how the church should respond to it. This article looks at passages in the Hebrew Bible which demonstrate the communal character of sin and atonement. God holds the whole nation responsible despite righteous individuals, often for the sins of individuals. Paul develops this relation between individuals and groups in his ecclesiology. I argue from this development that responsibility for sins, individual or systemic, is placed on the whole community. Thus, there is for the church a corporate responsibility for reconciliation, demanding group agency in rectifying systemic sins like racism.     

The Apostasy of the Church and the Cross of Christ: Hans Urs von Balthasar on the Mystery of the Church as Casta Meretrix

The ongoing moral and theological catastrophe of persistent and pervasive clergy sexual abuse across the Catholic Church makes theological reflection on sin in the church essential. This essay has two parts. The first, longer part is a hermeneutical argument. I offer a contextualized interpretation of Hans Urs von Balthasar's 1960 essay “Casta Meretrix,” in which he traced the image of the church as a “chaste harlot” through the Christian tradition. I demonstrate that several recent interpretations of this essay have not penetrated to its radical heart. A close reading of the text reveals that here Balthasar affirmed that the church sins precisely as the church, and not merely as individual members. The motivation for this affirmation was not the empirical failures of individuals, but was properly dogmatic—a necessary implication of christology. In the second and concluding part of the essay, I contend that even though Balthasar's use of the feminized image of the casta meretrix does have significant problems and should not be uncritically adopted today, the underlying theological claim regarding the church as sinner is theologically significant. He affirmed a necessary ecclesiological truth, one that can help the church recover its visibility and better understand its essence in repentance, which is all the more essential in light of the continuing revelations of clergy sexual abuse.     

Beyond Ecclesiocentricity: Navigating between the Abstract and the Domesticated in Contemporary Ecclesiology

In this article I seek to explore how ecclesiology might be apocalyptic, with all the ‘otherness’ and invisibility that implies, while at the same time properly concrete. In engaging the contemporary debate about ecclesiocentricity I suggest that an account of historical participation in the history of Jesus Christ by the Spirit will benefit from both a mimetic ontology and a christologically disciplined approach to the marks of the church. According to such an approach, the church is more clearly discerned as a eucharistic and dispossessive sociality.     

Missional Formation for Transforming Discipleship: A Response

As I approached teaching my first missiology course in the seminary of a Dominican partner church a few years ago, I had to ask myself, “How do we possibly talk about and engage in ‘mission’ in this hemisphere, where the first ‘mission’ ended in genocide?” In this article, I explore the context for mission, which I believe is sometimes given insufficient attention as we seek to form and equip our church leaders and members for mission. The contexts are both local and global, with much intersection between the two. I will also focus on methodology that may be useful for the formation of disciples for mission as part of the need for a different type of theological and ministerial education within the new mission paradigm that Míguez proposes.     

MUSIC AND METAPHYSICS

Abstract: In this article, I assume that musical works are abstract types, and I raise and address a new question concerning musical ontology that may take the types view at least a step further: When do musical works cease to exist? I then propound my view about musical works as types, which is somewhat like the Aristotelian Realist position concerning universals. Next, I address some objections to that view. Finally, I provide some grounds for rejecting alternative views that see Western classical musical works before 1950 (the sorts of musical works the discussion here is restricted to) either as classes or else as kinds.     

Black Church Leaders’ Attitudes About Mental Health Services: Role of Racial Discrimination

Black church leaders are often first responders to mental health issues in the Black community, yet few researchers have examined their attitudes about seeking outside mental health services. In order to fill this gap, we surveyed 112 church leaders in a northeastern urban Baptist Black mega-church (22 associate pastors, 34 deacons, and 56 congregation care givers) using The National Survey of American Life. Findings suggest church leaders more often relied on the church community and alternative health services, leaders who attended church more often tended to report not receiving any outside mental health treatment, the closer church leaders felt to all Black people, the less satisfied they were with help received from formal mental health services, and leaders who experienced more racial discrimination tended to report worse overall mental and physical health. Clinical providers and Black churches should develop collaborative partnerships to better meet the needs of this community.     

音乐训练对统计学习能力的促进作用

统计学习能力作为快速习得环境中信息规则的先决条件之一,有助于个体以较小的消耗代价适应环境。音乐训练作为一种由多个感官共同参与的强化活动,被广泛认为是有助于提升认知能力的有效手段。随着统计学习在音乐适应中核心地位的确认以及音乐训练效应的反复验证,近年来,陆续有研究在行为表现和脑机制上证实了音乐训练能够增强个体对输入信息中统计规则的敏感性、促进听觉统计学习能力的提升。然而,关于音乐训练能否促进视觉等其他模态的统计学习能力,目前还存在不一致的结果。未来研究还应对跨模态统计学习能力的音乐训练促进效应做进一步探索;也可选用新手被试进行音乐训练干预,以明确音乐训练与各模态统计学习能力增强之间的因果关系。     

Natural Sounds and Musical Sounds: A Dual Distinction

In this article I consider the relationship between natural sounds and music. I evaluate two prominent accounts of this relationship. These accounts satisfy an important condition, the difference condition: musical sounds are different from natural sounds. However, they fail to meet an equally important condition, the interaction condition: musical sounds and natural sounds can interact in aesthetically important ways to create unified aesthetic objects. I then propose an alternative account of the relationship between natural sounds and music that meets both conditions. I argue that natural sounds are distinct from music in that they express a kind of alterity or “otherness,” which occurs in two ways. It occurs referentially, because the sources of natural sounds are natural objects rather than artifactual objects, such as instruments; it also occurs acoustically, because natural sounds tend to contain more microtones than macrotones. On my account, the distinction between music and natural sounds is both conventional and vague; it therefore allows music and natural sounds to come together.     

Everyday executive function in standard-risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivors

Although absolute pitch (AP) is a rare skill in typical development, individuals with Williams syndrome (WS) are often referred to as possessing this musical ability. However, there is paucity of research on the topic. In this article, 2 studies were conducted to evaluate AP in WS. In Study 1, seven musically trained individuals with WS, 14 musically trained typically developing controls matched for chronological age, and 2 experienced musicians with AP completed a pitch-identification task. Although the task was a classical assessment of AP, it required participants to have musical knowledge, and the availability and accessibility of musically trained individuals with WS is very low. In Study 2, a paradigm suitable for evaluating AP in individuals without musical training was used, which made it possible to evaluate a larger group of participants with WS. A pitch memory test for isolated tones was presented to 27 individuals with WS, 54 typically developing peers matched for chronological age, and the 2 musicians with AP. Both individuals with WS and their controls obtained low results in the two studies. They showed an arbitrary pattern of response, and their performance was far from that of musicians with AP. Therefore, participants with WS did not appear to possess AP. Unlike what is usually claimed, results suggest that AP is not a remarkable ability in WS and that, as in the typically developing population, this musical ability is also rare in individuals with WS.