Customer Reviews

Beyond Smells and Bells: The Wonder and Power of Christian Liturgy

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am a recent convert to the liturgy (from Bible churches to an Anglican church) and found this book insightful and provocative. Rather than a practical guide to the liturgy (there are plenty of those out there, with titles like "Why do Catholics do what they do?"), Galli explores ways that God uses the liturgy to transform our minds, bodies, and spirits, as we participate in it with other believers over time.

The subject matter is deep and philosophical by nature, but Galli presents it in an engaging style that is easy to follow and leaves room for one's own continued reflection on the ideas. I have found myself thinking about things he wrote even weeks after finishing the book, as I read, pray, think, and worship. It has helped me enjoy the liturgy more as well, as I think about the ways it is counter-cultural, counter-intuitive, and transformative each week.

One of my favorite things about the book is Galli's willingness to be honest about himself - from spiritual struggles ("To be honest, I do not want to love God perfectly . . . I need a break from God every now and then") to his relationship with his wife ("I was infatuated with this woman because I was fascinated with me. I imagined [my wife] was a version of me with whom I could have guilt-free sex"). In a book whose subject matter could become purely academic, he makes it clear that the liturgy is, for him, a very real and deeply personal matter. I found this encouraging, not only because I saw myself in many of his examples, but also because it demonstrated how the liturgy can also be so deeply personal for me, helping me encounter God with such honesty myself.

My favorite chapter was 12, "Living in the Trinity: How the Liturgy Changes Us at the Very Core of Our Being." Galli explores how the liturgy draws us into the union of the Trinity and community with others. The liturgy helps make real for us the truth that we are "partakers of the divine nature." I found this chapter to be the most thought-provoking. He also explores the issue of "relevance" that is often so prized by churches, in a way that is compelling and gracious. Overall, a quick read that leaves a lot to chew on.

Mark Galli goes beyond the externals of liturgy, which in themselves are impressive, to the heart of the reason for liturgy. In the continued worship style debates contemporary worship is seen as being a genuine expression of "our" feelings toward God, however Galli brings out that the primary purpose of the church's heritage of 2000 years of worship was to impress the Personality of Christ upon us. And secondly, through the liturgy, the Holy Spirit brings us not only communion with Christ, but forms us into a body with others. Whereas, contemporary worship's focus is on self expression, the "I" is center, and frames the picture in modern faddish terms and music that are here today and maybe gone tomorrow. Liturgy frames our picture in biblical and early Christian Church forms of expression. In liturgy we join the communion of saints of all ages in the eternal song of God's love for mankind. A good book for those that find themselves attracted to the liturgical route of the Lutheran, Anglican, Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodoxy and don't know why. This book takes us beyond the ponderous and the repetitious first impression of the liturgical service to the Spirit that animates it.

For those of us whose Christian worship experience has been Low Church, this book is a fine introduction to the liturgical tradition. Galli's heartfelt passion for the liturgy is displayed on each page, while he correctly identifies some of the weaknesses in pop Christianity's modern (should we say "seeker friendly") worship. He notes, "Self-identified relevant churches, by their nature, limit a full-bodied expression of the church." Rather than try to pinpoint a specific target audience, liturgical worship transcends constantly changing cultural emphases.

Is it possible that liturgy is the remedy to the modern church's addiction to man-centered "relevancy?" Read this book. There is much fuel for future debate.

Paraclete Press provided me with a complimentary copy of this wonderful little book. It offers a nice defense, written in simple language, of the historic Christian liturgy. Mark Galli is an Anglican but focuses on the similarities between the historic liturgies in the Western church. He shows how the liturgy brings us into the Biblical stories and makes us contemporaries of Biblical events. He tells us how the liturgical calendar can help us order our lives and draw us into community with our brothers and sisters in Christ. It's the perfect antidote to the Jesus and me attitude of many American Christians. The liturgy shows us how to properly approach a Holy and Loving God. The liturgy keeps us from idolatry. Without the liturgy we are easily drawn into idolatry. We determine what is true and our own standing before God based upon our feelings and ideas. Apart from the historic liturgy we can easily get sucked into thinking that whatever makes us feel spiritual must be the best way to worship God. Our feelings become our god. The liturgy shows us what is important and what is objectively true and show us that God does not fit inside of our brains or heart. The Trinity is a great mystery and true Christian worship can only be worship of the Trinity and centered on the Trinity. Modern worship tends to be focused on the worshiper. Christian worship must be focused on Christ and His work. The historic liturgy is all about the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

This book could be used for a variety of situations. A liturgical church could use it to educate their members as to why the historic liturgy is important. A non-liturgical church could use the book to try to transition itself into a liturgical church. Church bodies with a liturgical history that are departing from historical liturgy should seriously consider this book. There are plenty of seeker-sensitive non-denominational churches out there and they can probably do contemporary worship a lot better than you can. Pastor Baby-boomer man: I know you think you're hot stuff up there with your guitar and quite the rebel. I know you think you know how to communicate to the youth. But you're just preparing the kids to go to the mega-church down the block. Why would the kids want to see the Sha Na Nas when U2 is down the street? Meanwhile, there are lots of younger people who are really interested in worship that is more mysterious. If you want the kids to come, you might want to consider buying some incense and doing some processionals instead of the PowerPoint and the guitar. Kids are tired of watching their teachers at school fumble with the PowerPoint, they don't need to see you trying to muck with it. The historic liturgy is even toddler-friendly. Little kids that can't read will quickly memorize the liturgy.

Beyond Bells and Smells is a breath of fresh air. As pastor of a very liturgical Presbyterian congregation I welcomed this book with much enthusiasm. Indeed, when a person leaves a liturgical service they are never, ever the same.

I am sharing this book with a number of my friends.Mark Galli has done us all a great favor.

In this well-crafted and insightful book, Mark Galli likens the Liturgy to the Garden of Eden -- it was a place where Adam and Eve could enjoy remarkable intimacy and beauty with God, but it was also a place where they could hide from him -- so to the Liturgy.

Thanks to Galli's passion for unpacking the ancient movement of the Liturgy, I know that my own worship experience will be enriched. Galli blows the dust off of prayers and rituals that could easily become dull rote recitations. By exposing the way that the Liturgy offers us incarnational moments with Christ, inviting us into holy time (where past, present and future are united), Galli invites the reader to engage with the deep mysteries of the liturgical experience.

I recommend this book to people who are unfamiliar with liturgical churches, those who are experiencing a desire to return to the Liturgy, or those who have been faithful church goers but don't understand much about why they stand, sit, kneel, and pray the way they do.

Galli writes a measured defense of the Christian liturgy of the Great Tradition. He promotes liturgy as spiritually formative and encompassing of the God's story and his invitation of humans to worship and experience Him. Galli introduces readers to key parts of the liturgy using examples from Roman Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran and Eastern Orthodox traditions. He shows how liturgy invites and leads participants through the history of salvation...the creation, fall, redemption, reconciliation and future consummation. He highlights the mystery conveyed through liturgy...it is not about the glory of man and necessarily the experience of people; it is about the worship of the Trinity that is present yet transcendent. Liturgy is the guard against a consumerist or enculturated Christianity because it maintains the Great Tradition that was developed in the early church.

Galli shows the beauty and effectiveness of liturgy while also maintaining that any liturgy can become stale without the invigoration of the Holy Spirit and sincere worship.

This is a great book for Christians who question the continued relevancy and significance of liturgy in light of mega-churches and community-style churches that eschew any ritual as quaint or stodgy.

I've just finished this book today, and really enjoyed it. I guess the best way to describe why I liked it so much is to say that, while I didn't feel like the author said things I'd been thinking all along, he did say things that, upon reading them, I realized I had been wishing someone would say. I plan to revisit this book, so that I can more fully appreciate and reflect on some of his points.

I have always appreciated a more formal worship service, and this book did an excellent job of articulating some reasons for this appreciation that I could not put into words. The sections of the book treat various aspects of the liturgy, either as sections of the service or conceptually across sections. The author's exemplars and supporting stories are easy to relate to, and make connections to which the churched and unchurched alike (I've been both in the last 20 years) should be able to relate.

I'd like to use this with a church group as a basis of discussion for the significance of our service; I think the author would agree with me that it is far too easy to fall into rote recitation, not only with liturgical services, but with any service with which we become comfortable and to which we become accustomed. If we can't answer a question about why we're doing something, for ourselves or for others whom we would have join us, we ought not to be doing it. Reading this book caused me to reflect on the whys behinds the whats that add so much meaning to my worship experience.

Beyond Bells and Smells is a short, passionate book about the impact of Christian liturgy upon our coming ino a relationship with God. Through liturgy we transcend the cognative into the mystery of knowing God. Galli gives practical personal examples that communicate the significance of worshiping through the use of liturgy. He makes clear that we are not lone-ranger Christians but are called to be transformed within a Christian community. For those who are unfamiliar with litugical worship or for those who think that "rituals" are dry and boring, this book provides an excellent introduction into the life-giving liturgical worship.

We are tempted to see our own culture as the measuring rod for all meaning. When we speak of being "relevant," argues Galli, we are really talking about being relevant to our own culture. Christian liturgy, however, does not need the approval of our culture or any other culture to be considered "relevant" because it pertains to a completely different world. "The liturgy," says Galli, "presents a form of worship that transcends our time and space" (p. 58). It invites us into "the culture of a Trinitarian God and his kingdom" (p. 60). And the liturgy has always "steadfastly refused to let the culture determine its shape or meaning" (p. 61).

Beyond Smells & Bells is not intended as a scholarly treatment of "high" church liturgy, it does serve as a popular introduction to the how and the why beyond the outward trappings (smells and bells) of Episcopal worship. It is an introduction to "another world."