Tinkering in tongues - on liturgies badly performed

I could probably be placed squarely within the audience James K.A. Smith imagines when he is writing. Having grown up in a pentecostal church, only to spend the past decade slowly moving towards Catholicism and even (...) 'Eastern' Orthodoxy, just being aware that Smith had written this book was a challenge to my self-image. Other books by the same author had provided bridges for my 'crossing-over', is he now trying to bring me 'back' across that gap? On the one hand I want him to be right. Indeed, if one could isolate what pentecostal churches do (at least in terms of social work etc) from their own often rather studdering attempts to articulate theological rationales, that would be great. On the other hand, if Smith is right, and Pentecostalism has 'something to offer' philosophically, then it also feels a little like I would have to reconsider quite much of my own 'journey' so far. And that would be uncomfortable, I guess, and I would probably prefer to avoid that. Who likes admitting they're wrong...?

James K.A. Smith is a very good writer with a rich toolbox of anecdotes and home-made hyphenated words (I know from his blog that he is consciously honing his writing skills - probably unlike many academic writers - and the result shows). Earlier he has written on how reformed Christian philosophy might benefit from interaction with anglo-catholic 'Radical Orthodoxy', how Evangelical apologists must not simply reject all that is called 'postmodern', and how Christian education lies embedded in the 'rhythms' of embodied, habitual, and collective practices rather than in the content of the curriculum. All very bold projects, considering Smith's largely Evangelical context.

His latest work(s) draws heavily on that of Charles Taylor, in particular on the concept of the social imaginary. In short, Smith takes 'social imaginary' to mean '(big) ideas implicit in practices', which is an OK short-hand for what Taylor is speaking of. On this (phenomenological) view, meaning resides not primarily in heads as propositional thoughts, but is rather 'always-already' embedded in collective habitual bodily conducts. (Like Taylor, Smith bypasses the question of the ontological relation between practices and discourses - the main point is that these are never entirely synchronized, and that the former is more vital). Smith then introduces the idea that this 'social imaginary' resembles notions carried in the word 'liturgy': our deepest desires are directing - as well as being directed by - the embodied 'common work' a group performs together. Then he can speak of the liturgies of shopping, the liturgies of higher education, you name it. Practices we take for granted can hence be analyzed as formative of our desires, as 'cultural liturgies', which might or might not conform to 'orthodox' theological articulations.

At this point, both self-proclaimed secularists and Catholics might hesitate. Smith anticipates the critique of the former (evoking familiar 'secular' names from scholarly fields with 'post' in front of them), but seems (to me at least) to neglect the latter, who might have objections regarding this 'watering down' of the Rite to simply include every collective practice in equal measure. In any case, I am willing to go quite far with Smith down this road (as would many catholic theologians as well). Personally, I am very warm to the idea that 'culture' should be assessed in terms of liturgy, (but then) taking the Eucharistic event as fundamental to all reality. And I like Smith's academic boldness, pure and simple. But in this book problems arise even for me.

I realize that my hesitance might stem from my own background and journey. When I was a teenager in a pentecostal church, the word 'liturgy' was meant to denote empty practices done by mere habit rather than by conviction. And that, so it went, was a really bad thing (as if habits could ever be 'mere', or practices ever be 'empty'). Of course, at a certain point you have to concede that 'we also have a kind of liturgy', and then encourage the services to be 'open' for 'interruption' so that authenticity might be preserved. At a certain point I began thinking that since 'everyone has a liturgy' the difference would have to be how well-performed and comprehensive these liturgies were, and that they should be somehow comparable. So I was hoping this book would have something to say on that. Maybe my notion (now conviction) that 'high church' liturgies are simply better than pentecostal ones must be qualified?

Smith's project is to tease out the big ideas that are implicit in the embodied, habitual, collective practices of pentecostal worship, and to show that these not only beat 'modern' reductive rationalism every time (which is probably true, as far as I'm concerned - but hey, that's an easy target), but that they are closer to traditional 'orthodoxy' than pentecostal articulations of doctrine itself sometimes tend to be.

There are several issues here. One question is what Smith thinks is the relation between the meanings he discerns in the practices of 'ordinary' pentecostal worshipers, and the somewhat different meanings these 'ordinary' worshipers (or even pentecostal theologians) are articulating. Smith grants that practice and articulated theory are not always in synchrony, but does not attempt to explain their actual or ontological relation. Here stops phenomenology, so Taylor would be excused for not going further, but why does not the theologian at least attempt to connect the two?

But much more importantly, there is something revealing about Smith's choice of 'field studies':

Smith wants to 'decode' the rhythms of pentecostal worship, and does so by referring to single events, single Sunday services treated as full examples of Pentecostal worship. It is for example telling that these events as they are described could be taking place at any time of the year. There is no sense in Smith's recaps of pentecostal worship of any 'long-term' rhythm, akin to the traditional church year, with its high and low points. And this is probably accurate. Had he attempted to do the same with Roman Catholic services, he would have had to consider the service in the context of the whole church calendar, with its slow ebbs and flows of different seasons.

And why would Smith limit pentecostal 'worship' to Sunday services, when all collective habits are supposedly 'liturgical'? Doesn't the 'flat' nature of the pentecostal church year signal any 'implicit understandings'? To me, it seems this aspect of the pentecostal social imaginary is far closer to the market/individualism Smith rejects than he would want to admit. Maybe the absence of a 'thick' annual calendar structure in pentecostal worship suggests that the 'overlap' with other (ultimately contradictory) social imaginaries is more problematic than Smith allows for. Because he isolates 'pentecostal' behaviour to Sunday services. Smith actually ends up ignoring the actual complexity of embodied life patterns, and how the 'market liturgies' (to take an example) penetrates into the 'pentecostal imaginary' itself.

Smith also bypasses any comparison of the centrality of preaching in pentecostal services with that of the Eucharistic event in 'higher' liturgies. He focuses on the centrality of embodied action in pentecostal services as an implicit critique of procrustean rationalistic categories. But is not in fact the sermon the central event in the pentecostal service, rather than the bodily actions that happen before (song) or after (alter call) it is delivered? While many elements in pentecostal worship emphasize the goodness of human embodiment, the very structural centrality of the sermon (as well as the architectural centrality of the pulpit) still imply a heavy leaning towards disembodied and 'unmediated' transmission of abstract and unchanging content.

If one compared the sermon as the central event in a pentecostal service with the Eucharist and sharing of bread and wine as the central event in a service in a(ny!) 'higher' church tradition, what would be the difference? My hunch is that such a comparative study might  reveal two very different 'ideal types' of the church (and here we might invoke catholic thinker Charles Taylor for support, this time against Smith) implicit in the two performances.

In the pentecostal service, then, the implied social imaginary would perhaps be one where fundamentally atomistic individuals come together for mutual benefit, centered on the transmission of a 'pure' message that they are then to 'apply' after hearing it. As the message "moves from our heads to our hearts", it can also 'seep into' the world outside. This is very akin to what Charles Taylor calls the modern social imaginary. For all its emphasis on embodied movements, it remains strictly modern as much as the market that Smith wants to provide an alternative for.

In the 'high' church service, the implication is that one single yet universal (!) event provides the eternal foundation for all other events in reality, including the individuals 'emerging' from its relational centre. The ontological 'archetype' implicit in the Eucharistic rite is one where relationality as such is fundamental and originary, and where all events (such as individuals) are ultimately such only by a kind of sharing in one single event - that of the Incarnation.

If we were to compare church years (longer term rhythms), or architectural organization, or what is the high point in the liturgical 'narration' (sermon or Eucharist), I still feel that Pentecostalism is 'modern', far too 'modern'. 

I have long been on a kind of journey from Pentecostalism to something kind of more 'catholic'. But I am not really more 'catholic' than 'pentecostal'. I don't really know what it would be right to call myself. My theory and practice are still out of sync, though I believe I am slowly catching up with myself. Smith's book unfortunately (because I was actually hoping a little - maybe that's why I'm a bit touchy) provides no answer to what for me was the question spurring my journey:

It's liturgy all right, but is it well-performed?

Mission Impossible Complete

After reading Monstrosity of Christ I have been looking forward to Creston Davis’ follow-up: the exploration of the contemporary relevance of St. Paul’s thought among both radical atheists and radical theologians. Apparently, since St. Paul's ideas are engaged by several contemporary thinkers, this means he has 'a new moment'. Of course, this book is not really about St. Paul at all, but hey, which book about St. Paul ever was? This book is instead another step forward in the editor’s endeavour to think with, through, and beyond the ideas of Slavoj Zizek and John Milbank (who in this project is flanked by theological comrade in crime, Catherine Pickstock). No more.


I should say I am deeply sympathetic to Creston Davis’ project. The attempt to find ways of combining the ideas of his two former teachers might be the only response that remains true to them both. Paradoxically, one might say. Or dialectically. I believe which term you prefer comes down to what blogs you like to read (i.e. whose approval you are after).


The mere fact of having been taught by both Milbank and Zizek gives Davis a kind of street cred that not everyone can boast. This biographical fact itself suggests that, at least in Creston Davis’ head (since he has simply had to make it work somehow), Milbank’s metaxology and Zizek’s dialectics can be fruitfully combined. And indeed, it is Davis’ own contributions to the book, together with Catherine Pickstock’s wonderful reflection on the liturgy and the senses, which are (to me at least) the most interesting.


Not that Milbank and Zizek are boring, not at all. But when reading the allegedly new reflections on Paul from the two ‘ultimate fighters’ from Monstrosity, I realized that I have read most of this before. This is where the book disappoints a little. Milbank’s style is entertaining if you like the metaphysical ‘zapping’  of enemies. But the in-it-to-win-it theologian’s essay on Badiou has been available (albeit in draft form) online long before the publication of this book (which raises interesting questions regarding online and printed publishing, but that’s for another day). Zizek’s essays are as entertainingly rebellious as ever (he is that school yard bully you think is cool so long as he's not after you), but his arguments are yesterday, today and forever the same. And, hey, why not? 


Now, here's the point. In his (dauntless or hopeless, I leave that to the reader) attempt to combine these two thinkers, it seems to me that Davis is, in some weird way, actually being faithful to both of them. Not that either would embrace everything he writes, as if Milbank and Zizek were a quarreling couple, who after a therapeutic session with Dr. Davis realize that they are in fact meant for each other. Not that. But simply because neither of them could be content with less than Everything. We are discussing ontology, after all. Neither Milbank nor Zizek would admit that there is anything that ultimately escapes his own ontological framework, because then they wouldn’t be doing ontology anymore. Ontology speaks of Everything, and there is no ‘outside’ space for the opponent to inhabit. 


This is what makes Davis’ project seem (to me, at least, though blog wars will go on) to be the only appropriate response to the incompatibility of Milbank and Zizek. Both will fit the other into his own ‘system’ of thought rather than reject him as simply ‘outside’ it. To Milbank, then, Zizek is fundamentally a protestant assuming the possibility of a qualitative break from stale tradition and hence failing to account for human creativity as improvised participation in God’s life. To Zizek, by contrast, Milbank is fundamentally an ideologue providing a vague yet final theodicy in the face of even God’s ultimate suffering, disguised as aristocratic babble of cosmic/societal harmony. Of course dressed up in a dispute over who is ‘more Christian’, but that’s not only beside but really quite far off the point. In this sense they are really engaged in an all-or-nothing battle. But precisely for that reason, it would be inadequate to simply choose one of them. To choose one and reject the other would, in some ways at least, be to deny the all-encompassing nature of the system one chose, and allow the rejected ‘outsider’ a legitimate foothold beyond the reach of one’s categories – which would reveal one’s blind spot – which would be the end of one’s ontology.


And of course, the conflict itself can be construed in the terms of both sides. "It's harmonic difference!" "No, its dialectic constitutive contradiction!" Ad infinitum. Fun for the kids.

Davis’ clever response has been, primarily, to produce these two books, thus literally placing these two articulated universal ontologies next to one another in a shared space. Not only does this open up room for thinking about the nature of the space where such an unlikely meeting is somehow made possible, but it challenges the reader to join Davis in the effort of holding things together (without simply postulating a common enemy in liberal capitalism). Or, if you like, to deny the necessity of the violent rejection of one in favour of the other. Now, this ‘positive’ approach, I think, implicitly betrays Davis’ debt to thinkers such as William Desmond (who Milbank draws on for conceptual clarification in Monstrosity). Death and dialectics are not simply eradicated, but 'swallowed up', all St. Paul-style.


In this subtle way, Davis simultaneously kills and resurrects both of his former teachers. He also thereby ensures that he pisses off two opposing camps of devoted followers in one and the same move, which, to my mind, is probably not a bad thing. So having read both Monstrosity of Christ and Paul’s New Moment I now eagerly await a book to complete the trilogy – this time one written primarily by Creston Davis perhaps flanked by like-minded explorative thinkers who respect both Milbank and Zizek enough to neither follow nor reject either (though this is of course impossible to avoid – Dialectic! Paradox!), but rather think with them till the end, and then a bit further. Maybe that book will feature numerous footnotes with the name ‘William Desmond’ in them. I’d like that, I think.