Near the end of his time at Notre Dame, where he had become a member at Broadway United Methodist Church, Hauerwas, with his family, spent six months teaching in England. In South Bend Hauerwas always took his son Adam with him to worship. So, in London …
“We thought we should go to a Methodist church. We found one some distance beyond Portobello Road. For a month, we walked an hour each way to go to church with the Methodists. The church was described as a ‘people’s church,’ which meant that it was mainly black. We liked the people but hated the liturgy. The Sunday that we sang ‘God is like a magic penny, you lose him and he comes rolling back,’ I told Adam we were not coming back.”
He should have tried a URC. He might have got “If I were a butterfly”.
Stanley Hauerwas, Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir (London: SCM, 2010), p. 168.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Allan R. Bevere 08.27.10 at 2:58 pm
You gotta love the theological rigor of contemporary Methodism.
Kim 08.27.10 at 3:57 pm
Allan, it was interesting to read of Hauerwas’ experience at Broadway United Methodist Church, how its minister John Smith, after due congregational study, with “particular attention to Wesley’s understanding of constant communion”, and with unanimous agreement, led the church to celebrating the eucharist every Sunday. Of course Calvin too pleaded for weekly celebration of the Lord’s Supper in Geneva - but to no avail. Churches in the URC, like Methodist churches in Britain, almost invariably have Communion once a month. I’m with Calvin and Wesley, but lack the persuasive powers of John Smith.
PamBG 08.28.10 at 12:23 am
On a practical note, most United Methodist ministers expect to be present in their church almost every Sunday, vacations and very dire emergencies excepted. Most of the British Methodist Circuits I’ve seen pretty much only have enough ministers for the congregation to have communion once a month. The British Methodist regulations on presiding at communion (particularly the “no bringing of consecrated elements to shut ins by lay visitors” practice) are such that the minister often spends his or her week as a perpetual communion machine whilst the congregations only get it once a month.
But I think all that IS partly because we don’t value communion as something central to our liturgy and our faith. But most of all, many Methodist would see it as Too Catholic.
Tony Buglass 08.28.10 at 9:52 am
Pam I don’t understand your comment ‘particularly the “no bringing of consecrated elements to shut ins by lay visitors” practice’ - we have had the practice of extended communion for some years now, in which lay visitors take the elements out to the housebound. I have to say I’m not sure, because I can’t see how it differs from the reserved sacrament (which I don’t believe in), but it is official policy.
As to Methodist people and communion - it varies so much. I’ve had folk who worry if there aren’t enough communion service in a quarter, and at the same time I’ve had members (and I mean life-long dyed-in-the-wool Methodists) who never come to communion. I tried to discuss it with one couple, and got that “Yorkshire farmer” expression which makes a brick wall seem malleable…. God’s peculiar people?