Worship As A Performative Act

Worship is a powerful and world-changing activity for Christian believers. When Christians worship, their view of the world is transformed and God's kingdom is made manifest. The following article examines the power of the worship event from a philosophical and social scientific point of view. These perspectives, when paired with the theological perspectives described throughout this volume, teach us about the significance of ritual action in the life of the Christian community.

The notion of the performative act is receiving the attention of those who study liturgy and worship. Essentially, the term performance or performative as applied to liturgical ritual refers to an exploration of the rite as it is enacted. Because the meaning of liturgical events is found both in the words expressed and in the actions enacted, it is useful to examine the performative from both of these perspectives. Each of these will be explored here, but only briefly. The Performative Utterance The English philosopher J. L. Austin first developed a theory of the performative as applied to language in a book entitled How to Do Things with Words (2d ed., Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1975). His book laid much of the ground work for future reflection in the area of language and performance theory through a key insight into the relationship between meaning and text. He realized that words could do something. When a minister declares a couple married, that minister is not reporting to them that they are married or describing marriage to them. He is performing a marriage. In such instances, to speak is to do. Even statements do something. The simple assertion, "?the temperature is seventy degrees,?" is more than a mere transmission of information; it is an act. In the act of uttering, a relationship is established between the speaker and hearer. Thus, the object of linguistic performative studies is not concerned with the structure of a sentence but with the emergence of an utterance in a speech situation. That is to say, the performative utterance does more than simply transmit information. Language establishes a state of affairs in the act of communicating. Theorists have coined the word speech-act to convey this sense of an intimate connection between speaking and doing. Speech-act theory quickly gained the attention of those who study liturgy because it understands all speaking as doing something, or causing an effect. Thus, liturgical speech affects the relationships among the participants in the liturgical action, not by putting thoughts into words, but by establishing a framework for social interaction. This suggests a wider application of the word text to liturgy than is commonly understood. While one may examine ritual manuals in order to recognize how the liturgical books describe a celebration, it is becoming increasingly apparent that these verbal descriptions are merely summaries or idealized scripts of liturgical events as they are regularly celebrated. Therefore these manuals must be appreciated in relationship to the whole network of intentions that must be taken into account in order for the meaning of the rite to emerge. The language of liturgy in this wider usage does not operate in the same way as ordinary human speech. It is not primarily concerned with conveying individual thoughts or intentions. Rather, it displays observable repetition in conventional structure and forms precisely because it is ritual language. By ritual, I mean the performance of more or less formal or conventional acts. Ritual by its language naturally has a social character. Ritual is a social performance and therefore its language is never individualistic or private. It carries an indelible social or communal stamp. By performing the repeated words of the liturgy, worshipers do not communicate thoughts or express private feelings. Rather, they enact something in a social context. The language of liturgy establishes conventional social forms. For a minister or presider to say, "?I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,?" or "?This is my body,?" is not to tell the worshiping assembly something that it did not know before; it is to enact these conventional forms for the purpose of identifying this group as a community of faith. Through the performance of these forms, an authentic affirmation of the enacted community is realized. Liturgical language is first and foremost an act; it does not describe or inform at the risk of weakening the liturgical act itself. Individuals embody these forms in order to establish their membership in the community, and through this collective embodiment the community itself is recognized and realized. As the forms of liturgical language are conventional, so are its effects. The ritual text accomplishes its end through the very performance. A couple intending to witness their love for one another in the marriage ritual knows the intended outcome in advance. The same holds true for the assembly that witnesses to their pledges of love. For the rite of marriage to be established (that is, for the change in social status to be affected), all present must conform to the forms of the rite. Everyone must play their proper part. The presider or minister must be recognized by the faith community as a duly authorized leader of that community. Someone not properly designated as the leader in that community or someone from outside of the community cannot accomplish the task. On the other hand, the couple must be free to marry, publicly declare their love for one another, and follow the forms of the marriage rite. They cannot convey their love for one another in private or create their own forms and assert that such a ceremony constitutes the proper form of marriage. In liturgical worship, the act of acceptance on the part of all present constitutes a public act of faith. While there may be significant disparity between the public act of worship and individuals' subjective attitudes toward that act, it is the public performance of the rite that is most significant. To participate in liturgy is to conform to the religious identity expressed in the performance. By participating in a rite, individuals automatically embrace the ritual's obligations by enacting the identity expressed in the ritual performance itself. For example, an individual who is duly married may immediately engage in marital infidelity. This does not mean the rite was ineffective. On the contrary, by uttering the marriage promises and taking on the forms of the marriage rite, the married partners assume a social contract and come under its social obligations and sanctions. By entering into marriage, individuals are changed regardless of their subjective attitude toward the rite precisely because their situation in the social and public sphere is transformed by means of the performance of the rite. The Performative Event Many people engaged in critical liturgical reflection have come to realize that it is no longer adequate to simply examine the texts and rubrics of ritual in order to understand what a liturgy means. It is becoming increasing apparent that comparing liturgical texts and deriving one's theological interpretation of a liturgical rite based on those texts is an inadequate method for explaining what happens during a liturgical event. That is to say that the truth and effectiveness of what one claims in a theology of liturgy and sacrament can be either confused, misconstrued, or altogether obscured by concerns that have, at best, marginal claims to the deeper intentions of the liturgical act. For example, in the liturgical rite of marriage, some Christian traditions claim that the true ministers of the rite are the bride and groom themselves—that the presiding official serves only as a formal witness. Yet, multiple observations of marriage celebrations within these traditions often indicate that despite all claims to the contrary, the presiding official operatively functions as the true minister and guarantor of the transaction, with the bride and groom in a subordinate role. Attentiveness, therefore, to the liturgical event is critical because the actual doing of liturgy may reveal a theology quite different from the explanation of the liturgical event. This approach to the performative takes seriously the actual experience of the liturgical celebration. Some ritual theorists and social anthropologists have criticized the linguistic approach to the performative because of its emphasis on the primacy of ritual belief over ritual behavior. By suggesting that ritual enactment is only for the purpose of constituting a social group, these theorists contend that many of the marginalized individuals within the group often get overlooked. Women, strangers, people of color, non-ministers, the destitute—to give a few examples—may be allowed to participate in the liturgy while at the same time being excluded as proper subjects of the liturgy. Ritual establishes not only a group but a particular kind of group. Theorists concerned with the cultural performance of ritual argue that all rituals, including what we call the more traditional liturgies operate out of their own cultural context and therefore contain situational and political agendas that are often implicitly present in a ritual's performances. Because each ritual performance endorses certain intentional patterns for the group, many of these conventional forms may include patterns which suppress certain individuals within the group—patterns which are continually enacted, reinforced, and sanctioned by means of the ritual performance itself. Theorists concerned with the liturgy action, therefore, typically confront theoretical notions of the ritual with questions from the liturgy as it is enacted in order to discover the incongruities that exist between professed and observed ritual behavior. Performance and Ritual Criticism Liturgical theologians have been concerned with the boundaries of experience from which we look for the meaning and intention in liturgical ritual. Performative theory submits that these boundaries need to be greatly expanded beyond the areas and disciplines from which we might ordinarily inquire. The more established methods of liturgical research, such as the analysis and comparison of liturgical texts, the historical evolution of the rites, the theological and institutional pronouncements concerning these rites, and the cultural adaptations of ritual patterns, become focused in actual celebrations. Those who participate in liturgical rituals more or less unconsciously take on the patterns and intentions of the liturgical event by observing and listening, by interaction with others through responding, moving, gesturing, singing, and so forth in the collective ritual experience. Performative theory simply attempts to make more explicit this unconscious process. To be able to discern the meaning and intention of a particular liturgical space means that one must be concerned with more than what is said about the space. It demands that critical questions be raised about how the liturgical space actually functions and affects the participants—of what things the space allows them to do and not do. Similar questions could be raised about the arrangement of the space. How do the furnishings function: To demarcate space? For what purpose? To suggest differences between sacred and profane areas? To provide a non-intrusive space for private worship or promote interactive space for a worshiping assembly? Does a free-standing reredos serve to bring visual focus to the sanctuary space or, because the presider's chair is placed in front of it, does it serve to highlight the role of the presider? Performative analysis trains a critical eye for such spatial relationships and a critical mind to ask the appropriate questions. The choreography of liturgical actions, interactions, and gestures within the ritual expression are also suitable subjects of performative analysis. How is the liturgical assembly configured? Is the assembly perceived as subject of the liturgical action with ministers facilitating that action? Or is it configured as a ministerial elite with the assembly as passive observers? Is it configured to facilitate multifocused leadership that distributes roles, power, and wisdom among the members of the assembly? Performative theory focuses on the intentionality of these relationships. How are liturgical actions done? By whom? Deliberately? Casually? What is the relationship between the spoken words and the enacted gestures? What does the quality of embodiment say about the person who embraces these liturgical actions? Furthermore, liturgical objects and art are subject to performative analysis. What do liturgical objects and art communicate about the community of which they are a part? How do they speak to this community? What do they say to others not associated with this community? How are liturgical artifacts connected to the action of the liturgical rite? Performative questions can also be asked of music in the liturgy. Is liturgical music a matter for each individual's taste? Is music in the liturgy meant to trigger sentimentality or is its purpose to entertain? What is the function of music in the liturgy? What is the relationship between the text of music and its somatic effects—its pitch, timbre, rhythm, volume, and so on? What is the relationship between the music and the liturgical structure of the rite to which it is associated? Can liturgical music be completely variable or are there some relatively fixed elements that make it proper to the liturgy? Who sings—and who does not? Why? For whom is the music written? What needs are being met? Whose needs are being met and why? To study liturgical performance is to realize that the actual experience of a celebration carries within itself a whole series of critical questions about the meaning and intention of a rite which are beyond the competence that descriptions of that rite provide. Furthermore, performative theory suggests that by attentiveness to the enacted liturgy, our perspective on what the ritual means and its intention will not only be disclosed to us, but broadened, as well as questioned, and ultimately transformed.