I attend church in downtown Salt Lake City, in what I would be prone to think of as flagship wards of the church.
Over the last six months, in particular, I have attended some particularly uninspiring Latter-day Saint meetings, including several sacrament meetings and firesides where the most senior church leaders have been present. I would like to assume that they have been as mortified as me by the low quality or off-base tenor of so many addresses. On some, but not all, of these occasions has the senior church leader taken the opportunity to try to salvage the meeting by sharing a message before or after the meeting closes.
During two meetings that I remember specifically, with the exception of the opening, sacramental and closing prayers and the sacrament hymn, the name of Jesus was never mentioned. (I guess the speakers also perfunctorily closed in the name of Jesus.) One of the Sundays I particularly remember because a practicing Protestant friend from New York City attended with me. One of the hymn's only reference to Jesus was "and Jesus listening can hear the songs I cannot sing." The speakers spoke about themselves and their respect for their each other in their callings as auxiliary leaders. No scriptures were ever read, no meaningful witness was ever borne. My friend's response to my apology for the meeting was, "Don't worry about it. If I ever come again, I'll do what the woman sitting next to me did: I'll bring my phone and read on it the whole time."
Two days ago I attended sacrament meeting, and the first speaker took the topic of "return to civility." She briefly cited President Ballard (who was sitting on the stand), but the rest of her remarks failed to even mingle scripture with the good but not eternal philosophies she recited. The next speaker spoke mainly about his great love for his wife and children, again never referencing any further eternal truths.
The organist played "In Remembrance of Thy Suffering" at a tempo that resembled a waltz, with apparently no attention to the text she was accompanying, and the music leader showed no effort or sense of need to reign in the tempo in order to provide a more reverent and worshipful setup for partaking of the emblems of the Lord's sacrifice.
By all observations of the smiles on the stand, everyone was quite satisfied and oblivious to how frightful this experience was playing out for some in the congregation. How easy to leave feeling unfed, frustrated and alone that no one in charge cared more about what happened. Sadly, this was not a unique sacrament meeting.
Historian Jana Riess' observations of Latter-day Saint culture and practice often sting because of their accuracy. I reiterate four of her five points about why Latter-day Saint worship services fall short--why some of us leave church on Sundays knowing full well we would have at least been assured of multiple scriptures being read and expounded on, or the name of Jesus referenced with more frequency had we attended mass or to a major Protestant denomination's service, instead, during the time of sacrament meeting.
- We think we’re there primarily to learn about God, not to worship God. It’s no accident that we call our Sunday gatherings “sacrament meetings” rather than worship services. We do lots of good things in those meetings, like taking communion every week . . . But if you take a straw poll of Mormons and ask them why they’re there, “worship God” is not going to show up in your top five. At best, we relegate worship to the temple . . . and at worst, we don’t think about worship at all. Yet the scriptures name worship as our primary reason for gathering each week.
- Our music is confining and often funereal. For a supposedly joyful people, Mormons are missing a crucial element of joy that should accompany our worship services. We sing three hymns per service, sometimes four, and they are often lovely. Beyond that we do not venture. We neglect the vast richness of the world’s musical heritage, especially the gorgeous offerings of sacred music through the ages. . . . I feel a terrible sadness about the disconnect that exists in Mormonism between the exalted beauty of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, which touches thousands of hearts with its renditions of music both sacred and secular, and the anemic, impoverished approach to music that typically exists at the ward level, where whole classes of instruments, styles, and composers are simply barred from the door.
- Our talks are often substandard.
- Nobody seems prepared to envision this differently. This . . . is our most pressing problem: where there is no vision, the people perish. . . . We need men and women who are theologically trained, who understand what a worship service is intended to accomplish, and who can comb the scriptures and our own history for examples of how to make Sundays more fulfilling. Only when that leadership is in place can we make the necessary changes in the details, like improving member talks and allowing for music that enhances worship.
(original and complete pieces from Jana Riess can be found here.)
