USA > Pennsylvania > Change and challenge: a history of the Church of the Brethren in the southern district of Pennsylvania, 1940-1972 > Part 12
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MUSIC
The twentieth century has also witnessed change in the music prac- tices of the congregations. The Church of the Brethren has produced three basic hymnals since 1900. "The old black book" was produced in 1901. This volume contained works by George B. Holsinger, J. Henry Showalter and William Beery. It was published under the title, The Brethren Hymnal. In the 1925 hymnal, entitled Hymnal, Church of the Brethren, hymns were classified according to topics, revealing the emphases of the denomination. Such topics as World Peace and Brotherhood, Christian Patriotism, Christian Education, Missions, Children and Youth were included.
An all-purpose hymnal was produced for the church in 1951. This hymnal, The Brethren Hymnal, in preparation since 1943, brought congregational music toward a balanced program of worship in the denom- ination. The hymnal included thirty-four hymns composed by Brethren writers. When congregations began to purchase this new hymnal, they called upon Nevin Fisher and George L. Detweiler and Perry L. Huffaker to introduce them to the newer hymns. Hymn Sings became popular in the early 1950s, just as they had been popular in the 1940s.
For many years the contributions of Americans to church music had been slight. Many of the hymns used in hymnals depended on British sources. In the 1940s and 1950s, musicians from many denominations made concerted efforts to recover music from the church's past in order to adapt it to current needs. As a result, many of the hymns used in our
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hymnals bear eighteenth and nineteenth century dates. Henry G. Gott- shall, of the Southern District, composed music and published a book entitled, Joy of Salvation. One of his hymns has been printed in The Brethren Hymnal. Modern hymns have tended to be more ecumenical in nature than the hymns used by the Brethren in the 1700s and 1800s.
The Church of the Brethren has taken justifiable pride in its congregational singing. Many printed services of the district contain simply the words: "Congregational Singing!" Congregations have pro- duced quartets, trios, choruses and other singing groups. Perhaps the most conspicuous change in the church worship experience has been the introduction of the church choir as a regular feature of the public wor- ship experience. Special music often was used in congregations in past decades, but the regular church choir is of rather recent origin.
The Church of the Brethren did not use choirs until the colleges began to use them. A few city congregations began to model their choral music after the large a capella choirs of colleges. College music professors, Charles Rowland and Nevin Fisher, directed choruses and gave music festivals in various sections of the state. As congregations formed their own choirs, the services began to be more liturgical with responses and "Amens", responsive readings and anthems. Seasonal musical presen- tations at Easter and at Christmas also became familiar patterns.
Those who have been reared in the tradition of congregational singing occasionally complain that the choir monopolizes the congregation's role in worship. Perry L. Huffaker, in a booklet on Choir Ministries, warned-that the choir need not destroy congregational singing. The choir should be an integral part of the congregation during the singing of the hymns. It is the choir's responsibility to inspire the congregation to sing. The essence of common worship is that all people should participate.
STRESS ON NEW MINISTRIES
During the 1960s, values associated with the past were questioned. New forms of Christian ministry were tried. In worship, "celebration" became the keynote, the expression of joy and intense inner feeling was encouraged in worship. The Standing Committee members of the 1972 Annual Conference warned that the tendency to the free expression of feelings may develop into conflict over the issue of tongues and other gifts of the Spirit. Young people began to search for new and dramatic forms by which to express their ideals and feelings. The church was seeking to express its faith in a vernacular form. The feeling developed that a new age must invent new signs, symbols and liturgies for worship as wonderful as those the church inherited. The church was seeking to discover God in new forms as he had been discovered in the traditional forms.
Coffeehouse ministries grew popular among the young. In 1965, over eighty college campuses and churches and foundations had coffee- houses. These gatherings were aimed at the young and, for the most part, they remained religiously neutral. A few churches within the Southern District experimented with the coffeehouse ministry.
Many churches of the district began to seek for renewal in small group life. Brethren of earlier ages tended to identify with the small group. Under the influence of Mission Twelve, congregations formed small groups for study, prayer and social action. In a sense, the church was returning to the Pietistic stress on "little churches within the church". Both the seventeenth and twentieth century groups represented attempts to involve the laity in the mission of the church.
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In 1926, the British Council of Churches began to cooperate with the Federal Council of Churches in promoting a Preachers' Exchange between British and American ministers. Harold Z. Bomberger was in- volved in such an exchange in the summer of 1967. In 1970, William L. Gould and Elmer Q. Gleim became part of a team of preachers who left America to spend several months in Great Britain. William L. Gould spent the month of July in England, fulfilling preaching assignments at five churches. He ministered to the St. Mary and All Saints Anglican Church, Whalley; St. Stephen's Anglican Church, Clitheroe; Chadsmoor Methodist Church, Cannock; Clarendon Road Congrgational Church, Wat- ford; and the Beechem Grove Baptist Church, Watford.
The assignment given to William L. Gould was for the months of July and August. However, because he was changing pastorates, he requested Elmer Q. Gleim to accept his August preaching assignments. The Gleim family arrived in London, England in the closing days of July. While in the British Isles, Elmer Q. Gleim spoke in the Holy Trinity Church in London; the Brighton Free Church on the English Channel; St. Cuthbert's and St. Mary's Churches in Edinburgh, Scotland; the First Methodist Church in Belfast, Northern Ireland; and the West Kirby Presbyterian Church near Liverpool.
In some instances, the visiting minister supplied the English pulpit in the absence of the regular pastor. In other cases, the visiting minister became involved in the community life, visiting with parishioners, attending service club meetings, and participating in the weekly activities of the congregation. The experience of exchange is designed to be informative and inspirational and provides an experience in religious understanding and tolerance.
In recent years there has been a tendency to use the traditional anoint- ing service as a public worship experience. The Church of the Brethren uses the epistle of James (5:13ff) as the basis for the healing service. In most instances, the service has been private and offered only at the call of the church member. On rare occasions, members of the church have requested public services of anointing. The author has participated in such services in several pastorates. The Annual Conference of the church concluded that the anointing service is to be used as adjunctive to and not competitive with medical and psychological treatment.17
The First Church of the Brethren in York, under the pastoral leader- ship of Curtis W. Dubble, has inaugurated the practice of offering a monthly service of public healing. The pastor wrote about this service:
"The basic emphasis of this healing ministry is to provide an opportunity for intercessory prayer, for those whose names have been suggested on a prayer list and an opportunity for anyone who attends to come and receive a prayer for healing of body and mind and spirit through the laying-on-of-hands. The emphasis is upon commitment to God's will and purposes. It is through commitment that we are made whole. We seek God's healing for His sake and not for health's sake."18
If the trends in the future run true to past experience, the decades of the 1970s will most likely be a time in which the church will recover its spiritual and Biblical roots. The next years will belong to those who will seek to preserve the church's ties to the past. No age is safe until it has discovered its rootage in all other ages. To live without such rootage, emphasizing experiment only, a people suffer from spiritual amnesia. On the other hand, to rely on tradition only hinders genuine growth. The church and its people must recover a balance between experiment and tradition.
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CHAPTER SEVEN
NEW CHALLENGES IN CHRISTIAN EDUCATION
Christian Education in the Church of the Brethren has been in a state of ferment over the past decades. The changes which have come to the educational program of the church correspond to similar changes in public education. During the past quarter of a century, exhaustive studies at all levels of education have produced new discoveries concerning the learning process. These discoveries have led to a widening of horizons in Christian Education, a willingness to explore, and the discovery that faith can be witnessed in action as well as in words.
The lay leadership of the church has made its profoundest impression in the field of Christian Education. Active and dedicated leaders in church and Sunday School have made possible the growth of the church. Lay people in most congregations have made their greatest contributions to Christianity in religious education.
The rising secularism of this age and the demand for qualified lead- ership have thrust the church into new programs of education. During the 1950s and the 1960s, the committees and boards at the district level moved away from the belief their main function was to provide fellowship and inspiration. Programs began to turn on the development of educa- tional resources and the promotion of qualified leadership.
The period following 1920 saw the emergence of the weekday church school, the daily vacation Bible school and leadership training schools. The period following 1945 saw the rise of new courses of study and the increased use of visual education. Various denominations united in their purpose to develop a meaningful and an attractive curriculum for their congregations.
THE SUNDAY SCHOOL
The Sunday School movement was seventy-seven years old before the Church of the Brethren authorized its acceptance (1857). A survey of the congregational histories within this volume reveals that the older congregations of the district adopted Sunday Schools in the closing decades of the nineteenth century. By 1876, the denomination began to publish its first Sunday School literature.
The Sunday School won gradual acceptance against considerable opposition. When the Brethren fell into a three-way division in 1881- 1883, part of the reason for this division was opposition to the Sunday School. There were fears the Sunday School would eventually release parents from their responsibilities as religious teachers.1 Opposition to the use of the church house for Sunday School purposes compelled early Sunday Schools to meet in private homes.
The adoption of the International Uniform lesson in 1872 gave the Sunday School movement wider favor. It also made the Sunday School teaching more Bible-centered. The catechetical methods of earlier years gave way to the memorization of Scriptures and the narration of stories from the Bible.
Beginning in 1899, the Southern District Christian Education com- mittee regularly sponsored an annual Sunday School meeting. These meet- ings were patterned after the popular Sunday School convention move-
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ment of the closing quarter of the nineteenth century. Such district-wide meetings were designed to promote the growth and the improvement of the Sunday School. For example, Rufus P. Bucher spoke at the Upton house meeting on Angust, 1942, on "Our Need In Christian Education".
The Sunday School meeting was combined with the district Minis- terial meeting in two-day sessions. Each Sunday School was entitled to send two delegates to conduct the business of the conference. The dele- gates usually brought with them contributions for support of the work of the District Board of Christian Education. As part of its work, the Sunday School meeting voted financial support for several missionaries on the foreign field.
Although these meetings were strongly supported in the 1940s and early 1950s, by 1958 the interest had declined. A committee was appointed to determine the future of the Sunday School meeting and the Ministerial meeting. The study committee made its report (1959) in the form of a conference query, calling for the discontinuance of these joint meetings and the development of independent programs. This query passed the conference.
The upgrading of education in the public school systems in the district created stirrings among the laymen of the churches. The Tri-District Secretaries reported how requests for help and guidance in the field of Christian Education came regularly to the offices. A report of 1962 said:
"The demand for professionally-educated ministers and teachers is bound to have its results within the next few years."
NEW CURRICULA
The district has followed the religious education practices common to other evangelical communions. The use of the International Sunday School lesson (since 1872) and the graded lessons (since 1914) have been widely accepted by the congregations. Dissatisfaction with these courses was expressed in the 1940s and the 1950s. The Sunday Schools noted declining attendances. C. Ernest Davis, Executive Secretary of the Christian Edu- cation Commission, reported in 1944 that the Church of the Brethren Sunday School enrolment reached its peak in 1921.2
Criticisms of the Sunday School and its program were plentiful. Many felt the Sunday School did not give sufficient time for study. The use of the lecture method by teachers came under heavy fire. The Uniform Lesson itself was criticized because it actually did not thoroughly survey the Bible, nor did it encourage depth study. One survey indicated that the Uniform Lessons covered only thirty-four percent of the Bible in a twenty-eight year period. Teachers themselves were criticized because most did not have sufficient training. In spite of its fine efforts, the Sunday School was not actually reaching the masses of people.
These and other criticisms forced Christian educators to take a new look at the methods and objectives of the program. In the 1920s, many denominations rewrote their courses of study, making them more child- centered and more directly related to the experiences of the child. Begin- ning in the 1940s, a second attempt at curriculum reform was begun. Fourteen denominations, in the Cooperative Curriculum Project, worked together to create a new curriculum by the year 1967. The result of this effort was the publication of a streamlined, colorful series of texts, tailored to the needs of specific age-groups.
The Church of the Brethren began to rewrite its courses of study in 1961. Theologians and professional teachers and writers cooperated to produce a new curriculum for the denomination. The materials were
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lavishly illustrated with maps, photographs and color reproductions of great works of art. Supplementing these texts were guides for teachers and parents, filmstrips, motion pictures, dramatic skits, murals, record albums, mobiles and dioramas. The lessons tended to draw on interdenom- inational materials. They also encouraged open-ended study. They did not state the conclusions the student needed to find.
By the fall of 1964, the new Senior High School Curriculum was ready for use. Graydon F. Snyder visited the churches to speak of the purposes and the content of the new curriculum. In 1966-1967, a series of workshops were conducted at various locations to acquaint teachers and leaders with the forthcoming Encounter Series. Workshops were held in Waynesboro, Lost Creek, Codorus and Carlisle with 181 persons in attendance. Here was something new in the history of the denomination. The introduction of an entirely new curriculum for all ages had never been tried before in the Church of the Brethren.
The new curriculum was ready for use in the fall of 1969. A report for the Southern District at the close of 1970 disclosed fourteen of the fifty-two meetinghouses were using five or more units of the new En- counter Series. There were objections to the new curriculum. Teachers found it required much more preparation to teach than the previous lessons. Others objected because the Scripture texts were no longer printed.
The new curriculum was designed to encourage congregations to exercise more freedom in developing their own Christian Education pro- grams. Each congregation could now offer a wider series of courses for study by its membership. The "Keysort System" was devised to aid con- gregations in selecting books and pamphlets by grades and subjects. This opportunity for curriculum development proved difficult for the churches. It implied some acquaintance with educational philosophy and methods and thorough grounding in Biblical and Christian concepts.
Many churches with professional pastors adopted the membership classes in order to prepare people for life in the congregation. These classes were theologically-based, giving people an appreciation of the faith which had been inherited and of the church as the transmitter of that faith. In many instances these classes were denoted as "Pastor's Classes". In a few instances, the membership classes were graded and were taught by laymen and laywomen.
There are sharp contrasts between the teaching ministry of the churches in the 1870s and the ministers used in the 1970s. Learning by rote, memory and drill gave way to activities and projects. The nine- teenth century view that Christian Education must lead to a climatic conversion experience gave way to the belief that becoming Christ-like is a process which begins at birth. Christian Education was found to be a continuous process from birth till death. Virginia S. Fisher once observed to the Southern District Board:
"Bridges and roads can wait to be built, but the Christian char- acter of children and youth demands immediate attention".3
CHILDREN'S WORK
The greatest changes in Christian Education came in the sphere of children's work. The curriculum was graded since only the graded cur- riculum could meet the needs of the child at each stage of his growth. The curriculum also became more experience-centered than the Uniform Lessons had been. Teaching moved away from moral exhortations and began to stress activities and discoveries. Greater emphasis was placed
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on the interaction of the teacher with the pupil and less on subject-matter of itself. The teacher became more concerned about teaching the child to think about daily problems within a Christian framework. When new buildings were constructed, classroom space was allotted for each group in a quieter, brighter setting.
For many years in the Southern District, children's work and junior high activities were directed by appointees of the District Board of Chris- tian Education. The Lawrence Conference (1938) approved the formation of district cabinets for children's work. The first cabinet in the Southern District was not formed until 1958-1959. Prior to this time, Mrs. W. L. Widdowson (1940-1949) and L. Anna Schwenk (1949-1960) conducted the children's work activities at the district level. Glenn E. Kinsel (1952- 1953) and Anna Kepner (1954-1958) handled intermediate work.
When the cabinet plan was adopted, a children's work cabinet and a junior high cabinet were formed. These cabinets promoted workshops, demonstration schools and district rallies for children's workers and junior high workers. L. Anna Schwenk (1960-1961) and Sara Swartz (1962- ) served as district directors of children's work. Ervin E. Block (1961-1962), James V. D'Amico (1963-1964), Lois Myers (1965), Helen Sealover (1966-1970) and Earl Dibert (1971-1972) served as directors of junior high work in the district.
For many years the children's work phase of Christian Education was conducted without budgets. Under the cabinet plan, the Christian Edu- cation Commission began to apportion moneys for workshops and confer- ences. The emphasis in children's work changed from simply transmitting the best of the religious experience of the past to the creative discovery of God within present experience.
LEADERSHIP TRAINING AND FAMILY INVOLVEMENT
Under the direction of the Christian Education Executive, Christian Education in the Southern District was strengthened and broadened. When the joint boards of the three districts employed Mrs. Virginia S. Fisher, her assignment was to emphasize the teaching ministry of the church and to develop "pilot projects". She said of her work:
"I see a new day dawning in Christian Education. The educative process is being taken seriously in every aspect of life and we shall have our turn too."4
Beginning in the late 1950s, the Southern District began to promote adult education in the church. Adults were both the teachers and the parents of the young. Leadership training schools, family life institutes, Christian Education Days, curriculum workshops and Mission Twelve groups were formed to encourage new leadership. The field of Christian Education was broadened to include much more than Bible study. Chris- tian Education was found to include recreation, social action, worship and study as well.
The workshop was devised as a means of involving more people in the experience of learning and sharing. The method was borrowed from the public school system. The use of the method involved a wider sharing of ideas and concerns within groups. In December, 1949, some members of the Southern District were involved in a workshop at New Windsor, Maryland for recreation leaders. Workers who had served abroad re- turned to share with others their knowledge of music and crafts learned in other lands. Some displaced persons, who were temporarily residing at New Windsor, taught unique leather work skills. Similar recreation
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workshops have been conducted regularly in the past several decades on college campuses.
The District Christian Education Commission annually sponsored a York Area Leadership Training School for teachers and church school workers during the 1950s and the 1960s. Such schools have been conducted in the Pleasant View, Second Church, York First, Codorus and New Fair- view congregations.
A new type of training experience was presented in 1971 by the District Christian Nurture Commission. Thirty-two district church leaders and teachers met at New Windsor on May 21-23, 1971. Under the leader- ship of Donald E. Miller of Bethany Theological Seminary, the weekend experience emphasized the feelings and the sense of personal worth of each individual. The experience reflected the trend toward sensitivity train- ing developed in 1947 by social psychologists. Encounter groups, problem- solving groups, nonverbal exercises become part of the experience as the leaders avoided the usual skill and knowledge training associated with traditional education. The experience of the weekend was based on the conviction that personal worth is conveyed more through the living spoken word than through the visual, printed word.
In 1972, the Greencastle, Waynesboro, and Chambersburg Churches united in a demonstration school for their teachers of children. On a Sunday in September, forty guests and leaders arrived at the Chambers- burg Church to witness guest teachers as they demonstrated teaching for the various age-groups. The experience of witnessing a class taught from the regular Church School curriculum by an experienced teacher was a valuable one. Other groups also began to experiment with regional interchurch experiments in Christian Education.
Christian educators were keenly aware that the amount of time given to Christian Education on Sundays was far too brief to help a person cope with the problem of life. They began to turn increasingly to the family with appeals for a cooperative program in the religious training of the child. Schools and seminars on family life focused on the significant role the parent plays in developing sound religious attitudes and beliefs. The new curriculum showed that a quickening of the imagination, the growing sensitivity to others, the developing appreciation of the world and the increasing love of living are all essential to the learning of Chris- tian ways.
The new curriculum appealed for family involvement in the Chris- tian Education process. When the Sunday School appealed to the family to give up its children for the purpose of teaching Christianity, this was fine for unchurched families. In time, however, many Christian families were tempted to lower their standards by surrendering to the Sunday School their work as Christian educators. The new curriculum was based on the conviction that moral character requires the fullest cooper- ation of the home.
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