The Pilgrimage - PRIMER

To explain where our Pilgrimage is beginning, I need to tell you a story. It has two beginnings; they intertwined with time, but I'll have to pick one to start with.

After Jody and I first heard about CrossWalk America, she started a six-week sermon series that covered two of the Phoenix Affirmations per week. To help us remember, we gave each Affirmation a word. The first four were Witness, Listening, Stewardship, and Worship, respectively. Our first "Aha!" moment of clarity came after the second sermon, when we realized that the first three Affirmations named the sections of our worship much better
than our old headings.

What had been known at St. Peter's (and in many other churches, in a very traditional Protestant style) as "Gathering," (Opening Hymn/Words/Prayer, Call to Worship, Announcements) "Sharing the Word," (Scripture, Children's Moment, Anthem, Sermon) "Responding to the Word," (Prayer, Hymn of Preparation, Offering, Communion) and "Sending Forth" (Closing Hymn, Benediction) became:

Witness - We gather to confess who and whose we are
Listening - We share God's still speaking voice in scripture, community, and prayer
Stewardship - We accept the invitation to be care givers for God's world and God's people.

The other beginning is the older one; last Christmas I was invited to glean from the personal library of Paul Bock, who belonged to my home congregation before his passing. Knowing and loving the work of Quaker authors such as Thomas R. Kelly, I picked up Elton D. Trueblood's "Alternative to Futility." Trueblood's insight on the purpose of Christian gatherings - to be small, purposeful, redemptive communities - gave shape to my own longing to belong to such a society. I passed the book on to Jody, and she re-copied fully half of the book in her notes (it's a real gem) she discovered a similar desire. We were clearly moved to attempt something along the lines of Trueblood's "redemptive fellowship."

A synthesis of these flashes of clarity came when we saw that our Sunday morning worship service was centered on the Listening section. Our new hope was for a way of moving deeper into stewardship; discerning what it means, where we are being called, as we accept the role of caretaker for God's world and people on an individual, personal level. Our hope-beyond-hope was that practicing discernment in this way would lead organically to new, meaningful, effective action.

The Pilgrimage is organized in the same way as our Sunday morning worship, with Witness, Listening, and Stewardship sections (you can see the whole "script"/order of worship here), but the content has been un-programmed. Instead of a litany, worshippers have an opportunity to name their hopes, which the community responds to. Rather than a sermon, together the ommunity discerns the main point(s) of scripture and its implications. And the center of worship are the discernment circles; carefully structured opportunities for each person to speak truly about their hopes, struggles, and sense of call in relation to their role as a steward of God's world and God's people.

The Pilgrimage is informed by our own tradition (in Christian, Protestant, and St. Peter's senses), by the model proposed in "Alternative to Futility," and by our own creativity. And the best part is that it is followed by a potluck - not as an afterthought or gimmick - but as a natural, essential, purposeful part of striving together as Christians.

Really (though the word is loaded), we are a church.