A Book Review by Bryan Knedgen
Tish Harrison Warren is Co-Associate Rector at Church of the Ascension in Pittsburgh, PA and a Priest in the Anglican tradition. She is notorious for being removed from Vanderbilt University for her orthodox views of Christianity where she was ministering to graduate student with Intervarsity. Warren penned Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices for Everyday Life which won Christianity Today’s Book of Year for 2018 in Spiritual Formation. She is also a contributor at The Well, Christianity Today and Mere Orthodoxy.
One of the joys of being in campus ministry is our ability to see students grow in profound ways that shape them for the rest of their lives. Their time at the university is not in any sense of the phrase “real life,” but instead is full of adventure and change. However, to be frank, this is not true of life after college as most of our time is ordinary and mundane. Following college, we begin to ask, “How do we worship and see God in these repetitive schedules?” Thus, we turn to Warren’s Liturgy of the Ordinary.
There is no technical introduction, ironically, the book jumps right into the day like some worship services which often never tell anyone the structure and purpose of its elements. However, she uses the first three chapters to set us on a trajectory to understand the book. We’re introduced to that structure when she lays out the events of a normal day as chapters and relates those events to acts in a liturgical service. Throughout the book she draws on this pattern to make parallel connections between the tangible actions and events of our daily lives and the inward spiritual reality of our lives.
Warren begins where most of us begin every morning, in bed. She starts with the notion that we are loved by our Triune God before we have done anything, and connects that directly to baptism as the representation of entrance into the community of God. In the second chapter, “Making the Bed: Liturgy, Ritual, and What Forms a Life,” she discusses the known and unknown ways that daily routines shape us. She uses the example of her first instinct in her morning routine, to reach for her phone and peruse news/internet/Facebook formed her to be a seeker and consumer overtime. Thus, we need to be intentional with the types of practices we participate in daily, because they are forming us. As believers, we need to create counter formations to mold us towards God and not the world.
In the next chapter, “Brushing Teeth: Standing, Kneeling Bowing and Living in the Body”, she continues her introduction with the reality of living in our bodies and how much time it takes to maintain and care for them. Here she uplifts Christianity’s view of the goodness of our bodies in contrast with most other religions which have a disdain for the body, as she states, “…what we do with our bodies and what we do with our souls are always entwined.” She pushes the idea that our movements train us to worship God not only with our minds but also with our entire bodies as living sacrifices.
There are eight other chapters that flesh out the previous three chapters discussed and build upon them. I will highlight two of them. The first is “Loosing Keys: Confession and The Truth about Ourselves,” reflecting on how the most common trials of life, such as misplacing our keys often bring us to a point of furious anger and hopelessness. In those moments we need to repent and turn to God. The other chapter, “Eating Leftovers: Word, Sacrament and Overlooked Nourishment.” Warren connects the daily task of eating with our reading and listening to the preaching of God’s word. Every meal nourishes us and shapes our body; similarly every sermon and our time in the word shapes us.
Liturgy of the Ordinary is a fantastic book. I have read it about five times now since I have bought it and every time I go through it, I see the beauty of our God more in the most mundane task. One of the chapters that impacted me the most was “Fighting with my Husband: Passing the Peace and the everyday work of Shalom.” In any relationship, fights will break out, but as followers of Christ are we called to be peacemakers in those moments. If we cannot have peace in our own relationships how can we hope for peace in the world? Thus, passing the peace in a worship service is not a mere greeting but a reminder that Jesus is our Prince of Peace, and he extends this peace to us every time we worship him. This gave words and form to a ritual I never understood and now I relish the practice during our worship service.
At the same time there are some things I would push against. In her chapter on “Eating Leftovers: Word sacrament and Overlooked Nourishment,” she begins to talk about environmental things with assertions that lack real depth. She does the same thing with issues of justice too. It is difficult not to see these discourses as preaching to the choir. The other is that this book presumes upper class normativity as the vantage point of understanding, thus alienating those not from that socioeconomic status.
This book has helped me see the small things throughout my day and know that each one of those events shapes me towards glory. I highly recommend everyone read Liturgy of the Ordinary. It is a great book for your personal devotion, as each chapter is under 20 pages and amazing for small groups with questions at the end for each chapter.