I've decided to wade into this debate, but since I think it is my first
contribution to this list, I'd better introduce myself.

My name is Nathan Nettleton.

I am an ordained Baptist minister, and I am pastor of the South Yarra
Community Baptist Church, a smallish church in an inner suburb of Melbourne,
Australia. The local area contains both some of Melbourne's wealthiest
residential streets and a huge public housing estate, so it is an area of extremes.

I did my study and training through Whitley College and hold an honours degree
from the Melbourne College of Divinity. My honours work was in liturgy. I
don't know about elsewhere, but here in Australia a Baptist with a
qualification in liturgy is seen as a sort of hybridized freak of the
evolutionary process! Certainly I'm the first Baptist member of the Australian
Academy of Liturgy.

I guess I should try to summarize my place in the spectrum. I am a product of
the radical socially active churches, but with a concern for those who got
burned up along the way, so I'm seeking to explore and hold together the
disparate strands of radical Christian social activism, free church
evangelical passion, and richly "monastic" liturgical spirituality. This may
of course just be another way of saying I'm deeply lost in my own mid-life crisis!

If all that's not chaotic enough, I've just become the father of a baby
daughter named Acacia.

I hope some of you out there make more sense than me!

Now, as to my contribution to the discussion on joint presiders at the
Eucharist. After the introduction above I am probably expected to give voice
to some heretical dissent, so I won't disappoint you!

The line taken in a number of the contributions so far has been that to have
different people presiding over word and sacrament fractures the unity of the
liturgy as a whole. It seems to me, from my admittedly Baptist perspective,
that this line is based on a dubious clergy-centric presupposition. The unity
of the liturgy is based on the unity of the gathered community, not on the
office of one member of the community. While different members of the
community may have different roles in the liturgy, all stand equal before God
and the integrity of the liturgy presumes their prayerful participation.

If the community understand that they, as a group, are the central actor in
the liturgy, then there will be no perception of fragmentation when different
voices take different components of the liturgy. 

I am aware that for some of you this is merely a theoretical discussion
because you have ecclesial orders that proscribe who does what, but some long
established traditions still warrant challenging.

Of course there can be practical reasons for avoiding too many voices. If the
logistics require everyone who leads to come to the front, it can start to
look like a messy Jack-in-the-box routine. But other contexts may allow a
different approach. In my congregation we have a Wednesday night Eucharist
which is regularly attended by eight people. All eight of the regulars lead
parts of the prayers in roughly equal proportions, so there is no obvious
presider. But because the whole service takes place with us standing in a
circle around the table in a small chapel, we don't have to move anywhere
before speaking, so chaos is avoided.

In summary I would contend that joint presiders is theological acceptable, but
challenges the all-to-frequent monopolization of the liturgy!

Am I just an iconoclast? Perhaps, but there are six traditional icons in the
chapel where we hold our Eucharist. Just don't leak that to the Baptist Press, O.K?!

Peace and hope, 

Nathan 

_____________________________________ 
Nathan Nettleton 
Pastor, South Yarra Community Baptist Church 
Melbourne, Australia 
[log in to unmask]


%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%