Alan Jacobs

A final thought on the cultic. The word has a primitive feel. This is intentional. Christianity should be far better at foregrounding its exotic otherness. For it is interesting, and engaging – this business of worship. At least in theory! Why is it that religious worship seems duller than more limited cultural expressions such as art and literature? Why is that people are fascinated by dismembered aspects of religious worship – theatre, carnivals, icons, meditation, performance art – but seem to have little desire for the form that integrates these things in a supreme performance of meaning? Why have the churches not learned to be culturally exciting places? A reinvented liberal Christianity needs a new sacramentalism, which should seek the attention of the secular world. Perhaps the medieval feast of Corpus Christi should be the churches’ model: worship should spill out from churches into the streets and nurture busy amateur creativity. Why hasn’t this sort of thing happened to any large extent? There remains a strange failure to notice that religious worship is the highest possible state of cultural creativity and also, dare one say, of grown-up fun.