Gathered Together

How can the church honor a person's profound experience of struggle, change or celebration? How can corporate worship link to the unique and real-life needs of the people in the pews?

God wants us to be whole. One of the purposes of the church is to encourage that. However, in seeking to provide something for everyone, corporate worship traditions may have lost a personal touch that members need.

Perhaps your most dedicated parishioner, for whatever reason, looks outside the congregation for support or growth. Positive change comes from these efforts, but often the much needed spiritual element is left unaddressed.

In Gathered Together: Creating Personal Liturgies for Healing and Transformation, Tilda Norberg offers ideas for creating tailor-made liturgies that connect daily life with the rituals of worship.

"Individualized healing liturgies are not psychotherapy but a wonderful adjunct to an inner journey that may include therapy," Norberg writes. "...Personal liturgies can bring a vital component to the life of the church. [They] offer an exciting, effective, even necessary, contribution to personal growth-a natural addition to healing ministries."

Norberg details more than two dozen custom liturgies she has designed and led among the "ad hoc church," honoring such specific events as finding a vocation, recovering from illness, giving up false hopes and receiving first car keys. These liturgies are truly faith in action-intimate, honest and deeply transformative-as a congregation of close friends participate with the celebrant in a service uniquely designed around a personal need.

Her wise, creative guidance will inspire pastors to widen the scope of the liturgy and encourage laypeople to seek an authentic bridge between the personal journey and church life.

Norberg brings together her knowledge of pastoral care, psychology, and liturgical tradition to propose something new – the personal liturgy that bridges the gap between faith and therapy.

Norberg understands the question asked by many Christians engaged in counseling, therapy, and 12-step groups: How can the church honor the individual’s profound experience of struggle and change? Is there any way to connect one’s unique and maybe not-so-holy journey with church tradition? Yes, she answers. The personal liturgy is a brilliant way to integrate the sacred struggles of inner work with the rituals of corporate worship. The resulting services for healing and wholeness are intimate, honest, and deeply transformative.

Norberg’s image of God as a compassionate healer is borne out in her theology of the “ad hoc church” – the congregation of close friends who participate with the celebrant in the personal liturgy. These services are faith in action – celebrants bury real hatchets, break forth from actual bondage, and pour gallons of cleansing waters. Norberg details over two dozen personal liturgies she has designed and led, honoring such events as finding one’s true vocation, recovering from illness, giving up false hopes, and receiving one’s first set of car keys.

Gathered Together is a wise, creative work that will prompt pastors to try new healing ministries and laypersons to ask more boldly for the needed bridge between personal journey and church life.

- pastoral counselors, clergy, and spiritual directors who work with faith-based healing and wholeness