music – The Lloyd C Douglas Page

Wanted: A Congregation, Part 4j: Encouraging Meditation

From Lloyd C. Douglas, “Wanted—A Congregation, Fourth Phase—The Service of Worship,” in The Christian Century, 9/2/1920.

[The following is from the fourth installment in Lloyd Douglas’s series, “Wanted—A Congregation!” in the summer and fall of 1920. This installment, dated 9/2/1920, is titled, “Fourth Phase—The Service of Worship.” The series is about the Reverend D. Preston Blue, who is on a campaign to enlarge his congregation. This episode takes place after he has begun to succeed in building his audience. He is telling his wife about his plans for improving the order of worship…]

“‘That organ prelude,’ soliloquized Blue, ‘ought to begin quietly. People come in from the racket of traffic on the street. They should be given some incentive to calm their spirits and meditate without being overwhelmed and distracted with a thunderous noise. It should be understood by the ushers that the seating of the people should be done with a minimum of confusion. From the moment the prospective worshipper steps inside the door, he should be impressed with the fact that this is the House of God. He should be given a chance to think, to pray, to sense the divine Presence. Therefore, the organ prelude, which helps him to that mood, must not be a big ‘show piece,’ but rather an impassioned tug at the heart-strings. And then it should grow, almost imperceptibly, at its close, until it seems to be building up toward some definite action. The people must be filled with a desire to express themselves.

“‘Without a pause,’ continued Blue, thinking aloud, ‘the organist will modulate into the score of the opening hymn. Just think of the thrill of it, my dear,’ exclaimed the minister – ‘the organ piling harmony upon harmony, higher, richer, fuller, until, in one great, triumphant chord, it peals out the majestic measures of ‘O God, the Rock of Ages!’ – and the choir comes to its feet – and the congregation rises, not hesitatingly, by squads, but spontaneously, immediately, because it can’t sit still another moment – and then they will sing! Fine – isn’t it?’

“Blue remembers a wonderful service he had attended, in which the organist had begun with an impassioned prelude, rising to a martial mood, and, because the minister was going to preach on a patriotic theme, brought the congregation to a stand with the strains of ‘The Star Spangled Banner’ – after which he swept his choir and the audience into the first verse of ‘Lead On, O King Eternal,’ which happened to be in the same key and therefore required no introduction at all. True, the congregation didn’t know for a moment what was afoot, but it was not long in finding out, and the genuine thrill it experienced shattered every vestige of indifference and tuned the heart for a thorough appreciation of that great militant hymn.”

[Douglas’s story will continue in my next post…]

Wanted: A Congregation, Part 4h: Psychological Considerations

by Ronald R Johnson

[The following is from the fourth installment in Lloyd Douglas’s series, “Wanted—A Congregation!” in the summer and fall of 1920. This installment, dated 9/2/1920, is titled, “Fourth Phase—The Service of Worship.” The series is about the Reverend D. Preston Blue, who is on a campaign to enlarge his congregation. This episode takes place after he has begun to succeed in building his audience. He is taking a critical look at his order of worship and finding many things he doesn’t like, especially his tendency to announce the hymn over and over again, even though it’s listed in the bulletin…]

“Then there would ensue an awkward pause, during which the organist was guessing whether Brother Blue had said everything that was in his mind at that moment. Having finally determined that the preacher had said it all, the organ would pipe out a puny little combination of ‘solicional’ and ‘violin diapason’ wherewith to introduce the hymn, playing the entire score of it in this feeble manner until, by the time the congregation was actually turned loose to sing, it didn’t want to. There is a peculiar psychology back of this. When the minister has begged the congregation to sing, the man in the pew is reluctant to make the adventure. He fears his neighbor may think that he is going to cut loose and show these people that he, for one, is some singer. Again, when the organ introduces the hymn with a frail little prelude, everybody is afraid to begin, for fear there will be no support.

“But, just now, the thing that filled D. Preston Blue’s mind with misgivings was the thought that he had been talking too much during his ‘service of worship.’ When he had come to the point of announcing the responsive reading of the psalm, he always said something like this: ‘Shall we not now turn to selection one hundred and six, in the back of the hymnal, page one hundred and twenty, and read responsively?’ Then came another of those blighting delays, while people hunted for the page. Blue was conscious of the awkwardness of such moments, and his only remedy for them was to fill them up with talk – mere superfluous chatter. He would keep on repeating, dully, while they searched, ‘Selection one hundred and six – on the one hundred and twentieth page – in the back of the hymnal.’ Oh, how could he have been so exasperatingly stupid? Every time there arose the merest ghost of a chance for the congregation to have a little of blessed silence, here was Blue chattering like a magpie!

“Thus did he review, with burning cheeks, the specific defects in that cold and pulseless ‘order of service,’ searching for the cause of its failure; when, suddenly, the real secret of its hopelessness and dullness stood out, clear-cut as a cameo, and he shouted to Mrs. Blue, ‘I’ve got it! I know what ails Broad Street Church! She’s a-been gettin’ too much gas and not enough spark!'”

[Douglas’s story will continue in my next post…]

Douglas Looks on the Bright Side

by Ronald R Johnson

From the March 1920 issue of The Intercollegian.

I’ve been doing a series on the essays Lloyd Douglas published in The Intercollegian (the monthly magazine of the YMCA) from January 1919 through June 1920. If you’ve been reading these articles, you may have noticed that Douglas was quite upset with some of the things going on in the nation’s universities following the First World War. When Douglas was against a thing, his sarcasm often took over, and he could become quite pessimistic.

In today’s essay, from the March 1920 issue, Douglas tells about a student who wrote to him and challenged him to change his attitude. Douglas’s response was called “Streaks of Sunshine.” He accepted the challenge and tried to find things to rejoice about. (It’s amusing that one of the things he found was evidence that jazz was on the way out. Douglas, who loved classical music, had a life-long aversion to jazz, and he seized upon this news. Fortunately for the rest of us, that prophecy was not fulfilled.) Here is that essay:

“The other day an undergraduate in a midwestern college who had read in this magazine a few pessimistic remarks of mine relative to some depressing observations of present-day student life wrote and told me so.

“He was highly indignant, and his pen fairly spluttered his disapproval of me and my sour reflections.

“I was glad that he didn’t agree with me. If I were sure there were fifty men just like him in every college, ready to quarrel with me on that point, I should throw up my hat and yell, Hoo-ray!

“Or forty — or thirty — or twenty! I would hoo-ray if there were only ten! Ten optimists could have saved Sodom. And Sodom was a bad outfit. (See the Bible for particulars.)

“I told this young fellow that I would take a few doses of calomel and try to think of some good reasons for being cheerful. Pursuant to this promise, I hereby beg leave to report.

“You can’t get a seat at the Cort Theatre in New York to see John Drinkwater’s ‘Lincoln’ unless you apply a month in advance, with a special pull and a stuffed club.

“The obese producers of our theatrical entertainment (much of whose fatty tissue has accumulated above the collar) are slightly bewildered. They always thought they knew exactly what the American people wished to see. They have produced salacious drivel and sensational flapdoodle for the stage, under the impression that a play couldn’t succeed unless it was slightly off-color. Now they are discovering, with something of a shock, that the Americans have brains. Thousands are clamoring for a chance to see a drama woven about the history of a great American leader. It is a streak of sunshine on our way! Cheer up!

“Reports, properly authenticated, certify that jazz is on the wane; that people are getting tired of the abominable racket of it, the drooling idiocy of it, the execrably bad taste of it — and that a revival of decent music impends. It may be some time before all the back counties hear that the Great Jazz is dead; but whoever contemplates taking up trap-drumming as a life-work had better consult the oracles before he invests too heavily in a supply of cowbells, tin pans, and sandpaper, wherewith to gladden the hearts of his countrymen. For his countrymen are weary, to the point of tears, over such nasty noises. This is a streak of sunshine! And again I say: Rejoice!

“One hundred and forty of the branches of the Christian Church in America have become party to a plan which proposes to demonstrate that they are all able to work together for the common good, forgetful of the old divisive controversies.

“Plenty of people who have spent their lives chattering about the reprehensible ructions among the denominations will now have nothing to talk about. Some of them will again have to be taught to speak, just as many a typhoid patient is obliged to learn how to walk. This will be a great pity. Otherwise, it is all very happy. It is a streak of sunshine! Dawn of a new day!

“A tidal wave of evangelism sweeps the country, invading many quarters previously stolid and indifferent. The colleges are feeling the impact of this new idea. You know what a ‘hormone’ is, don’t you? Well, this new idea is in the nature of a hormone. (Business of looking it [up] in the dictionary. I doubt if you find it. It’s a new word. So is this a new idea. You can’t pour a new idea into an old word, lest the word break, and the idea be spilled.) More students are asking questions about enlistment for life service than ever before in the history of American colleges. More sunshine!

“Here’s to the student who gets sore when some old fossil says we’re going to the bow-wows. Let him line up the other nine in his school who feel as he does about it — and see what happens! Another streak of sunshine! I expect to see daybreak before long!”