Johan Cilliers A SPACE FOR GRAC1

This paper proposes that the church cannot be edified without taking cognizance of the role and function of liturgy. Whilst liturgical experimentation seems to be the rule of the day, a plea is made for responsible liturgical renewal that does not follow the opportunism of fashionable liturgical cosmetics. This entails a deepened understanding of the liminality of liturgy, especially in this time of transition in South Africa. Some key concepts of a liminal liturgy are expanded on, namely lament, re-framing and anticipation. 1. BEWARE: YOU ARE NOW ENTERING THE LIMINAL ZONE In his important book about preaching, Ek is die verskil, Malan Nel (2001: 5) starts out by proposing that preaching is basic and central in the building up of a congregation. By this he does not mean that preaching alone can build up the people of God to be and to do what He intended them to, but that this can indeed also not happen without preaching. On the basis of thirty years of research in, and observation of, the church he contends that preaching (and by implication the liturgy) plays a paramount role in the formation and motivation of communities of faith, moving them in the direction that God has in mind for them as his people in a given context. If we intend to build up the church to fulfil her calling, especially in this time of transition in South Africa, we need to revisit our understanding and practices of liturgy. It would seem as if we are presently going through a phase of homiletical and liturgical experimentation as never before, with a tendency to develop in (superficial) width, but not in (theological) depth (cf. Cilliers 2007a: 54). There seems to be a fine line between responsible renewal, following the calling of ecclesia semper reformanda, and the opportunism of fashionable liturgical cosmetics, which Leonora Tubs Tisdale calls the movement from saying “Holy, Holy, Holy”, to saying “nice, nice, nice” (Tisdale 2001: 1 Associate Professor in Homiletics and Liturgy at the Faculty of Theology, University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. 2 Ek is die verskil. Die invloed van persoonlikheid in die prediking. Bloemfontein: CLF. 2001.