Worship as Repairing Ruptures
Worship as Repairing Ruptures
For and Against a Trauma-Informed View (with a practical list at the end)
Public worship should be a place for REPAIRING RUPTURES—spiritually, corporately, and individually.
But our polarized environment promotes either totally rejecting therapy or totally accepting a trauma-informed perspective. It is easy to fall into one of two extremes.
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View #1: Trauma-Informed is Spiritual Coddling
On the one hand, is to overemphasize “rupture” by totally focusing on sin, on sinners, on God’s judgment against sin. This is often accompanied by the simplification that all mental health issues are a result of sin, of personal choice, and individual action.
Worship environments and liturgies along these lines would be high challenge, pushing people out of their comfort zones, and revving people up to do hard things. All self-care is viewed as selfishness.
This view would scoff at the need for being trauma-informed and see it as a kind of spiritual coddling.
View #2: Trauma-Informed, otherwise it’s Abusive
On the other hand, I’m seeing concern that worship services should never cause ruptures, that to do so is spiritual abuse and traumatic—especially talking about sin or sinners rather than the inherent goodness of people. This view is often accompanied by the oversimplification (through expansion) of trauma as anything one disagrees or is uncomfortable with.
Worship environments and liturgies along these lines would be high care, allowing people to participate as they want, when they want, and making sure not to trigger anyone.
This view of being trauma-informed (which is not all views, but I see this as a growing popularized view) has the goal of minimizing all ruptures for all people, of apologizing when ruptures happen, and labelling churches as cults and abusive if they don’t do things the proper trauma-informed way.
[I see some in this trauma-informed space now saying that all churches are inherently abusive and traumatizing no matter what—which does not follow the data which shows that religious participation, on the whole, helps develop resilience and healthy coping strategies.]
Balanced and Integrated Worship: Repairing Rutpures
Thankfully, many churches of all kinds are trying to find a balanced and integrated approach, as worshippers of a loving God have always tried to do (the same people and churches that rarely pop up on your social media timeline).
This perspective acknowledges that there are always ruptures in human (and divine) relationships. Ruptures are unavoidable. It is the processes of repair that matter.
This view knows that we are often the cause and contributors of ruptures (not just other people, our life history, or the environment we live in), so confession of sin and a strong doctrine of sin aren’t necessarily abusive or traumatizing. It also acknowledge that some ruptures are good for us, that this is how we grow into maturity.
This perspective also acknowledges that the heart of the gospel is that God is always repairing our ruptures, and we have the joy of joining God in this work for the benefit of ourselves and others. This process of repair is long and complicated, and has as many setbacks as breakthroughs. So we learn to walk it together with compassion for others and self-compassion for ourselves, all surrounded by the lovingkindness—the steadfast love—of God.
A worship environment and liturgies with the “repairing ruptures” view would integrate care and challenge. It would meet people where they are (call it trauma or something else), and helping move them closer to God and closer to who they are called to be (call it resilience or something else).
What this looks like
Greetings and welcome should remind people of the different zones of care and challenge and that the spiritual journey together includes both.
Passing of the Peace/Meet N’ Greet times should acknowledge the challenge for some people and invite people into it.
Times of Silence and Prayer should acknowledge the challenge for other kinds of people and invite them into that formative practice.
Times of Confession should always include personal and corporate aspects, and always end with God’s forgiveness, mercy, and love.
Times of singing should include space for joy and sorrow, praise and lament. Those who don’t want to sing should be gently encouraged into it. And those who only want to sing should be reminded that other formative practices are equally important.
Preaching should include cognitive and emotional aspects, as well as teaching and storytelling, which gather people into the redemptive story of God repairing all ruptures.
Basically, all things should be done with compassion and love, encouraging people to appropriate levels of self-care along with self-challenge as all seek to experience the loving repair of ruptures that God is drawing us all into.
I think many, if not most, liturgical tradition had already learned this integrated balance if they haven’t been changed too much by high challenge or high comfort perspectives.
I love the idea that church can create appropriate ruptures with the messages of God’s justice and holiness and then heal them with the message of God’s unconditional acceptance and infinite love for us.
Just like a parent creates a rupture when they yell and scream at their toddler who is run I g into the street, then repairs the rupture by holding them and reassuring the toddler of their love and belonging.
SO much wisdom here. I so often see how churches get it wrong in both directions. Thank you for the clear explanations and summaries. Definitely will inform my thinking and writing moving forward.