Full, Conscious, and Active…Listening?

Active participation by Christian laity in singing is a goal assumed by all liturgical leaders, scholars, and musicians. Is singing, though, the only form of active participation in liturgical music? What about listening? Drawing on discussions of listening by Aaron Copland, Frank Burch Brown, and Ronald J. Allen, it becomes clear that listening well is an active task, one for which musical leaders must prepare their congregations. Lay people should be encouraged to both receive music as a gift and to search out what it means in relationship to the congregation, the day, and the liturgical context. Congregations also need to be equipped with the background necessary to perceive the music in question, such as information about the composer or implications of a text being sung or the musical means employed. Finally, the emotional atmosphere of a piece, the musical content or language, and the relationship between performer and congregation are all critical components in the listening that takes place in worship. As church leaders equip congregation members to commune at the Lord’s Table, so church leaders should give congregations a glimpse of how the music of choir or organ or other instruments can be a vehicle for grace and for encountering God’s presence

Days Will Come that Sap Our Vigor

Days Will Come that Sap our Vigor speaks encouragement to individuals and congregations in the face of exhaustion (the first stanza), depression (the second stanza), and even death (the last stanza). In each case, God restores to us strength, hope, and life. The tune for this text, FALLS PARK, alludes to the fact that the author wrote the hymn text after visiting Falls Park in Sioux Falls, South Dakota

We Need a Church that\u27s Inside-Out

This hymn gives voice to one frustration that many Christians feel: a despair over watching Christian factions argue about doctrine while the poor suffer outside of church walls. This hymn calls us to see the self-obsession which prevents us from attending to those in need (first stanza), confess our neglect of Jesus\u27 mandate to care for others (second stanza), and turn away from the distractions of petty bickering toward the expression of Christ\u27s peace, grace, and love to all those outside the church (third stanza)

INTELLIGENCE AND HIGHER STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS: A LONGITUDINAL STUDY

When William James (1890) introduced the concept of consciousness into American psychology, he argued that beyond the range of normal waking consciousness there is the possibility of exceptional states of consciousness that are completely "discontinuous" with discursive thought. He argued that these heightened states of awareness could be induced under specifiable conditions, could influence thought and behavior profoundly, and could be adaptive for the individual. He challenged psychology to investigate these states scientifically

A scoping review and thematic analysis of social and behavioural research among HIV-serodiscordant couples in high-income settings.

CAPRISA, 2015.Abstract available in pdf