Vol. 2, No. 1, Fall 2003

[page 141]

Herbert Sennett

PREACHING AS PERFORMANCE
(A Preliminary Analytical Model)

Over the past thirty years, a group of scholars, led by Richard Schechner of New York University's Graduate Center, began exploring the intersections between what had been known as traditional theatre (or "aesthetic drama" as Schechner called it) and the rituals of everyday life (what Schechner dubbed "social drama").(1) The theoretical issues raised by Schechner and his colleagues have been used to theorize about a number of life activities such as the interplay of office workers, the interactions of people shopping, and the roles people tend to play in their personal lives. The field of study that developed from this research became known as performance studies.

This paper will attempt to formulate a basic analysis of Christian preaching as a first step to the development of a model for Christian preaching as performance. This study will have as its immediate context Christian preaching as it exists within the African American Christian community with its rituals and societal contexts. As such, the methodological approach will be analytical and phenomenological rather than deconstructive or post-structuralist in nature. The African American preacher holds a unique position within the Black community: a socio-politico-activist position unshared in most other sub-cultures of the American experience. As such, the position offers a unique opportunity for rich study. This paper will attempt to analyze [page 142] the preaching phenomenon in this unique community and attempt to draw an analytical model of the performance aspects of preaching.

I believe that a new look at Black preaching from a performance studies viewpoint can be pivotal for the development of a communicative/performative model of preaching; a model which I will propose within the context of this study. I will begin by offering a model of the Performing Preacher based on performance studies theories. I will then discuss the preacher as a performer whose presentations have a deeper meaning than the performance of an actor in the theatre and perhaps similar in nature to the presentations of a politician "running" for office. I will include a discussion of the Black preacher as a paradigm for communicating a particular culture and a specific religion. I will utilize the works of James Peacock and Miles Richardson in a book edited by Richard Schechner (1990) along with the writings of Gardner C. Taylor and Victor Turner to formulate the performative aspects of the model. Then I will appeal to Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Sacvan Bercovitch, and M. M. Bakhtin in support of the textual aspects of this model. I will conclude with a final reference to the model to offer a few conclusions as to the problems with the model as a way of offering grounds for further discussion.

A Model for Preaching

The diagram at Figure 1 (on the following page) illustrates just how the various aspects of preaching and performance intersect and interact with one another and move to create a cohesive whole. In the discussion that follows, I will explain the various elements and their relationships. Although this diagram is only preliminary, it is intended to offer a starting point for discussion on preaching as performance.[page 143]

Figure 1 Model of Christian Preaching as Performance Art

The Christian preacher prepares for the message to be presented on Sunday (or Saturday in some traditions). Although the preparation varies with various traditions, the preacher is rehearsing for the performance on demand weekly. The message prepared is usually based upon a biblical truth or text from the Bible. That message becomes the script of the performance on demand. That message is then preached (or performed) at the appointed time and place (just like a play is presented at specific times and places). The performance conforms to pre-determined conventions or expectations of the specific Christian community (tradition) in which it is presented. The sermon is performed in the crucible of conformity and creativity, between preparation and spontaneity. Thus, the preacher is a performer --is a prophet --is a preparer --is a conformer --is a preacher. The circle of performativity allows the preacher to be [page 144] genuine and unique yet fully in compliance with the traditions of the community in which he/she works. The preacher is a performer. In the discussion that follows, I will illustrate and prove that this model offers a good place to begin discussion and hopefully lead to an orthodox understandings of the place that performance has in the Christian church and that preaching has in performance studies.

The Preacher as Performer

Using the term "performer" may be considered a heretical by some in the Christian tradition who hold that the preacher is one who has been called of God to speak a Word from the Lord, then sent out from the congregation to carry out this charge. Karl Barth, one of the twentieth century's great theological philosophers, wrote that the people in the congregation come together on Sunday with "a passionate longing to have the word spoken, the word [which] promises grace and judgement, life in death, and [the presence of] the beyond in the here and now, God's word" [author's italics].(2) Preaching is a special "calling" in and of the church. The preacher must never simply a performer in the sense of one who performs before a crowd in expectation of praise and applause. However, it is my contention that the concept of performer can and does apply to preaching.

A possible problem in the use of the word "performer" lies in its association with the theatre and the performance of an actor. The Greek word for "actor," hypocrites, means "one who wears a mask." This particular Greek word has been translated "actor" in most classical literature. However, in Christian literature it has been transliterated into the English word "hypocrite," a term used to refer to a "pretender" within a congregation. Referring to a [page 145] performance by a preacher could be interpreted as calling that person an "actor," which may imply that this one sent by God is merely pretending to be God's spokesman. Tradition holds that there is no room for pretense in the pulpit. However, I am convinced that there are too many parallels between preaching and performance to be overlooked or ignored and that the original understandings of "actor" should not interfere with the performative aspects of preaching.

Several elements of performance appear in the sacred event of worship. James L. Peacock wrote about a study that he conducted among primitive Baptists in the hills of Virginia. He concluded that the people in his study believed that "a sacred performance is not simply a performance."(3) He argued that among the primitives of the community, the preacher is highly respected because of his leadership and station. The lives of the ministers are closely inter-woven with the daily lives of the people. There is a certain expectation of "performance" in his actions both in and out of the pulpit. The ministers are expected to work hard during the week at a secular job, then during off hours they are to spend time in study, prayer and meditation. The preacher is regarded as always performing, always in view, always before the public served. Thus, what was done in everyday life is as important as that done in the pulpit on Sunday morning. The preacher's performance is reflective of and just as important as the other.

These primitive Baptists did not expect the preacher to write a prepared sermon in the common understanding of sermon preparation. Instead, he was expected to have his life so completely ordered in the things of God that when he mounted the pulpit, the "Spirit" of God would take over his body and mind in such a way as to use him to deliver a word from God. Peacock's conclusions point to the symbolic struggle of the performer who must be a part of the [page 146] community at large and yet perform on cue for the audience--an integrating of form, meaning, and context. In this sense, the preacher is a performer; albeit not in the sense of a stage actor, still a performer.

One of America's greatest African American preachers is Gardner C. Taylor. In his Lyman Beecher Lectures at Yale, Dr. Taylor made an interesting comparison between the preacher and the actor. He spoke of a performance he witnessed of a production of Othello on Broadway featuring Jose Ferrer, Paul Robeson, and Uta Hagen. Taylor had an opportunity to speak to Ferrer about how he was able to tackle such an imposing task as playing Iago opposite Robeson's Othello. Taylor recounted the following:

The performer and the preacher share a responsibility to understand and address the issues of humanness–those aspects of being human that are shared by all in the preacher's congregation. What Taylor refers to as "empathy" is what theatre semioticians would speak of as mimesis. The actor finds the truth within the reality of life and presents that truth through his performance on the stage. In like manner, the preacher must be a student of human nature with an eye to discovering a truth of life in humanity which can then be shared with his congregation. That truth is first refracted through the preacher's understandings of the word received from God, then presented to the congregation in the form of a sermon presented before [page 147] the congregation. The actual presentation of the word must be faithful both to the traditions and teachings of the church (the sermon must be "orthodox") and to the truths he has discovered about the people he serves (the sermon must be "practical").

The similarities between a Baptist worship service and the theatre are noted by Miles Richardson in an article entitled, "The Spatial Sense of the Sacred in Spanish America and the American South and its tie with Performance." In this well researched piece, Richardson referred to several points of interest. "The worshiper must perform as himself," he states, because "the sacred lies within him, all else, save the Bible, is 'symbolic.'"(5) The Baptist church tradition, of which many Black Churches are a part, stresses the internal nature of religion over the externals – yet the externals allow for the release of the internal emotions.

Richardson finds some interesting similarities between the theatre and Baptist worship. He points out that people have to get ready and purposely go to worship as well as to the theatre, they are both occasions that are different from everyday; they require a certain attire, both have signs in front of the building announcing the play or sermon, they both have ushers and programs for the people, and they both start on time. Richardson sees a distinct break at this point. He continues by saying that the actor on stage performs, but "... on his platform, behind the pulpit, the minister preachers. During his preaching, he may be and frequently is, theatrical, but what he must be is be sincere."(6)

Here I think Richardson missed an important element. I believe that even the actor must be sincere in his efforts to faithfully recreate the depth of human emotion and inner truth. It seems to me in reading his article that performance, especially on the theatrical stage, has a [page 148] mission to transcend the mundane into a deeper understanding of the meaning and emotion of life. The playwright takes a common moment from life and then exposes hidden elements that may or may not have been in the original but are now part of the fictionalized moment on stage. As the members of the audience watch the action taking place, they are drawn together as one to explore and enjoy the moment portrayed. The truthfulness in the moment allows for the identification by the audience with that moment. If that understanding be true, then preaching can be tied to the action of performance. Richardson comes close to this idea as he concludes his article with a similar observation. He stated,

The preacher constantly struggles with the line between true sincerity and acting sincere. I cannot help but to wonder about those times when the preacher fails to actually achieve the goal of being himself (being real, being sincere) and simply works up an emotional state and appears to be sincere to the congregation. If the congregation believes that what they are witnessing is real, is it any less effective or any less valuable to the worshipers? Who is to say that the preacher is not being true to himself and to his congregation? What of the preacher whose acting skills are such that he can portray a power and sincerity undetectable even to the most sensitive congregant even though the people may not know that at that particular moment the preacher would rather be somewhere else?

[page 149] These questions lay open the possibility that a preacher may be performing. And if the preacher is performing, and the product of his performance is so close to truth that it is received as truth, then is this a deception? If the word is received, then what more can be expected? I believe that these questions lead to the inevitable answer that preaching is a "performance" in the most positive sense of the term.

The objectified reality of an actor is to be found in the words of the text that he has memorized and rehearsed to the point of perfection. In like manner, the objectified reality of the preacher is the word which becomes for him the text, a result of the intersection of the text of the Christian Bible and the minister's study, prayer and meditation with his contact on a daily basis with the people in the community. The preacher spends hours of preparation and (dare I say it?) rehearsal as he readies himself for the task at hand. The portrayal of the objectified reality is performance--whether that performance be from the stage or from the pulpit. The preacher is a performer in a deep, rich, and transcendent sense.

Herb Sennett holds the M.A., M.F.A., and Ph.D. in theatre with additional degrees in religious studies (M.Div. & D.Min.). He has taught at three Christian colleges and has worked as a professional lighting designer. His book Religion and Dramatics explores the relationship between the Christian church and the theatre world. Dr. Sennett is currently associate professor of theatre at Southeastern College in Lakeland, Florida.