My mother is approaching 90 years old, and, while still pretty spry, has pared down her social activities considerably. "I can really only do about one major event a day," she says, which, in the case of my visit to her home in Tucson this weekend, pretty much amounted to church.
We attended her Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) congregation, Fountain of Life, on Saturday evening. One feature of Fountain of Life I've always liked very much is the altar cross. It's done in hispanic style, with colored stones, tastefully lit, beyond which you can see the Catalina Mountains.
This church used to have about 600 in attendance on a weekend. As church attendance falters throughout the nation, Fountain of Life has likewise felt the pinch. Last week's attendance at six services was about 500, and that's counting attendance at two nursing home services.
This was a "juggler" service, i.e. one in which you "juggle" a hymnbook, marked in two places, and a bulletin. We used their setting four of the liturgy, with its lovely Hymn of Praise. Alas, that was the only song I enjoyed singing. The other hymn selections were standard LCMS fare, sung with notable lack of enthusiasm even by those who knew them. The service was attended by about 80 people, about 70 of whom were seniors.
The service was led by a retired pastor who preached on the lectionary's 1 Corinthians text for the 8th Sunday after Epiphany. He used the text as a springboard for a sermon on the office of ministry. In the LCMS, only men may be pastors. When the pastor would refer to "men," I would lean over to mom and say, "that's men and women." Outside of that piece of theological dissonance, his sermon was well-crafted and well-presented.
Sunday morning, we went to Our Savior's, a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), which is across the street from University of Arizona Hospital near downtown. This is the oldest Lutheran congregation in Tucson. Just the day before, we had been at this major intersection where we honked and waved, along with many others, in support of union members and others who were expressing solidarity with the public employee unions of Wisconsin.
The service at Our Savior's was their "Celebration" service, which means guitars and drums playing songs I don't know, don't particularly like, and can't sing. If the singing didn't work out, I figured I could transfer my attention to the architecture of the building, which was splendid.
The entire building is in southwest style, including the rather simple, but strikingly beautiful sanctuary. The colorful contemporary stained glass on the side windows was pleasing to contemplate as was the beautiful hand-carved altar table.
In a sharp contrast with Fountain of Life, the presiding pastor at Our Savior's is a middle-aged hispanic woman. She did not wear clerical garb, and her manner was soft-spoken and affirming. Her sermon was based on a text in, of all places, 2 Timothy. She spent some time on the historical background of the text, addressed some of the issues regarding its authorship and transmission, then made practical application.
I am perhaps the world's worst sermon-listener. My nose twitches at statements of the obvious, and my eyes glaze over at the first hint of pietistic tripe. Pastor Ascarza's fine sermon, with its exceptional use of language, held my attention from beginning to end. Greeting her upon leaving, I commended her "intelligent sermon."
Like Fountain of Life, Our Savior's has seen its membership decline. There were perhaps 80 people at the service--they average about 400 on a weekend. The age distribution and diversity of the congregation were a marked contrast to Fountain of Life. There were several children in attendance, several singles, several people in their 20's and 30's, a lesbian couple or two, and even a few old Scandinavians!
The bulletin was chockfull of service and fellowship opportunities, everything from lobbying the legislature to scrapbooking. Considering that I didn't care for the songs or the band, in addition to which the ushers were disorganized, the sound system had a glitch, and the band's singer was flat about half the time, the thought occurred to me that, if I lived in Tucson, this is where I would worship.