Merging Two Parallel Movements

The 1960’s birthed two movements in America: the Civil Rights movement and the Contemporary Worship movement. While both made their way around the world, sadly, they have run on separate parallel tracks for sixty years. Sunday morning worship is about as segregated and disconnected now as Martin Luther King described it back then. One of Common Hymnal’s hopes and aspirations is the merging of these two movements, hence our slogan: Praise and Protest.

Racism is an uncomfortable concept for white people to consider, let alone discuss, let alone confess. Yet it is on full display in our world - no disguise or concealment anymore. Everything is out in the open. It causes white people to feel embarrassed. It causes people of color fear for their lives. Here is a simple illustration that highlights our contrasting experiences. When a white mother gives her teenage son advice before he goes out gallivanting with his friends on a Friday night, she can confidently advise: “If something goes wrong, look out for the police. They’ll protect you and make sure you get home safely.” However, when a black mother gives her teenage son advice before he embarks on the very same activities, she nervously pleads: “If something goes wrong, and the police appear, please hide.”

The great commission and fighting racism are strangely interconnected. When Jesus sent us out into the world, he never sent us out to disciple individuals but to disciple ‘ethnos’ - ethnicities in the plural. The presupposition was that we would go in the way of Christ, from the bottom-up - as servants. Instead, the gospel became packaged into white colonization, and evangelization was done top-down, with white people invariably being on top. Our ability to disciple the ethnicities of the world is directly related to how we view and engage with the ethnicities of the world. Therefore, civil rights is inseparable from the great commission. Taking it one step further, the great consequence of the great commission is the worship of Jesus. So, using reductio ad absurdum, civil rights is also intrinsically connected to worship.

In the 1980’s, in the apartheid era of my native South Africa (before Nelson Mandela was released from prison and the country went through a radical restructuring) my life was turned upside down in a worship gathering. God spoke to me about my complicity in the the abhorrent system of legislated racism in which I had grown up, and how this limited my ability to embark on the great commission. The awful consequence of apartheid was not only the damage that it did to the oppressed, but the numbness and lack of awareness that it fostered in the privileged. After this encounter with God, I hungered to to make a difference. For the five years leading up to the release of Nelson Mandela from prison, I instigated a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual worship community that fused praise and protest, merging civil rights with contemporary worship. It was a complex but rewarding journey.

God gave me a sense that my country would change in 1990, that I would move to America in a time when it would face its racism heads on, resulting in an America that would be more dangerous to live in than the South Africa in which I had grown up; and that, as an older person, I would support a younger generation in the US who would do something similar to what we did in my youth in South Africa - merging worship with civil rights. It told this to my church on September 1st, 1985, more than thirty five years ago.

Common Hymnal is the fulfillment of that prophetic insight: a multi-ethnic community that fuses praise and protest in a time in the history of the world when racism seems to be worsening rather than subsiding. Common Hymnal is about the fusing of worship and justice, hence our slogan: “Praise And Protest.”

Can you imagine if Christianity was synonymous with justice? Can you imagine if Christianity became a trusted voice of healing in our world? Can you imagine if the contemporary worship movement and the civil rights movement were one and the same? The time for the merging of these two movements is now. Surely you can play a small part!!!

Malcolm du Plessis