While both friend and foe of John Calvin have regarded him as an enemy of the physical body, a pessimist about the material creation, and a negative influence on the liturgical arts, that would tell only half the story—and be far from the more interesting story. This seminar explored ways in which Calvin, standing at the headwaters of the Reformed tradition, represents a rich resource for the arts in worship, even if not in the ways one might initially suppose. More specifically, Calvin’s theology of creation opens up a trinitarian grammar by which we might understand the theological purposes of music, painting, architecture, poetry, and other media of art in corporate worship.
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Recent Media Resources
Playing Well with Others: Musical Collaboration in the Worship Service
Musical collaboration in worship can be rewarding: it can build relationships, enrich the musical life of a congregation, and add more colors, timbres, and textures.
Public Worship, Health Care, and Illness in Early Christianity
Explore how Christians in the earliest centuries of Christianity preached and prayed about illness, pain, and health care and shaped practices of baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and funerals in response to illness and injury, including during pandemics—all so that we can learn from their pastoral, theological, and practical instincts as we seek to be faithful witnesses to Christ in our own globally diverse contexts.
Morning Prayer with Nate Glasper and the 7:9 Project
Nate Glasper and the 7:9 Project, a multicultural group of Calvin University students, lead a time of morning song and prayer firmly grounded in scripture. Inspired by the vision of Revelation 7:9, this gathering reflects the beauty of “every nation, tribe, people, and language standing before the throne and before the Lamb.”
Playing Well with Others: Musical Collaboration in the Worship Service
Musical collaboration in worship can be rewarding: it can build relationships, enrich the musical life of a congregation, and add more colors, timbres, and textures.
Public Worship, Health Care, and Illness in Early Christianity
Explore how Christians in the earliest centuries of Christianity preached and prayed about illness, pain, and health care and shaped practices of baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and funerals in response to illness and injury, including during pandemics—all so that we can learn from their pastoral, theological, and practical instincts as we seek to be faithful witnesses to Christ in our own globally diverse contexts.
Morning Prayer with Nate Glasper and the 7:9 Project
Nate Glasper and the 7:9 Project, a multicultural group of Calvin University students, lead a time of morning song and prayer firmly grounded in scripture. Inspired by the vision of Revelation 7:9, this gathering reflects the beauty of “every nation, tribe, people, and language standing before the throne and before the Lamb.”
Wealth, Church, and Leitourgia
How did early Christians understand and practice wealth in relation to worship/service and care of the poor?