Take off your shoes: How Christian liturgy forms the people of God

This thesis offers a renewed vision of Christian liturgy situated in a sacramental ontology in order to address the possibility of liturgical formation. In it I bring together a variety of sources in an attempt to demonstrate that the Christian liturgy is an epistemologically valid and rich experience which forms the ecclesial community into the people of God. I first argue that the possibility for such formation through the liturgy is based in a sacramental ontology which conceives of the world as sharing in the divine life and reality of God. This requires a shift in our present cosmology so as to undergird the centrality and functionality of the liturgy. After sketching the contours of this cosmology and participatory ontology, I argue that when properly oriented towards worship of God in Christ, the liturgy offers the primary and most thoroughgoing opportunity for enriching our knowledge of God. This knowledge comes through both the mind and body, particularly through the embodied and material nature of the liturgy and correlated actions. Furthermore, the aesthetics, physical and material space, as well as the beauty of the liturgy are necessary considerations to understand God’s self-revelation and mediation through the liturgy. Together these contribute to moulding the people of God into one body through repeated actions which serve to shape our communal and individual imaginations. This formation transfigures our vision and enables us to see the world in and through Christ while also preparing us to engage in the eschatological beatific vision and share in the divine life. While the principles that I explore in this thesis will apply in general across a wide range of liturgical traditions, I will make many specific references to the liturgy of the Anglican Church of Aotearoa New Zealand, as followed in the particular church to which I belong