November 11, 1999

CLEVELAND—Though their value cannot often be quantified, the arts are the carriers of meaning and value and so are of great theological importance to the church, according to leaders of the arts program for the National Council of Churches of the U.S.A. (NCC).

We ask the church to look to its artists," said John Gingrich, a New York City Presbyterian and editor of a new NCC music resource, New Songs for Unity in Christ. "Our artists know it means to seek perfection and perfect expression and therefore can teach us all how to ‘practice’ faith."

New Songs is a collection of seven new hymns commissioned from member churches by the NCC for the 50th anniversary celebration. Dedicated at the event in Cleveland, it contains hymns contributed by the Moravian Church, the American Baptist Churches, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Swedenborgian Church, the United Church of Christ, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church.

The arts program of the anniversary celebration is sponsored by the Center for Arts and the Church at First Presbyterian Church, New York, and produced by director, Frank Lloyd Dent.

In his introduction to a dramatic reading, Here We Stand, on Nov. 8 at Cleveland’s Old Stone Church, Dent said, "Artists remind us that we cannot be onlookers at the intersection of materialistic and transcendent values. We are party to a fateful collision between qualitative and quantitative values, between reason and emotion, between sense and sensibility."

The arts program began Nov. 7 with "The Chicago Jazz Mass," a full jazz liturgy to accompany the celebration of the Eucharist. From a Coltrane-inspired "Sanctus" and "Gloria" to Preservation Hall-like arrangements of familiar hymns, the Jazz Mass combined exuberant praise of God with only-in-America improvisational musical stylings.

The mass was composed by Lutheran Andrew Tecson in 1985 and was played by an interfaith ensemble – Lutherans, Presbyterians and a Jewish piano player – that has been playing together for 18 years. "I wanted to bring jazz into worship situations while respecting the worship traditions of the church," Tecson explained. "Jazz adds colors to the rainbow of religious experience and, we hope, opens eyes and hearts to new meaning."

On Nov. 9, the Cleveland Orchestra performed a private concert for 50th anniversary guests. Works by Berlioz, Debussy, Holst, Dvorak and contemporary composer Bernard Rands – who was present – illumined the theme of the evening, "Inspiration in Music."

Introducing the evening and its purpose, local elected official Jane Campbell—who is the daughter of NCC general secretary the Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell – said cooperation between arts and the church are essential to the revitalization of urban communities. "Movement of the soul is what moves the community, and music moves the soul," she said. "That’s why music and the church must be partners to transform communities."

At a panel discussion following the concert in Cleveland’s Allen Theatre, Rands described the spiritual power of music. "The phenomenon of music is universal but at the same moment intensely personal – how it originated God only knows, which, of course, must be the answer."

Panelist Melva Costen, a professor of sacred music at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, responded, "Yes, music and religion have in common the task of expressing the inexpressible."

Other events in the 50th anniversary arts program included dramatic, choral and percussion performances by young people from the Cleveland area; Biblical storytelling, poetry readings and a number of scheduled conversations on the arts and religion.