WHEN the first Common Worship material was trialled, it revealed creative variety, but only a limited attempt at linguistic inclusivity. Consequently, even with the wide range of alternatives presented, it is often a struggle to provide liturgies that don’t feel overloaded with the male pronoun, especially when referring to God.
The product of Mary Kells’s extensive experience in this area, God Beyond Gender is a welcome and imaginative resource that ignites a shift in our understanding of how practitioners might unleash bold, sensitive, and more generous choices in their liturgical language.
Since Common Worship was authorised, a complex discussion about sexuality and gender has informed mainstream society, encouraging a nuanced and less binary understanding — with some pushback. Briefly, but simply, Kells examines this in the book’s opening section, delivering a concise rationale for her belief that inclusive liturgies are necessary and scriptural, while offering opportunities for richer and deeper encounters with God.
The second part of the book begins with practical guidance on formulating various categories of prayers, such as confessions, collects, eucharistic prefaces, and intercessions — useful for anyone crafting liturgy — and includes the Lord’s Prayer, for which she presents examples that convey some of the allusive and multi-dimensional intensity of the original Aramaic which is diminished by traditional English renderings.
Following on are fifty pages of liturgies (samples of Kells’s work written for various occasions), leading into an extensive bibliography of resources, before concluding with an overview of Church of England canon law as it relates to liturgy, indicating where there is scope for flexibility and greater creativity. Working within these parameters, her own prayers are refined in their inclusivity, and refreshing and clear in focus. They go a long way in making space for every member of a worshipping community to be comforted, discomforted, challenged, and consoled by an untamed and all-embracing God.
The Revd Richard Greatrex is Rector of the Chew Valley East Benefice, in Somerset.
God Beyond Gender: Crafting inclusive liturgy
Mary Kells
Canterbury Press £12.99
(978-1-78622-631-0)
Church Times Bookshop £11.69