The Naked Preacher: Action Research and a Practice of Preaching

Viviane

Tel est mon bien-aimé, tel est mon ami

Cantique des Cantiques 5.16

(La Bible Segond)

Acknowledgements

I owe a debt of love to my wife Viviane for believing in me and urging me on. I thank Naomi, Sonya and Jeremy for the joy they bring to me and for trying to understand why on earth I wanted to keep on going to ‘school’! My family has been patient with the hours of research and writing, my absences and occasional emotional meltdowns.

I thank God for the love and faith of my parents, Clare and Evelyn Boyd and grandparents, Wesley and Christina Boyd and Howard and Freda Bergren. I have been gifted with a rich heritage.

I wish to thank Elaine Graham and Wayne Morris for their creativity and wisdom in their supervision of my doctoral research, which has given birth to this book.

I am grateful to Cumnock Congregational Church for supporting me in commencing my postgraduate work and being part of my pilot study. Particular thanks go to Elizabeth Smith and Margaret McIlvean for minute-taking.

Words are inadequate to thank properly Witney Congregational Church. Not only did they participate in the research but they were extremely generous in giving me time and space to write this book. Thank you to Jacqui Powlesland for unstinting support and in catering for the Word Café sessions, and to Sue Birdseye for hours of transcription.

I am grateful for the late Michael Elliott for introducing me to action research, to Neil Messer for encouraging me to do this research as a PhD, David M. Adams for inspiration and encouragement, Janet Wootton for editing and Richard Cleaves and Graham Adams for being critical friends. Thanks to Joe Boland, who accompanied me through the Ignatian spiritual exercises, and my present spiritual director Judith Lancaster, a wise companion. At key moments I benefitted from the gentle encouragement David Spriggs, supervisor of Bible Society Scholars, for which I am grateful.

The financial generosity of the Bible Society, the Congregational Federation and The Coward Trust made it possible for me to undertake this research.

Contents

Title

Acknowledgements

Abbreviations

Introduction

Interlude

1  Action research: a messy business

2  Action research as a way of doing theology: is it an ART?

3  Word Café: opening up communicative space?

4  The Bible transforms the preacher: let those with ears hear

5  Looking the congregation in the eye: the naked preacher

6  The visible preacher: finding a place to stand

7  The unfinished story: continuing to negotiate the insider–outsider terrain

References

Index of Names and Subjects

Copyright

Abbreviations

AR − action research

ART − action research as a way of doing theology

PAR − participatory action research

PJ − process journal

PPPM − preaching project planning meeting

PT − practical theology

R − reflections − I wrote these following the Word Café, having completed transcriptions, thematization and entries in my PJ both before and after watching the video.

SJ − spiritual journal

TAR − theological action research

TARN − theological action research network

WS − writing style (this refers to the way I identified clusters of writing that appeared to me to be in the same writing style as I transcribed the table cloths produced during each Word Café).

Introduction

I look back over what I’ve written and I know it’s wrong, not because of what I’ve set down, but because of what I’ve omitted. What isn’t there has a presence, like the absence of light … You want the truth, of course … The living bird is not labelled bones. (Atwood, 2001, p. 484)

These words belong to Iris, the protagonist in The Blind Assassin. Having kept silent about the events surrounding her sister’s death and her part in it, she writes her story and leaves it in the hope that one day her estranged granddaughter will read it. She imagines that writing the truth would be possible if you thought no one would read it: ‘You must see the writing as emerging like a long scroll of ink from the index finger of your right hand; you must see your left hand erasing it. Impossible of course’ (p. 345). Iris comes to realize that the omissions are often more important than the ‘labelled bones’ or the tidy script.

This is my dilemma too. I attempt to tell the truth knowing that you are reading. How do I write of a living inquiry that goes beyond the bare bones of what might appear to be facts? There are so many different ways that the story of the naked preacher could have been written. One measure of the truthfulness of my account is in the admission that there is much more to this inquiry than what I have set down on paper.

Should you be in doubt, I am the naked preacher. Why naked? The image stems from a recurring nightmare of my youth, a dream that is experienced by many. It surfaced in my mind as I was reflecting on a discovery I made about not looking my congregation in the eye when preaching. It served as a metaphor for the all-pervasive, profound sense of vulnerability that cloaked me in the act of preaching a sermon. Not only did nakedness illumine my understanding of averting my eyes, it gave insight into my sense of vulnerability as an involved researcher. I was both the researcher and the one being researched. I invited my congregation to hold up a mirror to my practice. How terrifying was that?! What would I see? What would they say to me? Would I like my reflection in the mirror or would the glass be shattered for shame?

In this book the naked preacher and the naked researcher are one and the same person: me. I set out to demonstrate a way that a practitioner may collaborate with others to gain insight into their practices. For me, it was my practice of preaching that raised questions I sought to explore in the community of practice. My hope is that my inquiry as naked preacher will yield insight for preachers who want to improve and transform their own practice of preaching.

The process of answering this question meant that I was engaging in research. Any practitioner involved in reflecting on their practices is a researcher, even if only in an informal sense. My role as researcher was formalized through a postgraduate programme. Though my inquiry was framed by the obligations of the academy, my intention was to develop a process for practitioners in everyday settings to attend to their ordinary practices. For me, the focus of my research was my practice of preaching as a minister in a church setting. My aim in this book is to flesh out a process and mode of inquiry for those engaged in a plethora of practices.

The presence of the naked preacher and researcher is an image of a person invested in a practice who is willing to risk the vulnerability of seeing clearly. It all began with the question, ‘What is going on when I preach a sermon?’ It was a question nagging at me from below the surface of my consciousness. How could I gain an understanding of my congregation’s experience of my preaching? While many other professions have systems in place to appraise effectiveness of practice, preachers intuit responses to their sermons from their own perceptions. Responses at the church door range from bland ‘nice sermon’ to engaged positive or negative comments. I wanted to know how I could tease out how my congregation saw and heard me in a sustained and systematic way. Do sermons – my sermons – change the way my congregation live? This question stripped me bare as both preacher and researcher.

Early in the research process I explored whether action research was an appropriate and useful approach to theology. Out of the inquiry emerged ‘action research as a way of doing theology’ (ART). In order to tell the story of ART, I adopt the metaphor of an artist placing colours on a pallet.

The image of colours on an artist’s pallet is suggestive of the way the artist takes the brush and mixes the paint in order to create an image on the canvas. The artistic process is both intentional and intuitive. It requires acquiring and employing skills in which planning, precision and surprise combine to make the work of art.

The colours for my ART pallet consist of action research, practical theology (PT) and the Ignatian exercises. These encounters generated knowledge that I blended together in exploring with my congregation my practice of preaching the Bible. Each colour was new to me and I chose to place them on my pallet. In this sense my engagement was intentional as I acquired new knowledge and skills. It was intuitive in that I was astonished by the way combining the spectrum of colours offered new and vibrant ways of seeing and transforming my practice. I was engaged in an ART-ful integration of action–reflection practices.

After a decade in pastoral ministry I embarked on a postgraduate programme. In my previous undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in theology I had encountered practical theology as applied theology. I had never heard of the practice of theological reflection or of the pastoral cycle! It seems extraordinary to me now that I had made it this far without the least awareness that there was anything other than systematic theology applied to pastoral practices.

Action research was new to me too. I was entirely ignorant of the practices and theorization associated with this orientation. The notion that practices were bearers of theological insight and could be understood through drawing on a wide range of disciplines was a significant challenge to my existing paradigm. It was groundbreaking to consider that disciplines that could be described as ‘secular’ had a place in theological discourse. It was a seismic shift to think there could be mutuality between the disciplines. Initially my engagement with AR was principally influenced through Freire (1970) and Argyris’ conceptualization of espoused theory and theory in action (via Dick and Dalmau, 2000). I experimented with the colours of theological reflection, pastoral cycles and action research (AR) (e.g. Boyd, 2010b).

Parallel with my postgraduate studies was the discovery of the Ignatian exercises. This came about through a startling experience that left me bewildered. I was settled in my Scottish congregation and declared to Viviane, my wife, that I would be content to remain with these people for the rest of my ministry. She asked me whether I was becoming complacent. Within weeks I felt as if I had been grabbed by the shoulders and shaken to attention. Three individuals who were not connected to my congregation asked me whether it was time for me to move on. After the third person made this comment I was troubled to such a degree that I went to my study and turned to the Bible readings for the day. I was shocked that each of the readings (Num. 33.1; Ps. 39.12; Luke 8.21) spoke to me of a kind of moving on. I found myself weeping and feeling afraid. I did not know what to make of the questions and the Bible readings. What was God saying to me?

I shared my consternation with a colleague, who put me in touch with Fr Joe Boland, someone experienced in guiding people through the Ignatian exercises. Our initial meeting crystallized that indeed it was time to ‘move on’ even though I did not know what that meant in practical terms. Fr Joe invited me to consider undertaking the exercises in life according to Annotation 19 (Ignatius, 2004, p. 9). I chose to do so. The exercises became a part of my daily life for six months. Central to the exercises was the process of attending to my desires and discerning to what degree they were directed towards freedom to love God our creator. The exercises focused on engaging with biblical texts intelligently and imaginatively, encouraging a colloquy – a dialogue with the Lord (Coghlan, 2005, p. 93). It created space for a whole-body response as meditation deepened into contemplation (cf. Ivens, 1998, p. 46). My experience led to growing awareness in discerning how God was active in creation and in my desires. I was discovering how to make choices in freedom in order to act in concert with God’s purpose for humanity to love him wholly.

Two aspects discovered during the exercises stood out in terms of my other learning. First, Ignatius (2004, p. 68 [230–1]) introduces ‘The Contemplation to Attain Love’ by stressing that love is expressed in ‘deeds rather than in words’ and that love ‘consists in mutual communication’. This emphasis on love being active and dialogical resonated with the AR trajectory of human flourishing and freedom together with liberation theology, a strand in PT.

Second was the way the exercises involved attention to the senses. Ignatius’ emphasis on somatic spirituality realizes Graham’s (2009, p. 83) vision of ‘a practical theology that tells stories of embodiment [which] can really examine what it might mean for God to be revealed in a human body, broken and suffering, whose resurrection proclaims that love is stronger than death’. The exercises enlivened my perception of spiritual experience as a meeting of intellect, imagination and senses with the divine creator in the incarnate Jesus.

I have squeezed the colours on to my pallet. In doing so I express my conviction that all knowing comes from somewhere. It is a self-reflexive, critical awareness of the motivations driving my questions and research process that makes ‘me’ visible. I have wrestled with these questions:

•  Why is the research question important to me?

•  Where does it come from?

•  Does inquiry into my own preaching practice risk unhealthy introspection, wild subjectivity and unbridled bias?

•  Am I justified in writing a narrative of a messy, emergent inquiry?

In what follows I shape the narrative of how my congregation and I developed Word Café as a method of generating conversations. Together we explored our experience of what happened when I preached the Bible in the context of congregational worship and what if any change occurred. By tapping into the experience of talking over a cup of coffee, Word Café created space for us to attend to the experience of my preaching practice.

There are several critical issues that frame the choices I have made in writing this narrative. First, this inquiry pays close attention to a particular context (emic – insider/subjective) (cf. Coghlan, 2013, p. 335). This contrasts with approaches that aim for generalizability (etic – outsider/objective). In delineating the features of ART, I am not proposing a McDonald’s-style recipe which, if followed, will replicate a good experience of the sermon for all preachers and congregations. This is not to say that this ART project has no wider contribution to make. My purpose is to model a way of being that is transformative.

Second, though I planned and implemented the research with my congregation, the story I tell in this book is my own. When I refer to ‘my’ research I recognize that it was the congregation who shared my question(s) and participated in the planning and implementation of the project. ‘My’ includes ‘we’, for I am indebted to the generosity of participants.

A third matter is to do with the way I have opted for the priority of participant voices over those of academe in extending knowledge within the disciplines. This is intended to mitigate the tendency of the expert voices to dominate discourse. Essential to writing AR is what Marshall describes as ‘grounded form’ and the idea that ‘form should be congruent with content’ (2008, p. 688). This is an articulation consistent with our experience of the world we are seeking to know. Discovering the right form in writing ensures resonance with ‘voices that matter, one’s own and those of co-inquirers’ (p. 689). Guba and Lincoln (2005, p. 207) identify that the ‘Omission of stakeholder or participant voices reflects, we believe, a form of bias.’ This written account of the inquiry privileges participant voices in relation to the literature and gives shape to this subjective, highly contextualized experience of a practice of preaching.

Fourth, my written account is consistent with the messiness of AR. From conception to implementation my inquiry has not been linear. It has been a twisting road of meeting the familiar and the strange around the bend and adjusting my manner of travelling. Action inquiry is messy because we do not work with humans in perfect laboratory conditions but in the topsy-turvy world (Ladkin, 2004, p. 547). Snoeren et al. (2012, pp. 201–2) insist that this messiness of inquiry has to be mirrored in the presentation: ‘The messiness of participatory research should not be polished into nice smooth paragraphs … Let us be honest and vulnerable about our wrestling and searching, struggling and striving, because there are no easy answers.’

At stake is exposing questions of power and position of the researcher in relation to those with whom they are researching. Mellor (2001, p. 479) suggests that a ‘full description of the faltering reality of research or practice, presented as part of an honesty trail, may contribute to that sense of resonance’. In AR an unpolished text in which the ‘I’ of the action researcher and the complexities of inquiry are made visible is an indicator of validity.

This is why, against the distancing ‘we’ of academic writing, ‘I’ will figure explicitly. This ‘I’ is in direct relation to ‘we’ as I weave ‘my story’/‘our story’ critically, writing ‘us’ into a narrative (cf. Walton, 2007, 2009). With Reason and Bradbury (2008b, p. 6), I consider that first-person practice is ‘a foundational practice’ to second- and third-person AR (cf. Coghlan, 2013). Referring to Chandler and Torbert (2003), Brydon-Miller (2008, p. 204) is adamant that ‘Prior to entering a research setting of any kind … we might begin with a critical examination of ourselves as individual researchers using a first-person action research approach.’

In the spirit of first-person inquiry, ‘I’ raise these questions about ‘me’:

•  Why am I a preacher?

•  Why does it matter whether my practice of preaching connects and communicates?

•  Are there hints in my story that will shed light on these questions?

•  What will I discover about myself as I write?

In the practice of ART there is no neutral or objective vantage point from which to give a definitive analysis of the ‘facts’. It is essential for the self-reflexive practitioner-researcher to be rendered visible including the manner of presentation. Graham (2013b, p. 150) notes that ‘This level of self-revelation is rare in most academic literature, even examples of research that aim to work collaboratively and sensitively with research subjects.’ The activity of making visible leaves me the naked preacher and researcher all at once. This baring all and seeing clearly does not aim to humiliate but to humble, and in so doing makes possible transformation.

The chief aim of this narrative is for me to be written on to the page, not for self-indulgent purposes but in order to demonstrate how ‘who I am’ pervades and shapes all my knowing. Herr and Anderson (2005, p. 69) are adamant that obscurity is not an option in AR (cf. Moore, 2007, p. 38; Reason and Marshall, 2006, p. 315). ART is an invitation to practical theologians to resist the prevailing tendency to airbrush themselves out of the research picture. Being written on to the page is in the interests of transparency serving the cause of justice and liberty.

The reluctance to be on the page is widely evident in practical theology. There are exceptions in Adams (2010, pp. 6–8) and Hodgson (1994, pp. 332–7), both of whom reveal something of who they are, the former in an introduction and the latter in an epilogue. A recent and more radical departure from academic reserve is evident in Bennett and Rowland (2016). Bennett is a practical theologian and Rowland a biblical scholar. They are clearly on the page as they engage with their respective disciplines in an imaginative and scholarly manner.

It is clear to me that being visible is easier said than done because it involves the vulnerability of being exposed and runs against the academic invisibility cloak. My experience of researching and writing has given birth to this book. I have had to summon up the courage to confront both the naked preacher and the naked researcher. I have wrestled with my identity, being named and re-named, filled with fear and renewed in faith.

Summary

There are two ways to read this book. If your primary interest is in the practice of preaching and you have little exposure to action research and/or practical theology, begin with the Introduction and Interlude followed by Chapters 3—7. If you are familiar with action research and/or practical theology, proceed consecutively.

Chapter 1 identifies the embryonic beginnings of my inquiry. I set the stage in searching for a definition of AR, beginning with the narrative of our local definition. Chapter 2 sketches the outline of ART. Drawing on the insights of the spirituality of the action researcher David Coghlan, I identify in Graham and Reader sources for negotiating the boundaries between PT and AR.

Chapter 3 offers the rationale for the method of Word Café as communicative space. I outline the principles underpinning the conversations, after which I flesh out the process of collaborative research design and of facilitating Word Café events. I evaluate the extent to which Word Café opened up communicative space using the phases of inclusion, control and intimacy.

Chapter 4 centres on a hearing of Luke 24.13−35 (‘Emmaus road’). I consider the use of the Bible both in PT and my own spirituality. Critically reflecting on my aural encounter, I explore several themes suggestive of the interpenetration of ART.

Chapter 5 explores a pivotal insight gained in the inquiry into not looking the congregation in the eye when I preached. I unpack the phrase ‘listen with your eyes’ as a whole-body experience that necessarily requires confronting vulnerabilities.

Chapter 6 argues for the visibility of the involved researcher. The narrative of finding a place to stand before my congregation leads into a discussion of the insider–outsider continuum. I identify the imperative of making visible the relations of power and knowledge.

Chapter 7 focuses on three salient themes pertinent to negotiation of insider–outsider relations. The learning narratives demonstrate how I grapple with power and wisdom, silence and feelings in collaboration with my congregation. These are snapshots capturing particular insights and continue to call for further action and reflection. It is a story without an ending.

Notes on usage:

•  All quotations from participants in my data sources have been reproduced with the barest possible ‘correction’.

•  I deliberately chose not to capitalize action research as a way of doing theology (ART), action research (AR) and practical theology(PT). I do this to counter the notion of clearly delimited disciplines(see ‘From Upper Case to lower case’ in Chapter 1).

•  All italics appearing in quotations are original.

•  I use s/he in the text for two reasons: first, it preserves anonymity of participants; second and more importantly, it is an intentional act addressing gender inequality. The she has priority in s/he in order to overturn patriarchal written forms.

Interlude

The process of being an ‘involved’ researcher from time to time produces an incredible emotional response. Today has been such a day.¹

First of all, I hesitated to write myself into my research. I put it off until after lunch. Then I sat for almost an hour. I wrote a phrase. Then I deleted it. Wrote again. Then deleted. And so on …

It reminded me of my experience of doing a fire walk. I remember sitting at the kitchen table breathing heavily and feeling utterly sick. I told Viviane that I simply couldn’t do it. If only I would break a leg or suddenly become ill. Then I wouldn’t have to face the impossible. How can a person walk on a bed of glowing embers?

When I finally dragged myself out to the event I was like a man facing the death sentence (though never having faced this I suppose I cannot know for sure – hyperbole I guess). It was only my ego that kept me from making my excuses and going home. I was driven on by the need to save face before my Anglican and Methodist colleagues. I couldn’t bottle it at this crucial juncture, could I?

Our facilitator used the ‘F’ word in a way that would normally have caused offence. Somehow his choice language didn’t concern me one bit. The thought of what lay ahead was enough to cause me to consider uttering the same profanities (though I was too scared to form the words)!

Part of the process involved participants going to the site of the fire walk. The wood was piled high and bathed in flammable material. We were made to walk the unlit distance – to pace ourselves – to imagine success at the sight of what appeared to be certain failure. Then like those staring at one who is dying and knowing that this is the inevitable end, we gazed at the pyre and watched the flames consume it. Tongues of fire leapt high. I couldn’t believe the madness of what I was about to do!

I’d signed consent forms that presumably let the fire-walking company out of any responsibility for my injuries. The ink was on the form. I looked my Methodist colleague in the eye. He was 60 odd; I was 30 odd. He was confident; I felt like soiling myself. Pride was the only thing that held me to this moment.

We walked down to the smouldering path with purpose. There was no turning back. This event was surrounded by townspeople in the Market Square. My children were watching. Members of my congregation were watching. The event was being filmed.²

The instruction was clear. Step on to the turf of grass. The facilitator who’d been swearing like a sergeant leaned into my face and screamed ‘What’s your name?’ and I shouted back, ‘Jason!!!!!’ and stepped on to soft warm velvet striding forward to the end uninjured.

‘What’s your name?’ and the academic in me screams, ‘It’s none of your business!’ But I know that the objective observer, the researcher who has no vantage point – no roots, no context – is a phantom of positivism.

‘What’s your name?’ and the human in me screams, ‘I don’t know!!!!!’ and steps into a world of writing myself into existence. And as I write I am moved to tears with the memory of praying at my mother’s knee to ask Jesus into my heart. The force of seeing myself hits me as I recognize that preaching and being a preacher has been my identity since my early memories. I am bewildered as I write that I cannot imagine life without being a preacher. Is there not more to me than this?

I step on to the heat of embers to stride towards discovering my name.