Without Limits: Singing the Congregation’s Song

This sectional examines how the intersection of music and theology is encountered, considered, and understood in contexts outside of the church, and how these environments create, are shaped by, and animate community. Music is a powerful means of gathering people around core theological ideas, and of articulating, conveying, and circulating theology within and beyond a Christian community in a given context. These communities of practice include parachurch organizations, musical and theological societies, seminaries and divinity schools (and the centers and institutes associated with them), ecumenical intentional prayer communities, and musical and liturgical conferences—like The Hymn Society. These disparate communities have in common the development of a distinctive musical identity that has emerged from the community’s core theology, or has served as a catalyst for the formation of the community, or a combination of the two.

In this sectional, we explore how the interplay of music and theology animates these specific communities, and how an unfolding musical-theological conversation impacts the culture beyond those communities. We examine three broad categories of organization for which the convergence of music and theology is formational: ecumenical communities of practice (including The Hymn Society in the U.S. and Canada), worship communities, and academic communities. The intersection of music and theology informs and shapes each community in distinctive ways. In some instances, theological reflection emerges from the work of musical practice. In others, musical practices have emerged from theological positions. In some contexts, the relationship is either reciprocal or concerns seem to have emerged simultaneously, resulting in a messier relationship. And finally, sites where conversations on theology and music have limited, indirect, or no clear connection to actual practices.