Methodists: The Challenge of Fortune

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Best & Worst. One reason they listen is that Kennedy is unquestionably among the four or five most dazzling preachers in the U.S. today—an oratorical genius with a commanding baritone, and the pace and timing of a Broadway pro. The bishop is also a stylish and fluent writer whose lectures and 23 books (his latest: For Preachers & Other Sinners) sometimes express complex theological issues as gracefully and clearly as did the works of Anglicanism's late C. S. Lewis. As writer, preacher and bishop, Kennedy is the contemporary Methodist who best seems to express the peculiar quality of his church's active, outgoing faith: pragmatic but perfection-aimed, equally concerned with personal morality and social order, loving discipline yet cherishing freedom. Kennedy calls it "sanctified common sense."

To Bishop Kennedy, the genius of Methodism is uniquely displayed at a General Conference, which he describes as "democracy at its best and worst—the process of a large church trying to find its way." This year's conference, suggests Methodist Layman Charles Parlin, a Manhattan lawyer and a co-president of the World Council of Churches, "might be historic." In twelve brisk days of debate—interspersed with sessions of prayer, preaching and hymn singing—the Methodist legislators are considering petitions and commission reports that could, if accepted, help rekindle much of the church's old zeal. Among the principal issues:

∙WORSHIP. Almost certain to be accepted is a proposed new order of worship that will bring a welcome measure of austere dignity to Methodism's sometimes freewheeling Sunday mornings. In language and spirit, the revised services resemble those contained in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, which Methodism first used. The order takes account of the contemporary liturgical revival by providing a greater variety of seasonal prayers for the Christian year. Last week delegates approved the first new Methodist hymnal in 29 years. The songbook drops some familiar samples of 19th century hymnody, such as Rudyard Kipling's Recessional, which Negro Methodists claim has an unmistakable racial slur in its reference to "lesser breeds without the law." Added are 122 new texts, including such non-Methodist favorites as The Old Rugged Cross and How Great Thou Art. Also new are 91 all-but forgotten hymns by John and Charles Wesley, a number of Negro spirituals (cleansed of dialect wording), tunes and lyrics borrowed from Anglican, Lutheran and Roman Catholic hymnals. But the hymnal committee, Kennedy explained, did draw certain lines: it firmly rejected I Want to Be a Jesus Cowboy in the Holy Ghost Corral.