Why The Leipzig Door?

Dear Friends,

Welcome to the first edition of The Leipzig Door. I am excited about the prospects for this new cyberspace enterprise, and I am honored that you have elected to give it a look.

The Leipzig Door will be a blog for those of us who love the church and, either as a vocation or as an avocation, have given much of ourselves in her service. Some of you, if not most of you, are still serving in the trenches of parish service as a pastor, musician, lay professional, or volunteer. You experience the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. You see the hand of God vividly as you go about the liturgia -the work of worship and witness. You struggle with self-centered leaders and laity, you fight the limitations of financial and physical resources, you bend under the weight of levels of idiocy that are nowhere more onerous or tragic than they are in the Church. Still, you love her, you serve her, and you fight for her.

The Leipzig Door is here to give you a voice. There will be times when we rail in collective frustration and we will call out the Church and (especially) her leaders and exploiters for their sins against common sense, against high ideals, against the Holy Spirit, and against Bach. There will be times when we will seek to offer spiritual encouragement, practical advice, or a funny story that works to get you through the next rehearsal or service.

One of my greatest hopes for The Leipzig Door is that it will be a place where the TRUTH about the church ...its polity, its worship, its music and its leadership... can be told without fear. From my lofty perch as a retired church professional, I can say things that I would never have dared to express so boldly when the needs of my family depended on my bi-weekly alms from a congregation’s bank account. After serving over 30 years in congregations from three of the top five denominational groupings, I am not surprised that mainline churches have lost millions of members in the last quarter-century. It is only by the hand of God that we have anyone left at all. In a small way, The Leipzig Door is here to help reverse that trend.

I hope also that we will have fun with all of this. Many folks in the Church have grown so uptight that they check for devils under the bed before retiring every evening. If you are one of those, you might just find my devilish face staring back at you when you look. I believe that God loves a good story ...if you don’t just check out some parables in the Gospels. I believe that God has a sense of humor ...after all, He did create fundamentalists. I believe that God is not threatened by satire. And, I believe that God loves to have a good time and wants us to join Him in doing so, as evidenced by His creation of Louis Armstrong, baseball, and Pouilly-Fuisse.

One last thing: You may be wondering where the name “The Leipzig Door” came from. In my younger days I considered a call to the ministry before making music my life’s vocation. While taking classes in worship and homiletics, and while hanging with seminary types, I came across an underground newsletter called The Wittenberg Door. That “Door” offered some bold commentary on the things of the Church that both entertained and inspired a younger me. In creating our new blog focused more toward liturgy and music, I imagined the spirit of Johann Sebastian Bach, disgusted with the music and worship of the modern Church, nailing his own protests on the symbolic door of the Church at Leipzig.

So, we are off. The plan is to post a new commentary every Wednesday morning...just in time to get your blood boiling for your weekly rehearsals. Please consider giving us the honor of reading, and please give us the insight of your response.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Bill