[Urbanstudy] Renu Cherian on city and cherisma

[Sadan]

Dear All,
Find below a posting sent to me by Renu Cherian. She is currently a sarai-csds student stipend. hope you will enjoy reading it.comments and responses should be made either on this list or can be sent directly to Renu on renucherianp at gmail.com
wishes,
sadan.


Hi friends,
This is my first posting. My study analyse how the charismatic movement constructs its own religious space within the community. I have selected a popular Christian Charismatic Movement in Kerala, whose head quarters is at Kottayam town (Kottayam town is also the district head quarters of Kottayam district). I have given fake names in my writing. And I have named the Christian Charismatic Movement as ‘C.H.M’.  Participatory observation and fieldwork were followed for the collection of data. It was an interesting experience for me. Here I am going to share my experiences with you.
Here in my first posting I am presenting a regular worship pattern followed by  ‘C.H.M’. In the coming postings I will discuss more about the performative elements of worship.

‘C.H.M’ has lots of worship centers or churches at main city centers in all over Kerala along with several centres at various parts of the country and outside the country. Two persons started it about 10 years ago; I name them as John and Thomas. They are the main pastors of this movement (The charismatic Figures of the movement). ‘C.H.M’ conduct their worship in a big tents constructed with G.I poles and G.I sheets. Worship is conducted on every Friday and Sunday at daytime. More than thousands of devotees assemble there for the worship in a day. Men, women and children participate in the meetings. Among the worshippers, women are the majority. People from all classes, castes and religion came to worship there. Although people from the lower middle class background, form a significant proportion of the gathering.

A DAYS WORSHIP
[Worship at ‘C.H.M’ church in Kottayam town]

Here I shall demonstrate a regular worship of ‘C.H.M’ to comprehend the pattern that convey out of it. The convention starts at 9a.m with a song. At the beginning, main pastors are not in the stage; junior pastors are initiating the meeting at this time. They give short messages and sing songs. Malayalam and English songs are sung with the accompaniment of musical instruments (drums and organs). People are instructed to wave and clap their hands according to the music. When the mob is in high sprit, one of the main pastors of ‘C.H.M’ appears on the stage. Now he is triggering the meeting. He, after a song, selects a bible portion and starts his message. In traditional Churches, the priest delivers the message by standing still at a place, while here in the ‘C.H.M’ worship the pastor is always moving around the stage, shouting and exhorting the people. The worship is a blend of speeches, songs and prayers. Along with these there are special prayers for the miraculous healing of the affected. All through the worship, the whole mob is actively and emotionally participating. They are crying, shouting, clapping and waving through out the meeting. During the message the main pastor, ask the devotees to give hands to the adjacent one and repeat some statements which are spoken by the leader, or ask some questions, or say some wishes to the person near by. 
Example; 
 “God will relieve you from all of your troubles, and sufferings”
 “Jesus Christ has the power to do many thing.”
Some times the pastor asks the devotees to ask some questions to each other.
 Example
“You please say any one of the blessing which you have received from God during the previous week?”
Both of them will answer the question to each other. This enables an active participation from the devotees.

PRACTICE OF SPEAKING IN TONGUES
During the prayer, devotees are clapping their hands and singing according to the music played. And as the rhythm increases their clapping frequency increases, and they say words, which are not at all familiar to the present society. Some of them utter sounds that resembles to howling. For the devotees, this is holy ritual, called speaking in tongue. While for a layperson it is only crying, shouting and uttering of meaning less words. For gaining the power of tongues, the crowd begins to utter ‘sthothram, sthothram, sthothram”(it is a Malayalam word) which means “glory, glory, glory”. This finally leads to saying of strange words, which they call speaking in tongues.
Example: SHANTHALALA…. SHANTHALALA…
It is meaningless only to those who are outside this worship. However, for those who are participating in the worship and practicing the speaking in tongues, it is meaningful. They consider these words are as the gift of holy sprit. Here the Holy Sprit is considered as the power behind doing all these things. They call it as spiritual awakening, which is the most precious goal of all who approaches the Charismatic movement. Those who experience spiritual awakening have the feeling that they are near to God. And so God will hear their prayers and will fulfill it. Here one can view a kind of extreme confidence in devotees. This hysterical condition is experienced in every meeting. During this highly emotional condition of mind they make prophesies.

PRACTICE OF HEALING
Then comes the time for miraculous healing. During the prayer meeting the main pastor speak out the names of some diseases (example: body pain, arthritis, heart problems, cancer e.t.c) and state that, the person with these diseases are going to be healed at this instant. He then asks those people to stand up. And a lot of sick people stood up. Then the main pastor announces the entire believers to pray for the cure of these persons. He along with the community of believers starts praying. Then the main pastor says that 
“Jesus will touch you now. You are going to be healed at this moment ”
He adds,
“Satan and his bindings are going to be broken. And you are going to be cured     now.”
At this point the mob becomes highly excited. Then after the prayer for miraculous healing, the pastor asks healed one to lift up their hands. We can find that about 85% of the sick were healed. And then the healed ones are invited to the stage to deliver their testimonies.

RECEPTION OF NEW COMERS
The new comers are received in a particular way in the meeting. They are asked to stand up at their places and few members of ‘C.H.M’ reach these persons, embrace them and pray for them. The whole community is also praying for the new comers. Then a card is given to them, which is wished-for to be returned after recording their personal details. 


OFFERTORY
Offertory is taken in the course of the meeting. There is no demand for the offertory. Gathering can give according to their will. The concerned people collect the money. The money is then brought to the stage, and the pastor prays for the offerings and also for the whole community.

EUCHARIST (Holy Communion)
Then the Eucharist is conducted. Bread in trays and Wine in small cups are placed on a table in the stage. After glorifying it by the main pastor, it is distributed among baptized devotees. After theEucharist the pastor prays and thus a regular meeting comes to an end at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. 

Here we can find an important thing that this worship group has no written liturgy, and also the ritual practices or performances don’t follow any regular order.

Here I conclude my brief description of the one days worship.