Michael Emerson Quotes About Worship

Quotes about: Worship

• It's one of the things we find in these congregations is that they are much more likely to be sort of up-beat worship styles, more likely that people in these congregations say "Amen," maybe get up and dance some, tend to be a little bit more lively than a typical white service would be, but not as lively as a typical black service would be.

  Michael Emerson

  White, People, Black

  Source: www.pbs.org

• So there was great clashes when, you know, if you believe you shouldn't remove your shoes and someone's taking their shoes off, how can they do this? That actually was such a big clash in this case that they had to put a curtain down the middle of where they would worship.

  Michael Emerson

  Believe, Shoes, Worship

  Source: www.pbs.org

• So they actually put it into their mission statement, and they start changing things as a result. They may change how worship works. They may actively recruit folks and try and get them to come and help them to feel comfortable and get them involved in leadership, and there's a variety of ways.

  Michael Emerson

  Trying, May, Way

  Source: www.pbs.org

• And then they would have the shoe removers on one side, and the non-shoe removers on the other side until they could work through coming to understand why we might both be trying to worship authentically, and because of our cultural background we have these different ideas. But it took a while.

  Michael Emerson

  Shoes, Ideas, Trying

  Source: www.pbs.org

• There are three things, and it depends on the group that we're talking about, but there's history, there's culture, and then there's social networks. So, you know, historically black and white, they worship together until about the end of slavery, and people started moving out into separate churches. But it was because of discrimination and racism and such that blacks began to establish their own denominations and their own churches.

  Michael Emerson

  Moving, Black And White, Talking

  Source: www.pbs.org

• I may have to shop with them. But on Sunday I don't want to have to worship with them. I want to be able to just be myself and let my hair down." It's also, of course, as we know, the seat of political organization and the affirming of your blackness and so on.

  Michael Emerson

  Sunday, Hair, Organization

  Source: www.pbs.org

• You find the most in not any particular denomination specifically. It's the style of worship. So if we have what we call a charismatic worship style, that means upbeat music and a more lively style of preaching usually, people are allowed to clap, say "Amen," whether they're mainline Protestant, conservative Protestant, and Catholics, whatever, they're much more likely to be integrated.

  Michael Emerson

  Mean, People, Catholic

  Source: www.pbs.org

• In part because they had no choice, right? If you were a slave, you did what the master said. And they said to worship: "You're going to worship with us."

  Michael Emerson

  Worship You, Choices, Slave

  Source: www.pbs.org

• If you move here from somewhere else, I often think if I move to Germany, for example, or if I move China and I go worship there I will understand and I'll be willing to give up a lot of my culture because I'm in somebody else's homeland. So I'm going to have to act German or Chinese, whatever that might mean.

  Michael Emerson

  Giving Up, Moving, Mean

  Source: www.pbs.org

• So these are the kind of things that now when people are trying to move towards multiracial congregations that they're stressing. They're talking about these scriptures that say we ought to come together, and that at Pentecost, when that the Holy Spirit is said to have come upon the first Christians, they were given the ability to speak in different languages, and so that no matter who the people were, they could all worship together.

  Michael Emerson

  Christian, Stress, Moving

  Source: www.pbs.org

• Now they had to sit in separate places and sometimes they'd even have to sit outside and look through the windows. But they did worship together.

  Michael Emerson

  Together, Looks, Worship

  Source: www.pbs.org

• What happens is sometimes these congregations will still have the white style of worship, even though they're mixed, because folks are willing to give up whatever they may have come with. So it's still quite a stretch for African Americans, yeah.

  Michael Emerson

  Giving Up, White, African American

  Source: www.pbs.org

• So we didn't get the denominations and the separate congregations really till about into Civil War time. What's happened then, of course, is now that we've had well over 100 years of this history to establish separate cultures, different ways of worshipping, and different ways of understanding theology so that when people try to come together makes it very difficult. And then, of course, social networks, you know, how do we find a place to worship?

  Michael Emerson

  War, Years, People

  Source: www.pbs.org

• Absolutely, although every congregation will say, you know, every worship leader will say it's vital. It's very important, but again these are, you know, these are different cultural styles.

  Michael Emerson

  Leader, Style, Important

  Source: www.pbs.org

• If we go into white congregations, non-whites will sometimes say it felt like worship never started. It was sort of dead and didn't feel that warmly received. But so - and there are different realities either way, and it makes it difficult for all groups to try and cross boundaries.

  Michael Emerson

  Reality, White, Trying

  Source: www.pbs.org

• There's a lot of life there, but it's a different sort, because there's a lot less immigrants and a lot more racial, the mix of black and white in particular. I've actually never been to their worship for an extended period of time, so I can't comment wisely on it.

  Michael Emerson

  Black And White, Different, Worship

  Source: www.pbs.org

• Call-and-response style, yes, exactly. So whenever different groups get together then there has to be this long period of negotiation. How will we worship? What's acceptable? What's not? If I want to say "Amen" can I?

  Michael Emerson

  Long, Style, Together

  Source: www.pbs.org

• What sort of difficulties would happen when people of different cultures try to come together to worship? Tiny little things such as let's tell jokes with each other.

  Michael Emerson

  People, Trying, Together

  Source: www.pbs.org

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