Philip Arthur Bence PhD Thesis - Research@StAndrews:FullText

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
On any given Sunday in Great Britain, over 49,000 men
and women'. preach God's Word to congregations with
memberships totalling over 6.9 million persons. 2 These
preaching events possess common features, but the
differences among them remain vast.
St. Andrews, the city in which I work, might be a
typical community. A new student in town could taste the
sermonic offerings in a wide variety of settings.
Denominational affiliation, congregational size, and
building architecture would vary among the Holy Trinity
parish church, the Baptist Church, St. James Roman Catholic
Church, the Gospel Hall, and others.
But, even if, by some miracle of ecumenical
cooperation, denominational labels could be dropped for a
week, and all local pastors preached sermons in the same
building to an equal mix of people from all religious
backgrounds, there would still be an enormous difference
between the Reverends MacGregor, Donaldson, Taylor, and
McLeod. Some of the contrasts one could attribute to the
accidents of nature: age, size, shape, and voice tone.
But behind each of these incidental details lie real
differences in preaching theology and practice. Many
factors contribute to these differences. One such factor,
the homiletic training preachers receive in college or
university, forms the central focus of this study. Another