An investigation into the phenomena and practices of spiritual ...

The extract below from an observation of a healing service illustrates the standardprocess at the beginning of all URC services. The variation in a healing service comesat the end of the service when church attendees are invited to come to the front of thechurch for healing through prayer and the laying of hands.The minister enters from the vestry as the organist plays a musical rendition.He is dressed in black clerical attire. The service starts promptly on time.He welcomes the congregation and introduces the healing service.The minister reads psalms 108:1-6 from the New International Version of the bible (thepew bible) together with the congregation as a call to worship. Part of the regularorder of the service is the call to worship (Jones 2002).The music seen as therapeutic in the URC draws on a different cultural tradition, whichemphasizes a very different style of music. There is a wide body of “complementary”(Campbell 1998) and “new age” (Cottrell 2005) thought which has exaggerated andcapitalised commercially on the tentative scientific work of Tomatis (1991) andRauscher, et al (1993). This provides a secular version of narrative about the practice,therapeutic, cathartic and hypnotic uses of music through history and in most culturesdiscussed by Priestly (1975). Within this tradition Campbell (1998) has actually calledthe alleged therapeutic input “The Mozart effect”.299