The Belhar Confession and liturgy : a hymnological study

[摘要] Much study regarding the Belhar Confession has been conducted already such as: TheBelhar Confession in its historical context Plaatjies-van Huffel (2014), Chronicle ofConference Barman/ Belhar Consultation 18 and 19 October 2004 Hansen (2005), Agift from heaven-the receptions in the Belhar Confession in the period 1982-2000 andits ecumenical significance today Naudè (2003) and On violence, the Belhar Confessionand human dignity Koopman (2008) to mention but a few. From preliminaryobservations and some initial research, it seems that there is still a need to do an indepthstudy on the liturgical function of the Belhar Confession in Music. The workinghypothesis of this study is if the Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa URCSAuses Belhar more in the liturgy, especially in singing it will have an impact on thecongregations and members. In other words the working hypothesis is that there is alink between liturgy, here specifically hymn singing, and the formation of worshippers. IfURCSA is expecting others to adopt this confession it is its responsibility to embrace itduring worship in church and to the rest of the society outside church vicinities. Theliterature survey that will be carried out later in this study confirms this state of affairsand that there is thus indeed a huge research gap in this regard. The researcher did aliterature study, conducted semi-structured group interviews, as well as the someempirical research in order to explore the basic research question.

[发布机构] University of Pretoria