Norris compares poetry to worship

"Poetry originates in the oral, as does religion," according to Kathleen Norris, 1995 Whiteside Lecturer and author. Norris compared poetry to worship in her Feb. 2 lecture, "Worship as Poetry: Implications and Incitements," sponsored by Candler School of Theology. She reminded the audience that just as poetry "is best understood when it is heard, that scripture also says that `Faith comes through hearing.'"

Norris, the acclaimed author of Dakota: A Spiritual Geography (Houghton Mifflin, 1994), is also a poet and a lay minister in her home state of South Dakota. In her lecture sprinkled with poetry, she challenged the audience to perceive worship in a fresh perspective. "Poetry is grounded in metaphor; it's ambiguous, troubling to people with literal minds. We think of metaphor as things untrue, but in poetry, metaphor brings things together in a unique kind of truth."

Worship, she said, is also a "metaphorical exchange. It doesn't have much literal meaning." Having been pushed away by the intellectualism of worship and religion, Norris said she was brought back to worship when she stumbled across monastic liturgy. -- Nancy M. Spitler