Silencing the Preacher: The Use of Silence During Post-Disaster Sermons
Abstract
This thesis examines the helpfulness of using silence during the sermon immediately following a disaster. It tests an adaptation of Paul Scott Wilson’s The Four Pages of the Sermon, which adds a period of silence which allows people to express their narrative on “page two” and a period of silence which allows people to experience God’s hope on “page four.” The action/reflection model was used to test this sermon form in five congregations which had experienced disasters in the past to determine the helpfulness of periods of silence during the sermon.
This paper has been withdrawn.