”I dag skall jag gästa ditt hem.” (Luk. 19:5) : En studie av teologiska förutsättningar för att välsigna hem i Svenska kyrkan

The purpose of this essay is to examine the theological premises within the Church of Sweden for blessing homes. The study is based on theoretical and methodological concepts such as divine presence and divine absence, and employs a content-oriented ideational analysis in combination with theory formation and theory development. The analysis covers the liturgical order for house blessings in the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Finland, the corresponding liturgical order in the Church of Norway, as well as two liturgical orders used in the parishes of Häverö-Edebo and Harbo-Östervåla, both of which contain elements for the blessing or dedication of objects used in church life. The analysis identifies the underlying theological ideas and structures that shape the blessing practices, as well as the consequences these ideas entail. Based on the study of existing liturgical orders for the dedication and blessing of church objects, together with examples of house blessings from other Nordic churches, the essay develops four theoretical models: private prayer, prayer of use, character-altering blessing, and transformative blessing. The results show that there are theological grounds for house blessings within the Church of Sweden, provided that these are understood within the framework of the first three models. The first three models differ in their view of the necessity of a formalized ritual but share an emphasis on God’s omnipresence and the absence of an ontological change. The transformative blessing, on the other hand, appears problematic in a Lutheran context, as it introduces a distinction between the sacred and the profane that lacks support in the theological tradition of the Church of Sweden.