Some Short Thoughts on Liturgy

Both Derek of Haligweorc and *Christopher of Bending the Rule have been discussing liturgy lately. They have important perspectives, since they are both academics in communion with the church that have expertise in the history and philosophy of these matters. I look forward to what they have to say. I also recommend a recent piece by Michael Spencer of Internet Monk that looks at similar phenomena from a Low Church perspective (Spencer is a Southern Baptist with Calvinist leanings, so I think it's fair to call him in Low Church if he were transferred into an Anglican context. For instance, much of what he says would be relevant to a Lutheran church I attended last summer.)

But they also have asked for the perspective of intelligent folks of both the lay persuasion in the church sense and the academic sense. Since the closest I get academically to liturgy involves the buoyancy budget of the Red Sea boundary layer (which tells you nothing about proper occasions to sing the Song of Moses), I'll give you a few notes, based on fifteen years as a lector, fourteen years as an usher, fourteen years as an acolyte, nine years as an intercessor, eight years as a chalice bearer, six years as a subdeacon, and five years as a preacher (all of them somewhat discontinuous). (Note: I am 22, and I have reasonably conservative views on liturgy. One way to obstruct the phenomenon discussed in Spencer's article is to prepare older children and teenagers to do "adult" jobs in the liturgy when they're ready and there has been some discernment of their gifts in this area. It makes them part of the tradition. (Frankly, my favorite job relating to liturgy is to cook dinner for folks after Sunday Eucharist. It made me feel like a servant.)

****In English, we go to church services. I occasionally say something called the Office. Lately, I've found it helpful to restore the usage that connects these ideas. What we do at church is Divine Service. This is a usage to amuse Australians, but it has been lost from the mindset of most. So often I hear language that suggests what we do at church is merely done for us. The Eucharist has become "strength for the journey" instead of "Oh, you know, Body and Blood of Christ and all that, participation in the Eschaton, sacrament of the Church. Bagels afterward" (as one of my Orthodox friends puts church). Perhaps, I'm wrong, but there is some important difference there. Now, I could riff on the very word "liturgy" for a while, but let's just say that Aristotle often uses an important form of liturgy as an example, i.e., the arrangement of a big communal and potentially sacrificial banquet. So, yes, there is some suggestion in this that liturgy helps us, but the liturgy of this type is still for the larger community. Liturgy is pro Deo , and to some extent it is pro nobis , but it isn't propter me .

****At first, it's hard to see traditional liturgy in the Bible. Jesus, for instance, did not say (to our knowledge), "Verily, I say unto thee that those who cense the altar shall enter the Kingdom of God before thee." But there a few things I notice Jesus did do that has relevance to liturgy. He read the Scriptures in the synagogue and he preached on the text of the Scriptures. Jesus did not read, "The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound" and then discuss for fifteen minutes that great play he saw at Herod's Theater on Thursday night. Now, I cannot say I have been perfectly faithful to completely Biblical preaching in my time. But I do try to make the Lectionary readings central to what I say. Moreover, I look for the harmony in the readings, in whatever way that can be justified. Hence, the Liturgy of the Word is important. Jesus knew His Bible like the back of his hand (and He didn't even own the latest translation by Vandervan). He almost certainly memorized the Law before the age of 12 based on the readings he had heard in the synagogue. We should aim so high. He also instituted Holy Baptism and Holy Eucharist. No one has tinkered with the Words of Institution in my hearing, but cave glorificator !

“Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, king of the universe, who has made a distinction between the sacred and the profane, between light and darkness, between Israel and the nations, between the Shabbat and six days of work..”

(from the Havdalah ).

These words are prayed at the end of the evening prayer service that closes Shabbat. (I once went to Havdalah. Very cool, the Messiah could come any time...) Now from what we can tell from the Gospels, Jesus acted very much against the viewpoint of this prayer. He associated with profane people. He healed on the Sabbath. He suggested that God actually could stand the Gentiles. For Jesus, it seems, there was no distinction between the sacred and the profane. But think carefully here. Jesus was God. If God is willing to do these things, it seems to mean that the profane ought to be sanctified by the holy. And that's one way of seeing Jesus, the Man-God made his entire life into Divine Service. He made life into liturgy. And He did it so well that the author of Hebrews can say,

But now Christ has come, high priest of good things already in being. The tent of his priesthood is a greater and more perfect one, not made by human hands, that is, not belonging to this created world, the blood of his sacrifice is to be his own blood; not the blood of goats and calves; and thus he has entered the sanctuary once for all and secured an eternal liberation. If sprinkling the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer consecrates those who have been defiled and restores their ritual purity, how much greater is the power of the blood of Christ; through the eternal Spirit he offered himself without blemish to God. His blood will cleanse our conscience from the deadness of our former ways to serve the living God

(Hebrews 9:11-14).

Hebrews says also of the sacrificial tradition established by the Law, "All this is symbolic, pointing to the present time." Christ did not abolish the sacrifices of the Law, He merely fulfilled them by incorporating their symbolic content into the Verity of His Being. And He, having passed through the heavens, continues in such Verity as He did from Eternity. Thus, the Temple worship really is the model for Christian worship. I mean, the present traditions of Judaism, did not receive Christ as we did, but they still structure their synagogue worship around the Temple worship, transferring animal sacrifices to good works, just dealings, and effluent praise to the Most High, for the Old Testament says that's all God really wanted in the first place. Derek has suggested that monastic liturgy really should be our exemplar. He's exactly right in my opinion. The monastics certainly took Temple worship as their model, problematizing themselves simultaneously as the Levitical choirs of the Temple (under Asaph's direction) and as fellows with the angelic choirs. Thus, Christian liturgy seeks to participate in a Temple worship translated to Heaven in which Christ is once and eternally Our Intercessor and our atoning Sacrifice. As Morning Prayer I quotes Hebrews, "Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us."

So bring on the incense! Well, not quite. I am an Anglican and so believe that a diversity of rites can speak to the same verities. Low Church Anglicans have a strong tradition of Psalm singing that must be holy vengeance for the monastic lands their ancestors stole ;) . One does not need lots of glitter to give God the service due to His Name. Now, Texanglican and I disagree strenuously about this, but worshipping in a whitewashed basement chapel does not suggest lack of reverence (though since his critiques, I aided with certain holy and decorative touches to a chapel where the ciborium-looking thing is a utiility box and there was a sewer pipe in the sacristy), but we said our Psalms antiphonally by half-verses. In other words, the Church is the people not the building (and so with worship).

OK, that's the big stuff. Here's some small stuff.

1. The Book of Common Prayer is an awesome book that is useful every day, not just Sundays. Even Baptists use it (Internet Monk, for instance). But its use must be learned and so it must be taught. There's a great Lenten Adult Education series here... If you are printing your liturgy for good wholesome evangelical reasons, please keep as much of the BCP"s formatting as possible for good wholesome formational reasons.

2. Care about the small stuff but don't sweat it. I still may remember how to light triple candlesticks (though it's against Holy Tradition in some places for me to do so). I also remember being taught by one of my Rectors, "The Gospel candle never burns alone." It's a great system. It has interesting symbolic meaning. And I've seen many people do it the "wrong way." I really think God is served not by our principles itself (which by this time are mostly man-made) but by the fact we believe there should be one. I love American representative democracy, but I enjoy reverencing a High Altar and walking backwards down steps as before an Oriental potentate, because Jesus is my King and so I shall not be slave to any mere man.

3. If you're going to be High Church, watch your ventilation. It's great to introduce people to incense, but if you're in a church not designed for it, you will win yourselves few friends by choking the Low Church senior citizens.

4. Responsory prayers can be great. I love Eucharistic Prayer C of Rite II, because it really involves me in the great power of God and my utter incompetence. But saying the closing portion of the Eucharistic Prayer is a little too much. I am not concelebrating. I cannot do fun hand motions. I am not acting in the person of Christ. I also dislike tag team Eucharistic Prayers for the same reason.

5. Finally, because my pet peeves could go on forever, let me remind everyone of a certain rubric from the BCP (also printed in the front of the Hymnal with the relevant citation from Canon 24), "Hymns referred to in the rubrics of this Book are to be understood as those authorized by this Church. The words of anthems are to be from Holy Scripture, or from this Book [BCP], or from texts congruent with them...[From the Canon] [The minister and persons skilled in music he consults] shall see that music is appropriate to the context in which it is used." As much as I love "Love Alone" by Caedmon's Call, I really don't see where it fits in the liturgy though there is some congruency between the lyrics of the song and the Holy Scriptures. I mean even "Loud, Boiling Test Tubes" (I mean "Earth and All Stars") is an homage to Benedicite Omnia Opera (and thus fits well).

OK, those are my seventy-five dollars.

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that thy lips be opened so wide and reverently that they might give such praise to God on earth that the worlds be suffused with them, even to the horns of the altar of the holy city, Jerusalem.