Anyone up for a chat thread?

[The Liturgist]

Indeed, for the first century or two, it appears the eucharistic prayers were largely improvised by the celebrant and didn't even have a fixed form.

That was a widely held belief in the 1980s and 1990s but lately it has been challenged because of the implications of documents like the Apostolic Tradition and the Strasbourg Papyrus, and also, there is a certain lack of diversity in the number of styles of Eucharistic prayer. Basically, we know of only five: those of the Antiochian variety, which include the Hagiopolitan, Byzantine and Armenian anaphoras, those of the Alexandrian variety, which include the oldest texts we have, those of the East Syriac variety like the aforementioned liturgy of Addai and Mari, the Roman Rite anaphora and its slight derivatives and variants, and the highly variable text of the Mozarabic and Gallican liturgies. Unfortunately the church in North Africa (outside of Egypt) was exterminated in a genocide (including the Chalcedonian Latin speaking churches of what are now Tunisia, Algeria and Morrocco, the Greek speaking church in Libya, and the Oriental Orthodox church of the Numidians), although scholars have been able to reconstruct, for example, the lectionary used by St. Augustine of Hippo from his homilies, but we don’t know how his Eucharistic liturgy compared with that of Rome, for example.

The numerous variants we have among, for instance, the West Syriac anaphoras, are all relatively late variations on older prototypical liturgies, with only the anaphoras of St. Basil, St. James and the Twelve Apostles and their textual variants, including the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, regarded as likely predating the fifth century AD. I would expect less consistency with the older manuscripts and more diversity in the oldest strata of prayers if there was as much improvization as some people were proposing in the 1980s and 1990s. Of course, we don’t know one way or another, and it doesn’t influence our work.

Also you might be interested to know that one of the more interesting ideas that is gaining traction is that the Roman Canon is related to the Alexandrian family of anaphorae, and as evidence for that the supporters point to the fact that the ancient Alexandrian liturgy (which we see in the Strasbourg Papyrus, in the Euchologion of St. Sarapion of Thmuis, and in the Greek Divine Liturgy of St. Mark and the Coptic Divine Liturgy of St. Cyril) has a weak epiklesis preceding the institution narrative, like the Roman canon, and then a strong institution following the institution narrative, which perhaps the Roman canon had at one time.

At any rate, the idea they are related would not surprise me, since in antiquity, the early church regarded Rome, Alexandria and Antioch as the three “Petrine Sees” and the churches of Alexandria and Antioch have a high Petrology (in the case of Alexandria, it is based on the idea of St. Mark as the disciple of St. Peter), and one also finds among the Syriac Orthodox anaphoras a number attributed to or written in honor of Roman bishops who aided bishops highly venerated by the Oriental Orthodox, for example, an anaphora attributed to St. Celestine of Rome, who aided Pope St. Cyril of Alexandria against Nestorius. There are also the well known anaphoras of St. Sixtus and St. Julius and a number attributed to St. Peter, including the Maronite anaphora called St. Peter Sharar, which is particularly interesting as it is an East Syriac anaphora in structure, but being used by a West Syriac church whose liturgy is resoundingly similar to that of the Syriac Orthodox.

For my part, I really am disinterested in what part of the anaphora is actually consecratory, since I believe in the consecration as the main thing, but what I enjoy is the thrill of discovery as one reads the ancient prayers, not just anaphoras, but also other ancient liturgical texts.

Recently, the one major part of the Byzantine Rite lacking from my library because of expense, that being a good twelve volume Menaion, became available online in three editions, along with a vastly superior Octoechos, and additionally, of great benefit since I have been having difficulty handling printed books due to my illness, the versions of the Triodion (the hymnal used from pre-Lent to the Vesperal Divine Liturgy on Holy Saturday morning) and of the Pentecostarion (the hymnal for the period from Pascha to All Saints Day, the Sunday after Pentecost) became available online free of charge, and also my preferred go-to resource for liturgical propers, the legendary “Nasser Five Pounder”, Prayers and Services of the Orthodox Catholic Church by Fr. Seraphim Nasser, became available on a lending basis for print-disabled users such as myself via archive.org, and thus I have been able to re-immerse myself in the gorgeous hymns for the first time in a few years.

The Copts have a superb app that has all of their liturgical propers including the proper hymns, which it arranges automatically, although getting all the features on it enabled costs about $45, which is still much cheaper than the costs of the service books otherwise, some of which have English translations which are incomplete (for example, the translation of the Psalmody).

 

[The Liturgist]

And I would have thought of the ecumenism as a feature, not a bug!

So would I, but there are some, even among denominations who you would think would be open to the idea of using an ecumenical liturgical resource, who disagree, even those from several of the mainline Protestant denominations, for example.

For this reason we don’t even try to do resources for denominations where we don’t have members of those denominations in our group, or former members who still like that denomination. Thus we have a number of Anglicans, and I was an Episcopalian for a year and would join an Anglican or Episcopalian church again, so we have the modular BCP project. We have a Methodist, and I was baptized a Methodist and still like the Methodists, so we have a project proceeding more slowly which aims to expand Wesley’s Sunday Service Book (itself a recension of the 1662 BCP) with propers from later Methodist liturgical texts. We have the current Congregationalist minister of a mission I founded as a Congregationalist mission (I was once with a mainline denomination in that capacity but the Faithful and Welcoming group I realized was pointless, since traditional parishes could simply change affiliations, and that is what was happening, and meanwhile I was deeply unhappy about the advertising campaigns we were running in the mid 2000s, which I felt were divisive and hostile to our more traditional members).

One thing I love about the Episcopal Church is that in much of it mutual respect exists between members who are very traditional and members who are avant garde. For example, in Detroit there is an Anglo Catholic parish which uses the 1928 BCP, which I thought was continuing Anlgican and was genuinely shocked to discover was in the Episcopal Church, and then you have broad church parishes like Old North Church and St. Thomas Fifth Ave, which has the best boys’ choir in the US and one of the four best surviving Anglican boys choirs in the world along with the Chapel Royal, Westminster Abbey and the Chapel of King’s College in Cambridge, and then there are parishes that have some interesting liturgical ideas such as St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church, which is more avant garde than I would be personally comfortable with, but at least they do care about liturgical beauty quite a bit, which I do appreciate immensely.

 

[Shane R]

the lectionary used by St. Augustine of Hippo from his homilies

I modified the epistle reading for this week based on one of St. Augustine's homilies. The Gospel reading is the Lost Son (Luke 15) and St. Augustine expounded it in conjunction with a couple of verses of Romans 11. So I made the epistle Romans 11:22-27.

 

[Deegie]

That was a widely held belief in the 1980s and 1990s but lately it has been challenged because of the implications of documents like the Apostolic Tradition and the Strasbourg Papyrus, and also, there is a certain lack of diversity in the number of styles of Eucharistic prayer. Basically, we know of only five: those of the Antiochian variety, which include the Hagiopolitan, Byzantine and Armenian anaphoras, those of the Alexandrian variety, which include the oldest texts we have, those of the East Syriac variety like the aforementioned liturgy of Addai and Mari, the Roman Rite anaphora and its slight derivatives and variants, and the highly variable text of the Mozarabic and Gallican liturgies. Unfortunately the church in North Africa (outside of Egypt) was exterminated in a genocide (including the Chalcedonian Latin speaking churches of what are now Tunisia, Algeria and Morrocco, the Greek speaking church in Libya, and the Oriental Orthodox church of the Numidians), although scholars have been able to reconstruct, for example, the lectionary used by St. Augustine of Hippo from his homilies, but we don’t know how his Eucharistic liturgy compared with that of Rome, for example.

The numerous variants we have among, for instance, the West Syriac anaphoras, are all relatively late variations on older prototypical liturgies, with only the anaphoras of St. Basil, St. James and the Twelve Apostles and their textual variants, including the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, regarded as likely predating the fifth century AD. I would expect less consistency with the older manuscripts and more diversity in the oldest strata of prayers if there was as much improvization as some people were proposing in the 1980s and 1990s. Of course, we don’t know one way or another, and it doesn’t influence our work.

Also you might be interested to know that one of the more interesting ideas that is gaining traction is that the Roman Canon is related to the Alexandrian family of anaphorae, and as evidence for that the supporters point to the fact that the ancient Alexandrian liturgy (which we see in the Strasbourg Papyrus, in the Euchologion of St. Sarapion of Thmuis, and in the Greek Divine Liturgy of St. Mark and the Coptic Divine Liturgy of St. Cyril) has a weak epiklesis preceding the institution narrative, like the Roman canon, and then a strong institution following the institution narrative, which perhaps the Roman canon had at one time.

At any rate, the idea they are related would not surprise me, since in antiquity, the early church regarded Rome, Alexandria and Antioch as the three “Petrine Sees” and the churches of Alexandria and Antioch have a high Petrology (in the case of Alexandria, it is based on the idea of St. Mark as the disciple of St. Peter), and one also finds among the Syriac Orthodox anaphoras a number attributed to or written in honor of Roman bishops who aided bishops highly venerated by the Oriental Orthodox, for example, an anaphora attributed to St. Celestine of Rome, who aided Pope St. Cyril of Alexandria against Nestorius. There are also the well known anaphoras of St. Sixtus and St. Julius and a number attributed to St. Peter, including the Maronite anaphora called St. Peter Sharar, which is particularly interesting as it is an East Syriac anaphora in structure, but being used by a West Syriac church whose liturgy is resoundingly similar to that of the Syriac Orthodox.

For my part, I really am disinterested in what part of the anaphora is actually consecratory, since I believe in the consecration as the main thing, but what I enjoy is the thrill of discovery as one reads the ancient prayers, not just anaphoras, but also other ancient liturgical texts.

Recently, the one major part of the Byzantine Rite lacking from my library because of expense, that being a good twelve volume Menaion, became available online in three editions, along with a vastly superior Octoechos, and additionally, of great benefit since I have been having difficulty handling printed books due to my illness, the versions of the Triodion (the hymnal used from pre-Lent to the Vesperal Divine Liturgy on Holy Saturday morning) and of the Pentecostarion (the hymnal for the period from Pascha to All Saints Day, the Sunday after Pentecost) became available online free of charge, and also my preferred go-to resource for liturgical propers, the legendary “Nasser Five Pounder”, Prayers and Services of the Orthodox Catholic Church by Fr. Seraphim Nasser, became available on a lending basis for print-disabled users such as myself via archive.org, and thus I have been able to re-immerse myself in the gorgeous hymns for the first time in a few years.

The Copts have a superb app that has all of their liturgical propers including the proper hymns, which it arranges automatically, although getting all the features on it enabled costs about $45, which is still much cheaper than the costs of the service books otherwise, some of which have English translations which are incomplete (for example, the translation of the Psalmody).

Thanks for all this. It's a good day when I can learn something new and you've given me many good days!

I would think the later dating of Ap Trad might actually bolster the hypothesis of improvised prayer in the first century or two, wouldn't it? Plus we have Justin Martyr's lines about the presider just praying "at length" and "according to his ability". Other than the Didache (which, as you noted, is a tricky one), we just don't have any extant anaphorae from before, what, the fourth century? Some of this stuff is impossible to piece together and we definitely have to hold our conclusions lightly.

Harkening back to our previous conversation about epiclesis and institution narratives, I'm using the version of Addai & Mari from PEER and I don't see an institution narrative in there. And Johnson elsewhere argues that the epiclesis is a later addition (as was the Sanctus). But I'm way over my head here and just relying on what I've read from others.

 

[Deegie]

and then there are parishes that have some interesting liturgical ideas such as St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church, which is more avant garde than I would be personally comfortable with, but at least they do care about liturgical beauty quite a bit, which I do appreciate immensely.

I will just say that I very much appreciate your grace in speaking of a liturgical practice that many find distasteful. Thank you!

 

[The Liturgist]

Harkening back to our previous conversation about epiclesis and institution narratives, I'm using the version of Addai & Mari from PEER and I don't see an institution narrative in there.

The version in Prayers of the Eucharist, Early and Reformed is taken from ancient liturgical manuscripts which lack diaconal responses, which make it harder to see, and even if you have a version with the diaconal responses, the narrative is spread right across the text, to paraphrase Pope Benedict XVI (who one would assume was using the current text of the Assyrian Church of the East, which lacks the words of institution, and the text of the Chaldean Catholic Church, which has the words of Institution).

I would also note that The Eucharistic Liturgies is a newer volume, also edited by Bradshaw and Johnson, that is somewhat more reliable, but I prefer Brian Spinks, Do This In Remembrance of Me, or, The Oxford History of Christian Worship, as far as that style of material is concerned, but even then, that particular format tends to involve more abbreviation than might be preferable.

Johnson’s opinions on this and others were of some interest but no longer reflect the latest thought - where Bradshaw and Johnson remain vibrantly useful is in curating collections of articles by other scholars. In their attempt to reconstruct the history of the early Eucharist before the oldest manuscripts of serviceable liturgical prayer they do offer interesting insights, but the territory is hypothetical and I feel their desire to reach conclusions may have at times exceeded what is actually indicated.

For example, if we take what St. Justin Martyr wrote, it could imply ex tempore prayer, but then, the phrase “according to his ability” is problematic, because it is quite vague - if read that way, it also would imply some were better than others. And if that is the case, it is helpful to remember that in much of the church, the liturgy was always sung (except in Rome, and of course St. Justin is a Latin saint, but what I say does not apply outside the Pomerium, where the liturgy was chanted as monody until antiphonal song was introduced in Milan by St. Ambrose and taken up gradually by the Roman church, but it was not until the reign of Pope St. Gregory Diologos, also known as St. Gregory the Great, who sought to import the eight mode system of chant in use in Constantinople, that the Roman Rite begins to resemble what it is today musically. However even with monody cantorial skill is a factor. But it is also possible that St. Justin is using the phrase to mean “according to his ability” in the sense that the celebrant is able to conduct the liturgy.

We do know that the early liturgies were long, and we do know that prior to the emergence of the Roman Missal service books tended to only contain the parts of the service to be prayed or sung by their intended user, which interestingly remains the case in the East, in that the hieratikon, euchologion or sluzhbenik as they are known in Slavonic usually does not contain the hymns of the liturgy, and conversely those books containing the hymns such as the unabbreviated horologion tend to lack the priest’s part. Indeed in the Syriac Orthodox, Ethiopian Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic Church, Byzantine Catholic / Eastern Orthodox and Assyrian Church of the East, there are several different books that different people use, for the liturgy as well as the Office, and only the Byzantine/EO and Armenian rites have a central book, the Typikon, and in the Armenian case a word that can be translated as “directory,” that act as central references controlling the use of the other books.

Most of our oldest surviving books are written by and for bishops, such as the Apostolic Tradition of St. Hippolytus, the Euchologion of St. Serapion of Thmuis, and the Apostolic Constitutions. It does not follow that everything not in the book was ex tempore, but conversely we do know that various divergent forms of the liturgy emerged in that era and it is possible that these forms were the result of ex tempore experimentation, but there is not enough to say.

For my part, since I don’t embrace the view that the liturgy becomes encrusted over time with material that should be removed, and also regard its development as enrichment, and for this reason I greatly appreciate most of the additional content in the 1979 BCP, in Common Worship, and in Enriching Our Worship, Vol. 1, I am most interested in the liturgy as it is used or has been used relatively recently. The 86 anaphorae of the Syriac Orthodox Church are not museum pieces and were all in active use at least until the genocide in 1915 and the subsequent diaspora of much of the surviving population.

In the case of Eastern Orthodoxy and Anglicanism I think we are in a golden age in terms of the availability of texts, although I am concerned about the loss of boys choirs and indeed the decreased attendance of youth in some Anglican jurisdictions and hope to see those trends reversed - separately, girls choirs have proven very successful. But either way, youth are needed. We have youth in Eastern Orthodoxy, but most of them are serving in the altar rather than in the choir, but in the Oriental Orthodox churches, this is not the case, in that they either form part of the choir, or function in both roles (in the Syriac Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox and Assyrian churches all clergy sing and priests and deacons are greatly valued for their singing ability).

Indeed I was ar St. Ephrem’s cathedral in Burbank once when Fr. Abdullahad Shara, memory eternal, and another elderly priest who recently retired, concelebrated the liturgy, and then in the parish hall, after many people had left, serenaded those of us who were still there with some splendid Syriac hymns, which they sang as a duet, which was amazing. Likewise Fr. Raphael Hanna, memory eternal, of St. Mark’s Coptic Orthodox Cathedral in Los Angeles had an amazing singjng voice. Both reposed in the past three years.

 

[Shane R]

Fellow clergy, how often do you tweak or change the lectionary? I find myself doing so 2 or 3 times a year. It's usually me extending a lesson. But occasionally I will make a substitution. I think this is because my former bishop used to say, "It's okay to change the lectionary here and there, maybe a couple times, but you need to give me a good reason for changing it regularly."

 

[Paidiske]

I haven't really kept records. There are a few things where we get creative; this parish was created by amalgamating two pre-existing parishes, and we always observe the Sunday closest to the anniversary as "Unity Sunday" (very much a work in progress, after nearly thirty years, that unity thing). If we're doing something on stewardship or some other particular focus that's not provided for in the lectionary I'll choose suitable readings. But I'd say that we're probably sticking to the lectionary without tweaking, more than 45 Sundays a year.

I've never heard my bishop articulate an opinion on that particular question, here. And my thinking is that if I don't ask, he won't tell me something I don't want to hear!

 

[Deegie]

I would guess I change the lectionary perhaps once a year at most. And it's always extending a reading and never swapping one out. But I wouldn't be entirely opposed to it if the need arose.

 

[Shane R]

My former rector under whom I served as deacon and curate prophesied that I would eventually be a bishop. I've been ordained for nigh on 8 years and turn 40 next month. Hasn't happened thus far but if there's one thing the Continuing churches are good at, it's consecrating unnecessary bishops.

 

[Paidiske]

Forty? You've got plenty of time!

 

[Shane R]

Forty? You've got plenty of time!

My old priest, Scott Seely, was consecrated a bishop short of 40. He was 39 when the Nigerians laid hands on him. They made him go to Nigeria for 2 or 3 weeks for the consecration. He serves in one of the dioceses that folded into ACNA.

 

[Shane R]

Someone got overly exuberant with the heating controls today and were trying to make me pass out. I was having to wipe my brow with a lavabo towel I wasn't using for the Communion. The church I was serving today actually has windows that open but they just got the place painted and weren't trying to have spring pollen blowing in.

 

[Paidiske]

We're coming into pleasant autumn weather here after a long, baking summer. None of my churches have cooling, so it's a relief not to feel like the vestments are my own personal sauna.

 

[RileyG]

We're coming into pleasant autumn weather here after a long, baking summer. None of my churches have cooling, so it's a relief not to feel like the vestments are my own personal sauna.

Wow! Are the Church buildings older? That surprises me!

 

[Paidiske]

Wow! Are the Church buildings older? That surprises me!

I have three churches, and two of them are quite old (in Australian terms). The more recent is about fifty years old.

But in Australia, even fifty years ago, I think air conditioning was seen as something of a luxury. (In fact, I don't think any church I've worked in has had air conditioning). And when you have churches which are anxious about spending any money, it's easy to decide that you can get by with opening the windows or turning on a fan for an hour.

More than once I've had to call an ambulance for someone who's collapsed in the heat, though.

 

[RileyG]

I have three churches, and two of them are quite old (in Australian terms). The more recent is about fifty years old.

But in Australia, even fifty years ago, I think air conditioning was seen as something of a luxury. (In fact, I don't think any church I've worked in has had air conditioning). And when you have churches which are anxious about spending any money, it's easy to decide that you can get by with opening the windows or turning on a fan for an hour.

More than once I've had to call an ambulance for someone who's collapsed in the heat, though.

Oh wow! I wasn’t aware of that at all!

 

[Tigran1245]

I have three churches, and two of them are quite old (in Australian terms). The more recent is about fifty years old.

But in Australia, even fifty years ago, I think air conditioning was seen as something of a luxury. (In fact, I don't think any church I've worked in has had air conditioning). And when you have churches which are anxious about spending any money, it's easy to decide that you can get by with opening the windows or turning on a fan for an hour.

More than once I've had to call an ambulance for someone who's collapsed in the heat, though.

I have a question. What proportion of income should each Anglican parish usually pay to the diocesan administration?

 

[Paidiske]

I have a question. What proportion of income should each Anglican parish usually pay to the diocesan administration?

That's a matter of diocesan policy, and would vary greatly. In most dioceses, more wealthy parishes would pay a higher proportion, and struggling parishes would pay less, or perhaps even receive support.

It also depends on how big a diocese is (as in, how many parishes); how wealthy in terms of land holdings and endowments; and so on.

 

[Shane R]

I have a question. What proportion of income should each Anglican parish usually pay to the diocesan administration?

The usual guidance for parishes was 10 + most or all of the travel costs for an episcopal visit. Where things got more complicated was missions. Missions were asked for 3 or what they could afford. However, there was a policy, official or unofficial I do not recall, to let them be duty free for 1-2 years after the launch.