Ok. This will likely come across as offensive to some people, but that is not my intent. I simply need to get something off my chest, and discuss it. I sincerely hope that nobody is offended, and if they are, understand that I am not doing this to condemn or poke, but to express a very legitimate and deep feeling that I feel I have to share.
I have been reading a book called Blue like Jazz, by Donald Miller. I doubt it's circulated among Catholics and EO much. But that aside, it is a brilliant piece of writing.
something in the book struck a cord with me, regarding the religious observances of Christians, and their place in our lives. And the more and more and more I read it, the more I realized one of the primary reasons I simply cannot accept the claims of some of the churches out there, why I could not see myself being what they are, or doing what they do.
and it boils down to liturgical service.
I feel that there is a disconnect between what was, and is. The claim is, hey, this is how Christians always worshipped. They did the divine liturgy, or this mass, or that form. (This is not intended to single out any one church. Each of the liturgical style churches has their own, and belive it to be the right way, and the way it's always been done.)
but looking in the bible, it is a very different picture. We are to imitate Christ, are we not? What do we see there? How they gather? How he taught? It wasn't the same thing, week in, week, out. It wasn't formulaic. It wasn't prescribed. It was esoteric, it was impactful it was INFORMAL. Men and women sitting in the grass while the Master blessed them with heavenly truth. The broken being healed by his hands. Eating together, reclining together, discussing. Inviting sinners to join in on all but the Bread and wine.
IF the claim is true, that the early church worshipped in exactly the same style as they always have, a dramatic, complete, and sudden shift in they way things had been done, must have happened shortly after the ascension. I can't see any other way. To go from footwashings and sharing a meal, or simply praying together in someones home, to candle lighting, censor swinging, Icon carrying methods doesn't happen overnight.
I do not believe that that is how it was done in the early church. I cannot see it. The only think I can conclude is that it developed over time, until a method of religious ritual was settled on, and that it stuck, and that is what continues to this day (with, of course, subtle changes from time to time, but that is a separate issue.)
there, I've unburdened.... now I expect I'll be shouted down for it, but I felt I had to say it.
ciao.
Read the Apologia of Justin Martyr 180 AD instead of some knucklhead who has no concept of Christian history.He explains the Christian Liturgy to the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius, who reigned from 138-161 A.D and how it was passed down by Jesus and the Apostles
For Catholic and Orthodox, our Churches are permeated with the Odor of Sanctity because ours is not only the Worship Prophesied by Malachias, it is the Worship Malachias Prophesied and Perfected by Jesus and He Commanded His Apostles to Worship this way as The Way until the end of time.
At a Catholic Mass/Orthodox Divine Liturgy, it is the action of Jesus, as Priest, Victim, Meal, which is the focus and essence of Worship. In a protestant service, it is solely the action of man - reading and commenting upon scripture and singing hymns and praising God. Now, there is nothing wrong with that. HOWEVER, there IS something wrong in that Our Lord and Saviour has been excised from the exercise. Protestants tells us the works of man are bloody rags. By their own words they are condemned. Their service is solely about the work of man (bloody rags)as the protestant progenitors jettisoned the Sacrifice, Priesthood, Eucharist and rejected Apostolic Succession, Eucharist, Mass etc.
Protestant services are man made and they were created to supplant the Sacrifice of the Mass. Sadly, protestants do not have a Sacrificial Worship. It is, IOW, worship unacceptable to God.
Worship acceptable to God is the Worship Jesus Himself Commanded. His Last Supper/First Mass is the Pluperfect Sacrifice of the New Covenant and it is the Heavenly Banquet of the New Covenant
the 16th century revolutionaries rejected the Sacrifice of the Mass and substituted songs and sermons in its place.
Malchias 1 prophesied a perfect Sacrifice and Oblation - the prot revolutionaries falsified Holy Writ, excised
Sacrifice and
Oblation and substituted words congruent with their non-sacrificial ideology - and Jesus Commanded that Sacrificial Worship via the Eucharist continue until the end of time.
the prot revolutionaries thought Jesus was wrong in Commanding us to Worship God as He Commanded. He had to decrease. They had to increase
A the Lasst Supper, and in the Mass/Divine Liturgy, Jesus, as both priest and victim, offers Himself to God as an act of propitiation and we Redeemed Christians, gathered at the altar with the Ordained Priest, offer our lives - works, joys, sufferings etc - and our Sacrifice, matched with Jesus' PluPerfect Sacrifice is thereby made acceptable to God and innumerable Angels, gathered about the altar, take our Sacrifice to the Altar in Heaven. meanwhile, on the other side of town...songs and a sermon.
The Mass is well framed in the last chapter of Luke:
"their hearts were burning in their breasts as He explained Scripture to them"....and they asked Him to "remain with them" and He answered their request and ... "they recognized Him in the breaking of the bread."
The two parts of the Mass are the reading and explanation of the Scriptures (the Old Testament and/or the Epistles, the Psalms, and the Gospel), followed by words of Consecration and the Breaking of the Bread.
We recognize Him in the "breaking of the Bread" and the reception of his Body, Blood , Soul and Divinty in the Eucharist. In this way, by Word and Sacrament, He fulfills our desire for Him to "remain with us."
And up to this day, He does so, at all hours around all the world.
We had a protestant visitor not too long ago who commented, "I felt as though I was in the book of Revelation, not reading it, but living it, experiencing it".
