All of Creation Rejoices

Book Review: A Practical Handbook for Divine Services

2012-01-24T15:07:00.001Z

Last Spring, Holy Trinity Publications, (the publishing arm of the monastery in Jordanville), made available A Practical Handbook for Divine Services. This is really a compilation of detailed instructional notes for the priest and deacon (with a few notes for servers) at Vespers, Matins, and the Divine Liturgy in the Slav-Byzantine tradition, penned by the late Abbot Gregory (Woolfenden), a priest and liturgical scholar from the northwest of England. A number of the clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate's Diocese of Sourozh, to which Fr Gregory once belonged, remember these and other liturgical notes with gratitude, for Fr Gregory used to hand them out at diocesan clergy meetings, and many a new clergyman would have been lost without them.

I bought a copy of this book last summer and found it immensely helpful in understanding some of the actions of the priest and deacon at our divine services. It is particularly helpful to me as somebody who, while knowing the general roles, does not have much experience of services at which a deacon is present and serving. Despite the fact that our services rely heavily on the deacon and can seldom be offered fully without one, the reality is that most Orthodox people - clergy and laity alike - are unaccustomed to having a deacon present, and when one is fulfilling his duty, it shows: priests who are accustomed to doing everything themselves forget where the end of their role lies and where that of the deacon begins (or perhaps, due to having served only a short diaconate, they never learnt in the first place), choirs forget (or are possibly unaware of) the different responses and methods that are employed when the Liturgy is served with a deacon, and so forth.

This is but one of a number of difficulties that would be ironed out with clear instruction, and Fr Gregory's handbook certainly provides this. He establishes some general principles before following through the daily cycle of services step by step, detailing with immense clarity everything from vesting, reverences, prayers, censings, right up until the dismissal. Where there are variations in practice, these are mentioned in the appendices so as not to clutter the text and confuse the reader unnecessarily. Each section has its own appendix (which is really a collection of what would usually be footnotes but which are so extensive that they would overtake the page if included underneath the main text). There is even a section for the Liturgy of the Pre-Hallowed Gifts, of which many clergy in the missions have little experience and which is often not served outside of cathedrals, monasteries, and larger city parishes. All in all, I think this is a necessity for English-speaking clergy to learn or to refresh their memories, and for anybody seeking better comprehension of the ceremonial actions of the services.

Having said that, this work is not without its critics, and there are those clergy who are knowledgeable about Russian liturgics who claim that the book bears some inaccuracies. I am no expert so can only speculate as to the nature of these disagreements, although I, myself, have spotted two points on which my experience and reading differ from Fr Gregory's direction. They may simply reflect regional variations in practice (Russia is not a tiny place, and the young church of the diaspora was made up of people from many areas who took different customs with them).

Of course, the differences may also be due to the author's past as a Uniate priest. Readers may be aware that, after many centuries of latinisation, the eastern-rite churches subject to Rome have been encouraged by two successive popes (Messrs Wojtyla and Ratzinger) to return to their eastern roots, both in terms of liturgics and devotional culture. In some churches, such as the Ukrainian Greek Catholic church, of which Fr Gregory was a priest before becoming Orthodox, this has taken the form of a return in many areas to the precise letter of the typikon, even on points where living Orthodox custom has developed beyond that. Therefore, in videos from the fascinating church of St Elias in Canada, for instance, we witness practices that are only to be found in rubrics in most of the Orthodox Church: the two choirs joining and parting at specific times, deacons fanning the Gifts throughout the Anaphora, censings performed in a cross-wise fashion, and so forth. Perhaps Fr Gregory's notes reflect the typikon on other points that are less obviously no longer followed. Again, this is merely speculation on my part.

Whatever the differences may be, surely they can only be minor, and any points requiring clarification can be referred to the bishop for his direction. Whatever disagreements there may be, I am certain that the Church in the English-speaking world, where many of the traditional means of training the clergy are difficult to encounter, is better off with this book than without it, and that we ought to be grateful for Father Gregory's labour of love.

May his memory be eternal!

Jesus Christ!

2012-01-22T20:30:00.000Z

At the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
- Philippians 2:1-11

Why do people use the name of the Saviour as an expletive? And why do they think it acceptable to do this, particularly in conversation with Christians?

The Saviour's name is held in such high regard among Christians that many terms used by us to refer to Him stem precisely from not wishing to utter the name of Jesus casually. So we say things like "the Lord", "Our Lord", "Christ", "the Saviour", and such like, all out of reverence for the Holy Name. Indeed, in the Western tradition, there is a holy day in the Church calendar set aside for honouring The Most Holy Name of Jesus, and indeed, the people bow their heads during services when it is uttered in prayers. So when we hear this holy name being cheapened, used commonly and sacrilegously, it is offensive in the extreme, and I wince every time I hear somebody exclaim 'Jesus!' as an expression of surprise, frustration, or anger.

Then there are the variants. "Jesus H. Christ" is bad enough a distortion but the first time I heard somebody say 'Jesus f***king Christ!', my mouth fell open in disbelief.

Why do people do it?

I understand that most people who do this may not be Christians, but quite aside from the question of whether they believe in the Saviour and have a personal reverence for his holy name, there is the simple matter of basic good manners. Since when is it socially acceptable to take something that is sacred and revered in somebody else's religion and degrade it in conversation with that person? It simply shows contempt for the sensibilities of others. Surely well-bred people, even if they do not believe in God, have some respect for others.

Please tell me I haven't got that wrong as well.

New Western Rite Website

2012-01-22T19:30:00.002Z

The British missions and study societies of ROCOR's Western Rite Vicariate, having placed themselves under the protection of the Mother of God in her title of Our Lady of Glastonbury, have a new website.

I like it. It is clean and attractive, informative but not overwhelming, and sets the tone just right to engage people without scaring them off. I hope and pray that it bears fruit. Certainly, my own parish has found that most of the people who have come to us recently learnt of us through our website so this sort of online presence is essential to Orthodox mission in our technological age.

Respectability and Conscience (or "A Good Kick up the Bum")

2011-09-03T19:35:00.000+01:00

Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.
- Matthew 7:13-14

As has been made clear from recent posts to my blog, I far prefer Google+ to Facebook. For a while I used both but found juggling two social networking websites to be tedious and distracting so now my online social networking focuses primarily on G+. Many of my FB "friends" (both real friends and online contacts who are categorised as such by FB) have not made the transition, and a number of them cite their establishment on Facebook as the main reason. They already have Google accounts which they use for Google services: Gmail, Blogger, and Youtube, among others. Yet Facebook is where their groups are, where they chat, where most of their friends are. They have an attachment because of that so will not transfer to Google+ even though some of them like it.

My intention here is not to speak about social networking websites. However, the aforementioned situation has got me to thinking about faith in God and our ecclesial affiliations. Of course, the two are not directly analogous - the salvation of one's soul is not comparable to preference of one form of electronic communication over another, particularly when the matter of electronic communicaton is really of little significance in the grand scheme of things - yet I do wonder how often our attitude of preferring comfort and familiarity over what we know to be better is transferred to matters of principle, conscience, and even our eternal salvation.

This is not intended as a condemnatory post but it will perhaps be a somewhat forthright one. It stems from my own musings in recent weeks due to certain internal questionings of my own, and if there is any sense of condemnation it applies to me first. Please bear with me.

I first became aware of this in myself when I began hearing a call to Orthodoxy. As an Anglican, I had grown up being taught the branch theory of Christian ecclesiology - a theory that teaches that different ecclesial groups holding to varying and even contradictory doctrines and which are out of communion with each other, nonetheless constitute various "branches" of the Church of Christ, provided that they retain certain common factors, (the list of which varies from one adherent of this branch theory to the next). I had also been taught that the Church of Rome was the continuation of the original Church, from which the Orthodox and later, the Anglicans had separated. As I began to look at history and read of the changes in doctrine, I came to realise that, contrary to what I had previously understood, it was Rome that had separated from the Orthodox Church, itself the original Church of the Apostles. However, since I had no reason to doubt the branch theory, this was of little consequence. It was only in 2004, when I began to explore ecclesiology in light of accusations thrown to and fro between the warring factions of Anglo-Catholicism, that I slowly began to understand the nature of communion, of what it is to be in communion and therefore the Church, and the true implications of heresy and schism.

After that, I continued to read and discuss Orthodox theology, to pray Orthodox prayers, and occasionally go to Orthodox services. Yet it was nearly a year later that I eventually asked for baptism, and only because an agnostic with a Lutheran background and Roman Catholic leanings told me that he had got fed up of me talking about becoming Orthodox and wished that I would just get on and do it. Why? Why did I take so long? Why, having arrived at the realisation that I was unbaptised and outside the Church, and that I had never received the sacraments, did I wait for nearly a year to do anything about it?

Well, I can tell you why. I had become a slave to officialdom, comfort, and establishment, and this culture was far more deeply entrenched and much more difficult to shake off than any doctrinal belief that contradicted Apostolic Christianity. I was in the Church of England. I belonged to the state church, it was known to even those who had no care for religion, and there was a certain respectability that went along with it. It was also easy: there was a parish church every couple of miles, clergy were generally readily available (at least in suburban areas such as where I lived), and a church building with all of the infrastructure of parish life in situ was more or less guaranteed, (certainly a parish without a building was the exception). I knew people in various parishes - particularly on the Anglo-Catholic circuit - and they knew me, and I had even been on the official path to exploring ordination, known to various priests and bishops.

By contrast, Orthodox parishes were few and far between, difficult to get to, and many worshipped in private homes or borrowed buildings, often having to set up the church and take it all down again Sunday by Sunday. They were not very well established, clergy were rare, services were not always weekly and I didn't really understand them anyway, and being part of those parishes meant working for the things that could be so easily taken for granted in my then current home. Then there was the fact that nobody really seemed to know what the Orthodox Church was. Many had never heard of it, thinking it to be Jewish or something else that wasn't Christian. Those who had heard of it ignorantly thought it was only for Russians and Greeks, and that there was no place for a Briton in Orthodoxy. To top it all off, I would go from being well known and liked to being nobody. Nobody in the Orthodox Church had any idea who Michael Astley was. Although I knew that Orthodoxy was true, I used all of these things as excuses for staying away from Christ, deciding to live as best I could in an Orthodox way within a structure that I did not believe to be the Church - something I knew from the start to be disingenuous.

Sunday by Sunday, I would go to the mass, knowing in my heart that it was no Mass. I would decline to receive the eucharistic bread and wine, questioning in my heart what it was and what I was doing there. My lapsed Lutheran online acquaintance came along just at the right time, and I was made a catechumen in September of 2005 (on the feast of the miracle of the Holy Archangel Michael at Colossae), and baptised into the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church on the Sunday of the Prodigal Son the following year. It was a time of great excitement and radiant spiritual joy. Now my life in Christ has settled into something more normal: it has its ups and downs, and I struggle along, as do we all. Sometimes, that excitement comes back to me, particularly when some quotation from a Saint or some interaction with another person shows something to me of the love of Christ, and mostly, when I am present at the Divine Liturgy.

Now, people come to me. They say things to me about their own explorations of Orthodoxy and other confessions, and I sometimes see in them what I recognise in myself from 2004/2005. As I listen to what they say, it becomes clear that they know in their hearts where they need to be but they have become slaves to comfort, familiarity, and establishment, placing these things above that still, small voice that calls them into the saving bosom of the Church. So some Anglicans tell me about their disappointment with the current state of affairs in the Church of England, while others do not care so much because they have come to realise that the bigger issue is schism, and that this is no basis for the Christian life, whatever the branch theorists may have told them in their childhood. They may go to Orthodox pilgrimages or occasional vigil services, develop a small collection of Orthodox books, and even buy prayer ropes and say the Jesus prayer, all the while, going to their Anglican churches week by week and crying in their pews or at the communion rail, either out of upset or frustration. Some of them, having left behind the branch theory but having embraced some sort of "two lungs" understanding, have reached a point of action, and decided to leave. Yet, not having been properly grounded in scriptural, patristic, and ecumenical (in its true sense) ecclesiology, they cling to this common Anglo-Catholic hankering after Rome. Therefore, presented with the choice between the largely unknown saving Church of Christ whose local manifestation has all of the practical difficulties mentioned two paragraphs back, and an heretical pseudo-church which has buildings, a prolific pope, established infrastructure and parish life, and organisational cohesion, a familiar worship style, not to mention (perhaps most importantly of all) respectability in the Anglo-Catholic circles in which they have moved for their whole lives, they choose the latter and become Roman Catholics. They may have fulfilled the Anglo-Catholic dream but it is at the expense of truth, and they find themselves as much outside the Church as they were before, having endured that upheaval for the sake of respectability - a quality that may win them admiration in some earthly quarters but which does not impart that divine grace which brings salvation.

For what profit is it to a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man will come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.
- Matthew 16:26-27

The list of new-martyrs (those who died at the hands of persecuting civil authorities) in the Church calendar is astounding. These are those who were given the option to forsake Christ and lead a calm and quiet life of social acceptance and respectability, but who defied what was affirmed by the majority as normal, choosing instead to take up the Cross of Christ, facing persecution, torture, and death, and ultimately achieving union with the Holy and Undivided Trinity through the uncreated and life-giving grace of God. I do not think that I go too far in saying that, when we claim with our lips to profess Christ but in our actions choose the easy option of social comfort and personal familiarity at the expense of what is true and holy, (and most of us have done it at one time or another), we betray the blood of those martyrs and may as well spit on their relics. This is no small matter.

I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of my mouth. Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked—I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on my throne, as I also overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the Churches.
- Revelation 3:15-22

Aside from the aforementioned enquirers, there are others who, Anglican or otherwise, seem to love Orthodoxy but remain outside the Orthodox Church, hiding a selection of the above excuses behind a veil of not yet having reached a point of personal agreement with every single doctrinal point, (taking an individualistic approach to communal faith). Others may be gay or otherwise unmarried and involved in active sexual relationships, and use integrity as an excuse for staying outside the Church: "I love the Orthodox Church but I cannot profess all of that knowing that part of my life contradicts it". Or indeed there may be a host of reasons why people who might otherwise be Orthodox give for not taking that final step.

Well, so what? I didn't agree with everything the Orthodox Church teaches when I became Orthodox. As an Anglican, in all of the arguments about human sexuality and the ordination of women, I fell on the liberal side of the debate. On matters of Scripture, I would have laughed at anybody who told me that Moses wrote all of the Pentateuch (especially those bits that recount events that took place after his death) or that Adam and Eve were historical people. Yet, that wasn't really the point. The Orthodox Church was the Church and I had to be part of it. I had to be baptised, dying to my old self and rising from the font a new creature, grafted into the Body of Christ. Academic understandings could be sorted out later, from my vantage point of being within the Church, surrounded by the light of its Mysteries and its Tradition, rather than fumbling in the dark outside. Even today, I cannot say that I am 100% at peace with Orthodox understanding of all of these or other matters, but that's ok. I have left behind my past home where some of these things were at the heart of arguments and where anybody who didn't have a definitively worked-out position was branded an unthinking sheep. I am not a Protestant: my understanding of Truth does not depend solely on my own reasoning, and I can afford to simply be obedient to the Church's teaching, deepening my grasp of it through study and prayer, in my own time, and without external pressure to always have answers.

After all, we all suffer the effects of the Fall in one form or another. The Church is a spiritual hospital, where we seek to overcome these effects at the hands of experienced physicians, who prescribe the appropriate spiritual medicine for us, over time, that we may grow into health and fullness of life in Christ. To cite temptation to sin and prideful disagreement with Church doctrine as reasons not to enter the Church is like citing sickness as a reason not to go to hospital. Yet who has ever heard of a hospital that insists that people must stand outside and get better before they can be admitted as patients? The Orthodox Church is not made up solely of Saints. We are called to be holy but it is only through life in Christ's Church that we are made so.

'Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means: "I desire mercy and not sacrifice." For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.'
- Jesus Christ (Matthew 9:13b)

We are all sinners when we start off, and I know that I have remained so but I'm not about to walk away for that reason, however uncomfortable the struggle may seem at times, and to anybody who has spent some time teetering on the edge of Orthodoxy but hasn't made the leap, and who has survived reading this far without becoming bored or too affronted to continue, I urge you to consider the reasons for your own inertia and ask yourself whether they justify your continued separation. Do not answer here - nobody is accountable to me. Rather, when you are in your own company - not in the midst of a conversation with anybody about matters of faith or anything else, but when you are alone - in the stillness of your own private thoughts, ask yourself that question, examine your heart, and answer yourself honestly. For some, I know that it is not so easy. For many, it is not simply a matter of comfort, as housing and income may be linked to one's ecclesial affiliation and this presents problems, but for most people this is not the case, and you know what you need to do.

We are called to be martyrs in this world, to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Christ. Sometimes that means losing our current social circles, losing our reputation and status, having to learn an unfamiliar rite, worshipping God according to a calendar that is not in step with that followed by the world, and doing a whole host of other things that make life just that little bit less comfortable, that make us appear strange, and that cause the world and even those in our past homes to laugh at us or reject us, but it has ever been thus, and if we do take up the Cross of Christ, what we will find is that the rewards, even in this life, make it truly worthwhile.

Status, knowledge, reputation, physical comfort: these worldly things are fleeting. Monastics leave behind their friends and family, avoid weddings and even sometimes their own families' funerals, shed their surnames with the status and heritage that it entails, and focus purely on their salvation. We in the world may not always live up to that full angelic ideal but we must always bear in mind the ultimate purpose of our life, and not withdraw from it or make do with something less for reasons that have nothing to do with God, grace, and salvation.

'We see the water of a river flowing uninterruptedly and passing away, and all that floats on its surface - rubbish or beams of trees - all passes by. Christian! So it is with our life... I was an infant, and that time has gone. I was an adolescent, and that too has passed. I was a young man, and that is also far behind me. The strong and mature man that I was is no more. My hair turns white, I succumb to age, but that too passes away; I approach the end and will go the way of all flesh. I was born in order to die. I die that I may live. Remember me, O Lord, in thy Kingdom!'
- St Tikhon of Voronezh

The Procession of the Cross

2011-08-10T12:55:00.003+01:00

This coming Sunday (the 1st of August by the Church calendar) is the feast of the Procession of the Cross in the Byzantine Rite. It is one of the few occasions in the year when, at the Divine Liturgy, the Trisagion is replaced by the hymn:

Before thy Cross we bow down, O Master, and thy Holy Resurrection we glorify!

This feast has not fallen on a Sunday since I have been Orthodox, and, being part of a small mission parish with a working priest, I have never celebrated this feast in Church. Indeed, despite knowing of its existence in the calendar of the Church, I have never really known what it is about. So, in preparing this Sunday's Liturgy, I thought I would do a little exploration. Here is the explanation of the feast by one Fr S. Janos, taken from my Holy Trinity calendar iPhone app:

In the Greek Chasoslov (Orologion) of 1897 is explained thus the derivation of this feast: "By reason of the sicknesses, often everywhere occurring in August, from of old customarily it was done at Constantinople to carry out the Venerable Wood of the Cross along the roads and streets for the sanctifying of places and for the driving away of sicknesses. On the eve (31 July), carrying it out from the imperial treasury, they placed it upon the holy table of the Great Church (in honour of Saint Sophia – the Wisdom of God). From this feastday up to the Dormition of the Most Holy Mother of God, making litia throughout all the city, they then placed it forth for all the people to venerate. This also is the Issuing-forth of the Venerable Cross". In the Russian Church this feast is combined also with a remembrance of the Baptism of Rus', on 1 August 988. In the "Account about the making of services in the holy catholic and apostolic great church of the Uspenie-Dormition", compiled in 1627 by order of the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus' Philaret, there is provided suchlike an explanation of the feast: "And on the day of the procession of the Venerable Cross there occurs a church-procession for the sanctification of water and for the enlightenment of the people, throughout all the towns and places". Knowledge of the day of the actual Baptism of Rus' was preserved in the Chronicles of the XVI Century: "The Baptism of Great-prince Vladimir of Kiev and all Rus' was on August 1". In the practice now of the Russian Church, the service of the Lesser Sanctification of Water on 1 August is done either before or after Liturgy. Together with the Blessing of Waters, there is made a Blessing of Honey (i.e. first-honey for the Saviour: "Saviour of the Water", "Saviour Moisture" [apparently in place of the vinegar and gall offered Him on the Cross?]). And from this day the newly harvested honey is blessed and tasted.

While August may no longer be a time particularly associated with various ailments, there is no time that our souls and bodies are not in need of healing, and when due honour is not due to the Saviour and the precious and life-giving Cross on which He died, and now that the Cross has become for Christians a sign of life rather than death, I particularly love the offering of sweet honey as a replacement and even a reparation for the bitter gall.

So I have purchased my honey and I thoroughly look forward to this Sunday, urging as many of you as possible to join in this celebration.

Why choose Google+ over Facebook?

2011-07-27T19:56:00.008+01:00

This is one of those occasional posts that have little to do with matters of faith. However, as most of the people I know through church circles do use Facebook, this seems as good a place as any. (Also, Blogger, part of the Google emporium, is hardy about to ban me for suggesting people leave Facebook for Google).

I joined Google+ last week and have, since then, found it to be far superior to Facebook. Currently, I run both accounts but I only plan to continue doing so until a reasonable proportion of my regular contacts set up Google+ accounts, at which point, Facebook will be used only for the parish group, and perhaps not even that.

In the meanwhile, here are the reasons why I prefer Google+:

It is tidy and intuitive

Things are easy to find and they do what I expect them to do without my having to think too much about how they might work.

It is simple

On Facebook, if I want to post to somebody's wall, I first have to visit the person's profile; if I want to send the person a private message, I have to either do the same as above or go to the "messages" section of my account; if I want to chat, I have to open up a separate sidebar window. If I want to update my own status, I have to visit my wall. Different forms of correspondence are all over the place.

On Google+, this is all simplified. Chat is embedded in the same "stream" page where I see all of my other correspondence (and is the same chat facility that has long been available through Gmail anyway, so is not unfamiliar). Status updates, private messages, and updates on others' "walls" simply do not exist on Google+. Their functions have all been consolidated into one simple "share" function, which is accessible from anywhere in Google+, and I can choose to share with certain individuals or certain groups of people, as I wish.

It is more realistic

On Facebook, to establish long-term contact with somebody, I must become the person's "friend". So people with whom I have shared personal experiences and details for years, people from my parish, people I meet occasionally in other church circles, people I know from work, and so forth, are all placed into the same category. This causes some degree of awkwardness, particularly when I receive requests from strangers asking to be my friend and I do not quite know how to respond. As in real life, I may want occasional contact with some people but not to the degree that I would my real friends. Facebook doesn't really make it easy to manage that difference.

Google+ doesn't expect me to be everybody's friend. In fact, Google+ is not based on a system of mutual relationships at all. There is a group of people with whom I choose to share and there is a separate group of people who choose to share with me. While the two lists contain many of the same people, functionally, they are completely independent of each other. So I don't have to gain somebody's approval of friendship before being able to share something with him or somebody else doesn't have to gain my approval of friendship before she can share something with me. This allows much more readily for the sort of interaction that often happens in real life. It is more natural. The people with whom I share are put into circles of my devising and my choosing, and I can have the same people in multiple circles if I wish. It is so easy.

It respects my privacy

This is perhaps the current major selling point for me and one of Facebook's main failings. Facebook's privacy settings are far too complicated for me. Access to each element of my profile is controlled by a different setting. I neither need nor want that meticulous level of detail, and find it too much to handle. Then there are the exceptions to the rules, and the exceptions to the exceptions. It becomes impossible to keep track of it all and I become confused.

Google+ makes this much simpler. The fact that my contacts are already arranged into different social circles makes it much easier for me to control who sees what I share and who can respond without needing to navigate my way through a minefield of privacy settings. I can arrange my contacts into circles according to work, those to whom I am personally close, those I like but only met once or twice, those who are the partners of friends whom I have added to be polite, clergy in my church, and so forth, and each time I share something, I can decide which circles see it. If it is for the eyes of one person, I can share with just that one person. I can choose to share it with the circles of people in my circles if I wish, and can choose to enable or disable them from further sharing it themselves.

In addition, unlike Facebook, Google+ allows me to change my mind. If I update my status on Facebook and choose who can see it, I am committing myself to that choice. If I change my mind or later realise that I have made a mistake and have shared something potentially embarrassing with the wrong people, it's just too bad: Facebook will not allow me to alter the setting. My only option is to delete the update and re-post it, which I may not wish to do if it has already received 25 responses and led to an interesting discussion. Google+ allows me to change my settings after I have shared something but warns me to be careful and to consider who may see it.

It is part of the Google Emporium

I already use Gmail, Google Maps, Google Books, Google Search, Google Calendar, Chrome, Youtube, and Blogger. These things are integrated with each other and all operate under a single account, making life much easier for me, especially as somebody who blogs and runs websites and could do without juggling multiple service providers, keeping track of mutiple usernames, and remembering multiple passwords. It only makes sense that my social networking be part of the same account.

So why would anybody NOT want to transfer to Google+?

I'm used to Facebook. I know how to use it and can find my way around. Learning something new would be too much of a hassle.

Google+ is very simply laid out. Unlike with Facebook, there is actually very little learning to be done. Give it a try and you'll see.

All of my friends are on Facebook. I would lose them all if I were to transfer.

This is a genuine concern but one without a firm basis. Most people use Google for most other things and will gladly embrace the social networking site if they can be persuaded that it is worth the change. While Facebook's minor annoyances until now have been tolerable and have not outweighed its benefits, now that something with all of those benefits is available without the annoyances, and from a trusted name, you may be surprised at how willing people are to jump ship. With a bit of effort at spreading the word (remember that Google+ is less than a month old) and telling of the benefits, more people will at least be willing to try it out. I was surprised at the number of my friends who were already on Google+ when I joined, and the number has grown in the past week.

All of my photographs are on Facebook. I don't want to have to start again from scratch.

You don't have to. You can import your photographs from Facebook to Google+. It took me no more than five minutes, and most of that was the computer getting on with it while I did other things.

I can access Facebook on my phone using an app.

You can do the same with Google+, both for Android and iPhone.

That seems to be it. I asked some of the people whom I have invited to Google+ why they have not joined and nobody had any reasons not covered above. Given, the benefits, and the fact that the drawbacks are easily overcome, why not stop labouring under the darkness of Facebook and embrace Google+?

On Liturgical Archaeology

2011-06-29T15:03:00.022+01:00

There are many objections to the Orthodox Western Rite. Many are founded on ignorance and can simply be either disregarded or educated away according to mood or circumstance, (such as the lady who flat out refused to believe that anything but the Byzantine Rite was ever used in the Church and tried to convince me that the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom was commonly used in England prior to the Schism). Others do actually have some basis in reality and in genuine concern for the proper passing on and living of the Orthodox Faith and for the spiritual well-being of Orthodox people. These deserve more attention and ought to be taken on board to one degree or another. There are yet others which cannot be so easily categorised because their proponents see them as so self-evident that, in expressing them, they do not often go beyond a brief statement, expecting that this will be readily understood and agreed upon by all right-thinking people, (i.e. people like them). The truth is that this simply serves to further polarise already opposing viewpoints. Then listening stops as, due to human weakness, both sides become defensive and dig their heels in.

One example of this is the position that holds that the restoration of pre-schism western services for use in the Church is "liturgical archaeology". This sort of disparaging terminology may serve as a self-congratulatory mantra among those who already agree with each other but to those who remain to be convinced, it simply shows a lack of respect and a dismissive attitude. Reliance on such belittling expressions instead of actual reasoned and coherent thoughts also suggests a severe lack of confidence in a very weak argument. This may be an inaccurate assessment but it is precisely the picture painted by the way in which this is often presented.

So, let us examine the reasons why people perform this "liturgical archaeology".

There seem to be two main approaches to the Western Rite within Orthodoxy. Both of these approaches may be found in both the Antiochian and ROCOR Western Rite Vicariates. I do not claim impartiality here and, often to my detriment, I am far too outspoken. Therefore, it ought to be clear which approach is my favoured.

The first is to try to rehabilitate heterodox services and culture, bringing them back into Orthodoxy, taking that with which many western converts to Orthodoxy will already be familiar and making it acceptable to the Orthodox ear. I suppose this has a certain appeal to those who are very much attached to the externals of Anglo-Catholic or traditional Roman Catholic worship and wish to continue in these forms while entering the Orthodox Church - personally, I find it very difficult to relate to, despite having been similarly attached to Anglo-Catholicism in my own past. To enact this approach is very easy. What you need to do is to take services as they exist in heterodox, western churches at an agreed date of their most recent agreed general acceptability, (usually Anglican and/or Latin practice of the mid-20th century or some other arbitrary date), remove from them what is obviously incompatible with Orthodoxy, add to them the Orthodox elements that are obviously lacking, then place the results before a Russian or Arab bishop, persuade him that they are Western Orthodox services, and ask his blessing to use them.

Along with this approach often (though not always) comes the importation into Orthodoxy of practices and devotions from the post-schism or even post-reformation period, that are not entirely in keeping with the culture of Orthodoxy and which may even be the result of arguments between Catholics and Protestants in which we Orthodox had no part, which really do not concern us in any way, and which we perhaps ought not to be importing into our Church.

Now, let me make it clear that, whether I like it or not, this approach was given the blessing of the Holy Synod of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, and those who use these forms of worship today are simply acting in obedience to proper episcopal authority within the Church. However, the Holy Synod's recommendations did not come without some reservation:

The examination of the "Book of Common Prayer" leads to the general conclusion that its actual contents present very little comparatively that clearly contradicts Orthodox teaching, and therefore would not be admissable in Orthodox worship. But this conclusion comes not from the fact that the book is actually Orthodox, but merely from the fact that it was compiled in a spirit of compromise, and that, while skilfully evading all more or less debateable points of doctrine, it endeavours to reconcile tendencies which are really contradictory. Consequently both those who profess protestantism and their opponents can alike use it with a quiet conscience. But worship which is so indefinite and colourless (in its denomination bearing) cannot, of course, be accepted as satisfactory for sons of the Orthodox Church, who are not afraid of their confession of Faith, and still less for sons who have only just joined the Orthodox Church from Anglicanism. If it were, their prayer would not be a full expression of their new beliefs, such as it ought essentially to be.
- from the Russian Synod's observations on the Anglican Prayer Book.

And therein lies the main reason why there are those who eschew this approach in their own worship. Many are converts and for them, conversion means leaving behind a clinging to Anglican forms of worship and a full embracing of Orthodoxy, both internally and externally. That is not to dismiss those who, after some time, are able to do this despite using worship based on the forms of their past homes but rather to express that such forms of worship do make it more difficult for some people. For others, they are simply Western Christians who have embraced Orthodoxy and wish to worship God according to the western forms of worship used by the Saints before them, who walked these isles, who sang those hymns, and so forth. They have no desire to use eastern services, for they are western, and they have no desire to use adapted Anglican services, for they are Orthodox.

The answer to this is to use existing Western Orthodox services, which is the second approach. These do not require adaptation or supplementation, for the most part, for...

...the west was Orthodox for a thousand years, and her venerable liturgy is far older than any of her heresies.
-St John of Shanghai and San Francisco

These services exist, intact, with very nearly a full complement of prayers, music, and rites for the various parts of the Christian's liturgical life.

Now, some tell us that western services have not been used in Orthodoxy for a millennium. Well, this is, of course, another objection with its basis in ignorance. The western rites of the pre-schism Church were not limited to use in the patriarchate of Rome and that patriarchate's persistent heresy and ultimate departure from the Church of Christ did not see the immediate disappearance of western rites from Orthodoxy. The most famous example of continuation of the Western Rite is perhaps the Amalfion Benedictine monastery that continued on Mount Athos until near the end of the 13th century but there were others in present-day Albania, Turkey, and likely elsewhere, (as indeed there were Byzantine churches in Italy). Up until the 20th century, a form of the western Mass of St Peter (the Roman Mass under the name by which it was known prior to the Gregorian reforms) survived among the Russian Old Believers. This was in a heavily byzantinised form (as was the case with other non-Byzantine Orthodox liturgies during their last days due to the gradual move toward uniformity of rite) but, nonetheless, there it was.

However, leaving aside for the time being the lack of accuracy of the claim, the general point seems to be that the western services have not been in widespread use within Orthodoxy for some considerable time and that any attempt today to resuscitate them is not the Orthodox way.

Well, I have to wonder about this. You see, one benefit that I find in the insistence on pre-schism services in the Western Rite is that they actually have more in common with the eastern liturgies than do those that suffered the eventual effects of the Schism and the Reformation, (see a few examples in my series of posts on ritual overlap, "from East to West"), both in terms of certain practical elements due to their common roots with the east and which they held before the later developments but, more deeply, in the catechetical and spiritually-uplifting richness of theology that they express. The troped propers of the early Sarum Mass are a direct equivalent to the troped daily and festal antiphons of St John Chrysostom's Liturgy, (which were anciently also used on Sundays and have been restored in the modern Greek tradition); the text of the Sarum hymn sung before the day Mass of Pascha is the very same text as one of the Resurrection stikhera at Matins in the week of tone 2; the Offertory procession in a Sarum Mass could easily be mistaken by a casual observer for the Great Entrance; and the thing that convinced a sceptical Greek friend of mine that the Western Rite was indeed Orthodox was reading the Sarum prayer for the blessing of the baptismal water at Pascha, and seeing that it is full to overflowing with the very same richness and super-abundance of the Church's understanding of baptismal regeneration and new life in Christ as can be found in the Trebnik. The ancient rites of the Orthodox west may not have been in widespread continuous use for some time but they are so full of the Faith that has been passed on continuously that, when they are used today, they fit like an old glove, with no evidence that the break ever occurred. If restoring these ancient rites to use is indeed liturgical archaeology, my question is: so what?

I'm afraid that it will simply not do to dismiss something with disparaging language and feel that this is all that is required to persuade thinking people that it is no good, and the onus is on those who oppose the use of these forms of prayer, embracing the words, music and faith of the Orthodox Saints of these isles, to show how they are not suitable for use by Orthodox people.

Those who go to church on Sunday morning are not called upon to be liturgicists or liturgical archaeologists, any more than the patient needs to be a medical scientist or go into the lab to be given medicine. The ‘finished product’ is nevertheless today’s worship; if they hear or join in texts that had been in an ancient manuscript, they need never suspect it, for all that is worth. These materials have been returned to use because they provide what was needed.
- Archpriest John Shaw (now Bishop Jerome of Manhattan, Vicar of the RWRV)

I think that the point was well made by Bishop Jerome. The people who pray those rites only need know that they pray in an Orthodox fashion, expressing the faith and custom of the Saints of old and according to the Faith passed down for generations since then. The fact that the prayers and rubrics come from a book that may not have been used for a few centuries need not concern them, if they ever know about it at all.

After all, how many people at the average Byzantine Rite parish know the roots of the various elements of the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom? How many know which portions go right back to the man himself and which were only added a hundred years ago? Very, very few, I am sure. Discussing the worship of the Church, there are those who suggest that not a word has been added since earliest times and that we must preserve this by refraining from changing anything ourselves (for this would be innovation) or from restoring things that, for good reason, may have fallen into disuse (for this would be archaeology). I would ask such people if they truly suppose that St John Chrysostom included prayers for those who travel by air, or what their views are on the omission of "O Lord, save the king" from the Greek Liturgy when the Byzantine (Roman) empire was no more and there was no longer a king to save.

For three centuries before the Peace of the Church, the early Christians held to an understanding of the worship of heaven reflected on earth, but, due to external influences on the Church, they were unable to actualise it in their earthly worship until the persecutions ceased. Only then were they again able to freely adopt those elements of temple worship that are right and proper to the Christian offering to God but which had been out of use for 300 years. Were they liturgical archaeologists too?

I think that, after all of the scholarship is done, and all of the spoken words and rubrics are fitted together, the question need simply be asked whether or not these services pray Orthodox, whether they lead a person to true repentance and amendment of life, and to being imbued, as part of the Body of Christ, with the energies of God. If the answer is yes, then perhaps the result of the archaeology, if that is indeed what it is, has been the rediscovery of a long-buried treasure which has finally been restored to its rightful owners within the household of God.

New Guide for Altar Servers

2011-06-08T16:58:00.003+01:00

Available here is a free download of a guide for altar servers at the Divine Liturgy in the Slav-Byzantine Rite.

It started life as a guide for servers at my parish, particularly now that, for the frst time since we moved into our church and found ourselves with the space and resources to perform the services more fully, we seem to have a modest but slowly growing number of servers. I was encouraged by a friend to produce something for more general guidance, that could be used in any parish. This seemed like a worthy project with potentially useful results, and I was flattered to be thought capable of such a venture, so I began to amend it accordingly.

However, after some efforts in that direction, it began to become apparent that, not only would the inclusion of all the myriad of possible variations be incredibly time-consuming and turn the guide into a study book for use at home rather than the handy, practical guide that it was intended to be, which could be quickly glanced at during the course of a Liturgy, but also such a venture would be beyond my knowledge and capabilities. Also, it meant that some of the directions that would be needful for my parish's servers due to the peculiarities of our building and circumstances would have to be omitted, thus reducing its usefulness to the very people for whom it was intended in the first place.

In the end, a little saddened that I could not go ahead with the bigger project, I decided to revert to the original plan. The result is a guide for the servers at my parish, based on what I understand to be standard Russian Orthodox custom but adapted to our local use. Please feel free to take as much or as little from it as you find helpful, even if that means none at all.

Western Rite Developments

2011-05-26T14:43:00.003+01:00

Well, it all seems to be happening!

After decades of existing as a handful of scattered monastic communities and hermitages, it seems as though the Western Rite within the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad is well on its way to being much more firmly established.

First, we got the informal decision of the Synod of Bishops that all Western Rite communities in ROCOR would be given stavropegial status - itself a great blessing, for it freed bishops from having to look after communities whose rite and culture they did not understand and communities with unsympathetic bishops striving to survive against all odds, generally making things easier for everybody concerned and removing some of the barriers that the previous unhelpful situation placed before those who might otherwise explore Orthodoxy as a spiritual home. After all, who wants to join an isolated mission whose ecclesiastical status is volatile and whose stability is precarious at best?

Then a number of parishes and missions started to apear: some of them newly founded, some of them developed from study societies, and some of them received from independent jurisdictions. The most signficant of these were perhaps the reception of the former HOCACA at the end of last year, and the encouraging news of the discussions with the Orthodox Church of France. This is all very encouraging, although it does raise some questions about the haste of things and the stability and formation both in the Faith and the priestly life of those being received.

Now, within the past fortnight, we have received news that the Council of Bishops has established a Western Rite Vicariate, giving much greater structure and stability to the Western Rite effort, and quite possibly addressing the matter raised in the previous paragraph, as now people are actually being received into something that is integrated and should now begin to operate as a unit. The recent meetings and proposed conferences, I am sure, will add to the stability, structure, and growth into a functional family.

Now, to top it all off, if anything makes a bold statement that the Western Rites of the Orthodox Church are as full and legitimate an expression of the Holy Orthodox Faith as any other, it is not that their forms of services are blessed for use, or that they come directly under the jurisdiction of the First-Hierarch himself, or even that those who belong to those rites are increasing in number, but rather the remarkable fact that ordinations are now being done at a western Pontifical High Mass, by an Orthodox bishop in western vestments, and using the Roman ordinal. I am almost sure that this combination is a first in modern Orthodox history and it speaks volumes, opening the way for people to trust the Church in its western expression with the salvation of their souls. May we soon begin to see Orthodox Saints whose lives have been formed in the Western Rite - the true test of its Orthodoxy.

I am truly delighted by this as an Orthodox Christian with western roots, who loves the western hymns, liturgies, and Saints, and I hope that this will also prove to have great missionary potential across the world but particularly in these isles where many of those Saints once sang those hymns and prayed those liturgies.

I thoroughly look forward to further developments and the video footage that we have been promised of this weekend's ordination. Please pray for Dom Joseph of Christ the Saviour Monastery as he is to be ordained to the diaconate.

I leave you with a photo-video collage from 2007, which brings back memories.

On Liturgical Languages

2011-04-29T19:32:00.013+01:00

25th June, 2011: I realise that I have managed to cause offence with this post, and for that I offer sincere apologies. On consideration, I feel it best for the sake of honesty and integrity that it remain as it is, particularly as the opinions expressed herein have not changed since the time of posting. However, I realise that the tone is more ascerbic than is necessary for the point being made or than is characteristic of me. I ask readers' indulgence. This was written shortly after I received an e-mail in which my own parish had come under attack for being "more Russian than Orthodox", and I suppose the defensive spirit in which this was written is apparent.

I am an Orthodox Christian. This says certain things about my faith in God, my worship of God, the manner in which I try to order my life (however abysmally I may fail at times), and my understanding of the world and my place and purpose in and in relation to it.

Within that wider identity, I am Russian Orthodox. This says particular things about my expression of Orthodox Christianity: the hierarchy to which I owe obedience and under whose spiritual direction I fall, the manner in which I worship, the style of music through which I pray, and my adherence to the Church calendar and the traditional forms within the Byzantine Rite for which the Russian church is known. As a person of English birth, whose ancestry is a combination of French, Irish, and Afro-Caribbean, I have no problem whatsoever in identifying myself specifically as a Russian Orthodox Christian. By so doing, I am not claiming to be culturally Russian any more than my friends who identify themselves as Roman Catholic are thereby claimimg to be culturally Italian.

This is the point where I fail to see any logic whatsoever in the arguments of those who claim that the liturgical use of Church Slavonic indicates something exclusively Russian about a parish. Yet one often hears this claim, not only from our non-Orthodox friends, looking in from the outside, but also from Orthodox Christians who really ought to know better. In fact, the non-Orthodox often have a better grasp of the benefits of the use of a liturgical language than do some Orthodox Christians.

To give some indication of how ludicrous it is to suggest that a parish's use of Slavonic makes it more Russian than Orthodox, (as is often the charge), I offer the examples from my own parish of Russian people who have told me that, despite having gone to church in Russia since their childhood, the first time that they actually properly understood the meaning of the Liturgy was when they moved to the UK and heard it served in English for the first time. If anything, this shows that the use of Church Slavonic is not in place for the benefit of the understanding of Russian people to the exclusion of others, and any charge of that can be dismissed for the nonsense that it is. The truth is that Church Slavonic is unlikely to be understood by most Russian people. There are exceptions in the cases of those Russian people who have studied the development of their language, or who may perhaps be trained in classical Russian literature, but I suspect that the majority of Russian people do not understand Church Slavonic very much more than most English people do.

Personally, I think that the exclusive use of Church Slavonic in divine services is a problem, not because it is indicative of any Russian exclusiveness as some might claim - far from it! - indeed, I think that it is as much of a problem in Russia as it is in any other part of the Orthodox world. Rather, I consider it problematic because, as a result of it, the people are giving their "Amen" to prayers that they do not understand, and are missing the wealth of theological beauty and instruction that is to be found in the divine services of the Church. This is not good. Apart from anything else, it is a barrier to mission. Visitors who cannot understand any element of the church services are unlikely to return very often, if at all. In fact, it is perhaps not unfair to say that all but the most determined Orthodox enquirer will never darken the doorway again, and thus we lose another soul who might have come to the saving bosom of the Church had he not been unnecessarily deterred.

Going to the other extreme, however, it is not difficult to find priests and parishes who pride themselves on serving exclusively in English, and who include indications of this prominently on their parish websites and other publicity, as though they consider this to be something beneficial. I have certainly seen this. I have friends at parishes just like this. And do you know some of the sentiments that I have heard from parishioners in some of those places (not all, to be sure)? They want an English Orthodox Church for English people. They tell me that they do not go to diocesan events. They do not go to services at their own cathedral, served by their own bishop, because they feel excluded: they cannot understand the Slavonic, they do not know the responses in Arabic, the Greek seems "alien" to them because they have no exposure to it in their own week-by-week experience of Orthodoxy. So they stay in their own little parishes, or perhaps only visit other parishes just like theirs, that serve exclusively in English. They only rub up along other English-speaking converts who are similarly learning the Orthodox way and miss the benefits of absorbing a natural Orthodoxy from those who have held to it from the cradle. The results are an insularity and congregationalism that simply do not in any way resemble anything approaching an Orthodox ecclesiology or spirituality; not to mention clergy who bumble through the services or who serve idiosyncratically because they are largely self-taught from books and have not learnt from experience of serving regularly alongside the "ethnic" clergy. There is something of a whiff of ethno-phyletism about some of the expressions of this that I do not like.

I recall my trip to Lourdes in 2001. While I would today wish to distance myself from the history and meaning of the place, in my Anglo-Catholic days, it was very special to me. I recall going there as part of a group from my Catholic Sixth Form College, and taking part in the singing, which was largely in Latin. Joining in those services, I was imbued with an awareness of the universality of the church (as I then understood it to be), of Christ's love embracing those who were not just English, but who came from all over the world. There were French people, Spanish people; British, American, and Maltese people; German people, and others. In many cases, I was not able to converse with these people about the mundane things of earthly life: what we had eaten for supper the night before, where we were staying, how comfortable the hotel was, and such like, because we did not speak the same language. Yet, because we shared a common liturgical language, we could come together in prayer. I could stand side by side with people from across the world, and sing the Pater Noster, the Gloria Patri, and the Ave, Maria, as well as other prayers and devotions, in Latin, from the heart. I cannot express in words the beauty of this.

This situation is not limited to Lourdes. Indeed, this is the situation in much of Orthodox Britain. The nature of our Orthodox Church in its manifestation here in Britain, and indeed the nature of the unchurched masses here in Britain to whom we need to take the saving faith, is not one of a church or society made up exclusively of English people, or exclusively of people whose first language is English, or even exclusively of people who speak English at all, and it is this reality that we need to face in ministering to people: not some romantic notion of afternoon-tea-and-cucumber-sandwiches-on-the-lawn religion entertained by some, which bears no resemblance to the reality on the ground. At the cathedral in my own diocese, there are many among the regular parishioners who do not speak the same language as each other. Some of the Russians do not speak English, many of the British and Oriental parishioners do not speak Russian, and I am sure that other nations and regions of the world are represented. Yet, when they come together to pray, they can do so in a common tongue, and this is an incredibly important unifying force in a parish with so much diversity.

Another element that I think may be at play here is Protestant clericalism. Many strains of Protestantism carry ideas which denigrate the role of the laity in liturgical worship, suggesting that the only way for the laity to fully participate is for them to have full comprehension of what the clergy say and do, and many converts to Orthodoxy bring this mindset with them. In some Protestant churches, everything the priest/minister does must be visible to the laity. Everything he says must be audible and immediately comprehensible to them. Anything less than this and the laity are said not to have fully participated. Yet this understanding of the participation of the laity being so intrinsically dependent on seeing and hearing the clergy is foreign to the Orthodox understanding of liturgical worship which, though not exclusively, is primarily a duty of service offered to God, and in which the laity have a full and extensive role that is theirs. Indeed, much of what our clergy say and do is neither heard nor seen by the laity, let alone understood. I recall an anecdote from my Anglican days, in which a new assistant curate at a parish decides to offer the weekday mass in Latin. At the end, the warden approaches him and reprimands him, saying, 'Father, I did not understand a word of those prayers', to which comes the reply, 'Well, I wasn't talking to you!' Therefore, it does not really matter too much if, on first encountering it, a lay person does not understand every single word of the prayers offered by the priest. With repeated participation, this comes to be understood, and the laity come to naturally participate in it. The desire for instantaneous satisfaction and immediate gratification comes not from the Christian heart but from the 21st-century world, and I am not sure that it is something that we should be importing into our church life or encouraging in those who come to us.

Therefore, I am incredibly grateful to have found an Orthodox grounding in my parish. We serve predominantly in English but with perhaps 20% of the Sunday Liturgy in Church Slavonic. This means that our people are able not only to understand the Liturgy, but that they have also been able to learn to participate, in Slavonic, in many parts of the Liturgy that they know. So, not only are they exposed to the teaching of the services in the troparia, the stikhera, and the canons in a language that they can understand, but they can visit our cathedral, or other Russian Orthodox parishes, or our nearest Serbian, Ukrainian, or Belarussian parishes, and take part in Slavonic services with their Orthodox brothers and sisters from various parts of the world, sharing the prayers of the Church with them, learning from them, and so forth. This is the Orthodoxy that I know and love, that is both local and universal, showing something of God's all-embracing love for all people that is, at the same time, extended to each one of us personally.

So for those who want an exclusively English-speaking Church for English people, (there is something of The League of Gentlemen about this), let them have it in their isolated little pockets of tea and crumpets. Personally, I want no part in it.

Lift up thine eyes around thee, O Sion, and see. For behold, like beacons shedding light divine thy children have come to thee, from the West and from the North, and from the Sea and from the East, blessing Christ in thee unto all the ages.
- The Paschal Canon. St John Damascene

Paschal Greetings from Ghana

2011-04-26T18:00:00.001+01:00

Inculturation at its finest!

Milan Synod - yet again

2011-04-25T10:59:00.003+01:00

Is it true?

I have heard on the grapevine that the Holy Synod of Milan, as of yesterday, is part of the Moldovan Orthodox Church under the omophor of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, its bishops have been received as bishops, and it is now in full communion with the rest of the Orthodox Church.

However, I have so far been unable to find anything in any of the usual places online to confirm this. Does anybody have further news?

Many thanks.

Great and Holy Week

2011-04-25T10:12:00.012+01:00

Here are a few photographs and video clips from my parish this Holy Week. We had two servers serving for the first time, along with a choir who did exceptionally well from memory given that the music for various things had been mislaid. This has been the most moving Holy Week that I have ever experienced and it has been in large part due to the dedication of my parish priest and fellow parishioners who, this year, seem to have made a special effort to assist with the various practical preparations for the services. There really has been something of a feel of communal effort and ownership of the liturgies that has been very encouraging.

Christ is Risen!

2011-04-24T18:06:00.000+01:00

A blessed and Holy Pascha to all! Christ is risen!

Orthodox iPhone

2011-03-31T00:47:00.012+01:00

Q. How do you know if one of your friends has the iPhone?
A. He will tell you.

Unfortunately, the joke above is founded on reality. There is something of a social status attached to possession of the iPhone, a Blackberry, and such like, and the manufacturers of these contraptions play on it. It is, for instance, not possible for me to post to Facebook from my iPhone without the Facebook application leaving a public note in addition to my comment explicitly stating that I have done just that. For the first time ever, I have full access to all of my e-mail accounts on the go, yet if I send an e-mail to somebody, the signature line that automatically appears reads "Sent from my iPhone". At least I have the ability to change this but the default setting is nothing more than a boast. None of this is particularly lenten or indeed Orthodox in spirit.

So why do I have it? Well, this is not the place for discussion of my unseemly and unlenten lusting after material possessions or for extolling the benefits of the iPhone. Let it suffice to say that some of the practicalities of life, including church life, will be made considerably easier and more efficient now that I own one. So how do I go about easing my conscience and possibly helping others at the same time?

Well, there are applications and other software compatible with the iPhone that are designed to aid the spiritual life of Orthodox Christians. I have done much googling and have found the following that I have so far found useful. You can find these by searching for the titles in the iTunes store. iTunes can be downloaded here. I bring them together in one place here for the benefit of my sisters and brothers who may benefit from them and who may find it a difficult or tedious task to find them in various places on the internet.

Orthodox Calendar

This is the well-known calendar from the Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Church (which can be viewed in the sidebar of this blog), but as an app optimised for the iPhone. It gives the Saints and other commemorations for each day, along with the main troparia and kontakia, the fasting rule, the full text of the daily appointed readings both from Scripture and the Synaxarion (Martyrology), and a selection of icons for many days of the year. While the default is to give the details for the current day, any other date may be easily viewed instead.

(I understand that the Greek Archdiocese of North America has produced something similar for those who follow the calendar of Meletios Metaksakis. I will not be linking to it from here but think that this knowledge may be useful to some readers).

Ancient Faith Radio

Just what it says on the tin. You can listen to the music or talk versions of AFR on the iPhone by downloading this app. I find the talk on AFR to be really rather good but my preferred option for the music is the next one.

Orthodox Christian Network

I have actually always preferred the music of the Rudder on OCN to that on AFR and I'm delighted that this is also available as an app. I would recommend this for Orthodox music on the go. Of course, the Ark is also available for people who like That Sort Of Thing™.

There is, however, a flaw in this app and the previous one. The iPhone allows for audio apps to continue running in the background while the user does other things, so it is possible to listen to music, news reports, and such like while sending text messages, browsing the internet, or whatever. For some reason, these two apps don't allow for this. If you try to go to another app while listening to either of them, the audio will simply stop, so you will have to choose between either forgoing your music while you do other things on the one hand, and listening to your music but restricting your ability to use the phone for anything else on the other. I hope they fix this in future releases.

Kindle

This is not a specifically Orthodox app, but there are numerous books available for purchase and download through Kindle, including many Orthodox books. Among them is the Orthodox Study Bible, complete with patristic footnotes. I would recommend exploring this app and seeing what other Orthodox treasures are there to be had.

Douay-Rheims Bible

For those for whom the cost of the OSB download would perhaps be a little steep, the Douay-Rheims Bible is available in a number of apps. It seems the nearest thing to a complete Orthodox bible available in English in this format.

PilgrimApp

Be slightly wary of this one. It is from an independent group and contains one or two minor things peculiar to that group. However, if you are willing to ignore the small amount of strangeness, you will find a superb selection of daily prayers, patristic quotations, catechetical materialas, a calculator of the date of Pascha and the moveable dates based thereon, as well as the text of the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom. Despite my caution, this is the best Orthodox app that I have found so far.

While searching the developer's website for the purposes of this post, I stumbled upon PrayDaily, another app from the same source, which seems to be a collection of prayers for various times of day, various needs, mealtimes, and such like. I have not used it myself so cannot recommend it but it may be downloaded here in case you wish to explore it.

Orthodox Prayer Book

This contains a good selection of prayers for different times of day, before and after meals, and for many needs in life. There is also the provision to compose one's own prayers and thoughts for each day, and to save them for future use. Prayers take a reader service format, making them usable in the absence of a priest without the need for on-the-spot modifications. This is a very good app, attractively laid out, and ideal perhaps for commuters to be able to set aside some time during those busy days to pray without lugging a book around. In future releases, I would like to see a preparation for Confession included (along with evidence that at least some proofreading has taken place) but otherwise, this is an excellent app and I would certainly recommend downloading it.

Early Christian Fathers

This is the book as it appears on the CCEL website, which contains a wealth of patristic and early conciliar material. Anybody already familiar with that site will know what a treasure this is. (Also available are the "Confessions" of Augustine of Hippo, from the same source.)

These are the few that I have found, considered worth downloading, and used. I am sure that there are others and I would be grateful if reader were to share them in the "comments" section. For instance, there is the "Church Slavonic Bible", which I do not have but which I imagine could be useful for practising reading Cyrillic script.

Orthodoxy hasn't really taken off in this area in the way that Catholicism particularly and Christianity more generally have, and these things are difficult for an individual to gather together. The more we share with each other, the better for us all, I think.

The Episcopal Liturgy

2011-03-17T21:10:00.008Z

Too often, the word catholic is made to carry meanings that are not its own, usually by people who are driving a particular cause, but it does not mean "universal" in the sense of being all-encompassing, accepting everything. Rather it means something more akin to "of the whole", internally complete, lacking nothing. The Catholic Church is not anything like "the worldwide church", and is indeed not limited to this world, but rather it is the Church in its wholeness, in the fullness of its sacramental life, with the people of God, adopted children of the Father, baptised into Christ's name, and sealed with the Holy Spirit, believing and living the faith that has come to us from the Apostles, in union with and under the care of their high priest.

The basic unit of Christian life is not the individual. It is not the family or even the parish. No. The most fundamental unit of Christian life is the diocese - the local and full expression of the Catholic Church. Too often we forget this. People become isolated in their parishes, or worse yet, simply "go to church", and then go home again, not even being aware of their fellow parishioners. Yet growing into the likeness of God, which is the entire purpose of our Christian life, involves growing into loving communion with our brothers and sisters, reflecting in some way the communion of the Holy and Undivided Trinity.

Then God said, 'Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness...' So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
- from Genesis 1

We forget that the eucharistic celebration with a priest is a mere shadow of the Church's sacramental ideal, and that our repeated commemoration of the bishop in our services is no mere pandering to worldly authority but an attempt to express at least in words what is lacking in physical presence, which is the gathering of the diocese around its bishop to make eucharist to God. In some mystical way, each of the parishes, monasteries, and missions in a diocese, offering the services to God, does so as a single offering with each other under the common bishop who is commemorated.

However, the Episcopal Divine Liturgy is the eucharistic celebration par excellence, for there is the fullest expression of the Catholic Church. There is the bishop, who rightly divides the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15), with his priests as extensions of his sacramental care for his people, and his deacons entrusted with assisting him in serving God in the liturgies, as he leads the gathered people of God in making supplication to their Lord, offering thanks and praise, and being imbued in return with the grace of God which is from on high.

Where the bishop is present, there let the congregation gather, just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church.
- St Ignatius the God-bearer

It is our duty as Christians to fervently pray for our bishop, and to take the opportunity to pray with him as he offers prayer and worship to God with us and on our behalf. We should take part in diocesan events, for these are events in the life of our family in God. We should know and love each other, and pray and serve with each other under our bishop, according to our particular order within the Body of Christ. Then we shall see the services of the Church as they are intended to be, without the curtailments and concessions that have to be made in the absence of a bishop but to which we have become accustomed in the parishes and perhaps come to accept as normal. This is itself fascinating and enlightening.

It is not every time that we shall be able to pray with the bishop - distances are long, fares and fuel are expensive, episcopal visitations are perhaps fewer than we would prefer - yet we must make the effort in humility and joyful expectation, for when we do so, properly disposed, we become more fully what we are to be as members of the Church, and we open ourselves just that little bit more to participation in the life-creating energies of God.

Be eager to do everything in God's harmony, with the Bishop presiding in the place of God, and the Presbytery in the place of the council of the Apostles, and the Deacons, most sweet to me, entrusted with the service of Jesus Christ.

Each of you must be part of this chorus so that, being harmonious in unity, receiving God's pitch in unison, you may sing with one voice through Jesus Christ to the Father.
-St Ignatius the God-Bearer

Kamilavka-tip to my friend, Reader Gregory Soloviev, for the video clip.

The Lenten Prayer of St Ephraim the Syrian

2011-03-16T19:44:00.002Z

O Lord and Master of my life, drive away from me the spirit of despondency, negligence, avarice and idle talk. But grant me, thy servant, the spirit of chastity, humility, patience and love. Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see mine own transgressions, and not to judge my brother, for blessed art Thou unto the ages. Amen.

Milan Synod - Part the Second

2011-03-06T17:14:00.008Z

Last year, I posted this, wondering what had become of the excitement surrounding the supposedly imminent restoration of communion between the Holy Synod of Milan and the Russian Orthodox Church (Milan was once in communion with ROCOR, whence it acquired its hierarchy). I had welcomed the rumours, which I had heard from two independent and reliable sources, so could only conclude that whatever discussions had taken place had come to nothing. There was no public news about this, to my knowledge. I did, however, wonder at how this could ever have gone ahead with such public and vociferous opposition to the Russian Church from certain quarters within the Milan Synod. Other individuals aside, it is no secret that Archbishop John of New York is no fan of the Moscow Patriarchate.

Over the past few days, things have taken an interesting turn. Archbishop John has been elevated to the rank of Metropolitan and appointed leader of a new metropolis of North and South America, and the British Isles, formerly the American dioceses of the Milan Synod, along with its deanery of two priests in the British Isles. Remaining in communion with Milan, this new metropolis has been granted autonomous status.

At the same time, the Milan Synod issued a statement, reproduced on the news blog of Bishop Abbondio of Como, to the effect that it is not engaged in fraternal relations with any Russian breakaway group but only the Moscow Patriarchate. To my knowledge, this is the first public acknowledgement of any movement of Milan in the direction of Moscow, and I wonder whether it may be a sign of things to come.

Could it be that the release of Archbishop, now Metropolitan, John into his own autonomous synod was simply Milan's way of "trimming the fat", unburdening itself and thus allowing itself to move more freely to pursue what it had seemingly tried to pursue a little over a year ago? It seems curious that, a mere few days after all of this transpired, this document of the new metropolis was posted for public consumption.

Let's see where this goes. I, for one, shall continue to pray for communion with Milan under its head, Metropolitan Evloghios. I have long sympathised with this particular Old Calendar synod, if not for its stability then certainly for its resistance to some of the ecclesiological heresies that seem to be plaguing much of the Church today, and hoped for its restoration to the Orthodox Church. I do believe that it will be a healthful presence within the Moscow Patriarchate should this result in communion. It only seems unfortunate that any such good news will not apply to the former Milan clergy here in Britain, at least for now.

May God bless their efforts.

What The Filioque?

2011-02-28T21:28:00.007Z

Seriously, what is going on in Russia? Why are Orthodox Christians, fresh out of the Russian Federation, reluctant to ask for blessings for travel, memorial services for their departed loved ones, or any of a number of other prayers offered by the Church, simply because they do not have money? What sort of situation have they become accustomed to that leads them to think that they will be refused if they cannot afford it, or that they would be expected to pay a fee for such things in the first place, or that would cause them to greet with such surprise the glad tidings that there is no charge? I can understand some people making some sort of donation to the church as a token of gratitude but that should come from their heart, no? This seems a different matter.

Has anybody else encountered this? Does it make anybody else feel as unwell as it does me? Have I painted a bullseye on myself by daring to mention it? Something smells foul to me.

A Milestone

2011-02-19T18:57:00.003Z

Thou art baptised, thou art illumined, thou hast been anointed with the Holy Chrism, thou art sanctified, thou art washed: in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
-from the rite of Chrismation

Today marks the fifth anniversary of my entry into Christ's Church. On the 6th of February, 2006, being the 19th of February by the civil calendar, I received the double Sacrament of Baptism and Chrismation. This was to have been at Pascha of that year but, for particular reasons, was brought forward to the Sunday of the Prodigal Son, itself a very fitting time for being received as an adopted son of the Father.

This year, the Sunday of the Prodigal Son falls tomorrow, and in preparation I have been reading the homily of St Gregory Palamas on the Prodigal Son. He makes some very good points about the detail of this parable that I had never previously considered, and makes me realise just how much I have inherited as a child of God. When I, as a result of my baptism, am able to stand with my brothers and sisters and cross myself, and sing 'Our Father', I am claiming all that is promised to the children of God who are adopted through the grace of baptism. The kingdom of God, the riches of heaven, the promise of growth into the life of God: I find this astounding once again, and it is in the Liturgy that I find this in its fullness.

There are two points in this homily that touch me most. St Gregory points out that the father in the parable only divides his estate into two portions: one for each of his sons. Nothing does he hold back for himself, having no need of such and being filled with generous love for his sons. It is only we who are in need of the grace that emanates from God. The second is that the Son demands of the father what he has no right to even request. The inheritance that is alotted to him is given only because of the father's loving generosity and is his. It reminds me of how much of what is good is often taken for granted and how little I sometimes acknowledge the source of these things.

I was also pleased and not a little disturbed to find elements of St Gregory's homily that bear directly on my struggle of faith last year, as though he himself had endured the same thing. Of course, it is perfectly possible that he had.

In any case, five years have passed, I have been relieved of many romantic ideas and like to think that I have grown a little amidst the numerous failures, thanks to those who have looked after me and guided me. I look forward to seeing where the next five years take me.

Having foolishly abandoned thy paternal glory, I squandered on iniquities the riches which thou gavest me. Wherefore, I cry to Thee with the voice of the prodigal son, saying, 'I have sinned before Thee, O compassionate Father. Receive me as one repentant, and make me as one of thy hired servants.'
-Kondak from the Sunday of the Prodigal Son

Most Ancient of All Mysteries: the Great Omophor

2011-02-17T08:30:00.012Z

One thing I came to love about Orthodox church life very early on in my journey into it is the way in which elements of liturgical life actually mean something. By this, I mean that they are not simply interesting things we do, whose symbolism is an optional extra for people who like That Sort Of Thing™, and which must be explained to them because it is so far removed from their everyday church life, but rather that they are a normal part of the life of the Church.

This is something that I never really experienced in my Anglo-Catholic upbringing. Yes, we did all of the stuff with all of the bells and whistles, and it was splendid, but it was never anything more than a local conceit. We were always well aware that there were those all around us with whom we were in communion and who saw what we did as something odd, peculiar, and a means by which to define us. Indeed, in many cases it was how we defined ourselves. Rather than the way we worshipped being simply the way we worshipped, it was a badge of distinction that we wore self-consciously. This was no fault of our own, to be sure, but simply the natural result of a situation in which what is right and proper is nothing more than a fringe belief, seen by the majority as something to be gauped at - whether enthusiastically, respectfully or disparagingly, the result is the same.

I remember once trying to explain this difference in Another Place. By way of illustration, I referred to the significance of a parish receiving the Holy Chrism from its bishop as a sign of ecclesial union with him. 'But we do the same thing: our oils come from our bishop', came the reply. Well, yes, this is true: Anglicans do have the chrism mass each year on Maundy Thursday, where the bishop blesses the oils and distributes them to the clergy, but this isn't the same. It is only when I came to Orthodoxy that I learnt of the bishop withdrawing the Chrism as a means of removing a priest's parish's privilege of functioning under his jurisdiction. It shows that acting on behalf of, and as an extension of, one's bishop is no mere legal formality, conveyed with the granting of a paper licence, but is rather a sacramental reality, actualised through participation in the sacraments with one's bishop. In the same way, in some cases, it is possible for a man who has undergone an ordination ceremony outside the Church, the form of whose ordination and the tactile succession of which is legitimate, to be truly made a priest through simple concelebration with an Orthodox bishop. I had long subscribed to this understanding of the true sacramental life of the Church but had never experienced it as a lived part of the way the Church operates until I became Orthodox.

The example par excellence of this reality of church life expressed in its worship is quite possibly the omophor. It is simply the eastern name given to the pallium although, while in the west, the pallium later developed a particular meaning and restricted use, the omophor remains part of the insignia of all bishops, (as does the pallium where it is used by Orthodox bishops in the restored western rites). It signifies the bishop's temporal authority as High Priest and shepherd of his flock, so much so that, in common church parlance, a clergyman, parish, or monastery under the jurisdiction of a paticular bishop is said to be "under his omophor". This is simply how we refer to being under a bishop's authority. It is natural and not forced, and nobody thinks twice about it.

The bishop wears the omophor when he presides over the worship of the Church. Like the mitre in the west, which is removed at certain points, the omophor is removed when the bishop, at certain times during the divine services, humbly lays aside his own authority in the face of Christ. So, before the Gospel, the subdeacons divest the bishop of the Great Omophor, and the Gospel procession is led by the third deacon, who carries it aloft, parading it before the people to show that the bishop has laid aside his authority for it is Christ Who now speaks to us in the words of the Gospel. If there is no deacon to read the Gospel and the bishop does this himself, he also removes his mitre. Similarly, at the Great Entrance, the bishop's mitre and omophor are again paraded before the people to show thay they have been removed, for, while not yet the Sacred Body and Blood, the Gifts which are transferred from the place of preparation through the church, to the Holy Table in some way already signify Christ Himself. The photograph to the left shows me holding the great omophor immediately after its removeal at the Trisagion, in preparation for the Gospel procession, (there were enough deacons at this Liturgy so I am not sure why I was called upon to do this, but there we are). You can also see the Gospel procession at 7.05 in this video:

What has got me to thinking lately about the omophor is that, having served at three hierarchical Divine Liturgies over the past week, I have finally developed some sort of understanding of how the great omophor works. For those who are not familiar with these things, I should explain that the great omophor is the most complicated of all vestments in the Orthodox Church. The mere sight of it strikes fear and dread into the hearts of all but the most experienced and confident of subdeacons. I was trying to explain this to one of our western rite priests yesterday, who didn't at first understand. As it is simply the eastern equivalent to the palliun, he assumed it simply pinned into place as the pallium does. Not so, Father! While the origins are the same, as is the common design, the omophor has developed to be considerably wider than the pallium and, rather than retaining the original material of wool, is usually made of similar lined and embroidered brocade to the rest of the vestments. This means that it is significantly stiffer and heavier, and has to be folded back on itself rather than simply draping, fastened in place with a complex system of buttons and loops, both in places where it fastens to itself and also where it fastens to the vestment immediately beneath it. It is truly the most incomprehensible mystery of Orthodoxy. There are times I wonder whether it would not be easier to follow the custom of many Ukrainain Catholic bishops and go for a modern, simpler form of omophor that requires little fastening and just goes on over the head. However, due to the end being suspended directly in the middle, it flops from side to side as they walk and looks rather less than dignified, plus they tend not to remove it at the appointed times anymore, so I think perhaps we ought to stick with our inherited tradition.

The answer to not knowing how to fasten it seems fairly straightforward, doesn't it? Surely, I simply need to practise, no? No. You see, unless a parish is incredibly wealthy and has cause to possess such things, chances are there is not a spare set of bishop's vestments lying around to provide such opportunities, and I'm afraid the vesting of the bishop is generally considered to be too boring to be included in videos of services. All of this means that the only time many subdeacons are confronted with the great omophor is when they are standing in the middle of a full church, fumbling along to work out how it actually goes onto the bishop, then they don't see it again until the next time.

The truth is that I am not a very good subdeacon. I seldom have the opportunity to serve for my own bishop. I no longer serve with my brother subdeacons in the Sourozh Diocese: I am always confused by the modern customs that they follow, and the loss of the pre-revolutionary customs in which I have been instructed in ROCOR. Because they do not know of these differences, they must think that I am incompetent when I am simply observing the Russian Orthodox Church's liturgical traditions that they have forgotten. The result is that I have much knowledge from books but only occasional experience of actually putting it to use, followed by months before I have such an opportunity again. It is for this reason that I am grateful for having served for my bishop over three consecutive days last weekend. I learnt a number of little things that I didn't know before and had reinforced many of the things that I did know but always seemed to manage to forget. I am also incredibly grateful to Reader Gregory, my new friend and a temporary import from our ROCOR Eastern American Diocese, with a vast amount of experience in serving the role of subdeacon for our bishops. He is a good and gentle teacher and served with me as second subdeacon.

On the first day, I simply looked at the omophor draped over Archbishop Mark's shoulders, looked up at him, and said, with my most pitiful voice, 'Please would you help me?', which he graciously did. By the second day, he let us get on with it, only instructing where he saw me struggling, and by day three, it went on, in the correct order, without any episcopal assistance. I do hope that, slowly, I can learn and get these little things right. Now that I have tackled the great omophor, I feel that I'm ready for just about anything that can be thrown at me. No doubt this feeling will quickly subside when I next get it all wrong.

Let's see how that works out.

New Western Rite Website

2011-02-15T11:41:00.002Z

Please visit here for a rather attractive website, bringing together information about Orthodox Western Rite communities around the world.

Lord, I Have Cried

2011-01-29T09:37:00.010Z

Lord, I have cried unto Thee, hearken unto me. Hearken unto me, O Lord. Lord, I have cried unto Thee, hearken unto me. Attend to the voice of my supplication when I cry unto Thee. Hearken unto me, O Lord! Let my prayer be set forth as incense before Thee, the lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice. Hearken unto me, O Lord!

Above is a portion of the service of Vespers, slightly rearranged from Psalm 140. The Lord, I Have Cried is actually one of the most solemn portions of Vespers for me. Yes, we have the Come, let us worship and I love psalm 103 as the joyful start to the new day and the recalling of our creation but it is only truly at the Lord, I Have Cried, with its repetitious and faithful pleading, 'hearken unto me, O Lord' that my heart is truly called prayer, when I am moved to seek communion with God more fully.

Imagine, then, my pain, bewilderment, and complete sense of loss over the summer of last year, when these words became empty and meaningless in a way that they never had before, when I was going to church and God simply was not there - or so it seemed. It has been known among a small number of friends that I very nearly apostatised last year. I found it immenselly difficult to convince myself that there was even a God left to believe in. It was not something that could be argued logically with any of the arguments from a position of faith that are often presented in debates about the existence of God for this was not an academic rejection of God. It was simply a feeling that God was not there. That God is made perfect sense to my intellect but I could no longer bring myself to believe.

It was the single most difficult part of my Christian life to date. In the past, there had been times that I had felt distant from God - no bad thing in itself and quite possibly nothing more than a realisation of the true nature of my spiritual state during those times. There had been times that I had felt unworthy of God - again, simply a reflection of the reality perhaps combined with a certain amount of faithlessness in failing to trust entirely in the boundless mercy of God. A slow and heart-imbuing reading of Psalm 102 would usually set that to rest. However, never before had I had a sense of the complete absence of God. It runs contrary to all that I knew and loved. Of course, my actions, my identity, the direction of my life were founded on Christ, and suddenly this lost all meaning. I worried about who I was, what I was to be, the practicalities of it all, and such like. One of my favourite prayers that has settled into my heart since having learnt the Eastern Orthodox services suddenly became repulsive to me. I felt so much that there is no God that I could no longer bring myself to say it:

O heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth, Who art everywhere present and fillest all things; Treasury of blessings and Giver of life, come and abide in us, cleanse us from every impurity, and save our souls, O Good One!

I shan't go into much more detail about all of this because that is really not the intention of this post. I only say as much as I do here to give some sense of the distress and anxiety that I felt over those few months. Things are now much better and have been slowly improving for the past three or four months. I pray again, and God is there; I go to church regularly again, and God is there; I try to look for the good in people and try to find it within myself again, and God is there. This turning point came about in large part due to the support of friends, and the patience and understanding of my parish priest, coupled with the quiet exploration of my Orthodox life until this point. I found an e-mail that was sent to me a few years ago when a paticularly ferocious Orthodox person told me that I must shun certain people in my life. The person who e-mailed me told me of a story in A Pearl of Great Price, which is the spiritual biography of St Maria of Paris (and which I currently have on order). After she and her priest were arrested, they were taken to the concentration camp at Ravenbruck. As gentiles, they were treated marginally better than the Jews but they could see the Jewish section through a barbed wire fence. One day, the priest was observing a frail, elderly Jewish man going for his daily ration of bread. On his way back, he passed a starving little boy who was too weak to go for his ration, and who begged from the old man. The man bent down, tenderly broke his own piece of bread into two, and gave half of it to the little boy. The priest wrote that it was only then that he understood what it said in the Gospel: 'They knew Him in the breaking of the bread', for there, in the actions of somebody who was not even a Christian, was a manifestation of the perfect love of Christ. It shows that we must shun nobody but must draw them close for it is through such closeness that revelation and enlightenment take place. More recently, at the instigation of a new friend who spent a day reading almost all of my posts of the last six years and was astounded by what he described as an amazing faith, (something that I found very humbling and at first slightly uncomfortable, knowing my recent faith history), I have read through some of my past entries on this blog, particularly from the early days of my exploration of Orthodoxy, and I realise just how much I almost left behind, and how much it truly is part of me and who I am. I could never leave - not ever.

Since then, my faith has returned and I realise that much of what I experienced during those months was due to my having fallen into the trap of assessing spiritual growth according to feelings. It is now that I realise that the emotional lows that we sometimes feel, as well as the emotional highs that we experience at church feasts and at certain times of year are not always true indicators of our spiritual state, and actually, the fathers do warn us about this, (says he, having learnt all too late). Perhaps I had to have that experience in order to truly understand. In any case, I am grateful to God for having brought me to where I am.

I realise that may come as a shock to some of my readers, both because of the fact of the matter and also because of my sharing it publicly. I am sorry for that but I do not post this here lightly. You see, what made this experience all the more difficult was the sense of loneliness that I felt. To whom in the Church could I turn? Could I scandalise my fellow parishioners by approaching them, as minor clergy, and telling them I did not believe in God? What of those in authority over me? Would I be removed? These were genuine fears. However, I did seek out some clergy, discreetly - sometimes in person, sometimes online - and what I learnt is that, without exception, every single one of them told me that he had at one time experienced much the same thing. I then felt less lonely and isolated, and less as though my world was crumbling, but it did make me realise that the Orthodox culture in which these matters ought not to be discussed too openly means that there can be a great deal of unnecessary angst when a person finds himself in this situation. I really just want folk to know that, while it is a difficult path, it needn't be a lonely one, and what may appear to be spiritual perfection among fellow Christians, particularly clergy, isn't necessarily that, or even a facade, but may simply be the result of a quiet faith that does not advertise its difficulties. Despite this, the true brother or sister in Christ will be a loving guide and support through such difficult times when they present themselves. Please do know and remember this.

Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
- Galatians 6:2

My Latest MW Report

2011-01-24T21:03:00.006Z

My most recent Mystery Worshipper report was published at the end of last week. I have been away from home for the weekend, hence the delay in highlighting it here. It has been edited perhaps a little more ruthlessly than I would have preferred but this is always the complaint of writers of any sort, I suppose. Anyway, here it is.

Is Outrage!

2011-01-23T23:41:00.006Z

Many will recognise the post title as the catchphrase of Fr Vasiliy Vasileivich Smith, a fictional character created by Reader Alexis Riggle of the Orthodox Church in America. Fr Vasiliy regularly featured as a priestly agony uncle in the Onion Dome, a spoof Orthodox news website that ran for some years until last year. Since then, the phrase seems to have made its way into regular church conversation, used by people with no idea of its provenance.

I am pleased to report that, while the website is now no more, some of the better excerpts from it, including almost all of the contributions from Fr Vasiliy, have been published in a book that is now readily available for purchase from Lulu.com. Having long been a fan of the Onion Dome, I can assure you that it will be well worth it. Here is a site created to give a little more information. Please do buy a copy for yourself or a friend. If you really like it, why not add Fr Vasiliy as a friend on the Book of Faces?

Tentatively Stepping Back In

2011-01-18T11:09:00.004Z

Hello, friends and readers.

The busyness now seems to have waned a little and I once again have time to devote to sharing the inner-workings of my mind with the world, (or the half dozen or so of its inhabitants who occasionally pass through here - inhabitants of the world that is, not of my mind). I was utterly convinced yesterday that my blogwell had run dry but a close friend made me promise to continue, and I realise that I do actually have one or two things to report so I intend to do so over the next day or two. I also hope to catch up on the goings-on in the rest of the blogosphere where I usually hang out but simply haven't had the time lately. Please do not think that my absence of comments on your posts is through any lack of interest. I have simply been either stretched or comatose for the past month but now I'm ready to inflict myself upon you once again.

Now to finish getting ready for Great Vespers of Theophany tonight.

More soon.

Hiatus

2010-12-14T15:24:00.004Z

I'm so very sorry that things have dried up here lately, and that some of you have not had full, or any replies to your e-mails. Life has become a little busier just recently, and really quite suddenly. I imagine that things should settle back to normal shortly after Christmas - proper Christmas, of course ;-) .

I had hoped to pad things out a little last week by reproducing my latest Mystery Worshipper report here but the website that runs the project seems to follow an order of publication that I do not quite understand. Some of the reports published a fortnight ago were for services that took place a matter of days before the one that is the subject of my report so I was sure that mine would be in the next batch. However, no reports were published last week. The ones that appeared this week are for services that took place some days and even weeks prior to those described in the reports from a fortnight ago! When it comes, I shall either link to it or reproduce it here in full.

I hope to be back in full swing soon. Watch this space.

Fans

2010-11-29T20:04:00.014Z

My parish purchased a pair of fans over the summer, which we only started to use regularly a month or so ago, (when we finally got enough altar servers to be able to do so). I had seen them used before in other places and had myself borne fans while serving at the cathedral. However, they were new to most of our people and, while I was able to explain their use and purpose, it occurred to me that I knew very little of their history and development. So I decided to do a little bit of googling and reading. This, of course, meant that a post about liturgical fans was destined to appear here sooner or later, and I must confess to having really enjoyed doing the background work for this. It has been educational and rather good fun.

First of all, the nomenclature is interesting. There is no doubt about the purpose of these implements: they were most definitely functional fans at one point, and the names by which they are called today simply reflect this. In the west, the liturgical fan goes by the name flabellum, which is simply the Latin word for fan. In the Russian church, it is called the ripidi, from the Greek word ripidion, again meaning fan. However, in the Greek church, the fans are generally no longer known as ripidia but rather hexapteryga, meaning six-winged, reflective of the ancient six-winged seraphim that are often depicted on them. Curiously, it seems that this name is applied even to examples that do not bear the image of the seraphim, (which many do not). Better, I think, to stick with fan. I rather like ours. They are a wooden pair, and form a complete set with our processional Cross and icon, which we keep at the High Place when not in use:

It seems that the use of such implements dates from the time of the ancient Egyptians, who would likely have used them to fan the pharaoh, keeping him cool, providing shade from the sun, and driving away flying insects. The earliest known surviving example dates from the 14th century BC, and was discovered in 1922 in the tomb of Tutankhamun.

As for how these fans came to be used in Christian worship across various places and times, I am not sure. In general terms, I think that it is fairly safe to assume that they came to be thought of as a sign of honour given to a sovereign god figure, and that this was simply transferred to the holy things used in Christian worship in honour of Christ. By what route this took place, I do not know and would be grateful for contributions from anybody with knowledge of this. Did they, for instance, come to be used in the Roman/Byzantine imperial ceremonies? Or did they perhaps, due to the Egyptian connection, begin use in the Alexandrian/Coptic rites and spread from there to other local churches?

The earliest record that we have of the use of fans in Christian worship is in the Constitutions of the Holy Apostles. The Apostolic Constitutions is a compilation of liturgical and other instructions drawn and expanded from various sources, and is generally agreed to date from the mid-to-late fourth century. Chapter 8, from which the above is taken, is itself an expansion of an earlier document (the Apostolic Tradition) discovered in the 19th century and now widely believed to be Alexandrian or possibly Syrian in origin, due to the nature of the liturgical praxis described in it. (This had previously been identified as a lost Apostolic Tradition of Hippolytus of Rome, an attribution that is now largely discredited, in addition to the doubts about whether such a work ever existed at all). In the 12th chapter of book 8, we find a description of what appears to be the part of the Eucharistic rite immediately after what we would today call the Great Entrance:

...let the deacons bring the gifts to the bishop at the altar; and let the presbyters stand on his right hand, and on his left, as disciples stand before their Master. But let two of the deacons, on each side of the altar, hold a fan, made up of thin membranes, or of the feathers of the peacock, or of fine cloth, and let them silently drive away the small animals that fly about, that they may not come near to the cups.
-The Apostolic Constitutions

The use of the fans prescribed here is more or less exactly what appears in the rubrics of the Byzantine Divine Liturgy to this day, where, after the Great Entrance and the Litany of Oblation, the deacon is directed to fan the Gifts throughout and after the Anaphora, laying the fan aside temporarily only to perform his other duties before continuing to fan. Today, this is generally only done on the occasion of the ordination of a deacon but I find it staggering that, after 1700 years, our service books still contain this direction. In my experience, when somebody on the internet says with absolute certitude that particular liturgical practices no longer take place, he is usually wrong, and this video from the mother church of the Milan Synod, depicting concelebrating priests with the fans during the Anaphora, would suggest that this practice, while no longer common, is certainly not forgotten. (They also seem to have those impressive, if rather noisy, fans with the bells attached, which seem common in the Armenian, Syrian, and certain other churches). Addition 07/05/2011 - Here is a video showing the use of the fan by the deacons at the Ukrainian Catholic parish that features on this blog from time to time.

Another thing that intrigued me was the specification of peacock feathers. Why these as opposed to the feathers of other birds? I am not sure of the significance of the peacock here, if there is any at all. It may simply be that peacock feathers are what were used in pre-Christian times and that, by association, their use, like that of the fan itself, came to take on honorific significance. Alternatively, it could be that other cultural traditions surrounding the peacock were inherited and christianised. The peacock does seem to be quite prevalent in early Christian imagery, notably in the catacombs of Priscilla and Sebastian. Even when other materials were used, it seems that sometimes there was still recognition of the feathers of the peacock, as can be seen in the example to the right. This is the earliest known surviving liturgical fan, dating from the 6th century. It was discovered in Syria with numerous other artefacts in the 20th century. This also shows just how far back the depiction of the seraphim goes, and shows that the purpose of the fan very early came to be seen as more honorific than functional.

The western form of the fan seems to have retained the feathers for much longer than in the east - indeed, it never lost that form, as can be seen from these photographs of processions. The first is of Pope Pius XI at Corpus Chrsti in the early 20th century and the second is from the Anglican parish of St Timothy, Fort Worth, a few years ago:

The use of the papal fans was discontinued in the latter half of the 20th century, though I think it would be quite good fun to see a pair of them used alongside the popemobile.

According to the Wikipedia article on the fans, (at least as it stands at the time of posting), they fell into general disuse from the Mass in the west in about the 14th century. I am intrigued to learn just how they were used and how they fitted into the divine services ceremonially. If anybody knows or has some idea of where I can find out, and would be willing to share, that would be splendid.

Below is a photograph of a Coptic fan, dating from the 8th or 9th century, currently kept in the Brooklyn Museum. It, too, bears the image of two six-winged seraphim, shown not as faces but as circles with wings, which is itself not uncommon. However, what is interesting here is that, within these circles, there appear to be the heads of animals. I suspect that these are the creatures attending the throne of God from the vision of the Prophet Ezekiel. These appear to be the ox and lion. Presumably, the eagle and the man would have been depicted on the other fan from the pair, which I assume has not survived.

All of these symbols - the seraphim with their six wings, the four living creatures attending the throne of God, and quite possibly even the peacock if somebody can work out what the significance is - point to our earthly entering into the worship of heaven. In the Byzantine Rite today, the fans are used at the Divine Liturgy at the Little and Great Entrances and at the proclamation of the Gospel, where they are carried before and after the Gospel Book and Holy Gifts in the procession, with those creatures truly attending the King of kings and Lord of lords in those mystical symbols of the Book of Gospels and his Body and Blood as the fans are held over them. They are also held over the Gospel at other services and also over particular icons when they are carried solemnly in procession or set up for the veneration of the faithful. I am so pleased that we are finally able to use these at my parish. They certainly add something of majesty to our worship, even in the humblest of settings.

I cannot think of a better way to close than to share with you this awe-inspiring depiction of the use of the fans at the Little Entrance from the Vesperal Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts.

My Conversion to Orthodoxy

2010-11-27T21:53:00.005Z

Or rather, the beginning of my conversion to Orthodoxy, which I now realise is not necessarily always a forward journey.

Reading a friend's recent post on his blog, which I recommend to all with particular interest in traditional western liturgy, I very much empathised with his expression of his current frustration and sense of confusion and lack of sure direction. I was actually reminded of very similar feelings when I first began to experience discomfort in my former home. Patricius and I have very different starting points and shall quite possibly have very different ending points but it strikes me that he and Ex Fide, another friend who currently seems to feel unsettled with his former understanding of his current home, may find it beneficial to see that others have trodden similar paths before, whatever destination they eventually reach, (which may well be precisely where they are now, having found peace there once again).

Another thing that I realise is that most of you who read this blog now did not know me when I started it. It started life in early 2005 with the title Sarisburium: Full-Faith and Filioque-Free, (and was at the location now occupied by the Oremus blog of Hieromonk Aidan), reflective of my interest in the liturgical Use of Sarum and my journey into Orthodoxy. It was my first attempt at a blog, even before my Orthodox infancy, (embryonic Orthodoxy?), and was to serve as a place where I could share my thoughts as I explored Orthodoxy, and receive guidance and read the experiences of others. The blog has changed its title, appearance, location, and focus a number of times since then but most everything from those early days is still here and accessible from the archive section in the sidebar, and I am grateful to you all for your ongoing encouragement. Some of those who supported me in those early days are good friends today. Others have since left Orthodoxy and yet others have rejected Christianity altogether. Yet, they were all a part of my online support in those early days, and some of them were among those who asked for me to post a summary of my reasons for conversion to Orthodoxy in the first place.

Therefore, I take you all back in time to August, 2006, six months after my Baptism, when I wrote this:

Conversion

As I said, it was very much the beginning of a journey that has proved to be very surprising and often turbulent, but I think that it may be helpful to at least two of my friends who read my blog from time to time, and sharing it with you all gives you an opportunity to see where I have come from and me the opportunity to update my blog without actually having to be particularly imaginative this evening. :-) I promise that such recycling will not become habitual.

Finally, please pray for Patricius, Ex Fide, and all who are questioning and searching, and experiencing the unease of finding the stability that they had once known to be perhaps now less certain.

The Worship of God: a Commercial Enterprise?

2010-11-25T10:43:00.031Z

There are those who may be offended by what follows. I fear that this is simply a hazard of saying what I believe to be right and true. Therefore, if you see your own custom criticised here and feel your back arch a little, I would ask you to take a step back from the initial reaction and ask yourself why you feel that way, and whether there might be something about your practice that could be reassessed.

Some of you have known me for a long time, whether as a personal friend of from my participation in a particular online Christian discussion forum, which has a real-life social element through which some of you have met me. Many of you will know that, in my Anglican days, I was a great fan of what is commonly called the English Use. This was the particular liturgical style that sought to restore Catholic elements to the worship of the Church of England, not by simply copying what modern or "traditional" Rome was doing but rather by restoring customs, music, and practices that had been part of the Catholic (and previously, Orthodox) tradition in Britain prior to the reformation, largely in the Use of Sarum and others similar to it. Among the benefits of these customs, were that, being part of the liturgical heritage of these isles, they were often found to be more palatable to the average Anglican than some of the more exotic continental customs which had come to be associated with Anglo-Papalism and other ecclesiologies that many found difficult, and had often continued in one form or another even during the most protestant phases of the Church of England. Also, they were free from associations with some of the sentimental devotional excesses of post-Counter-Reformation Roman Catholicism. Many of these early customs, of course, are once again to be found in the Orthodox Church in our Western Rite missions.

One of the most prominent proponents of the English Use was the Rev'd Dr Percy Dearmer, a rather eccentric Anglican clergyman in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, perhaps best known for his contribution to the production of The English Hymnal, (and authorship of some of its contents), and, even more so, The Parson's Handbook, which is just what the title suggests: a practical guide to the decent and orderly worship of God for ministers and those involved in the running of parishes. In it, he is highly opinionated and wonderfully forthright in the most amusing of ways, and demonstrates before his readers his own unique and refreshing brand of tact. Even those who disagree with his points, (and it is difficult to see how any right-thinking person could), must admit that his written style makes him an incredibly attractive author. I often wish he were alive today because I would love to read his blog, which I imagine would have a myriad of followers and receive regular comments, (unlike my own humble offering cough, hint, cough). In fact, my friends and I used to jest that, occasionally, it might be edifying to the people were we to occasionally forgo the Sunday Epistle and simply read an excerpt from The Parson's Handbook.

My intention here is not to elevate Dr Dearmer to saintly status, (although his former parish of St Mary the Virgin, Primrose Hill, which still implements some of his principles in its worship, is affectionately known as the parish of Our Lady & St Percy), but rather to focus on one of his more memorable points of sound advice, this one pertaining to vesture:

The pre-Reformation surplice, like that which has continued down to our own time, was very long and full. In the nineteenth century, however, a short garment, very undignified and ungraceful, came into fashion and still lingers in some churches. To wear a thing of this sort is scarcely to obey the Ornaments Rubric; it is as if a boy should wear a bathing costume at a cricket match when he was told to wear a suit of flannels.

...

A further cause that has led to the gradual cutting down of garments is the rage for cheapness, and the desire of the tailor to save as much material as possible. Before vestments became a commercial article, they remained full, on the Continent as well as here. Now the worship of Mammon has so far intrenched on the honour due to God that the sweater has his own way with us, and it is considered seemly for a minister to appear in church in the garment called a 'sausage-skin', a so-called surplice that is not only short, but is entirely deprived of gathers, so that a few extra half-pence may be saved from the cost of worship.
-The Parson's Handbook, 12th ed.

This touches on something that I have been thinking about since a conversation last weekend of which I was reminded by an exchange in Another Place yesterday. The discussion was about an element of Palm Sunday but the subject has wider implications for much of the rest of the liturgical year, the approach individuals take to the worship in their parishes, and actually the common life of parishes as well: it is the commercialisation of worship.

How many of us have at one time been subscribed to the catalogues of ecclesiastical suppliers? We receive their e-mails, their printed catalogues come through our doors, and we all know their websites. Please do not misunderstand me. They are incredibly useful. In many cases, these are the only places from which we can acquire many of the accoutrements of our worship, especially if we want items that are produced by those who are skilled and have given of their ability, time, and labour to produce a worthy offering. Often, making and selling vestments, liturgical books, communion vessels, and such like, is the means by which parishes and monasteries support themselves and enable themselves to continue their work. We shouldn't begrudge them what we can give. After all, the Saviour tells us in St Luke's Gospel that the labourer is worthy of his wages.

However, we have now reached the point where many of these suppliers have become the source of simple things that were once commonly home-produced in churches, and whose production in some cases was a community effort, building the family of the parish. These things would put the people more in touch with the liturgical cycle of the Church, through which time is sanctified, making it less of a theoretical concept discussed by the cognoscenti and more of a reality in the lives of the people.

I remember fondly Palm Sunday in my childhood parish in St Kitts. During the previous week, the churchwardens would climb the coconut palm trees in the churchyard, and cut palm branches from them and some of the shorter date palms, which they would then divide up into fronds for the people to carry in procession. Parishioners would gather to help with the effort, and whole palm branches of the fan variety were placed behind the altar Cross and decorated the interior of the church. Other fronds were used to decorate the processional Cross, with the longer variety tied to the sides of the pews to form arches of palm over the aisle. While people on the inside were doing this, others of us would sit outside to make palm Crosses to be blessed and distributed to the people, for them to carry in procession and take home afterwards. Each year, more people came to help. It was a time of fellowship and conversation among people who otherwise might see each other briefly on Sunday mornings but never really get to know one another. Not only that, but there was a sense in which, as we sat there, preparing this greenery, we became the Hebrews who, honouring their coming Lord, tore greenery from the trees that were about them in readiness to greet Him. We entered into that liturgical mystery through our act of preparation, and when Palm Sunday came, those of us who had helped sang with perhaps slightly greater devotion:

The children of the Hebrews, carrying palms and olive-branches, went forth to meet the Lord, crying out and saying: Hosanna in the highest! Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!

Then I moved back to the UK, and back to my family parish, where I was disappointed to learn that none of this communal preparation took place, but that instead the palm Crosses were bought from a shop! Yes, it seemed that one could purchase palm Crosses (in plastic packets each containing fifty) from ecclesiastical suppliers and have them sent in the post. Not only had this experience of entering into the mystery of Holy Week been reduced to a commercial exchange of money for goods, but imagine my horror when I saw that what we got for our money looked like this:

Forget fresh, vibrant greenery. Instead dead, dried out plant matter, often crumbling with decay, was deemed to be a worthy offering in service of God, and nobody seemed particularly bothered. In less slovenly times, the custom in Britain was what I had known in St Kitts, and what it is to this day in Russia, which was to decorate the church and have the people take with them fresh greenery in procession and then to their homes, according to what was available locally: palm, box, willow, and such like. Even the prayer for the blessing of the "palms" acknowledges flowers and other leaves. In the same way that the Hebrews took what they had immediately to hand, so did Christian people, wherever they happened to be. That is, until ecclesiastical suppliers started to send us seasonal catalogues, convincing us that we really must have the Real Thing, and that what we did would be somehow inauthentic if we were to use anything other than actual palm, which they could import for us from other parts of the world, where it had been cut months, even years before. And like mindless drones, the poor fools who received these catalogues bade farewell to their good sense, and in exchange for ease and convenience, sacrificed part of the community-building and wonder-invoking activities of the church year. Gone were the days of people coming together to prepare for, and to enhance the worship of their churches. Now, with a behind-the-scenes financial transaction, it all just happened, as if by magic, and there was no longer any need for anybody to get involved.

The same is true of Ash Wednesday. When I was growing up, as Lent approached each year, we all knew to start taking our palm Crosses back to church so that they could be burnt to produce ash for Ash Wednesday. It wasn't anything remarkable: it was just what we did. It was a small thing but it was simply part of the reinforcing in the minds of the people of a sense of the liturgical cycle of time in which we lived as Christians, and was a way of them becoming involved in the production of the physical things of our worship through which we encountered God - this earthy sacramentalism that forms the backbone of Christianity. I moved back to the UK, took my palm Cross back to church, and was asked, 'What's this for?' 'Ash Wednesday', I explained to my parish priest. 'What do you mean?' 'It's for you to burn to make the ash'. 'Oh, I just buy that,' came the reply. That's right - it seems that it is fairly common for churches in Britain each year to pay for a little sachet of ash. Ash! One of the easiest things to make around the house. And they pay money for it! It's ludicrous. So now, on Ash Wednesday, clergy emerge with a bowl of mysterious ash. The people have no awareness of what it is or where it comes from. It has no relation to their experience. It just appears. Well, I had none of that when I was sacristan of a later parish of mine. I burnt the palm Crosses in a biscuit tin. It took five minutes. With a few seconds of pestling, we had a fine ash - no problem. I just don't understand what the difficulty is.

These are all experiences from my Anglican past but let us not think that we Orthodox are immune to this sort of nonsense. If only it were so! We may like to console ourselves with the thought that our bread for the Eucharist is usually baked fresh within the parish rather than purchased en masse in little plastic tubs but this on its own means nothing. I have seen those dried out palm Crosses used in Orthodox churches, where we really ought to know better. (I am pleased to report that my icon corner is currently graced with the pussy willow that I received fresh and green last Palm Sunday.) Then there are the oil lamps before the icons: an ideal opportunity for somebody - perhaps someone who laments not having very much money to give to the church but takes comfort in being able to dedicate his time - to offer a small service in maintaining them, trimming or replacing the wicks, refilling them with fresh oil, cleaning the glasses when necessary, and so forth. In how many of our churches is this action replaced by quickly popping some tealights into coloured glasses? And why not? After all, they're convenient and quite cheap at the supermarkets, and we don't have to deal with any of that nasty mess on our fingers, caused by the oil, which has no special place in the history of Christianity or in Holy Scripture, does it? How many of our parishes have tailors and seamstresses whose gifts are not put to the service of the church because our default setting is to order our vestments and hangings on the internet? Indeed, how many of us have even checked if these gifts exist in our congregations?

There is something about this commercialisation of our worship that is detrimental to the very fabric of communal parish life. People seem less inclined to come and help to prepare for things because, through no fault of their own, they have lost, or have never had instilled, the sense of ownership of the liturgy. The liturgy of the Church is something they attend but is not something that they think of as their own in the way that it ought to be and more commonly was in former times. They become accustomed to someone behind the scenes paying some money on behalf of the church, and it all just happens. The result is a reduced awareness of our common liturgical life, and a fragmentation of our fellowship as we are robbed, one by one, of our opportunities for coming together to make our worship our joint effort, and the fruit of our labours. Try organising a cleaning party at church, or a greening party for Palm Sunday or Pentecost, or even have people come to prepare the tomb for the services in Holy Week and Pascha. A handful of people may come - usually the same few each time, and often at personal expense or inconvenience - but generally it falls to one, perhaps two people, or it is done by artificial means, or not at all.

All of this is to say that I fear Percy Dearmer may well have been right, and that his words are truer now than they were in his own day. The sweater has had his way with us and, whether we like it or no, we in the Church have become slaves to commercialism, even touching our worship.

May the Lord have mercy upon us.

The Norman Church of St Margaret, Hales

2010-11-17T11:29:00.008Z

On my recent trip to East Anglia, Mark and Katy-Elizabeth took me to the truly delightful church of St Margaret, Hales, Norfolk. It is no longer in regular use as a church but is under the care of the Churches Conservation Trust, whose website has this to say:

Visiting this astonishing little church, in the middle of open countryside, with no sign of population nearby, you feel a strong sensation that time has stood still. Its round tower, semicircular apse and thatched roof are almost unchanged since it was built in the 12th century. It is an almost perfect Norman church. A truly magnificent doorway leads into the church, with bands of richly carved pattern: zigzags, stars and rosettes over the arch. The columns at the side, too, have decorative motifs on their capitals. There is another similar doorway, though less richly carved, in the south wall. Further delights inside include a beautiful octagonal 15th century font, which is carved with angels and Tudor roses in the upper panels. The bowl is supported by more angels, with outspread wings, while eight lions stand below. There are remains of wall paintings on the nave walls, including a painting of St James, holding his pilgrim’s staff, with a delicate band of twining foliage, and opposite, St Christopher carrying the Christ Child.

It truly is a lovely building, and I was particularly pleased to see that the consecration crosses are still visible, along with remnants of some of the other holy images on the interior of the church.

Here are a few photographs that I was able to take:

One of the round towers for which Norfolk is known

The apsidal east end of the church

The magnificent Norman doorway, with detail below

Then, inside the church:

The east end, from floor level (above) and from the gallery (below)

The sanctuary

Below are what is left of the holy images that once decorated the walls of the church:

One of the four consecration Crosses

The octagonal Norman font

Matushka Mary Bond

2010-11-15T15:48:00.008Z

Received today from Father Deacon Andrew Bond of the Church of the Mother of God, "Joy of all Who Sorrow":

Of your charity
pray for the soul of
Mary
Bond (née Galitzine)
who reposed in the Lord
at All Hallows Hospital
15 November 2010

May our merciful God grant her a place of refreshment, light and peace.
May her memory be eternal.

A Random Act of Culture

2010-11-14T00:16:00.001Z

Or so it is called. I think it's really rather amazing.

New Western Rite Communities

2010-11-12T11:29:00.006Z

His Eminence Metropolitan Hilarion of New York is in the process of receiving ten new parishes and eighteen new clergy into the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, blessed to belong to the Western Rite.

They have existed for some years under the name of the Holy Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church of America (HOCACA), an independent group yet studying and seeking to live the Orthodox Faith under the headship of Mr Anthony Bondi, who has served as the group's archbishop. He and his assistant bishop will be received, ordained, and elevated to the rank of archimandrite. The ordinations of all of the clergy are hoped to be completed over the next few weeks, by the invocation of the Holy Spirit and at the hands of Metropolitan Hilarion of New York and Bishop Jerome of Manhattan. As is generally the case with these unions, the joy of union is the focus rather than the separation of the past and it seems that, as it right and proper, there will be no pressure for these new clergy and faithful to relinquish their previous understanding of their situation.

This group has been no stranger to the world of mainstream Orthodoxy and has had close relations for some time with a number of people in the Church Abroad and other Orthodox jurisdictions. I, for one, am glad to see these come to fruition as full sacramental unity and communion in the Holy Orthodox Faith. I welcome them, and hope that their witness may encourage more people teetering on the edge of Orthodoxy to find a home in the bosom of the Church through any of the rites blessed for use.

Here is the statement from the future Archimandrite Anthony, posted to the Occidentalis forum on the 10th of November, 2010:

Dear Brothers in Christ,

It is with great pleasure that I announce to you that the Archdiocese of New York of The Holy Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church of America, the Former Exarchate of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria has petitioned The Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia to be received into its fold.

It was our intention to do this quietly, without fanfare, until all the clergy were received and ordained. The post made here unfortunately preempted that.

This is the culmination of a long journey, many prayers, and great patience. It will also require the humility of our bishops, priests and deacons to bow their heads for ordination in the Russian Church which we do with great joy for the sake of the unity of the Church. We have accepted the use of the Julian Calendar as we were already on it for the Paschalion and most of us have been greatly disturbed by the commercialization of Christmas. We will also be able to keep our Liturgy which is based on the Dom Augustine Liturgy. We will also be able to continue our practice of gathering each year in the Fall for a Conference/Retreat and now open it up to other Western Rite Clergy. The 2011 Conference will be held at St Mary's Villa, Sloatsburg NY, Tuesday October 25th to Friday October 28th.

So that we are clear, the parishes being received were non-canonical Orthodox, not Anglican. Most of us come from the Roman Church though some of us have spent time in the Anglican Church, Episcopal, Continuing, or Charismatic Episcopal. We all became Western Rite Orthodox.

Archbishop Anthony and Bishop Michael will resign the episcopacy and be ordained and elevated to be Archimandrites and His Eminence, Metropolitan Hilarion has asked former Archbishop Anthony to be Vicar/Dean of his group of Western Rite parishes. The historic significance of this is that the Orthodox Western Rite will have almost ten new parishes and, when all are received about 18 more clergy. We will have an informal group called The Fraternity of St Gregory.

Those clergy who have already been received into the Russian Church have experienced the warm welcome and generous kindness of Metropolitan Hilarion and Vladyka Jerome who have been paragons of patience in doing all of the required ordinations for us. The Russian clergy surrounding them have been most welcoming to their new Orthodox brothers who will be using the Western Rite.

Some have commented on the humility that it has taken for me and Bishop Michael to give up the episcopacy. Anyone who knows our history also knows that we did what we had to do to keep our group together and to offer a place for those who wanted to be Orthodox Western Rite as we awaited the time God would appoint for our entrance into the Russian Church. Conversations were being held with Moscow through Fr Daniil Sosoyev (RIP) who through his martyric death has accomplish what he could not finish in this life.

We wish to thank Father James of Christminster who urged us for years constantly to hope and pray, Fr Ambrose (NZ) who continued to fast and pray for us all and who encouraged us, Fr Michael for his encouragement, Fr David (FL) and Fr Ambrose (GOA) for their prayers. We wish also to acknowledge the ongoing novena to St John of Shanghai and San Francisco for the past 9 years and the maternal graces secured for us by the Holy Mother of God.

Finally, we remember the words of the old Western prayer: "O Lord Jesus Christ, who for the accomplishment of Thy greatest works, has chosen the weak vessel of the world that no flesh may glory in Thy sight...." may we who have been called to the work of bringing the West to Orthodoxy have the strength and grace to perform it by your prayers.

Archbishop Anthony
New York

Just what is Liturgy?

2010-11-11T15:48:00.013Z

'I've never really seen the point to historical liturgy.'

These words were spoken by a very good friend of mine a few days ago and they have repeated on my mind on and off since then as I have tried to understand and to be able to articulate why the phrasing didn't sit well with me. I hasten to point out that they were spoken in friendly tones as part of a discussion we were having about the different preferences for worship styles that we and another friend of ours have. It was simply an expression of his own feeling on the matter and not any sort of criticism of mine - I say that because this isn't very clear with the words quoted out of context.

My friend is Roman Catholic and describes his spirituality as charismatic. He has an appreciation for tradition but finds his home in freer, meditative styles of worship with modern music, and without what he might perceive as too much rigidity as far as rubrics and such like go. I think that is a fair assessment, although I ask his forgiveness and hope that he will correct me if it is not.

As readers and anybody who knows me will be aware, I am very much of the view that it is right and proper that our worship be in continuity with and a development of that of those before us, as an expression of the same faith held by those before us. The elements that we have inherited only have any meaning and purpose within the entire organic unit of which they are part, which is the liturgical whole that has come down to us. It occurs to me that this is why I was not happy with the reference to "historical" liturgy. To my understanding, this is not "historical liturgy", as though it were some sort of archaeological exercise, dredging up something that is outdated and from the past. They are living rites with a rich heritage and in use today. We use them because they are the rites of the Church, expressing the Faith of the Church and not because of any obsession with the past. Worshipping God according to our inherited rites can be said to be historical insofar as their ongoing use by us today is part of their unfolding history, of which the past and present are both part, but I'm fairly sure that it is the former sense that my friend meant by his choice of words.

When he was still Priest John Shaw, His Grace Bishop Jerome of Manhattan wrote the following. He was specifically addressing the charge of liturgical archaeology pertaining to the restoration of western liturgies to use in Orthodoxy but the point is transferable to any continued or restored use of traditional rites.

Those who go to church on Sunday morning are not called upon to be liturgicists or liturgical archaeologists, any more than the patient needs to be a medical scientist or go into the lab to be given medicine. The ‘finished product’ is nevertheless today’s worship; if they hear or join in texts that had been in an ancient manuscript, they need never suspect it, for all that is worth. These materials have been returned to use because they provide what was needed.

So why exactly are there these different approaches to the liturgical worship of God by his people? Why is it that there are those who find it so important to ensure that our worship today is a development of what Christians did centuries ago, digging up old services that often come from a different part of the world? Why is its relevance to today's culture not important to such people? Then why are there those who freely accept modern services constructed from elements borrowed from the past but put together out of the context in which they have their meaning, or even elements that are of the compiler's own devising? And why does each type of person find the approach of the other incomprehensible?

Well, I'm not really sure. However, my suspicion is that it is to do with fundamental difference in understanding of what liturgy actually is. So, what is liturgy? A common definition that is often thrown about is that liturgy is "the work of the people". One often finds this definition used by those who advocate what I perceive as a very clericalist approach to corporate worship. That is, the approach that wishes to encourage greater participation of the laity in worship, but mistakenly goes about it by assigning to them roles that properly belong to the clergy, thereby unwittingly devaluing the actual role of the laity by suggesting that the only way for them to participate more fully is to take on clergy roles. Not all who subscribe to the "work of the people" definition go so far as to advocate clericalism but many people do often use it in such a way that "as opposed to just the clergy" is implied: "Liturgy is the work of the people". Well, to slightly alter a line from Bishop Brennan in Father Ted (originally applied to nuns), difficult though it may be to believe sometimes, 'Priests are people too.'

To be fair, as a definition of liturgy, "the work of the people" is not incorrect as far as it goes. The problem is that it simply doesn't go very far. It is the equivalent of defining a verb as "a doing word" as I was taught in the earlier years of primary school before graduating in Grade 5 (Year 6, for those schooled in Britain) to "a word that shows action, condition, or state of being". It is terribly incomplete and is no basis on which to build an understanding of corporate Christian worship.

Liturgy is not simply a synonym for worship. I can worship privately here at home, singing, bowing, or simply sitting and praying, and that would not necessarily be liturgy. Liturgy is more than that. As applied to Christian worship, it is an extension of liturgy (leitourgia) in ancient Greek culture, which was some particular, public, civic duty, usually performed by those in a financial position to be able to do so, on behalf of or for the benefit of the demos - the state and its people. This duty could be to do with funding and organising public feasts, providing the music for the city-state's religious observances, or perhaps a contribution to the military defence of the state, or indeed any of a number of things. It was not merely "the work of the people" but it seems to me that the important points were that:

it was a public service.
it was performed for and on behalf of the whole people.
it was considered a duty.

The understanding of the early Christians - those who sat at the feet of Christ and who learnt from his Apostles - was such that this sense of liturgy was what they thought of as best applying to their corporate worship, so that is the word they adopted. The public ministration that was performed by the clergy for and on behalf of the people, and with their participation to the degree that was proper, was considered to be primarily a duty of service to God.

I will be your God, and you shall be my people.
- The Covenant Formula

It was leitourgia, but now it was christianised. This was clearly inherited from the Jews of pre-Christian times as the word leitourgia is the one used in various parts of both Old and New Testaments to refer to the public service of the priests in the Temple (Joel 1:9; Joel 2:17; Luke 1:23; Hebrews 8:6) . Certainly, this is the understanding of corporate Christian worship that has continued through the centuries. The very fact that we call what we do at church a service is testimony to this, although the words and actions make it clear that this is something done not for what we can "get out of it", or to make us feel good, to entertain us, or to pander to our particular tastes. It is very simply a duty of service offered to God. It is telling that churches where this sense has been lost, where entertainment and engagement of the audience has taken precedence over duty to God, have begun to shy away from the word service, preferring something akin to meeting or inventing a trendy name, and often referring to liturgy in disparaging terms.

By contrast, see part of the anaphora of St John Chrysostom:

It is meet and right to hymn Thee, to bless Thee, to praise Thee, to give thanks to Thee, to worship Thee in every place of thy dominion, for Thou art God inexpressible, incomprehensible, invisible, unattainable, ever-existing, and eternally the same; Thou and Thine Only-begotten Son and thy Holy Spirit. Thou didst call us from non-existence into being, and when we had fallen away, Thou didst raise us up again, and didst not cease to do all things until Thou hadst brought us up to heaven, and hadst bestowed on us thy kingdom which is to come. For all these things we give thanks to Thee, to thine Only-begotten Son and to thy Holy Spirit, for all things whereof we know and whereof we know not, for the benefits both manifest and hidden, which have come upon us. We give thanks to Thee also for this liturgy (ed. sometimes rendered as "this service" or "this ministration") which Thou hast been pleased to accept from our hands, even though thousands of archangels and ten thousands of angels attend Thee; the cherubim and the seraphim, six-winged, many-eyed, soaring aloft, borne on their wings, singing the triumphal hymn, shouting, crying aloud, and saying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth. Heaven and earth are full of thy glory.

...

Mindful, therefore, of this saving commandment and all those things which came to pass for us: the cross, the grave, the resurrection on the third day, the ascension into heaven, the sitting at the right hand, the second and glorious coming again, and offering unto Thee thine own of thine own, on behalf of all and for all (ed. another mark of liturgy since pre-Christian times), we praise Thee, we bless Thee, we give thanks to Thee, O Lord; and we pray to Thee, O our God.

We see a similar sentiment in the Gregorian Canon:

We therefore pray thee, O Lord, mercifully to accept this offering of our service and that of all thy family; to order our days in thy peace, to deliver us from eternal damnation, and to number us in the flock of thine elect. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Although it seems best summed up in the Roman Rite, in the Orate fratres and its response:

Pray, brethren, that my sacrfice and yours may be acceptable to God, the Father almighty.
May the Lord receive the sacrifice at thy hands, to the praise and glory of his holy name, to our benefit, and that of all his holy Church.

I am sure that I could find the same in other rites were I to look. Certainly, from memory, I know that Cranmer had the right idea with "It is very meet, right, and our bounden duty...".

The point of all this is that I no longer see church services as something I go to for the purpose of seeing what enjoyment I can get out of them. For me, it is a duty of service to God. It is often a joyful duty but, actually, sometimes it is not. However, even on those occasions when I really can't be bothered and I force myself, the transformative power of the liturgy usually has a positive effect on my mood by the end of the service - in fact, if it is the Divine Liturgy, it is usually by Psalm 102 that my heart is called to worship, but even then, I do not always feel it as an emotion. Having struggled with faith recently, I know first hand just how meaningless the good feelings can potentially be and that an excessive focus on the emotional "high" that we often feel during and after services can be quite superficial. Likewise, the absence of such positive feelings means nothing necessarily and should not be taken as a measure of spiritual development. So for me, liturgy is first and foremost a duty of service offered to God, and God, being a good God Who loves mankind, and seeing that we, by seeking to serve Him, have disposed ourselves to receive it, bestows upon us and those for whom we offer the service his grace and mercy - his divine energies - those extensions of Himself that conform us more to his likeness and through which we enter more fully into communion with Him. We see something of this sacrificial exchange in the Byzantine prayer for the blessing of incense:

Incense do we offer unto Thee, O Christ, as an aroma of spiritual fragrance. Receiving it upon thy heavenly altar, do Thou send down upon us in return the grace of thine All-Holy Spirit.

It is through participation in the corporate liturgy in a spirit of humility and with a contrite heart that our offering becomes pleasing to God (Psalm 50:15-20) and through which we enter properly into the eschatological mystery of worship and receive the spiritual benefits; and not through our emotional responses, evoked by emotive icons or statues, or ambient lighting, music that excites the passions, or a service constructed with our entertainment in mind.

Our churches are consecrated - set aside for all time - as a part of creation where heaven and earth are to meet, and where the worship of heaven may in a mystical way be participated in by those of us on earth, and where there may be a free vertical flow of sacrifice and grace, by which we give of ourselves to God and may be exposed to the divine energies that transform our being and further our theosis. The services of the Church make numerous references to this our concelebration with the worship of heaven and the union of the church with the heavenly court:

By Him the angels praise thy majesty, the dominions worship, the powers tremble; the heavens, and the heavenly virtues, and the blessed seraphim concelebrate in one exultation. We pray Thee: command that with them, in humble thanksgiving, our voices may have entrance, as we say: Holy, Holy, Holy...
- The Gregorian Canon

We who, in a mystery, represent the Cherubim and sing the thrice-holy hymn to the life-giving Trinity; let us now lay aside all earthly cares that we may receive the King of all, invisibly upborne in triumph by the ranks of Angels.
- The Cherubic Hymn

O Master Lord our God, Who hast appointed in the heavens the ranks and hosts of angels and archangels unto the service of thy glory, with our entry do Thou cause the entry of the holy angels, serving and glorifying thy goodness with us...
- The Byzantine Prayer of the Entrance

...we most humbly beseech Thee, Almighty God, command these Things to be carried by the hands of thy holy angel to thine altar on high, in the presence of thy divine majesty, that so many of us as shall receive thy Son’s most sacred Body and Blood, by partaking at this altar, may be replenished with all heavenly blessing and grace...
- The Gregorian Canon

This is no mere figurative meaning but is a mystical reality in which we truly take part, and it is only through the performing of our bounden duty and service that we are able to take part in this and receive its spiritual benefits.

'There is nothing upon earth holier, higher, grander, more solemn, more life-giving than the Liturgy. The church, at this particular time, becomes an earthly heaven; those who officiate represent Christ Himself, the angels, the cherubim, seraphim and apostles.'
- St John of Kronstadt

What is important to me, all the more now that I realise this superficiality of emotion in the face of the great mystery that we enter into in worship, is the right glory of God - the literal meaning of Orthodoxy. So the service that we offer is to be done in faithfulness to the liturgical tradition of the New Covenant of Christ's Church that has been formed, moulded, and enriched by the Saints before us and the Saints of our time in the great offering of service to our God by his people. It is for us to pass this to those who come after us, and it behoves those of us with an active part to play in that offering, whether through singing or serving, or what have you, to understand what we are doing, why we do it, and why we do it the way that we do it, that we may do it well and from the heart. Seeking out where it originated and how it came to be part of our worship seems to me an essential part of that.

'Virtually all know the words of this psalm and they continue to sing it at every age, without knowing, however, the sense of what has been said. This is not a small charge, to sing something every day, putting forth words from the mouth, without searching out the meaning of the thoughts residing in the words.'
- St John Chrysostom

Were I to say that personal interest is not a driving force behind my fascination with the development of liturgy, I would be dishonest. However, I do think that it is important for the reasons stated above. In many ways, this touches on my post about small things and some of the comments in response to it. As Bishop Jerome rightly said, the average worshipper needn't know where every word, every action, comes from or how it came to be in its current form in order to be able to pray it, but that does not negate the importance of the continuity of our offering with our brothers and sisters in the household of Faith, both across the world and throughout time, for we are entering into the eternal. Therefore it makes very much sense that those responsible for the offering, for the duty of service, for the liturgy, understand it and act in keeping with its meaning as it has been handed down to us. This does not make it historical liturgy - a bygone thing of little significance in our day - any more than knowing the structural history of one's house in order to know how to care for it in the present is irrelevant today. Rather it blossoms from and, in turn, feeds a zeal, a yearning, for our fatherland, the heavenly court, the New Jerusalem, from which we are separated now for a time, but of which we catch a glimpse when we enter fully with our heart into the heavenly worship of God on earth, and in the life of which we hope to fully partake in the unwaning day of God's Kingdom.

Be eager to do everything in God's harmony, with the Bishop presiding in the place of God, and the Presbytery in the place of the council of the Apostles, and the Deacons, most sweet to me, entrusted with the service of Jesus Christ.

Each of you must be part of this chorus so that, being harmonious in unity, receiving God's pitch in unison, you may sing with one voice through Jesus Christ to the Father.
-St Ignatius the God-Bearer

This is none other than the house of God...

2010-11-10T10:00:00.009Z

...and this is the gate of heaven.
- Genesis 28:17b

I would like to share this modernised version of a little rhyme which, it seems, is found engraved on some of our ancient churches here in Britain:

This seems to embody the same sentiment as the three bows and their accompanying prayers that we make in the eastern tradition as we enter church, acknowledging the holiness of the place and our unworthiness to enter, and, of course, the prostrations that made by those of us who enter the altar for service. There are no prayers prescribed in the latter instance but I find comfort here in borrowing from the west, saying privately those verses:

I shall go in unto the altar of God, even unto the God Who giveth joy to my youth: I will praise Thee upon the harp, O God, my God.
- Psalm 42:4

Mitre-tip to Father Abbot David of the Holyrood Benedictine monastic house in Florida.

St Barsanuphius the Great

2010-11-09T15:09:00.014Z

'Silence of lips is better and more wonderful than any edifying conversation. Strive to acquire humility and submissiveness. Never insist that anything should be according to your will, for this gives birth to anger. Do not judge or humiliate anyone, for this gives birth to anger. Do not judge or humiliate anyone, for this exhausts the heart and blinds the mind, and thereon leads to negligence and makes the heart unfeeling.'
- St Barsanuphius the Great

'Never confuse the person, formed in the image of God, with the evil that is in him: because evil is but a chance misfortune, an illness, a devilish attack. But the very essence of the person is the image of God, and this remains in him despite every disfigurement.'
- St John of Kronstadt

'When anyone is disturbed or saddened under the pretext of a good and soul-profiting matter, and is angered against his neighbour, it is evident that this is not according to God: for everything that is of God is peaceful and useful, and leads a man to humility and to judging himself.'
- St Barsanuphius the Great

'Do we forgive our neighbours their trespasses? God also forgives us in his mercy. Do we refuse to forgive? God, too, will refuse to forgive us. As we treat our neighbours, so also does God treat us. The forgiveness, then, of your sins or unforgiveness, and hence also your salvation or destruction, depend on you yourself. For without forgiveness of sins there is no salvation. You can see for yourself how terrible it is.'
- St Tikhon of Zadonsk

Somebody managed to upset me recently. The truth is that this doesn't take much doing at the best of times but I was particularly hard on this person, perhaps partly because of my own recent struggles with faith, which have resulted in a departure from where I ought to be, and from which I am only now slowly recovering. In any case, I was harsh and judgemental. The only saving grace is that I did not express this to the person himself but, knowing my propensity to over-react and then regret my actions later, I kept my mouth shut, which is just as well as I have since come to learn of the personal difficulties that lay behind his actions.

However, it was reading the quotations above that called me to recognise what I was doing, and how far removed this is from what I want my life to be. It was particularly the words of St Barsanuphius, (which have now been added to the selections from the Saints at the side of this blog), that spoke to my heart and I would very much like to read some more of him. Apart from this, which is on my wish list, does anybody know of any books containing his writings or information about him? I should be very grateful for any help you may be able to offer.

Thank you.

Patronal Festival Celebrations in Mettingham

2010-11-09T14:36:00.006Z

I had the great pleasure over the past weekend of being the house guest of Reader Mark and his wife Elizabeth from the church of Our Ladye of Mettingham in East Anglia, (or the Far East as my hosts call it). I visited for the church's patronal festival on Saturday and I had a splendid time. It was one of only two churches in our diocese that I had not visited and it was a joy to spend time with my friends and get to make new ones.

The Liturgy itself was served by Fr Philip Steer of the Sourozh diocese, with Deacon Andrew Bond serving with him.

The joy of the occasion was tempered only by our knowledge that the foundress of the church, Matushka Mary Bond, is very unwell and was unable to attend the celebrations. She is currently receiving round-the-clock care but her illness is such that it was considered inappropriate to sing the Many Years for her. Instead, she was commemorated with the singing of a solemn Kyrie, eleison. Please remember Matsuhka Mary and Deacon Andrew in your prayers.

For those who missed it on the Orthodox grapevine about two years ago, this is the newest purpose-built Orthodox church in Great Britain and is really a beautiful gem of a building. It is not a large building but is more than adequate for its purposes and gives a firm Orthodox witness in the Waveney Valley area. The church is dedicated to the Mother of God under her title of "The Joy of All Who Sorrow" and represents a restoration of love for the Most Holy Mother of God in an area where she was once held in great devotion.

Original plans for the church were laid aside with the expectation that planning permission would not be granted. Only the revised plans were rejected as being too unimaginative, with the suggestion from the planning department being more or less identical to what was desired in the first place, which was an octagonal nave. The result of this combined with the high ceiling and wooden floor results in a really quite amazing acoustic worthy of the musical efforts of the singers there, and adding to an immensely prayerful atmosphere conducive to the worship of God by his people. I had the great privilege of serving in the altar for the Liturgy and it was effortless. There was no worry or panic about the practicalities. It simply happened and I was able to pray. They are are certainly doing something right there and I hope and pray that the mission continues to grow.

Some photographs I managed to take may be viewed here.

New Bishop for Old Rite

2010-11-01T16:09:00.004Z

Well, why should I be the only one who doesn't get to use tabloid-style headlines from time to time?

It seem that His Grace Bishop John of Caracas has been charged with the care of Old Ritualist communities in the Russian Church Abroad, which were placed under his extra-diocesan jurisdiction by a decision of the Synod of Bishops on the 13th (26th) of October. Bishop John was elevated to the holy episcopate at the parish of the Nativity, where he was consecrated according to the rites and ceremonies of the Old Rite. He, of course, replaces Bishop Daniel of Erie, who reposed in the Lord earlier this year. This would seem to indicate an ongoing support for the Old Rite and outreach to those who belong to it but who remain separated from the bosom of the Church. Long may it continue.

I am no expert on the Old Rite but only pick up snippets through reading due to my personal interest. However, I have noticed Bishop John's occasionally unusual attire and have always assumed that this was due to his Old Rite consecration. He does not always wear the klobuk, which is a modern combination of the kamilavka and monastic veil, but often the separate veil apparently worn over some form of headwear with a rounded top. Perhaps somebody with more knowledge can add more on this. Notice, as well, the distinctively less ornate Panagia (pectoral icon) and the Russian lestovka instead of the Greek prayer knots that can be seen in the above photograph, taken after Bishop John's consecration. Here are some videos from that occasion:

The Synod seems to be taking a few decisions lately without actually formalising them with a decree. I'm not sure what this means in terms of fluidity and future plans but I find it curious.

"The Way" now available as a DVD box set

2010-10-27T20:41:00.008+01:00

Many of you will probably know about The Way, which is an Orthodox catechetical course, presenting the basics of the Faith in an Alpha-style format but with actual substance. I know that my local Antiochian parish ran it a couple of years ago and it seemed to have worked well. Well, it seems that, earlier this month, the course materials were made available as a DVD set with instructional material for organisers. It may be purchased from Amazon or Gazelle Books.

I must say that I am disappointed by the region encoding. From my past experience of working in a Christian bookstore, I know that the majority of Christian DVDs, whether they depict worship, lectures, documentaries, films, concerts, or just about anything, are not region encoded, precisely because the motives of controlling distribution and making a substantial profit are usually not the primary concerns of the publishers. Yet, if the Amazon listing is correct, the DVDs for The Way are encoded for region 2, essentially placing a restriction on how widely they can be used. I do not understand why they would do this.

That said, I do like the approach of the publicity video. There is no false glitz or hype. It doesn't try to grab people's attention through empty gimmicks but simply presents the content in an adult fashion for adults. I, for one, appreciate not being patronised in the way that Christian outreach efforts often do in tryng to re-package the Faith but which almost always seems like desperation. If we truly believe that what we have to share with the world is what it is, then we shouldn't need to fall back on such things, and this seems to me to show great faith and confidence that the "product" needs no embellishment.

Here it is:

Liturgical Abbreviations Poll

2010-10-27T12:41:00.008+01:00

I was recently reminded of a service of "Great Vespers" I attended last autumn that could have been referred to, not unreasonably, as turbo-Vespers. A conservative estimate would be that at least a quarter of the service was omitted, and quite possibly as much as one third. I'm really not sure how this could be justified, especially as so much of the content of our services is already shortened to allow for our weakness and the busyness of life.

As I have blogged about in the past, St John wrote some quite strong words about this, yet at the same time allowed for the difficulties of parish life, with many people travelling long distances, clergy who have to work and are self-supporting. This balance is what I think is important. Here are his words:

'The divine services in their composition contain all the fullness of the dogmatic teaching of the Church and set forth the path to salvation. They present invaluable spiritual wealth. The more fully and precisely they are fulfilled, the more benefit the participants receive from them. Those who perform them carelessly and who shorten them by their laziness rob their flock, depriving them of their very daily bread, stealing from them a most valuable treasure. The shortening of the services which comes about through lack of strength must be done wisely and performed circumspectly in order not to touch that which should not be tampered with.'
- St John, Wonderworker of Shanghai and San Francisco

A recent post on a new friend's blog, lamenting the difficulties among our Catholic friends, got me wondering to what degree the services are commonly abbreviated in the Orthodox Church and realised that it is high time that I posted another poll, if only to satisfy my own curiosity. I have limited it to the Divine Liturgy as this is the service with which most people will be familiar. There are two polls - one asking what is omitted in your parish and the other what is included - each focussing on some of the common abbreviations that I have encountered.

1. The typical psalms 102 and 145

In a number of churches, these are abbreviated to one degree or another. I have seen some editions of the Liturgy with only four or five verses of each. While my preference is for the psalms to be sung in full as I find them especially encouraging, and particularly find that psalm 102 properly disposes me for worship when I arrive flustered and ill prepared, I'm actually not too bothered by the abbreviations here. After all, these psalms came fairly late to the Liturgy anyway, replacing the antiphonal psalms (which are often still sung on weekdays and with different psalms on great feasts of the Lord), which were themselves originally sung in procession on the way to church - a procession which no longer takes place except in token form at the Little Entrance, so I can sympathise with those who shorten them. (I beg indulgence of my readers from the Greek tradition where the custom surrounding the antiphons developed differently from in the Slavic tradition.)

2. The troparia on the Beatitudes

Whenever the Beatitudes are sung in lieu of the third antiphon, there are troparia appointed to be sung/read between the Blessed verses. I have heard arguments that these unnecessarily lengthen the service but it is too easy to forget that there is actually comparatively little within the Liturgy that actually highlights the particular celebration of the day, and that those who were not present at Vespers the night before might well benefit from hearing them. I find the resurrectional troparia appointed for Sunday mornings to be particularly beautiful and think it a shame that in many places the people do not hear them.

3. The kontakia after the Little Entrance

Generally, on Sundays at least, the order of entrance hymns is very simple: the appointed troparia of the day are sung in order, followed by a number of kontakia corresponding to the troparia just completed, and concluding with a theotokion, (usually O Protection of Christians). In some churches, they only sing one kontakion, regardless of the number of troparia.

4. The readings

On a number of days - most Sundays in fact - in addition to the Sunday readings from the Apostle and Gospel, there are additional readings for the Saint(s) of the day. In many churches, these are omitted and there is only ever one Apostle and one Gospel reading.

5. The Litany of Fervent Supplication

This is the litany with the threefold Lord, have mercy after each petition, and is essentially the community's litany, in which the deacon inserts petitions according to the particular needs of the parish or monastery: for those who are sick, travelling, pregnant, in conflict or war, and such like, so that the people's prayers for those concerns may be offered along with the communal offering of the Eucharist. In some parishes, these additional petitions are omitted entirely and the deacon/priest simply rushes through the standard petitions while the choir continuously sings the Lord, have mercy.

6. The Litany for the Catechumens and the two Litanies of the Faithful

In some parishes, these litanies, which are not optional, are never done. The Litany for the Departed is also commonly omitted in many parishes but as it is not generally supposed to be done on Sundays, most readers may not be sure whether or not it is done in their parishes so I have left it out of the polls.

7. Psalm 33

This is appointed to be sung after the Prayer below the Ambo, during which the distribution of the antidoron is to take place and the deacon consumes the Holy Things. In most parishes and cathedrals today, however, the antidoron is distributed after the dismissal, (a custom that possibly started due to large numbers of the faithful being present - itself encouraging). Consequently, the psalm has disappeared from the Liturgy in many parishes and cathedrals, and the deacon is forced to consume the Gifts after the Liturgy.

I must say that, while we do leave out some things because of our origins and our current stage of development, my parish doesn't come out too badly here at all. Please do share your own comments and thoughts once you have taken part in the polls.

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Consecration of St Nicholas' Church, Oxford - Part 2

2010-10-14T10:44:00.002+01:00

A photo-collage has now been posted to Youtube with some photographs not included in the set previously linked. I hope you enjoy it as much as I just have.

Consecration of St Nicholas' Church, Oxford

2010-10-11T10:16:00.015+01:00

I had the great pleasure on Saturday of taking part in the Consecration of the new church of St Nicholas in Oxford. It was a splendid and joyous occasion. I had never been to a consecration of a church before although, having the interests that I have, I had explored the service in the Trebnik. It was wonderful. I had arrived, hoping to simply blend into the congregation but I was recognised by the servers and fetched. I had been instructed to take vestments with me "just in case" but had left them packed in my bag which I had deposited in the cloakroom. So out they came and I bumbled my way through it but it was a joy to be able to take part. I was pleased to be included and touched by the special effort that our brothers and sisters in Sourozh always make to make those of us from the Church Abroad feel welcome.

It was also the first time that Archbishop Elisey had consecrated a church. He has become so much a part of the fabric of the vibrant Orthodox life here in the UK that it is easy to forget that it is only quite recently that he was consecrated and sent to a struggling diocese, which was recovering from recent difficulties. It is amazing what he has achieved so far and this consecration will hopefully be the first of many which will give some sense of hope, permanence, and stability to the Orthodox churches in Great Britain and Ireland which are under his care.

After the Reception and Vesting of the archbishop, he and the four assisting priests were clothed with full-length gremials and linen sleeves to protect their vestments from damage during the consecration. Then it all began with some prayers and the assembly of the Holy Table, which until then had been nothing more than four wooden columns with an elevated chest in the middle. The table was sprinkled with holy water and the cavities in the columns were filled with a mixture of wax, crushed incense, and other substances, which had been kept molten by heat until that point and was allowed to harden in the crevices. The mensa of the Table was then put in place and the process of the wax mixture repeated, with the excess being scraped away with knives. Then the mensa was secured in place with four dowels, which were hammered in with specially-selected stones. During this time, the choir sang psalms 144 and 22.

The Holy Table was anointed with rose water and wine, which was poured onto it rather copiously in the form of a Cross by Vladyka Elisey, before the priests wiped off the excess mixture and rubbed the residue into the grain of the wood with special cloths. Then the Holy Table was anointed with the Holy Chrism, as the choir sang:

Behold now, what is so good or so joyous as for brethren to dwell together in unity? It is like the oil of myrrh upon the head, which runneth down upon the beard, upon the beard of Aaron, which runneth down to the fringe of his raiment. It is like the dew of Aermon, which cometh down upon the mountains of Sion. For there the Lord commanded the blessing, life for evermore.
- Psalm 132 The Psalter According to the Seventy

I must admit that what was going through my mind was just how similar this was to the traditional Maundy Thursday ceremonies in the west, where the altar is similarly washed with water and wine and treated with great reverence, as Christ Himself, and that is what I then saw on Saturday, for as the Holy Table was vested with its paraments and the various appurtenances, the choir sang this psalm:

The Lord is King, He is clothed with majesty; the Lord is clothed with strength and He hath girt Himself. For He established the world which shall not be shaken. Thy throne is prepared of old; Thou art from everlasting. The rivers have lifted up, O Lord, the rivers have lifted up their voices. The rivers will lift up their waves, at the voices of many waters. Wonderful are the surgings of the sea, wonderful on high is the Lord. Thy testimonies are made very sure. Holiness becometh thy house, O Lord, unto length of days.
- Psalm 92 The Psalter According to the Seventy

Thus the throne of the Lord was erected, and upon it were placed the signs of the presence of Christ: the Book of Gospels, the life-giving Cross, and the tabernacle. After some more litanies and prayers, the entire interior of the church was sprinkled with holy water, and the walls were anointed with oil at various points in the form of a Cross. Those accustomed to western rites will be aware that anointing is usually done with the thumb, as could be seen in the much publicised consecration of the FSSP seminary chapel in Nebraska earlier this year. However, in the east, it is more customary to anoint using a brush. While this obviates the necessity for the solemn procession of the stairs (yes, I'm afraid I did chuckle while watching it on EWTN), it does mean that the one performing the anointing must have a rather steady hand in order to form the Cross properly. I think that Father Stephen did a sterling job.

Then it was time for the placement of the relics. Unfortunately, I do not have a photograph of the Holy Table prior to its assembly, otherwise I would have been able to show the small chest that sits elevated in the centre of it, beneath the mensa. This is not shown among the photographs on the parish website but perhaps this will be depicted among those which will, no doubt, soon appear on the Sourozh diocesan website. However, the relics were carried out of the church in procession, where prayers were offered before they were set on a table just outside the closed doors of the church. Those wonderful verses from psalm 24, which seem to get an airing at various services to do with doors, and at one time featured at the Great Entrance, were sung in dialogue between the bishop and choir:

Lift up your gates, O ye princes; and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting gates, and the King of Glory shall enter in.

Who is this King of Glory?

The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in war. Lift up your gates, O ye princes; and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting gates, and the King of Glory shall enter in.

Who is this King of Glory?

The Lord of hosts, He is the King of Glory.

Then, after further prayers, the relics were carried in procession back into the church and placed in their dedicated reliquary within the Holy Table. I think that usually, there would be a procession around the church but this would not have been practical here due to space constraints.

After the consecration, the archbishop and assisting priests removed their gremials and sleeves and the Third Hour was read, while Father Stephen performed the proskomede. Then the Divine Liturgy began. It was a tight squeeze. There were 28 concelebrating priests, 3 concelebrating deacons, and a number of subdeacons and servers but we managed. I am afraid that, having been instructed in the ways of the Church Abroad, I did cause some inadvertent disruption, being unaccustomed as I am to the post-revolutionary liturgical customs of the Moscow Patriarchate. The differences are only minor but they are enough to trip up the unsuspecting. Also, while I know the hierarchical Liturgy in my head, I have only ever served as subdeacon a handful of times, so I am still learning, slowly. Still, they were incredibly understanding.

A number of presentations were then made to the parish, including a relic of St John of Shanghai and San Francisco, which had been sent by Archbishop Kyrill with Hieromonk Irinei, who had travelled from America for the occasion. Some of you may be more familiar with him in his previous incarnation as Deacon Matthew Steenberg, formerly of the Oxford parish, who has since transferred to the Church Abroad and been ordained priest in Vladyka Kyrill's diocese. It was a delight to meet him and some other people, and to get to know a little better some of the servers whom I had only ever previously met very briefly. I was also pleased to see a friend with whom I had lost touch for about three years and who suddenly appeared next to me before I was called upon to serve. It seems that I now have enough connections in oxford to make occasional weekend visits a good idea so poor St Nicholas' parish may have me inflicted upon them from time to time.

A wonderfully relaxed and convivial reception then followed in the scout hall a little further along the road. I shan't post directly any photographs of that as they all seem to show me filling my plate with food while everybody else was talking with each other and being sociable. In my defence, I had travelled to Oxford that morning, having risen at 3.30 and left home at 4.20 to catch the 5.11 train, and by 1 p.m. was incredibly hungry. However, for those who wish to see the full set so far, they may be viewed here.

I can't want until the next consecration, which should be the Church of St Aidan and St Chad in Nottingham on a date yet to be determined.

The Cherubic Hymn meets Karl Jenkins

2010-09-22T16:21:00.004+01:00

I'll let you make of that what you will. I rather like it musically (for all of the same reasons that I enjoy the music of Karl Jenkins, who could easily have composed this) but can't see it possibly working as a Cherubic Hymn during the Liturgy. For those requiring an antidote, here is a setting of the Trisagion by the same composer:

I must also confess a fondness for this Trisagion by Serbian American composer Lisa Milena Simikic. I rather like modern music done well.

St Michael at Colossae

2010-09-19T13:42:00.001+01:00

Today in the Byzantine Calendar is the commemoration of the miracle of the Holy Archangel Michael at Colossae, being my name day and also the day on which, in 2005, I was made a catechumen.

The story of the miracle is here.

The New "WaterAid" Advert

2010-09-09T10:58:00.004+01:00

I don't like to push causes onto people and generally tend not to use my blog for such things. However, I would like to draw people's attention to this advert.

I think it's incredibly powerful and shows how, with a little bit of imagination, such appeals can be done in a way the truly engages the viewer without resorting to the sort of imagery that I am sure others find as disturbing as I do. That isn't to say that the reality ought to be hidden from us but I'm sure I'm not the only one who simply can't bear to watch at times and has been tempted to turn over for thirty seconds when images of starving and dying children suddenly appear on our screens without warning. With this advert, I actually watched from beginning to end and want to do something so I thought I would share it.

You can donate to WaterAid here.

Missions Now!

2010-09-07T07:26:00.006+01:00

The missions belonging to the Western Rite within the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad have launched a society to raise funds for their growth and work. I am sure that any assistance that you are able to give would be gratefully received and will go towards the spreading of the holy and saving Faith, for the salvation of God's people.

The website for information and donations is here and the Facebook page is here.

Under Metropolitan Hilarion, the Western Rite has received a degree of support and encouragement unknown in the Church Abroad since the time of St John of Shanghai and San Francisco. It is truly uplifting to see his missionary vision once again restored to the Russian Orthodox Church, which was at the forefront of Western Rite missionary plans before, and even for some time after the revolution and difficult times that this brought.

May God bless their endeavours and bring all who seek Him into his holy Church.

Impressive

2010-08-25T10:59:00.000+01:00

It's a spork!

2010-08-15T16:50:00.017+01:00

I grew up with the Story Teller series. It was a staple of my childhood and I still have fond memories of nonsense poems, Aldo in Arcadia, and various well and lesser-known stories. This series has become something of a classic, with a magnificent cast and imaginative tales. I wish they would re-issue them. Among the nonsense poems was Edward Lear's The Owl and the Pussycat, which includes the couplet:

They dined on mince and slices of quince,
which they ate with a runcible spoon...

For years I wondered what a runcible spoon was. I must stress that it was never an intensely pressing matter that caused lack of sleep, digestive problems, or anything quite like that. In fact, so insignificant a matter was it that for two decades I didn't think to look it up, but I simply had my curiosity piqued whenever I heard the poem, (which was, of course, during my daily viewing of Anne of Green Gables, in which the poem featured in a performance at the White Sands Hotel). 'Just what is a runcible spoon?' I would wonder. 'What does runcible mean?' 'Is it a spoon that is able to be runced, following the same logic as a flexible rule(r), which is a rule that can be flexed? If so, what is it to runce?' I never found any answers.

Anyway, about half an hour or so ago, I decided to finally ease the tension of over twenty years and I did a Google image search for "runcible spoon". Imagine my surprise when my computer screen was suddenly plastered from top to bottom with a bunch of sporks! Yes, the elegantly-named runcible spoon is nothing more than the common spork, found in kitchens up and down the country, and no doubt across the world (except in this house, as we don't own any), issued for free in plastic form with take-away meals, pre-packaged pasta dishes in supermarkets, and tubs of pineapple chunks. At the risk of giving the appearance of channelling Victor Meldrew, I don't believe it! I feel cheated, as though I have been robbed of something magical which I have treasured since childhood, and had it replaced with something commonplace, mundane.

I am sure that most people were already aware of this and consider it common knowledge. Please forgive my ignorance. For those of you who did not know and are now wondering why, having been disappointed at the discovery, I have chosen to further disseminate this knowledge, I can only ask why I should have to suffer alone.

In order to alleviate the distress which will, no doubt, be caused by this calamitous revelation, let us put it from our minds and focus instead on the wonderful world of the Owl and the Pussycat.

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea
in a beautiful pea green boat,
they took some honey, and plenty of money,
wrapped up in a five pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
and sang to a small guitar,
'O lovely Pussy! O Pussy my love,
what a beautiful Pussy you are,
you are,
you are!
what a beautiful Pussy you are!'

Pussy said to the Owl, 'You elegant fowl!
How charmingly sweet you sing!
O let us be married! too long we have tarried:
but what shall we do for a ring?'
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
to the land where the Bong-tree grows
and there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood
with a ring at the end of his nose,
his nose,
his nose,
with a ring at the end of his nose.

'Dear pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
your ring?' Said the Piggy, 'I will.'
So they took it away, and were married next day
by the turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
which they ate with a runcible spoon;
and hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
they danced by the light of the moon,
the moon,
the moon,
they danced by the light of the moon.

Post Scriptum: I have done some more searching for the meaning of the word runcible. I was interested to find that Chambers 21st Century Dictionary does not recognise it as a word other than as part of the phrase runcible spoon, and attributes it to Edward Lear. So I looked on Wikipedia and was tickled by the first paragraph of the entry for "runcible". I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Followers

2010-08-09T20:14:00.001+01:00

This is just a quick note to say that I am grateful to all of you who read, both those who comment and who do not, for giving me a sense of having something worthwhile to say, even if I'm often not so sure that I do. I also want to extend a special thank you to those of you who have recently added yourselves as followers. You're very welcome and I would love to read any comments you may wish to leave.

August Church Tour: part 2

2010-08-09T20:05:00.022+01:00

O holy Bertram, Ascetic of the Mercian woods, forsaking worldly wealth thou didst give thyself to God. Through fasting and prayer in a cave by the Manifold, thou didst acquire the riches of the age to come. Pray to Christ for us, that we too may be found worthy of his Kingdom.
- Tropar to St Bertram, tone 7

This time: Ilam, and plenty of photographs to share with you of the marvellous time I had on Saturday.

Long-time readers will know that I have a personal attachment to the spring and shrine of St Bertram in the village of Ilam. This shrine in the Anglican church of the Holy Cross somehow managed to survive the desecrations of holy places that took place in the centuries after the English reformation, and stands today a place of quiet pilgrimage for faithful Christians from various places. I made a private pilgrimage there on the day before my Baptism to get water to add to the font, and I have been back every year since then for the pan-Orthodox pilgrimage in August. This year had the highest turnout since I have been going, with about 80-90 pilgrims at the Liturgy, which was concelebrated by clergy from the Russian, Greek, Romanian, and Antiochian churches. I must say, as well, that I was very impressed by the decoration of the shrine, which was the most beautiful that I have seen it so far. The care and devotion that went into the preparation was obvious.

The Church of the Holy Cross

After the Liturgy, we took a break for a picnic lunch and some free time for fellowship and exploring the idyllic surroundings, encopmpassing Ilam Park, which is next door to the church. I revisited the spring near the river, from which I had taken the water for my baptism, only to be disappointed to find that it was dry.

Here are some photographs that I managed to take of the area and of some of the pilgrims spending time together.

The River Manifold

Pilgrims

After we had all eaten and caught up with each other, those who were physically able took the icon, which was in its new case, masterfully crafted of bulletproof glass and other materials by a parishioner of St Michael's Audley, and headed up the hill to St Bertram's spring, where we performed the lesser blessing of the waters.

Those who were not able to climb the hill to the spring visited St Bertram's cave beside the river, after which we gathered again at the church to close the pilgrimage with Great Vespers, before returning home. Not only was this a turning point for me for personal reasons but I also had the great privilege of sharing this special place with two good friends of mine. Another privilege was being asked to help choose some stones from the well for use at the consecration of a church next month. For those who are unfamiliar with the consecration of churches, (as it's hardly something that we see every day), the bishops assemble the Holy Table during the course of the service, nailing the top in place with specially forged nails, which they secure with wax mastic and hammer in with stones. I thought it quite fitting and very beautiful that the stones be taken from the holy spring and returned to there at next year's pilgrimage.

I always enjoy these pilgrimages and am keenly awaiting the Holywell pilgrimage to St Winefride's well in October. Perhaps some of you might be able to come.

August Church Tour: part 1

2010-08-01T21:27:00.021+01:00

I promised here that I would try to remember to take my camera on my visits to different churches over these three weekends. Well, I managed to remember it today for my visit to this parish. It was my first ever visit to a Serbian parish and I must say that I am thoroughly looking forward to repeating the experience. While I have always been welcomed wherever I have gone, never before today had I felt more immediately at home on a visit to any parish.

I planned my journey last night and was surprised to learn that it would take me considerably less time to travel to St John's than it does my own parish. It involved getting a bus to Rochdale then a train to Halifax. I managed to make use of the wonderful feature on Google Maps that allows one to view street level for many built-up areas in order to work out exactly where the bus stop was and what buildings to look out for immediately before I reached it, (never having been to Rochdale before). I got to Rochdale station, bought my ticket, and made my way to the platform, where I was greeted by a curious site. I took a photograph.

It is St John's Catholic church. I asked about it when I got to Halifax and learnt that, despite its appearance, it was built as a Latin Rite church and was never Byzantine, which came as a surprise given its appearance as Rochdale's own Agia Sofia.

The fascination soon gave way as my train arrived (on time!) and took me to Halifax station, where I was able to follow my jotted directions with no difficulty. However, what Google Maps didn't show me was that some bright spark decided many years ago to build Halifax town centre in the middle of a valley, which meant that travelling any distance out of the town centre in any direction means making an uphill journey, which is not particularly easy for the asthmatic, more generously-proportioned variety of subdeacon while carrying a case of assorted vestments, (not knowing what colours would be used, I took a selection).

I had managed to get an idea of the appearance of St John's church from the parish website but I had not been prepared for what I saw. There is an entire complex that belongs to the parish, including the church with its downstairs hall, a separate hall containing a small flat, and a presbytery attached.

The church itself is an old Methodist preaching house, with a gallery built for the purpose. This has been sensitively and lovingly adapted to Orthodox use, with the pews removed, a purpose-built iconostas installed, a new floor with solea laid, icons painted onto the front of the gallery, and icons on canvas mounted onto the walls. of the altar. The result can be seen below.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Liturgy. It was standard Byzantine Rite, offered prayerfully and without idiosyncratic additions. I was pleased that the doors and veil were opened and closed at the proper times. The Alleluia was abbreviated, as were the antiphons, but, given that the antiphons have not been used in procession for some centuries, I think that singing them in full has now become the exception rather than the norm. The ROCOR books print them in full and this is what my parish follows but I know that this is not universal, even in the Church Abroad. There was the ringing a bell at the epiklesis - something I have seen in Antiochian practice. Also, with reference to an earlier post, a prostration was made at the epiklesis. The sermon was given after the communion of the clergy, which is something I had known to be common but had never actually seen and, interestingly, no wine was used for the zapivka, but bread alone. One thing that tripped me up is that the hot water for the chalice was not boiled beforehand and poured into a vacuum flask but instead a kettle was boiled during the Liturgy itself. Obviously, vacuum flasks were not in use until recently so heating the water just before it is needed is clearly the older custom - I am just not accustomed to having to prepare for it.

Here are some photographs taken after the Liturgy.

After the Liturgy, I was taken to the hall downstairs where I discovered there was a bar! Now that's the sort of church I like. Blessed are they that thirst after righteousness. There is ample space for up to 200 people, and a substantial kitchen with more than enough ovens and burners to cater for such numbers. I would highly recommend it as a venue for hire. This is merely part of the excellent set-up they have in place to support themselves, another being the candle-room, where they make all of the candles that they use in their services, many of them from reclaimed wax from stubs. I was given the grand tour as a first-time visitor.

Here is a silent video from the day of the consecration of the sister church within the parish - Holy Trinity, Bradford.

I found in the parish of St John a close-knit family who, despite having known each other for decades and having worked together to build up all they they have today, are incredibly open and inviting to newcomers and are making a conscious effort to ensure that their communitiy, which contains a good spread of ages, lives and thrives into the future, bringing more people to the saving Faith. Of course, no picture of such a busy church would be complete without the serenity brought by the church cat.

Time for a Break

2010-07-28T21:07:00.005+01:00

My parish priest goes away tomorrow and will be away for three weeks. Our parishioners are spread somewhat far and wide so it is often easier to pray together at home if there is no Liturgy. Last year, a handful of us met for the Hours and Typika on the Sundays when Fr Paul was away and it was quite lovely. However, this year, this will be difficult.

What this means for me, however, is that I get three weeks where I don't have to compile services for a deadline, work out rules of occurrence, typeset music, or journey forty miles and back twice over the course of a weekend. I actually enjoy most of those things but it can be a little tiring at times and it's just good to have a break.

So, what shall I do? Well...

This coming Sunday I shall perhaps visit my local Ukrainian parish of St Volodymyr, a mere half hour's walk from home. I also plan to go there the following Sunday so, if possible, I would like to visit somewhere that I previously haven't been to but I'm not sure how possible that will be. I have served at St Volodymyr's on two occasions in the past and they are always incredibly welcoming. The sense of community is heart-warming, the music is splendid, and the Liturgy is straight-down-the-line by the book - so much so that, despite the priest who was there last time I visited not speaking English and my complete lack of Ukrainian, we were able to serve together in harmony, with no fuss or confusion. Just the ticket.

The following Saturday will be the annual pan-Orthodox pilgrimage to St Bertram's tomb and spring in Ilam, Derbyshire, which is always a good time of prayer and fellowship with people not otherwise often seen. I plan to take a friend to that, and then go to the Ukrainians again the next day.

Then, the Sunday after that, Fr Evgeny, from the Pokrov parish in Manchester will be back from his holidays and I hope to serve at the Liturgy there. I first met him about two years ago at our cathedral when he was a deacon on loan from Ennismore Gardens, and instantly warmed to him. I had read that he had been ordained to the priesthood earlier this year and was delighted the last time I visited the parish and entered the altar to find that the new priest who is serving the parish was none other than Fr Evgeny. After the Liturgy, I assisted at what was perhaps the most challenging baptism I have ever witnessed - three children of about two years of age, all aware of their surroundings and all offering protest in their own way, plus one young lady, likely in her twenties, who made not a peep. It was all great fun and very rewarding. Next time, though, I think I'll check in advance whether there will be a baptism. I still intend to help but I'd just like to be prepared.

So that is what I have to look forward to for the next three Sundays: services for which I have to do nothing but turn up - no planning; no thumbing through books of rubrics; no arduous and panic-filled journey as coaches run late, railways have maintenance work being performed, and taxis don't turn up - leisurely bliss!

Yet I'll not be entirely at a loose end as far as church goes, as I still have things to keep me off the streets. Our catechumen will be baptised shortly after we return to our normal cycle of services, so I have the excitement of a baptismal Liturgy to compile. In addition to some other private, non-parish-related projects, I am also working on a series of Taking Part in the Liturgy leaflets for church, touching on various aspects of the people's participation which could be encouraged or at least better explained now that we have an actual church and sufficient room for fuller ceremonial and devotions. I'm quite looking forward to the next few weeks.

More soon, no doubt.

St Moses the Black: the Motion Picture

2010-07-24T21:26:00.007+01:00

I would like, if I may, to draw readers' attention to Nathan's blog, where he has recently revealed his other talents as a film producer and screenwriter, and announced plans to produce a film about the life of St Moses the Black. It sounds a truly exciting project and one that will, no doubt, be greatly beneficial to many people. We could all learn from the life of St Moses, abandoning those things that separate us from God and neighbour, rejecting our shame at confessing them, and seeking as best we can to follow the way of Christ.

I now have the DVDs of the lives of St Elisabeth the New Martyr and St John of Shanghai and San Francisco, and I think that such presentations of the Saints are splendid, both for their edification of Christians and for their potential use in missionary activity.

This project needs monetary support. Please contact Nathan through his website if you think you might be able to help.

Otche Nash

2010-07-24T06:56:00.002+01:00

This is really quite lovely, especially the end. Young children praying in harmony always make me cry.

Mitre-Lights

2010-07-19T21:38:00.000+01:00

Something is puzzling me. There seems to be a new trend in hierarchical vesture simmering in the Russian Orthodox Church. From there, who knows where it will spread? Perhaps it is to do with the bishop's role of rightly diving the word of truth, and bringing the light of the Gospel to the people, but it seems that the new thing is for bishops to wear mitres that have a chandelier affixed to the top, like a sort of ecclesiastical helmet-lamp.

I have encountered photographs of two bishops wearing such mitres within the last week alone. The first was on the recent visit of Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk to Serbia.

At first, I thought that this was just a fluke and that the good bishop had done it as a teaching aid or some such thing. Having consoled myself with the thought that this was simply a one-off, I went about my usual business of looking at liturgical photographs and talking to the cat, when I stumbled upon this:

It would appear that, having seen and liked Metropolitan Hilarion's mitre, Archbishop Kyrill of San Francisco ran out and bought one just like it.

So are we likely to see more of this sort of thing? Where does it come from? And how are they powered? I have an image in my mind of a hamster running around in a wheel inside the mitre itself, which generates the electricty to power the bulbs, but I'm sure this can't be right, for they would never be allowed in the altar.

Has anybody else encountered these? If so, are you able to shed any light (cue: audible groan) on this for me?

Thank you so much in anticipation of your help.

Forward in Orthodox Faith

2010-07-08T12:41:00.024+01:00

An American-based friend recently sent me a message, asking about efforts on the part of Orthodox churches in Britain to reach out to Forward in Faith. I very rudely failed to reply in a timely fashion so have decided to make a blog post out of it in the hope that this will go some way towards appeasing the wrath of my acquaintance. I just hope that I don't offend too many people by responding publicly.

The answer is that I know of very little that has been organised on any sort of large scale. There is the quiet evangelism among individuals, for which Orthodoxy is known, but there's nothing such as the OCA's outreach to ACNA. While Metropolitan Jonah's address to their conference was outstanding and inspiring, and no doubt ideal for that context, it was tailored for a situation that is so far removed from the reality of church life in Britain as to be largely an irrelevance to us.

The impression I have got over the years, both as an Anglo-Catholic and now as Orthodox who hears the views of Anglo-Catholics about Orthodoxy, is that English (the factors facing those in Scotland and elsewhere may be different) and North American Anglo-Catholics simply do not understand each other. They may belong to the same genus but they are different species, and I suspect that much of it is historical. I am led to understand that the variety of Anglo-Catholicism known as Anglo-papalism is essentially non-existent in the USA, while among English members of FiF, it is by no means uncommon and may even be the position of the majority. The provinces of York and Canterbury were once under Rome in a way that other Anglican provinces never have been. Anglicans in England have a direct historical link to the patriarchate of Rome that those elsewhere do not, and I suppose Anglo-Catholics in England could find in this some sort of basis for a different ecclesiology from that of their American counterparts, seeing themselves simply as separated parts of the Church of Rome. The impression I get of American Anglo-Catholicism is that it sees itself as Anglican first, and seeks to establish/fortify within its Anglican context the ancient Catholic faith. From that position, the ecumenical dialogue with Orthodox churches and even the talk of possible corporate reunion is not beyond the realm of possibility.

This difference is borne out in worship. American Anglo-Catholics have traditionally used the Anglican Book of Common Prayer in one form or another, or have used one of a number of specially-tailored missals which have usually been based on the BCP but have been enhanced in some way. The result has always looked distinctively Anglican. To them, the concept of an Anglican church using the Roman Missal is simply incomprehensible. Not only can they not visualise it happening in reality, they cannot imagine why any Anglican would wish to do such a thing. Yet, in England, in many Anglo-Catholic parishes, that is precisely what happens day by day, week by week. Many of those that use Common Worship then use its various textual and rubrical options and loopholes, (and there are many), to make the end result resemble the Roman Missal as closely as possible. It doesn't stop at textual variations either. Many English Anglo-Catholic parishes also follow the liturgical trends adopted by their Roman Catholic counterparts, even if they aren't actually required by the Roman Rite, such as the laying aside of the chalice veil, the delegation of the priest's 'Let us proclaim the mystery of faith' to the deacon, and so forth. Chalice veils are often viewed as a middle-of-the-road affair by modern Anglo-Catholics here. North Americans generally do what they see best in their situation and would be less likely to turn to current Roman practice for a rule against which to measure their own.

This came to light when the talk first appeared of Anglican ordinariates under Rome, and the speculation began over what this would look like liturgically. The Anglican Use in the USA was approved some years ago, but, as we have seen, the Anglican liturgical tradition in the USA is quite different from here. In the British Isles, Anglican doctrine and therefore liturgics have often been, at least in part, a reaction against its neighbours. So the Scottish Book of Common Prayer was less Protestant than the English one in the doctrine that it expressed, as a reaction against Presbyterianism. It contained an epiklesis, among other things, and when Anglo-Catholicism appeared in the 19th century, those in Scotland would have looked at their prayer book and seen something with which they could work. (Incidentally, the Scottish Episcopal Church is still generally considered to be liturgically higher than the CofE, as is the Church in Wales, as a response to the "Chapel"). Of course, it was the Scottish Prayer Book tradition that was taken to the USA, and formed the basis of Anglican liturgical practice there. So, when those American Anglo-Catholics approached Rome and said, 'Right. We want you to receive us but we've got this Anglican liturgical heritage that we don't want to lose', Rome was able to examine their rites and see that, yes, there was something distinctive about it that they could take with them.

By contrast, the English Prayer Book was in many ways a reaction against Catholicism, and bore more marks of Protestantism than its Scottish equivalent. When Anglo-Catholicism came along, many found themselves quite unable to work within the constraints of such a book, and such books as the English Missal were published, which enabled the mass to be offered in what was essentially the Roman Rite of the time, only in English. That never really went away, and the result is that, if most Anglo-Catholics of the FiF variety were to now ask Rome to examine their rites so they could take their Anglican liturgical heritage with them, what Rome would see would be something that looks almost exactly like the Roman Rite, if not actually the Roman Missal itself. They would quite rightly ask, 'Where is this Anglican liturgical heritage that you want to bring with you?'

Now there are of course many exceptions to this, but in a large part, members of FiF with whom I have been in contact, both in my Anglican and my Orthodox days, have been Anglo-papalists. Rome is mother and Orthodoxy is some strange and foreign thing, which may be venerable for what it is but is in schism nonetheless. The sort of address that Metropolitan Jonah gave to ACNA and the standing ovation and cheers that punctuated it at various intervals would simply not happen here. Many simply have no time for Orthodoxy.

All of this means that the Orthodox response to FiF here in England at least will of necessity be very different from that in America. There are some members of FiF who are not Anglo-papalists but simply traditional Anglicans, who grew up with their Prayer Book and wish to continue their Christian lives in a context where they do not have to defend themselves against certain trends in the CofE or the eagerness of those around them to swim the Tiber. Many of them are somewhere in the Continuum, while others remain in the CofE. I suppose that it is to them that this effort is tailored. A couple of us who were initially involved with this left after a while, and what we had in common was that it was that we simply weren't part of the target group. I had been a liberal Anglo-Catholic and at the time had welcomed the revisions in the Anglican Communion, so I never felt driven out and in need of refuge elsewhere. My journey to Orthodoxy began because I took seriously my Anglican friends who disagreed and began to explore ecclesiology. In time, I saw their position as being just as untenable as my own and I came to Orthodoxy because I came to believe that it alone is the Church of Christ.

So my excitement about an Orthodox Western Rite was born not out of clinging to a Prayer Book but rather out of my love for the Orthodox history and heritage of Britain: its liturgies, its prayers, its music, its customs, its holy places - the Saints who would have known those prayers, who would have sung that music. I did not understand the existence within Orthodoxy of an Anglican-based rite, with Anglican chant, and Anglican hymns inserted into it. I still don't. Had I wanted that I would have remained Anglican, although it must be said that these rites reflect Anglican practice of years ago and would not be recognisable to many Anglican people today who might otherwise benefit from a Western Rite in Orthodoxy. That is not to say that these things no longer exist in Anglicanism but they are found in pockets rather than being the usual stuff of Anglican worship in England. The first time I ever heard Merbecke was when I was asked to lead the singing of it at these Orthodox services, and I had to learn it for the purpose. Anglican chant is something heard in cathedrals but not most parishes. As for the Prayer Book, services from that are something Anglican prayer Book enthusiasts have to go looking for because it is so uncommon, especially as a main Sunday service. Some places might use it for the quiet 8 o' clock service but even they are getting fewer and fewer.

I am sure that there must be other Anglicans who, like me a few years ago, cannot relate to incessant lamentation over the loss of the Church of England "as it used to be" because the Church of England as it is now is all that they have ever known, who find Prayer Book services alien to their daily experience of Anglicanism, and yet who might be open to be moulded by Orthodoxy if it weren't presented as something that is sniping at what has formed them into what they are today. And what of non-Anglican Christians who are nonetheless the inheritors of the western liturgical tradition in some form and who may wish to explore Orthodoxy: Sacramental Methodists, Roman Catholics, even Independent Catholics? What benefit are Anglican-style services to them? We may find the modern rites in use in these churches and in the CofE problematic but to pretend away the past 40+ years when they have been in use is to severely narrow our missionary efforts. The fact is that to many, possibly most, Anglicans in Britain today, Prayer Book services with Anglican chant, Merbecke, and the scent of teak oil in the air would take just as much adjustment as ancient western services with plainchant. Therefore, while I don't doubt for a moment that the Western Rite may well be more accessible to such people than the Byzantine Rite because the general structure of the Liturgy will be more familiar, and plainsong is commonly used in a number of Anglo-Catholic parishes, and this is part of their pre-schism heritage, if faced with a choice between ancient Orthodox rites with plainsong, and Prayer Book-based rites with Anglican chant and Merbecke, I see no good reason not to go with the former, but then it isn't my decision to make.

I don't mean to disparage the outreach that is happening here. After all, who am I? People are being brought into the bosom of the Church through it and this is always a cause for rejoicing, but I suppose I just have my own private reservations and concern for the relative isolation of some of those who are brought into the Church in this way. I still support them in prayer and would assist them if asked. I just suppose part of me is saddened that there is this splendid opportunity to reach out and it seems tailored only to a specific few: those who are old enough to remember, and wish to continue in something approximating the Anglican worship of 30/40 years ago.

So there's my answer to your question, my friend. There's enough there to certainly make it worth more than a Facebook reply.

Abbot Augustine Reposes

2010-07-04T15:56:00.005+01:00

I have just returned home from the Liturgy and switched the computer on to find an e-mail from Dom James of Christminster, sharing the news that Abbot Augustine of the Benedictine Monastery of Our Lady of Mount Royal has reposed in the Lord. Dom Augustine led the monastery into the bosom of the Church in the early 1960s and they were received into the Russian Church Abroad in 1975. He was a great father to the Western Rite monastics in the Church Abroad and no doubt a source of inspiration elsewhere, and it was to him that St John of San Francisco uttered the now famous words:

Never, never, never let anyone tell you that, in order to be Orthodox, you must also be eastern. The West was Orthodox for a thousand years and her venerable Liturgy is far older than any of her heresies.

In a blessed falling asleep, grant rest, O Lord, to the soul of thy servant the Abbot Augustine, and make his memory to be eternal.

Sixth Sunday after Pentecost 2010

We at Christminster received news this morning of the repose last night of Dom Augustine Whitfield, Abbot of Mount Royal. It was he who not merely brought the western-rite monastic community of Mount Royal into the Russian Church, but also - over many years, and in the face of many difficulties, and often alone - sustained and maintained that mission and vision, handing it on eventually to Christminster and to Holyrood Hermitage in Florida, under its Abbot Dom David Pierce. Abbot David has been a most faithful and dear son to Dom Augustine for many years and cared for him at the end with the Church's holy Mysteries and prayers. He and we at Christminster are the happy inheritors of Dom Augustine's long and lonely struggle.

Thus it is with mixed feelings of sadness and joy that we greet his repose: sad because we have lost a long-time friend and mentor, and joy that he can now receive the thanks he so much deserved for his often thankless task. May God greet his homecoming son as we pray he might greet each of us: Well done, thou good and faithful servant! Because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will set thee over many things. Enter into the joy of thy Lord."

According to his wishes he will be buried privately in a local Orthodox cemetery. There will be a solemn memorial Requiem scheduled for him in early August - possibly at Christminster - to enable all those who would honour his life and work to gather and pray for his eternal repose and heavenly reward.

May his sins lie lightly upon him and may he come to see, face to face, that one Face we all long to see and to adore and praise for all eternity. May this unsung hero of western-rite Orthodoxy and monasticism truly enter into the joy of his Lord. A Mass of Requiem will be offered for him tomorrow at Christminster. Further details will follow.

Dom James M. Deschene
Abbot of Christminster
Hamilton, Ontario

The Curtain Falls

2010-07-03T22:40:00.007+01:00

I sent my parish priest an e-mail a few weeks back, asking whether we could either have the veil at the Royal Doors put on a drawstring or I could be given £1,000,000. I made it quite clear that I was quite happy to settle for whichever was easier. Anyway, to my disappointment, he appeared at church one Saturday shortly afterwards with a corded curtain rail which, he explained with great delight, he had procured from B&Q for some ridiculously tiny sum of money - think single figures.

Having reconciled myself over the course of the afternoon to not having just become a millionaire, I found some pleasure in the new rail, until it became apparent that the hooks didn't move properly along the track because the tension in the cord of this costly masterwork of engineering wasn't quite right. Not only that, but the whole apparatus came crashing down in the middle of Vespers, causing the aposticha to come grinding to a halt while the two of us on the kliros looked up in bemusement. It is my parish priest's frugality that has seen our parish survive difficult times so we have much for which to be grateful. However, on this occasion, I was very pleased today to stay in awaiting the arrival of a rather smart corded curtain rail from John Lewis. Having removed the unnecessary parts, (the designers assume that one will be suspending two curtains that meet in the middle, which is, of course, not my intention), and having worked out how it all fits together, I shall make my first attempt at ecclesiastical DIY during the course of this coming week.

Watch this space.

In the meanwhile, I leave you with this song, the opening lines of which seem particularly pertinent:

Liturgical Oddities

2010-07-02T23:39:00.010+01:00

I stumbled upon this website yesterday and was delighted to find an Orthodox parish broadcasting its services. I began watching the most recent broadcast yesterday, as I very much enjoy looking at these things. Only, I could only watch so far before I just had to shut the computer down. I watched the rest today. Imagine my surprise at some of the things that I saw:

A subdeacon giving a litany, a deacon reading half of the Anaphora instead of the priest, a lay server placing items on the Holy Table, the priest not dividing the Lamb with the spear as usual but grabbing it and carelessly ripping It apart with his bare hands with seemingly little care for prevention of dropping crumbs. The Royal Doors were wide open throughout the Liturgy, even at the point where they would be closed if a bishop were to serve. Very peculiar was the complete omission of the Litany of Fervent Supplication, the Litany for the Catechumens, both Litanies of the Faithful, and the Litany before the Lord's Prayer, not to mention other minor things, which, while not major causes of alarm, were unusual, such as kneeling for part of the Anaphora (on a Sunday), the deacons splitting the litanies between them, and so forth. I found watching it more of a distraction than a spiritually beneficial experience.

Is this sort of thing common in North American parishes under Antioch? My experience of Antiochian worship is that, (with exceptions), those irregularities are not generally in evidence but my experience is severely limited.

I'm not usually one to go looking for things done not quite properly and playing "spot the fault". I think that this is immensely unhealthy. On the other hand, what of faithfulness in small things, in obedience, in recognising that we have received a liturgical heritage which sustains our Faith and which is not ours to tamper with on a whim but of which we are the stewards, to pass it on to those who come after us? I started watching this video with some excitement but was genuinely shocked by these things and wonder just how widespread they are. When there was a particular shot of the interior of the altar, I recognised the church as the one which was the subject of some controversy not too very long ago, so perhaps it is simply this parish.

In any case, I find it quite unfortunate. Has anybody else experienced these things?

Employment Agencies

2010-07-01T07:33:00.010+01:00

Some of you who know me from outside the blogosphere will know of my difficult employment history. I left a permanent job a few years ago, largely because the business for which I worked was going through a transitional period and there were a number of elements in the new modus operandi that clashed with my conscience. Also, I had moved house since starting to work there so what had started as a 20-minute walk to work had become a 1 1/2-hour bus journey.

Somebody suggested to me that I ought to try finding work through an employment agency. For the benefit of those who have always simply gone and found a job themselves, an employment agency is a business providing services to two sorts of clients: there are the prospective employers who may not have, or may not wish to spend their own resources on finding and interviewing people to fill their vacancies and who prefer to outsource this task; then there are the prospective employees, who may see an advantage in registering with an agency that has a number of jobs on its books. Each person is assigned an agency representative, who is responsible for matching the individual to a job, based on the person's qualifications, abilities, and preferences, and the requirements of the prospective employer. While the individual jobseeker pays nothing for this, the employer pays the agency for the service, and the representative then earns commission on top of his regular salary for each employee satisfactorily placed. This is where the problem lies, for the desire to earn more money often means that care for the proper placing of people in jobs often falls by the wayside, and all manner of dishonesty is employed simply to get as many people in jobs as possible, regardless of the hurt caused.

So...

I registered with this employment agency and, within a week, I received a telephone call saying that a telephone customer service job had opened up, with a little bit of upselling. Well, it wasn't the sort of thing that I had been looking for but I had done this in the past and it seemed something I could easily do again for a short time to earn some money until I was able to find something more suitable, so I accepted. In this case, the employer wished to conduct an interview of its own after placement by the agency. I went along to this and, during the course of this interview, it quickly became apparent from the questions that were being asked that this was a hard sales job and not "customer services with a little bit of upselling" at all. Faced with the choice between continuing with the interview and stopping and explaining to the interviewers that this was not the job for which I had come, thereby placing myself in an unstable financial situation, I decided to just continue, and managed to get the job.

At this point I should state that I had explicitly stated to the agency rep that I did not want a hard sales job. It is not in my nature to telephone people and try to persuade them to part with money that they may or may not have in order to purchase something that they may not necessarily want or need. For those of you with strong power of will, this may seem nothing more than a minor annoyance but I know that there are people who are very impressionable and who, for various reasons, may not be able to manage money very well, for whom this sort of thing is a real temptation and can be quite dangerous to their financial stability. This used to be me before I learnt my lesson the hard way so I know all too well what can result from this sort of thing. I did the job for about a month before the conflict between my conscience and the pressure to hit sales targets raised my anxiety levels to the point where I could simply do it no more, so I left.

Having accepted my agency rep's explanation that this had simply been a misunderstanding, I again alerted her that I was available for work. Within a couple of weeks, she had contacted me with an excellent-sounding job, which then turned out to be excellent in reality as well. It was general administrative and customer service work for an ALMO, (arm's length management organisation), which essentially operates as a housing association but for council properties rather than its own. It seems that a number of local councils are now outsourcing this element of their work. I loved this job. I was not forcing people to do what they did not want to do but instead was using interpersonal skills and genjuine care for people to help them as best I could. It took some brain work and innovative thinking at times, and, (apart from being quite well paid), it was very personally rewarding, largely because, day by day, I would speak with people in the office or over the telephone and resolve difficulties for them, and the genuine relief and gratitude in their voices and on their faces made it worth my while, even compensating for the disappointment and anger that was seen in others when we couldn't do everything that they wanted.

However, this was a temporary position, intended to last for three months. Six of us had been placed in this job by the agency, our rep having told us that, at the end of the three-month period, there would be four permanent positions which four of us would fill. While we all got on with each other, there was always a sense of competition and a quiet tension, although the atmosphere was generally pleasant. When one chap announced that he would be moving down south at the end of the three months, this of course increased the chances each of us had of getting one of the positions. However, about two months into the placement, one of the permanent members of staff walked into the office, exclaiming, 'It's in the paper!' Surely enough, there were four job vacancies at our ALMO advertised in the local newspaper, with a description that sounded identical to the work that we had been doing. So we asked the manager about this and she said that yes, these were indeed the jobs that we had been doing. When we asked about the arrangement whereby four of us would fill these positions, she seemed to know nothing about it. She said that this had never been the arrangement, that the intention had always been to advertise generally, and that, while we were all welcome to apply, we would be treated as anybody else, though with the advantage of having done the job already. She immediately telephoned the agency rep, who told her that we must have misunderstood what she told us - please note that she was asking this manager to believe that six people, at the time strangers to each other, had all misunderstood in exactly the same way what they had been told by one person. More likely, it seems to me, is that this one person had given the same incorrect information to all six of us, to her own benefit.

Anyway, the advertisement had gone out and the interviews began. So we sat there and watched as people came to be interviewed in the room next door for the jobs that we had been told were ours. I went for interview and only got past stage one, which is further than my colleagues got. A week or two later, the four successful applicants arrived and were shown around the building. Then - and this is the point where I could bear it no more - they were sat next to us and we were asked to train them to do our jobs. They were wonderfully polite and friendly people who bore no responsibility for anything that had happened, so we agreed among ourselves not to tell them lest they feel guilty, but when they commented on how much they were looking forward to working with us and we responded that they wouldn't be, they asked why, so the cat was out of the bag.

This was a transitional time in my life anyway. There were a number of changes, some good, some painful, all of them requiring adjustment to new ways of things and bringing about some lack of stability. This last series of events with the agency was the proverbial straw, and I started to have anxiety attacks, which got really quite severe. There were days when I wouldn't leave the house, or answer the door or telephone. Then the depression set in. This went on for nearly two years and, while, thanks be to God, I am fine now, it is often difficult to persuade prospective employers of this. It isn't information that I volunteer but if they ask about the gap on my CV, I answer honestly. It took a long while to find a job after that and, when I did, it was 40 miles from home, which made for long days and a tiring commute, but I enjoyed it, as I worked for an online Christian bookshop and got to do various things related to something I enjoy. That lasted for a year before I moved house and it became impossible to commute, and again, I found it difficult to find work after my past health difficulties came to light.

That is, until a couple of months ago when I finally did what I vowed I would never do again, and registered with an agency - a different one this time. Well, they found me work at the beginning of last month, doing a very tedious job but with good people. The hours were early, which was ideal for me, as I could have my afternoons free and get to church in the evening if need be. Finally, I thought that I was back on my feet and that there would be some stability at last. 3 1/2 weeks later, a rumour began to spread around work that the 100 of us who had been hired were only there to cover the busy period over the summer sale, and that we would all be laid off by the end of the week. While we had all understood that this was a temporary position, we had all felt that it would last for some time.

As we spoke among ourselves, it came to light that, at our interviews, each of us had been asked by the agency reps such questions as, 'Are you available to work long term?', 'Are you available until Christmas?' and such like. This way, they could give us the impression that the job would last for some time, thus increasing their chances of placing people in the positions and earning their commission, while at the same time enabling themselves to say, quite accurately, that they made no promises of long-term employment when the time came for us to go less than a month later. Surely enough, I got home from work on Wednesday afternoon to get a telephone call from the agency to let me know that all of us had been laid off with immediate effect. We hadn't even finished our four-week training period. As we had expected this to happen at the end of the working week, we were not even given the opportunity to say goodbye to each other.

Yet again, the dishonesty of the employment agency has reared its ugly head. Among my colleagues were a young man who was saving up to return to his love in Australia, a lady whose husband - usually the breadwinner - had become recently incapacitated, a single mother of three, and no doubt others who had taken the job on good faith that they would have some stability for some time. I simply cannot relate to the complete absence of conscience that is the only way I can imagine people can do this to others just to make a few more pounds. I hope they enjoy their money.

A friend once suggested that I apply to become an employment agency representative. I wasn't sure whether to be flattered or insulted. While my last job was rather mindless and tedious, and while I had my moments of pride and thought to myself on the more boring days, 'I'm really too intelligent for this', it is a job that did not compromise my faith or ethics and from which I could go home with a clear conscience. I do not think that I could say the same were I to be surrounded by the sort of atmosphere that seems par for the course in employment agencies.

May the Lord have mercy on them.

Prostrations on Sunday

2010-06-21T17:49:00.055+01:00

When I was newly baptised or perhaps still a catechumen, I picked up a great deal of what I know about Orthodoxy from discussions on the internet. Of course, one can question the wisdom of this as it has many pitfalls as well as advantages. Among these snippets of information was the rule that prostrations are forbidden on Sundays, in honour of the Resurrection. I had no reason to doubt this so I simply accepted it, and it was further reinforced by the fact that we did not make prostrations on Sundays at my parish, or at my local Greek or Antiochian parishes which I visit from time to time.

So, one Sunday a couple of years ago, when I paid a visit to my local Russian parish and saw some of the faithful prostrate themselves at the epiklesis, my first thought was that perhaps they simply did not know any better. My second thought, having seldom been to a weekday Liturgy, was just how much these people held their Lord in awe and reverence. Really, from that point, I have restrained myself from making prostrations on Sundays, contrary to what my heart calls me to do, and only out of obedience to this "no Sunday prostrations" rule.

Then, just over a fortnight ago, I was at the conference of the Diocese of Sourozh. On the Sunday morning, Archbishop Elisey served the Episcopal Divine Liturgy with his clergy, and I was confused to find that, with the exception of one priest who had trouble with his back, I was the only person in the altar who did not prostrate at the epiklesis.

Not being one to leave any liturgical question unanswered, I did some digging and found statements that prostrations are forbidden on Sundays and during the Paschal season, citing the following canons:

Forasmuch as there are certain persons who kneel on the Lord’s Day and in the days of Pentecost, therefore, to the intent that all things may be uniformly observed everywhere (in every parish), it seems good to the holy Synod that prayer be made to God standing.
- Canon 20 of the First Ecumenical Synod

We have received from our divine Fathers the canon law that in honour of Christ’s Resurrection, we are not to kneel on Sundays. Lest therefore we should ignore the fullness of this observance we make it plain to the faithful that after the priests have gone to the Altar for Vespers on Saturdays (according to the prevailing custom) no one shall kneel in prayer until the evening of Sunday, at which time after the entrance for compline, again with bended knees we offer our prayers to the Lord. For taking the night after the Sabbath, which was the forerunner of our Lord’s Resurrection, we begin from it to sing in the spirit hymns to God, leading our feast out of darkness into light, and thus during an entire day and night, we celebrate the Resurrection.
- Canon 90 of the Sixth Ecumenical Synod (Trullo)

These canons may be read, with notes, here and here.

Now, I do not have Greek, so I cannot read the original text and must rely on a translation but it seems to my reading that these canons are not discussing prostrations at all but rather the practice of kneeling down to pray, (as opposed to standing), which is not done on Sundays, but is quite a different action from a momentary gesture of awe and reverence such as the prostrations made at the epiklesis, when the Holy Things are presented to the people, and so forth.

Here are some more quotations:

On the Lord's Day we consider it improper to fast or to kneel; and we also enjoy this freedom from Pascha until Pentecost.
- Tertullian "On the Crown"

There are many other observances in the Church which, though due to tradition, have acquired the authority of the written law, as, for instance, the practice of not praying on bended knees on Sunday.
- St Jerome

This, too, we ought to know, that from the evening of Saturday which precedes the Sunday, up to the following evening, among the Egyptians they never kneel, nor from Easter to Whitsuntide; nor do they at these times observe a rule of fasting.
- St John Cassian, Institutes

Wednesday is to be fasted, because then the Jews conspired to betray Jesus; Friday, because he then suffered for us. We keep the Lord’s Day as a day of joy, because then our Lord rose. Our tradition is to refrain from kneeling on that day.
- Pope St Peter of Alexandria

To my reading, it appears that there is no contention surrounding the custom of kneeling down to pray. It seems universally accepted from earliest times that this is not done on Sundays and during Pentecost, when standing is preferred. The question, then, seems to lie only in whether the fathers who expressed in writing this tradition which they had received intended their words to be read as also precluding the making of prostrations on Sundays. No definite conclusion can be drawn either way from these patristic quotations alone. However, the extension of the meaning of the word kneeling to include prostrations does not seem to be the sense of St Basil's words below, where prostrations seem to be almost positively encouraged:

On the day of the Resurrection we remind ourselves of the grace given to us by standing at prayer, not only because we rose with Christ, and are bound to "seek those things which are above," but because the day seems to us to be in some sense an image of the age which we expect... On this day the rules of the church have educated us to prefer the upright attitude of prayer, for by their plain reminder they, as it were, make our mind to dwell no longer in the present but in the future.

Moreover, every time we fall upon our knees and rise from off them (ed. that is, make a prostration) we show by the very deed that by our sin we fell down to earth, and by the loving-kindness of our Creator were called back to heaven.
- St Basil the Great "On the Holy Spirit"

Relying on translations, it is not easy to decipher the subtleties of particular types of reverence that possibly exist in the original texts. I understand that English is quite limited in this respect. Is the expression rendered as "on bended knees" directly synonymous with what we today call kneeling, meaning nothing more than that? This seems to be the most obvious reading. Or does it refer to any posture, gesture, or action in which the knees depart from the straight and upright position? If the latter, then prostrations would certainly be ruled out. However, the reductio ad absurdum of that line of reasoning is that processions during prayers or antiphons on Sundays would also be forbidden unless we could work out a way of walking without bending our knees. Yet this is patently not the intention of those words in context, and it is easy to see how quickly things become silly once we start down that road.

Apart from how we interpret historical writings, this is also not what we find in the liturgical tradition of the Church. I asked a priest from my diocese about this and he corroborated my reading, saying that the talk about no prostrations on Sundays is quite incorrect. While I perhaps would not think of it in terms of correctness, I sympathise with his view. He pointed out that when the Holy Chrism is brought out and when the pre-Sanctified Gifts are removed from the tabernacle, a prostration is made, even if it is a Sunday. Also, we prostrate at Matins when we venerate the Cross on the third Sunday of Great Lent and on the Feast of the Elevation of the Cross, even if it falls on a Sunday. So the “no prostrations on Sundays” rule actually runs contrary to what the rubrics direct us to do in the services.

Add to the landscape the practice of our brothers and sisters of the Old Rite, who do make prostrations on Sundays, and we begin to get a clearer picture of things. The Old Rite has been discussed on this blog in the past but to briefly recapitulate, the reforms of Patriarch Nikon were made in the 17th century as part of an effort to bring Russian practice in line with Greek practice, the scholarship of the time suggesting that the Russian church had altered its services over the years, leading to differences between them and those of the Greek church. Those who refused to adopt the reforms were anathematised and persecuted with varying degrees of fierceness for their apparent disobedience. Then, in the 20th century, with improved liturgical scholarship and the discovery of old Greek manuscripts, it was learnt that the old Russian customs in fact represent an authentic ancient tradition within Orthodox praxis, largely untouched by the revisions of the Greek church over the centuries. This preservation of the old ways gives us some insight into how the "no Sunday kneeling" rule was traditionally interpreted, and it seems that it was by no means understood to preclude prostrations. This is from the website of the Old Rite Parish of the Nativity:

Prostrations are made at times and at prayers that are often different than for other Orthodox accustomed to the diminution of prostrations made by and after the Patriarch Nikon. A study needs to be made to determine exactly what the canons of the Church meant when they prohibited prayer “on bended knees” at certain times. For example, the service books used in the Old Rite, and used by all Russian Orthodox prior to the reforms of Patriarch Nikon, specifically direct prostrations at the Kissing of the Gospel at Sunday Matins, or at It is truly Meet… at the end of Liturgy, and even at the end of Shine, Shine, New Jerusalem… all during the Paschal season. While one might argue the propriety of making these prostrations, it must be understood the service books directing these prostrations are hundreds of years old and pre-date the schism in the Russian Church by many decades, if not centuries. Thus, these prostrations are not “Old Believer oddities” but the semi-ancient if not ancient practice of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Based on no actual study but rather on the above and what is generally known about Russian liturgical conservatism, my personal suspicion is that the “no Sunday prostrations” rule was likely a Greek innovation at some point, which has crept into popular consciousness over the centuries but which many of the Russians simply ignored, even after their services were revised to conform to Greek customs of the time. After all, popular piety, once it has become entrenched, often defies official rules. This would explain why the Greek parish that welcomes me does not know of the Sunday prostrations. Also, as Antioch tends to prefer Greek customs over Russian ones, this would explain why my local Antiochian parish also doesn't do these prostrations. At my parish priest's request, I asked my bishop about this, (for the sake of clarifying what our own parish practice ought to be), and his response was that, while in the Church Abroad, we generally follow the practice of Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, (which does not make the prostrations on Sundays and which, while we love it, we must never forget is only one monastery), they are indeed made in many parts of Russia and the Russian diaspora, including Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow, and that there is room for such variety in the Church. (Update 11/08/2010: Since having written this, I have received private correspondence telling me of Sunday prostrations in an Antiochian parish and I myself have witnessed the practice in a Serbian parish.)

For my part, I agree with his sentiment. If people prefer not to make prostrations on Sundays and during Pentecost out of honour for the Resurrection of the Saviour, I have no problem with this, especially as kneeling is now uncommon in our churches. Indeed, their personal piety is none of my business and if that is where my focus lies, then I need to reassess my priorities and learn to pray more fervently. However, it seems that those of us who do make the prostrations are doing nothing that indicates wilful disobedience, neither are we acting in an uncanonical manner. I just feel so relieved that what has felt like such a restriction for so long on my expression of my love for the Saviour and the awe of what happens at the Divine Liturgy has finally been relaxed. So yesterday, for the first time on a Sunday, I was able to freely prostrate myself before the Body and Blood of Christ at the appointed times, in keeping with my natural inclination, and was comforted to see our visiting priest do the same.

For the benefit of any who wish to adopt the prostrations but do not know when, they are done at the Liturgy:

at the Anaphora, at the beginning of "It is meet and right to worship the Father, and the Son..."
at the invocation of the Holy Spirit on the Gifts, immediately after the deacon's threefold "Amen"
at the end of the hymn to the Mother of God, at the words "thee do we magnify" or the festal/seasonal variation
at the beginning of the Lord's Prayer
When the Holy Things are brought to the people for communion, at "With the fear of God, with faith draw near."
after "We have seen the True Light...", at the final elevation of the chalice, while the priest says "always, now and ever...", a prostration is made. Those who have received divine communion never prostrate but instead make a low bow from the waist.