The purpose of this post is to explore how to deepen and enrich the typical Sunday experience at a typical Episcopal parish. Father John-Julian has for example expressed exasperation at the slackness in celebrating feasts and praying the daily office among Episcopalians. I agree with him, that we need to expect more, but how is that to be accomplished?
I want to suggest that by building a fuller experience on Sunday, we can improve the situation. By a fuller experience, I mean how can we recapture the idea of Sunday as the Lord ’s Day. The Book of Common Prayer has a wealth of material that can be useful in this regard, as does tradition. Setting aside for a moment, the early morning Eucharist, I want to explore how services ought to be structured.
First, I believe that in keeping with our traditional Daily Office piety and our historical practice, the services should start with Morning Prayer. 9 a.m. would be a good time at most parishes. If possible, this should be choral service or at least have music. It should be lead by the deacon or a lay officiant, so that the Priest can meditate and relax. This should last about half an hour. At the end of the service, the choir and clergy process out.
What happens next depends on the day of the month. I don’t insist on the following exact pattern, but I present it so that people understand the basic idea.
The first Sunday of the Month is baptism Sunday, the clergy, altar servers, and choir reform and enter singing the Te Deum followed by the B suffrages from Morning Prayer, followed by the Litany of Thanksgiving. Having collected the persons to be baptized and their sponsors, they process to the font were the baptisms are performed and the congregation renews their vows.
The second Sunday of the Month is Penance Sunday, the clergy, alter servers, and choir reform and enter singing the Great Litany or the Cantle of Penance from the BCP. They process to the chancel where a priest or deacon leads the Penitential Office from the BCP including the Decalogue and the seven penitential Psalms.
The third Sunday of the Month is Hymn sing Sunday, the congregation sings a combination of seasonally appropriate and their favorite hymns for half an hour. The latter have been solicited via a suggestion box or the like.
The fourth Sunday of the Month, assuming it is not the last Sunday of the month, is Exhortation Sunday. The clergy, alter servers, and choir reform and enter singing the Creed of St. Athanasius. They process to the chancel where the Rector gives a short sermon on the importance of the sacraments or perhaps reads from Henry’s Defense of the Seven Sacraments and reads the exhortation.
The last Sunday of the Month is What Next Sunday, the clergy, alter servers, and choir reform and enter singing a hymn. They process to the chancel where the Rector gives a short sermon on the Red letter feast days coming up in the next month and why people should come to services on those days. He also makes announcements for the coming month.
Other possibilities, include: a Rite of Thanksgiving using that litany, the five Laud’s Psalms, the General Thanksgiving, etc.; the wedding of a parishioner; confirmations; the office for the dead if a parishioner has died recently; and etc.
The forgoing having taken about half an hour, the Eucharist begins at 10 a.m. This does not need comment from me, but it is going to get some any way. One of the most important things a church can do is involve its young people in the services of the church. The teen years are a tough time in that regard and I suggest that after confirmation, young people be given an opportunity to do the readings at mass and during morning and evening prayer, in analogy to bar mitzvah. One of the many advantages of the combined Morning Prayer, Eucharist, Noon Prayer, and Evening Prayer is that it radically increases the number of available places for young people to act as lectors on Sunday.
After the Eucharist, the congregation breaks up into smaller groups for Christian education. This could be bible study, or church history, or studying the lives of the saints.
At noon, the congregation reassembles in the church for Noon Prayer. This lasts ten minutes or so, after which, the congregation adjourns to the parish hall for lunch and fellowship. The lunch should have a festal character, in keeping with the Lord’s Day. This does not have to be outrageously expensive, roast or fried chicken with some sides.
After an hour of food and relaxation, is an afternoon program or programs (e.g. a positive cultural activity: classical music, museum, movie, etc. or a parish related activity: choir practice, acolyte training, parish meeting, etc. or a deanery related activity: visiting other parishes, joint missionary work, joint charitable activity etc.)
At 4:30 or 5 p.m. the congregation reconvenes in the church for evensong. This should if possible be a choral service. After evensong everyone goes home for dinner, having spent eight hours together in prayer and fellowship.
Now some will say that no one would come to the whole eight hours, but that is not the point. No one would come to the 8 a.m. mass and 9 a.m. mass and 10:30 a.m. mass at my parish every Sunday, but we have them. More to the point no one can be expected to come to three masses on the same Sunday because once you have taken the Eucharist once for the day, you ought not to take it again without cause and the lectionary readings at the services are all the same.
The point of the schedule I outline is that one could expect people to come to five DIFFERENT services and three other activates. Sure some people might only come to Morning Prayer, while others might only come to the Eucharist. But some significant fraction might come to Morning Prayer, the Baptisms, and the Eucharist and a much smaller fraction to the whole day of services and activities. But the fact that there was a whole day of them would set the expectations of the parish. People could not say, I went to mass three of the last four Sundays. The question would become did I go to morning prayer, the hymn sing, and Mass last Sunday or did I only go to mass. That is moving things in the direction we want them to go in.
It would be a first step towards a fuller celebration of the church Calendar and Daily Office. Anyone who went to the full day would have been at most of the office for Sunday and the Eucharist.
I have thus far dodged the question of the early morning Eucharist. While some think this is disruptive (though I note they NEVER say the same about a family or youth Eucharist) I think it has a place. Not only is it a time to celebrate the rite (I or II) not celebrated at the main service, it is more importantly a way for people who want to keep the Eucharistic fast from the night before to do so without having to wait until 10 a.m.
In contrast, I think the idea of a separate family or youth Eucharist is extremely disruptive to parish life. Families ought to be the heart of the parish. They should be at the main service of the day. My schedule allows families that are just joining the parish to have a half a loaf so to speak. They can go to Morning Prayer, or Evening Prayer or the Eucharist, without committing themselves to the full day’s program. But that full day program is there as a challenge to them, something for every parishioner to grow into overtime.
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