www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy The Revised Divine Liturgy Asking for enlightenment

...This office undertook the process of reform, of returning the Ruthenian ritual back to its traditional roots, and to guide the process, relied on the research and advice of Archbishop Andrew�s friend, Father Cyril Korolevsky. (He was actually a Frenchman, Jean-Fran�ois Charon, who changed his name when he joined the Ruthenian Church.) His work was a true reform, returning the rite to its more authentic Eastern form. This was difficult to do, since the Liturgy had been modified for almost three centuries. He used the traditional texts of the Ruthenian Church where there was a unanimous tradition and followed the usage of the Great Russian Church where there were discrepancies, since his goal was to return to the universal Slavonic standards. This work was completed in 1941, and it was a true reform - the restoration of the Liturgy according to its Eastern form. After the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, the Oriental Congregation also produced the Liturgies of St. Basil the Great and the Liturgy of Presanctified Gifts, along with an Epistle and a Gospel book, a small Books of Needs (containing the sacramental mysteries, blessing and consecrations, the Book of Hours for the Divine Praises and - in 1973 - an Archieraticon, the book of the bishop�s rites. This conscious decision to restore the Liturgy was followed up by Rome in the solemn decrees of Vatican II, then in the Canon Law promulgated for the Eastern Churches, and most recently in the Liturgical Instruction of the Sacred Congregation for the Eastern Churches of January 6, 1996....

...This is where we are now. Our Church has existed in America effectively since the 1880's. In each of the generations since then there has been a reform of the Liturgy. The first reform was the implementation of the hybrid ritual of the Ruthenian Church in reaction to the Russian Orthodox. This was not an authentic reform, since the motives for it were political and sociological and constituted a loss of tradition. The second reform was what some have called the �americanization� of the Liturgy. The leaders of the Church felt that to fit in with the American culture, the Liturgy had to be shortened, and efficient Western type rituals that would not be a burden on the people were introduced. Some priests were able to cut the Liturgy down to thirty minutes. This, too, was not a true reform, since it abandoned the gospel mission of the Church to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ and instead surrendered to the culture and created a minimal form of worship that did not demand much of us except, of course, that God always acts in his Divine Liturgy, even if celebrated poorly...

one of the main problems is the term �lover of mankind,� Philanthropos, �mankind� being labeled as a sexist term.

In the world today, however, gender roles are changing.

"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness... So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply,

Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22* Wives, be subject to your husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 As the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 Even so husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no man ever hates his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31* "For this reason a man (anthropos) shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32 This mystery is a profound one, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church; 33 however, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.