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Since it has been expressed in the past and more recently in another thread on the forum, I ask all participants what their feelings are about the revisions to the Liturgy and more specifically what problems they have with them. I do ask everybody to limit themselves to the officially proposed revisions and not what a particular priest may do or not do. The revisions for the most part were present at the 75th anniversary Divine Liturgy, Otpust since then, and the Metroploitan's enthronement on July 9.

In Christ,
Lance

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How is this possible, as the official revised recension, though approved by Rome, has not been submitted to a vote by the Council of Hierarchs? In fact, the official revised recension has not been shown to anyone outside of the Vatican and the intereparchial liturgical commission--the entire work has been done largely in secret, and without consultations with the clergy and the people. All of which leads one to believe that the hierarchs think the liturgy is THEIR personal property, and not the patrimony of the entire Church.

In the interim, I do believe that all four eparchies have effectively adopted the so-called "Parma books"--which are NOT the official revised recension. My objections to this include:

1. A poor translation which tends to paraphrase or use circumloctions ("Christians of the true faith"; "the Episcopate of the true believers"), as well as flat, uninspired and non-hieratical English.

2. Suppression of the intermediate verses of the antiphons, particularly on the feasts, which reduces the amount of psalmody in the liturgy and much of its mystagogical character.

3. Suppression of the "Grant it" petitions, which tends to destroy the balance in the liturgy between joy in the Resurrection and awareness of our own sinfulness.

On the plus side, we have the reading aloud of the prayers of the Antiphons, of the Faithful, and of the Anaphora, which restores these important mystagogical prayers to all the people.

On a philosophical level, however, I have to object to the notion, implemented by one particular hierarch, of making his redaction of the typical edition into the mandatory form. Tradition mandates that the entire typical edition is just what it claims to be--the full and NORMATIVE recension of the Liturgy, which each and every community is free to adapt to its needs in accordance with local custom and certain minimum criteria. But those minima NEVER were taken to be the maximum. Hegumen Nicholas has had some very strong words regarding this deviation from Tradition.

By the same token, rumors seem to indicate that the intereparchial liturgical commission has gone far beyond attempting a better translation of the offical 1942 Slavonic typical edition, and has instead proposed a new typical edition which will be mandatory for the entire Metropolitan Church. This would violate several ecumenical and liturgical imperatives laid out in the Liturgical Instructions, and would have the effect of giving the Metropolitan Church a liturgical text not used by ANY other Byzantine Church, Orthodox or Catholic. It would differ from that used by the Mother Church in Europe; it would differ from that used by the Ukrainian Church in Europe and the US; it would differ from the text used by the Johnstown Diocese. Its only purpose, if the rumors are true, is to differentiate the Ruthenian Metropolitan Church from all other Churches and bring its useage closer to that of the Latin Church in the US. Is this perhaps Bishop Elko's belated revenge?

[ 07-08-2002: Message edited by: StuartK ]

Lance, is there some way to access "the officially proposed revisions"?

StuartK, could you please elaborate on the "several ecumenical and liturgical imperatives laid out in the Liturgical Instructions" that are violated by the proposal of "a new typical edition which will be mandatory for the entire Metropolitan Church"?

We're not really smooth on changing anything, so this process should be interesting.



Really, is there anyone involved in the process that can credibly be suggested to have such motives?

djs

I must admit that I get nervous when changes are made to the Divine Liturgy that distinguish us from our Orthodox brethren. While there may be some or other historical justification for this, the fact remains that the Council told us to look to our Orthodox brethren for an understanding of what the organic development of the history of our liturgy would be. To run off, willy-nilly, to establish some other paradigm seems not only to be foolhardy, but to be in direct violation of what the Council has mandated.

As for the secrecy stuff, I can't get beyond the idea that a 'select' group of clergy will make the decisions. This hearkens back to the idea that only the clergy have the education and 'wisdom' to determine what is to be done. And the observant and dedicated lay folks, who may have advanced training and degrees in all sorts of relevant disciplines, are told: buzz off. "You ain't a priest so you can't know what the reality is." Well, I hope they kiss that stuff 'good-bye'. If they don't, we'll be a perpetual K-Mart church, always catering to the velvet-painting crowd.

Blessings!

My opinion:

#1: Find the best English translation of the Divine Liturgies of St. John Chrysostom, St. Basic the Great, and Liturgy of the Presanctified currently in use by any of the Orthodox Churches in the US (whether Antiochian, OCA, GOA, etc.). This means keeping phrases like "all you Orthodox Christians"

#2: Insert the prayers for the Pope of Rome in the appropriate places.

#3: Begin the Liturgy

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This doesn't work for the "Ruthenians"--meaning the Carpatho-Rusyn and Ukrainian Greek Catholics, because our traditional liturgy is pre-Nikonian; i.e., we missed out on the wonderful experiment whereby the Russian Church in the 1650s tried to bring its liturgical useage into line with that of contemporary Greek jurisdictiosn. While on the Orthodox side, the traditional useage of the Kyivan Church was almost immediately "Russified", the Greek Catholics, while losing their ecclesial identity and picking up a lot of latinizations, did manage to retain their authentic liturgy.

The recension issued by the Pontifical Oriental Institute in the 1940s represents a magnificent work of liturgical scholarship, a model of how the work of restoration and renewal should be done. It is, to the greatest extent possible, a comprehensive recension of the liturgical useage of the Ukrainian and Ruthenian Churches at the time of their unions with Rome. As such, they are also models for the Ukrainian and Carpatho-Rusyn Orthodox interested in reclaiming their common patrimony.

Therefore, the proper steps to be taken by any liturgical reform in the US by the Metropolia should begin and end, with the issuance of an accurate, and singable translation of the official 1942 Typical Edition. It is then up to each individual hierarch, as liturgiarch of his Eparchy, to determine what the liturgical minima are to be. It is up to each individual parish to determine, on the basis of its own character and needs, how far beyond those minima it wishes to go.

If I could make a suggestion... When posting messages like the one that started this thread one should clarify the ritual Church to which the thread belongs. We in the Melkite Church, for example, have not "changed" the Liturgy in quite a while (not since the Synodal Liturgy was promulgated many years ago).

Edward, deacon, sinner and moderator

Dear Friends,

How utterly fascinating!

If there is anything with respect to liturgical reform that can be learned from the experience of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, it is that whenever the bishops propose a "possible" shortening of texts, that "proposal" becomes the rule of the liturgical day from then on.

Thus, we lost the Second Antiphon - permanently. And so why do we have the "Third Antiphon" where there are only two? Is this an imitation of an Old Believer recension or something?

We lost the Ektenia for the Catechumens - after all, we don't actually convert anyone any more, who would want to join our Church when there is the RC and other Churches?

We pay fine attention to commemorating the Pope all of four times in the Liturgy when originally he was only commemorated by the Metropolitan of Kyiv alone!

And all of this has nothing whatever to do with an upgrading of our liturgical tradition in the spirit of the Easternization mandate entrusted to us by Rome (let's not blame it for enduring latinization, shall we?).

It shows how weak our Eastern Christian identity is and how our bishops feel the need to model ourselves after the Latin Church.

The "shortening" of our Liturgy is being done to approximate the "shortening" evident in the Novus Ordo.

As Stuart has rightly pointed out, our bishops feel that liturgy is THEIR domain and not that of the common holding of the entire Church.

Some of our Religious Orders have historically taken it upon themselves to keep our liturgical tradition as closely aligned to the West as possible, lest we be "infected" with schism . . .
(e.g. the removal of "Orthodox Christians" from some liturgical recensions).

And look at what they did to the services of the Feast of Pentecost to ensure that the Orthodox understanding of the procession of the Holy Spirit didn't take hold of the imagination of our poor people . . .

As Dr. John said, our mandate is to be Orthodox in all things, "nec plus, nec minus, nec aliter!"

And rather than celebrate the Feast of all Saints of Rus'-Ukraine on Sunday last, we'll be doing it on the Fourth Sunday to allow for the celebration of some Latin holy-days . . .

But it does seem to me that you Ruthenians are a tad worse off than we!

(I had to throw that in.)

Alex

I serve at a Ruthenian parish where we never met a litany that we didn't like - and that affection extends to the little litanies between the 3 Antiphons, which have (at least) 3 verses apiece.

I know we're a tad unusual.

I've experienced the proposed new Liturgy. I don't have a major problem with anything except the supression/destruction - whatever you want to call it - the elimination of most of the service of the Antiphons. Speaking as an ign'rant convert, the Antiphons never made any sense to me until we began to "do them all" - and then they "fit" - at least in my sense of liturgics.

As for the "Christians of the True Faith" nonsense, ya, well - I know there are folks in our Church who would rather be dipped in rubbing alcohol & dragged over carpet tacks than use the dreaded "O" word, but it would sure be nice to get over that, too. Heck, the Orthodox use the "C" word in the Creed, don't they?


Just my two kopecks.

Sharon

Sharon Mech, SFO
Cantor & sinner
sharon@cmhc.com

[ 07-09-2002: Message edited by: Sharon Mech ]

Stuart said:

1. "How is this possible, as the official revised recension, though approved by Rome, has not been submitted to a vote by the Council of Hierarchs? In fact, the official revised recension has not been shown to anyone outside of the Vatican and the intereparchial liturgical commission--the entire work has been done largely in secret, and without consultations with the clergy and the people. All of which leads one to believe that the hierarchs think the liturgy is THEIR personal property, and not the patrimony of the entire Church."

2. "In the interim, I do believe that all four eparchies have effectively adopted the so-called "Parma books"--which are NOT the official revised recension."

3. "A poor translation which tends to paraphrase or use circumloctions ("Christians of the true faith"; "the Episcopate of the true believers"), as well as flat, uninspired and non-hieratical English."

4. "Suppression of the intermediate verses of the antiphons, particularly on the feasts, which reduces the amount of psalmody in the liturgy and much of its mystagogical character."

5. "Suppression of the "Grant it" petitions, which tends to destroy the balance in the liturgy between joy in the Resurrection and awareness of our own sinfulness."

6. "Its only purpose, if the rumors are true, is to differentiate the Ruthenian Metropolitan Church from all other Churches and bring its useage closer to that of the Latin Church in the US. Is this perhaps Bishop Elko's belated revenge?"

Lance replies:

1. The revised recension was sitting on Metropolitan Judson's desk the day he died waiting for promulgation. However, since we have a new Council it requires their vote. Again the revised recension, except for minor details is pretty much what was celebrated at the 75th anniversay, and Otpust, and will be used today at the enthronement.

2. The Archeparchy of Pittsburgh has not adopted the Parma books. Some priests may use it, but most follow the 1978 Blue Pew book arrangement.

3. I don't agree with the fear of the "O" word, but the translation itself is the same as the 1965 edition, except for a few word changes, as far as I have seen.

4. Suppresion is in the eye of the beholder. For the Archeparchy of Pittsburgh nothing is being suppressed and the third antiphon is being restored.

5. Again the eye of the beholder. Many (most) Pittsburgh parishes don't take these litanies at all now. The revised recension restores the important petitions and prayers. The Aitesis is a dismissal litany that was transplanted from Vespers and Orthros because people actually got dismissed from the Liturgy, certain classes of penitents after the Great Entrance and those faithful not under censure but not receiving Holy Communion before the Our Father. Since we are no longer dismissing anybody, I see no problem with suppressing them so the focus can be placed on the prayers that used to be said silently during these litanies.

6. I dont' see how any of the proposed changes imitate in any way what the Latin Church has done aside from taking the Anaphora aloud.

[ 07-16-2002: Message edited by: Lance ]

The circumlocution "of the true faith" has been part of our English translation for some time. (It's in my Nebesnaja Manna, copyright 1941 (3rd ed. 1960)). It should be easy to understand that, at a certain time, the more obvious translation could have been a major distraction to those praying to put aside earthly cares.

This is an issue of pastoral sensitivity; it has analogies in Orthodox translations, for example in the commemorations of the Theotokos:

"One can see why ["immaculate"] was used to translate the emphatic achrantou but the clear and familiar &#8220;most pure&#8221; (or &#8220;all pure&#8221 is perhaps superior to a word so associated with non-Orthodox spirituality."

The Word Magazine February 1997
THE DIVINE LITURGY IN ENGLISH: A BRIEF SURVEY OF
VERSIONS IN CURRENT USE
JOHN M. HARWOOD, B.SC., A.L.A.

http://www.antiochian.org/Midwest/Articles/Divine_Liturgy_In_EnglishNB.htm

Times have changed. Have we reached a point that "of the true faith" is more of a distraction to our people?

djs

Slava Isusu Christu Bratij i Sestrij!

It is 2:21 pm Pittsburgh time and I'm listening to the installation broadcast of Metroploitan-Archbishop Basil. Unfortunately it is on AM dial and keeps getting interrupted by cell phone telephone calls, not sure why. As far as the "new liturgy", it is as was expected, full of awkward wording that does not fit that well with the original Rusyn Prostopinije plain chant melodies and I'm not surprised. Very little plain chant is being sung, instead the use of the numerous choral arrangements Bortyniansky and other Eastern Christian choral music, both as used by the Ukrainian and Great Russian Churches. Also there seems to be a deliberate absence of the use of any prostopinije in the Church Slavonic language and that truly is a shame(we American Byzantine Catholics are too lazy even to try to understand a non-English langauge)! There should be a video of Metropolitian Basil's installation as well as Bishop-Elect John's episcopal consecration. Look for it to be advertised in the BCW Eparchial paper soon.

S'Bohom

Ung-Certez

Dear Ung,

In that case, I'm signing off right now and will pray for your new Hierarch.

Alex

If this is even remotely true, it would be a complete disaster for the US Ruthenian Church.

God Forbid!

Michael

Glory to Jesus Christ!

StuartK,

You are on a roll! Keep it up. You are quite correct regarding Hegumen Nicholas' opinion. He and does not agree with certain reformers in the area of liturgical reform. Divine Liturgies celebrated at Holy Resurrection Monastery are much more traditional ( monastic Orthodox Carpatho-Rusyn ) than those served elsewhere in the Van Nuys Eparchy according to the "modified" recension.

Neither the Russian Catholics nor the monks at Holy Resurrection have any objections to the "O" word.

My Russian parish does the following:

1) Prayer for "Our Holy, Ecumenical Pontiff, John Paul, Pope of Rome..." at the appropriate places.

2)"Orthodox Christians."

3) three antiphons along with the intermediate verses.

4) all of the "Grant it O Lord." petitions.

The result of all this is that my liturgical experience is nearly identical to that of a Russian Orthodox Christian. I can and have visited local Russian Orthodox parishes. I feel quite comfortable.

Ruthenian reformers ought to strive for the same effect.

Presviataya Bogoroditse Fatimsakaya, spasi nas.
RusOrthCath martyrs and confessors, pray for us.