Category: Worship

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Daily prayer: "I will pray for you" (and mean it)

“I will pray for you” and its secularized version “I’m thinking of you” are still lively expressions of concern, and often deeply valued by the person thought of or prayed for. Friends have approached me, asking for prayer, only last week.

“Of course,” I said. And I mean it, and I have a plan to fulfil that request. I will pray for you.

There’s a technique to adding petitions to collects. To review, collects (accent on the first syllable) are a variety of prayer with a particular structure, and they are typically prayed in a set series, with special collects added for particular occasions. In the morning and evening prayer the Universalists historically used, the collects come at the end. The collect “for all Conditions of Men” is a good place to add petitions, so I’ll show it as printed, and then as I pray it. Prayers for clergy and congregations (I always pray for my ministers and church, for what it’s worth), for this and other nations, for special occasions, and my blessings in this life come in other places.

As printed:

O God, the Creator and Preserver of all mankind, we humbly beseech thee for all sorts and conditions of men; that thou wouldest be pleased to make thy ways known unto them, thy saving health unto all nations. More especially we pray for the good estate of the Church Universal; that it may be so guided and governed by thy good Spirit, that all who profess and call themselves Christians may be led into the way of truth, and hold the faith in unity of spirit, in the bond of peace, and in righteousness of life. Finally, we commend to thy fatherly goodness all those who are any ways afflicted or distressed, in mind, body, or estate; that it may please thee to comfort and relieve them according to their several necessities, giving them patience under their sufferings, and a happy issue out of all their afflictions. And this we beg for thy mercy’s sake in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

How I pray it today:

O God, the Creator and Preserver of all mankind, we humbly beseech thee for all sorts and conditions of men; that thou wouldest be pleased to make thy ways known unto them, thy saving health unto all nations. More especially we pray for the good estate of the Church Universal; and in particular the churches in Iraq, that it may be so guided and governed by thy good Spirit, that all who profess and call themselves Christians may be led into the way of truth, and hold the faith in unity of spirit, in the bond of peace, and in righteousness of life. Finally, we commend to thy fatherly goodness all those who are any ways afflicted or distressed, in mind, body, or estate; particularly Anna, Bailey and Carter; the refugees in Syria and Gaza; and people suffering with bulimia that it may please thee to comfort and relieve them according to their several necessities, giving them patience under their sufferings, and a happy issue out of all their afflictions. And this we beg for thy mercy’s sake in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The semicolons are your friends. Added petitions seem to fit there naturally, or at the end of sentences. I’ll later share some resources about finding additional, particular (“proper”) collects.

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Different ways to "sing" the psalm

Each evening, for vespers, I “sing” the Bonum Est Confiteri, Prasm 92:1-4 as it read in the rubrics, and included in the Coverdale version:

¶ Then shall be sang the following Psalm:

Bonum Est Confiteri.

It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord: and to sing praises unto thy name, O Most Highest;
To tell of thy loving-kindness early in the morning: and of thy truth in the night-season;
Upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the lute: upon a loud instrument, and upon the harp.
For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy works: and I will rejoice in giving praise for the operations of thy hands.

Do I sing it? No. But there a different ways congregations can use this (and other psalms and canticles):

  1. Read in in unison.
  2. Read in by alternating verses or half verses; alternating between a worship leader and congregation, or between halves of the congregation.
  3. Read in unison, but book-ended with a sung antiphon. More often seen in newer hymnals.
  4. Chanted: plainsong or Anglican chant being two options.
  5. A metrical version sung to a psalm tune — “Old 100th” was the tune for an early metrical version of Psalm 100.
  6. A hymn based closely on the psalm.

The Sternhold and Hopkins metrical psalter is the likely choice for option 5, giving us, in common meter:

It is a thing both good and meet
to praise the highest Lord,
And to thy Name, O thou most High,
to sing with one accord:

To shew the kindness of the Lord,
before the day be light,
And to declare his truth abroad,
when it doth draw to night;

On a ten-string’ed instrument,
on lute and harp so sweet,
With all the mirth you can invent
of instruments most meet.

An assortment of hymns evoking Psalm 92 may be found here.

The point: a rubric and a text may be used in more than the literal way.

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Evening prayer alterations: Prayer for the President

Twice a day now, I pray for the President of the United States and others “in civil authority” as part of my morning and evening prayer practice. It is not only a hallowed practice, but one that gets its warrant in the same breath as a testimony made for universal salvation, namely 1 Timothy 2:1-4:

I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

(Reading on in the same chapter, I’m not so fond about the part about women teaching; the author of this letter makes a hash out of his Genesis prooftext, too. I digress.)

But the prayer appointed in the evening is increasingly problematic. I’ve given a good try, but I need to find a replacement. It reads:

Almighty God, whose kingdom is everlasting and power infinite; Have mercy upon this whole land; and so rule the hearts of thy servants, The President of the United States, The Governor of this State, and all others in authority, that they, knowing whose ministers they are, may above all things seek thine honor and glory; and that we and all the people, duly considering whose authority they bear, may faithfully and obediently honor them, in thee and for thee, according to thy blessed Word and Ordinance; through Jesus Christ our Lord who, with thee and the Holy Ghost, liveth and reigneth, world without end. Amen.

Close versions of this prayer have been in use in the United States in a number of different prayer books for two hundred years. Also, if you were saying Evening Prayer among traditionalists in the Church of England, you would note it is in the place of the state prayers (particularly “Prayer for the Queen’s Majesty”). Which is by way of saying this prayer bears more of the markings of a prayer for a Christian ruler than a prayer Christians would make for their elected leaders in a secular democracy. And while the author to Timothy had no imagining of our modern democracy, neither were the powers prayed-for either Christian or particularly sympathetic, so the tone of this prayer seems unnecessarily deferential.

We can do better.

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Morning and evening prayer for myself

For the last week or so I’ve been praying an abridged version of Universalist morning and evening prayer (evening prayer, rather than the morning prayer and vespers PDF I posted) at home. Abridged in that I don’t read out the dialogues, opening words or anything to direct the congregation. No hymns and obviously no sermon.

A psalm or two, a reading, and the usual prayers. I add a collect for the day, and I’m slowly working through various resources to find these, and collects for special occasions.

I’m getting used to the rhythms of grammar of the prayers, and I add to specific petitions more naturally each day. I started using small sticky notes to remember particular people places or situations in my prayers. Some elements are showing their age; others provide timeless comfort.

Even after a few days, I can feel something changing my direction towards God, and I look for new discoveries in the days and years to come.

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The Universalist services prayed at General Assembly

In case you wanted to see the printed services used at First Universalist Church, Providence, held over General Assembly, please download this PDF (4.2 Mb). I created this not out of the 1941 edition of A Book of Prayer for the Churches that First Universalist, Providence, uses, but the 1957 edition printed by the recently defunct First Universalist Church, Woonsocket, Rhode Island. (I got it on eBay.) Just to be clear that the tradition isn’t a nineteenth-century re-enactment, but long-held. And there’s a difference.

But the text for morning prayer and vespers in the two editions is the same. Note: we prayed vespers and not evening prayer. Evening prayer developed from vespers (the evening service) and compline (the service before bed) so that raises the question: why does the book have both? I don’t know, except to think that some churches used one and some the other. I’ll have to analyze their differences.

A word about how they ran. The pastor of First Universalist, Providence, lead the services making “micro-alterations” and applying local, customary ceremonial. We were supported in our singing and chanting by organ and organist. With readings (Old Testament and Gospel in the morning; New Testament epistle for vespers), sung responses, psalm, a brief address, and a hymn (vespers only) the services ran about 20-25 minutes in the morning and fifteen for vespers.

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Hymns of the Spirit at General Assembly 2014?

If you were at the 2014 General Assembly, or watched it by streaming video, you would have seen in the opening ceremony — the one with the banner parade, greetings, adoption of the rules and the first worship service — a prayer from Hymns of the Spirit, and you may have wondered “how did that happen”? It’s not exactly in the daily consciousness of Unitarian Universalists. bitb_ga2014_02

The prayer hits at about 1:35:20, read by service leader and Unitarian Universalist minister Erika Hewitt. You’ll have to listen in; it’s not printed in the prepared printed document.

The prayer, a confession, is from a Hymns of the Spirit, or more accurately, the Services of Religion that usually prepended it. A composite and adaptation of the prayer of confession from Service Eleven (which I began to muse on here) and the second prayer of aspiration from Service Eight.

So who wrote them?

  • “O Thou unseen source of peace and holiness…” by Von Ogden Vogt.bitb_ga2014_01
  • “Into this house of light we come…” by (don’t be shocked) Von Ogden Vogt.

 

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Opening worship: thoughts from Von Ogden Vogt

I was reading the 1960 edition of well-known Unitarian minister and liturgist Von Ogden Vogt’s Art and Religion that explained his vision of the opening part of worship. This is his chapter “The Order of Liturgy” — so influential that it’s cited as a such here. The following chapter “Introit and Antiphons” anticipated a revival of that liturgical use among mainline Protestants, but which have little purchase among Unitarian Universalists.

The book’s in copyright, but the original 1921 edition is in the public domain: that’s what follows. And if there’s any difference between 1921 and 1960 in these two chapters (there is an appendix) it has escaped my attention.

Von Ogden Vogt is important for understanding the influential — if now little used — Services of Religion that prepend the joint Unitarian and Universalist red Hymns of the Spirit. There’s no doubt in my mind that he’s behind making an introit an option for the services, though, as he explains in Art and Religion, these ought to be composed afresh. What he doesn’t write about is the sequence, particular to Unitarians so far as I’ve seen, of

  • Opening words
  • Exhortation
  • Invocation
  • Confession (sometimes broadly conceived)

The exhortation (which also sets the tone of worship) is the innovative part, and fills the role of the introit.

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Digging up theoretical works around worship

A couple of blog posts about worship before we dive into General Assembly. If you’re attending in Providence, perhaps we can meet?

The problem. There are at least two basic problems when you meet a liturgical text:

  1. if there are directions (rubrics), deciding how you make the right decisions among various choices, and
  2. understanding the intent of the liturgy-creator when you want to add in extra resources or make a substitution.

Without this understanding, it’s easy to get into a rut, confusing to make exceptions for special occasions, hard to correct eccentricies — those useages that have crept into worship that feel wrong, but you can’t put your finger on why — and almost impossible to add something new. Or, just as bad, hard to justify removing something that fills an emotional need for some, but just doesn’t work well in worship.  (I’m looking at you, Joys and Concerns.)

And, without knowing what the purpose of the words, actions and artifacts of worship are, it almost surely means the depth of worship is left undelved.

Also, what may work for a congregation of 20, may not work for a congregation of 64, which may not work for a congregation of 147. (These are the real, reported 10th percentile, 50th percentile and 80th percentile for United States Unitarian Universalist congregations.) Worship needs to be flexible enought to grow and shrink in scale, to reflect the capacity of the congregation.

It’s a daunting task if you have an education in worship, and must seem wickedly arcane and arbitrary if you don’t. And there’s a shortage of explanatory and theoretical material. So I try to surface what I can.

(I have some Von Ogen Vogt that I need to digest; that’ll be first.)

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So, why readings?

A liturgical thought for Unitarian Universalists and, by extension, not a small number of Christians.

Why do we have long readings — often two, sometimes three — in our services?

  • Almost everone in worship is literate; that is, worshippers can read long passages for themselves.
  • These books are in print, Bibles or otherwise. The Mary Jones days are behind us.
  • Too often, they have no other purpose than to source a sermon. Why not embed the important parts — that will like be repeated anyway — in the sermon?
  • A long reading, not to mention plural readings, are hard to remember and are rarely a delight, even when declamed well, which is rare. And in many Unitarian Universalist congregations they function as a spoken anthem, or a pre-sermon.

Perhaps that’s a side effect — both on the Unitarian and Universalist side — of publishing sermons and commending them to be read in mission churches where a preacher could not go, or go regularly. (Unitarians tended towards pamphlets; Universalists, in newspapers.) On the other hand, Protestant responses to the Liturgical Movement — to which Unitarian Universalists are not immune; stoles, anyone? — have tended towards longer and more readings, a tendency I think of as the cod liver oil approach.  (Get as much down their throats as they can bear.)

So it may shock some of you — I use the Revised Common Lectionary for preaching texts after all — but I’m about ready to suggest we dispense with the reading of the lessons, unless some reason can be found to maintain them where they are.

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A modest thought: standing for worship

Something lighter today. In some old Universalist baptism rites, we hear this traditional question with Satan taking on a new guise.

Renouncing, therefore, the fellowship of evil, will you endeavor to learn of Jesus Christ, and co­operate in the study and practice of his religion?

Fellowship of Evil? Sure I’ll renounce it, especially if it means I don’t have to move folding chairs. Members of fellowships will get that one.

I hate folding chairs. I hate moving them and having them bang my shins. I hate the noise the metal ones make. I hate time it takes. I hate how uncomfortable they are. But they’re pretty darn common for new churches (and some old ones) and I want to make operating a new (and probably small) church as easy as possible.

Here’s a radical thought. Do without them and stand. OK, a few chairs for those (no judgements) who need to sit; perhaps already in the borrowed room. A few wingbacks or the like in the Garden Club room the congregation rents, say.  Plus prime reserved space for wheelchair users. Cushions for small, collapsing children? (No need to wrestle with strollers!) Everyone else, up.

Not so strange a thought. In my experience, people often stand for an hour or more after the service to enjoy one another’s company and a cup of coffee. And we Protestantish types do have standing services, though we don’t often think of them as such: graveside services, small weddings, devotions at campgrounds.

But we think of church and we think of seats, if not pews. Why? Many Orthodox Christians don’t, of course, so perhaps that’s the influence of reading Orthodox missological works lately. (More about that soon.)  But as I’ve written before, it was only a few generations back that owning or renting “a sitting” was highly identified with church membership itself. And those days are over. Of course, you would grow weary in the second or third hour of worship, and would want a rest, but again those days (for Unitarian Universalists) are past.

Provided people are warned, a standing service has some advantages:

  • a wider variety of meeting space available
  • time and volunteer labor saved moving chairs; perhaps a saving of fees, too.
  • standing worshippers take less space
  • freedom of movement fights fatigue
  • standing worshippers can, as a group, better shift to accommodate newcomers. (Think of how people self-organize in an elevator.)
  • likewise, they can better shift to focus attention away from how few there are in a large space

It is, however, strange. And there would be pressure to keep the services briefer than usual. (Is this bad?) But it’s worth an experiment. And I’d like to hear if anyone has tried this.