St. Andrew: Lighting the way for Advent

[Michael Slusser]

Francis participates in the Divine Liturgy on the Solemnity of St. Andrew, patron of the Church of Constantinople

Vatican City, 30 November 2014 (VIS) –  <snip>

Following the celebration and after listening to the Patriarch's words, the Pope addressed those present, recalling how as Archbishop of Buenos Aires he had frequently participated in the Divine Liturgy of the city's Orthodox communities, but “today, the Lord has given me the singular grace to be present in this Patriarchal Church of Saint George for the celebration of the Feast of the holy Apostle Andrew, the first-called, the brother of Saint Peter, and the Patron Saint of the Ecumenical Patriarchate”.

He continued, “Meeting each other, seeing each other face to face, exchanging the embrace of peace, and praying for each other, are all essential aspects of our journey towards the restoration of full communion. All of this precedes and always accompanies that other essential aspect of this journey, namely, theological dialogue. An authentic dialogue is, in every case, an encounter between persons with a name, a face, a past, and not merely a meeting of ideas.

“This is especially true for us Christians, because for us the truth is the person of Jesus Christ”, observed the Pontiff. “The example of Saint Andrew, who with another disciple accepted the invitation of the Divine Master, 'Come and see', and 'stayed with him that day', shows us plainly that the Christian life is a personal experience, a transforming encounter with the One who loves us and who wants to save us. In addition, the Christian message is spread thanks to men and women who are in love with Christ, and cannot help but pass on the joy of being loved and saved. Here again, the example of the apostle Andrew is instructive. After following Jesus to his home and spending time with Him, Andrew 'first found his brother Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (meaning Christ). He brought him to Jesus'. It is clear, therefore, that not even dialogue among Christians can prescind from this logic of personal encounter”.

Peace,
Michael

The story continues at visnews_en@mlists.vatican.va

[LutherMan]

Fr S.

I get a message that the site may be malicious when I click on your link.  I really wanted to continue reading but unsure about the link...

[Michael Slusser]

Fr S.

I get a message that the site may be malicious when I click on your link.  I really wanted to continue reading but unsure about the link...

That was the location where I got it, but there is another, perhaps better certified, link to the same story: http://www.news.va/en/news/francis-participates-in-the-divine-liturgy-on-the

I hope that your foot is healing and giving you less trouble, Lutherman.

Peace,
Michael

[J. Thomas Shelley]

The meeting between the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople was a topic of conversation and small portion of the homily at the Greek Orthodox church this morning, in no small part because the Greeks are under the Patriarchate of Constaninople.

The other homelitical point worth mentioning (to bring this back discussion back to Advent) is that in Iconography Andrew the First-Called is always depicted with a full head of hair and a full beard--not just on his own Icon but in any Icon of Christ and the Apostles; such as the Last Supper or the Ascension.  Another Biblical figure with full beard and hair in Iconography is the Forerunner and Baptist John.   So there is a visual connection made between the First-Called and his former master....two ascetics, two seekers of the Messiah, two preparers of the way.

[LutherMan]

I hope that your foot is healing and giving you less trouble, Lutherman.

Peace,
Michael

Much better, thanks for asking.  The artery is also working better, pumping good warm blood into the foot.    Think I will be just fine with a great recovery...

[LCMS87]

Augsburg Fortress has produced three volumes under Using Evangelical Lutheran Worship. They are like the one-volume Manual on the Liturgy for LBW.


1. The Sunday Assembly by Lorraine S. Brugh & Gordon W. Lathrop
          Part One — The Assembly on Sunday: Foundational Reflections
          Part Two — Liturgy for Sunday: Reflections in Detail


2. The Christian Life by Dennis L. Bushkofsky & Craig A. Satterlee
          Part One — Holy Baptism and Related Rites
          Part Two — Life Passages: Healing, Funeral, Marriage


3. Keeping Time: The Church's Years by Gail Ramshoaw & Mons Teig
          Part One — The Church's Year
          Part Two — Daily Prayer


In addition, there is the Leaders Desk Edition, which offers the following in regards to Lesser Festivals:


The Sunday takes precedence over lesser festivals falling on that date, with the follow exceptions. Lesser festivals that normally replace Sundays when their date falls on a Sunday, using the propers of the festival, are the Name of Jesus (January 1), the Presentation of Our Lord (February 2), Reformation Day (October 31), and All Saints Day (November 1).

Other lesser festivals may be observed on a Sunday when their date falls on a Sunday. The propers of the festival may replace those for the Sunday, especially on the festivals of John the Baptist (June 24), Peter and Paul, Apostles (June 29), Mary, Mother of Our Lord (August 15), Holy Cross Day (September 14, and Michael and All Angels (September 29).

Local congregations may consider whether observing a lesser festival (with its propers) other than those named above outweighs the value of observing the Sunday with its propers.

However, because when they coincide with a Sunday the following festivals always occur in the seasons of advent, Lent, and Easter, these festivals never replace a Sunday observance: Andrew (November 30), the Annunciation of Our Lord (March 25), Mark (April 25), Philip and James (May 1), and Matthias (May 14).


After a few other exceptions, it states:


Even if the propers for the Sunday are used, a lesser festival that coincides with or is transferred to a Sunday may be marked through means such as mention in the sermon, inclusion in the prayers, selection of hymns and other music, and a note in the service folder. (pp. 12-13)

[LCMS87]

(This post with regard to the one immediately preceding it.  Difficulties with the software today.    )

Thanks for this, Pr. Stoffregen.  The sort of information you quote from the Leaders' Desk Edition is precisely the sort of thing I'm looking forward to in the long-promised LSB Desk Edition.  Thanks as well to all the others who provided information regarding this issue.

The section quoted by Pr. Stoffregen does, however, raise some questions for me.  First, there is apparently a bit of difference in nomenclature between ELW and LSB.  In LSB, The Circumcision and Name of Jesus, The Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Our Lord, and All Saints are identified as "principal feasts of Christ", while Reformation Day is identified as a festival, (an observance a step down in priority from a feast).  I can understand the Feasts of Christ taking precedence over a Sunday in ordinary time, but I'd like to understand the rationale for the Festival of the Reformation doing so as well, but not necessarily other festivals.  (And of course, in most Lutheran churches of which I'm aware, Reformation and All Saints not only take precedence over a Sunday that falls on the 31st of October and 1st of November respectively, but are religiously transferred to the last Sunday in October and the first Sunday in November whatever the dates.)

A larger question comes in response to this rubric:  However, because when they coincide with a Sunday the following festivals always occur in the seasons of advent, Lent, and Easter, these festivals never replace a Sunday observance: Andrew (November 30), the Annunciation of Our Lord (March 25), Mark (April 25), Philip and James (May 1), and Matthias (May 14). 

First a minor question:  In the LSB lectionary, the Festival of St. Thomas is 21 December.  If I read one post above correctly, in the calendar used by ELW, the Festival of St. Thomas is observed in July.  If it hadn't been moved, would it be included in the above list?

More significantly, why does a festival that falls on a Sunday in Advent, Lent, or Easter not take precedence over the Sunday?  Two are penitential seasons and one isn't, so it isn't just that festivals shouldn't be celebrated on a Sunday that is in or of a penitential season.  And what is the rationale for not including the Christmas season?  I seem to recall that someone, perhaps even Pr. Weedon, once shared a 'rule of thumb' that somehow referenced the liturgical color of the Sunday vs. the feast/festival to the effect that a red feast can be celebrated on a green Sunday, but not on a white one, or something like that.

Is there a liturgical rule that differentiates between Sunday observances based on the Year of our Lord vs. the Year of the Church, that is from Advent through Pentecost, excepting the Sundays of the Epiphany Season between the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord and the Feast of the Transfiguration on the one hand and the Sundays after Pentecost and the ordinary Sundays in the season of Epiphany on the other?  For example, what of the Festivals of the Confession of St. Peter (18 January) and the Conversion of St. Paul (25 January), both of which fall on Sundays in 2015?

And finally, what of the Festival of the Holy Innocents, Martyrs (28 December, a Sunday this year) and St. John, Apostle and Evangelist (27 December, a Sunday in 2015)?  If I read the ELW rubrics above correctly, would that be up to local choice, based on a judgment of whether "observing the festival (with its propers) . . . outweighs the value of observing the Sunday with its propers"?  Is there any direction from LSB regarding this?

[John_Hannah]

LCMS87

You really need an Ashby Calendar (Lutheran Edition). It will be a great help until they do the LSB whatever it's to be called. The Ashby Lutheran editor, Phatteicher helps you make intelligent choices based on best practices of the church through the ages.

Ashby Company
PO BOX 2051
Erie, PA 16512

1-800-413-5550
www.ashbypublishing.com

Peace, JOHN

[J. Thomas Shelley]

For 15 years I produced the manuscript for the desktop equivalent to the Ashby calendar; a spiral bound book published by Franklin X. McCormick.   Sales were not strong enough to sustain a Lutheran calendar so the final edition was printed in 2006,

In the final years Dr. Phatteicher and I were in frequent correspondence.  Sometimes we agreed and sometimes we agreed to disagree and each product reflected its editor's interpretations.

My interpretation was the Lesser Festivals outside of Advent, Lent, and Easter were never to suppressed or transferred to Mondays, and that "Bright Week" (week beginning with the Resurrection of Our Lord) was of a dignity and solemnity equal to that of Holy Week, meaning that Lesser Festivals falling therein were to be moved to the first Monday after Bright Week.

[LCMS87]

LCMS87

You really need an Ashby Calendar (Lutheran Edition). It will be a great help until they do the LSB whatever it's to be called. The Ashby Lutheran editor, Phatteicher helps you make intelligent choices based on best practices of the church through the ages.

Ashby Company
PO BOX 2051
Erie, PA 16512

1-800-413-5550
www.ashbypublishing.com

Peace, JOHN

Pr. Hannah,

Thanks for the suggestion and link.  I went to it and checked the Lutheran calendar page.  Shipping wasn't higher than the calendar cost so I ordered one.  For the time being it might well be of some help. 

Unfortunately, I don't simply want an authority I can follow.  I want to understand what rules are being followed and why.  For instance, at the link they show the January 2015 calendar page.  There, clear as day, are the 18th and 25th of January with a diagonal from top right to bottom left with white above and green below.  I already know there are festivals on those dates.  I assume the diagonal indicates freedom to choose one color or the other to go along with the festival propers or the Sunday propers.  (I'll be able to verify that once I receive the calendar, and figure out what the difference is between a diagonal line and a horizontal line--see the image.)

More important to me is the reasoning for the judgment, and why there's freedom on those Sundays but not on 30 November or 21 December.

Having served as a missionary, I understand that asking "why" regarding a cultural practice is as likely as not to be unanswerable.  My instructor in language acquisition techniques warned that the answer might well be the one he got, "Because the sky is high."  Answers to questions about cultural practices and beliefs are often unknown and unknowable even to the people of that culture.  It's just the way it is, the way it's always been, never considered or questioned except by some outsider who wants to understand something novel to him.  But if that's the case, then an LSB resource is even more important, because it would provide our cultural standards.

[LCMS87]

For 15 years I produced the manuscript for the desktop equivalent to the Ashby calendar; a spiral bound book published by Franklin X. McCormick.   Sales were not strong enough to sustain a Lutheran calendar so the final edition was printed in 2006,

In the final years Dr. Phatteicher and I were in frequent correspondence.  Sometimes we agreed and sometimes we agreed to disagree and each product reflected its editor's interpretations.

My interpretation was the Lesser Festivals outside of Advent, Lent, and Easter were never to suppressed or transferred to Mondays, and that "Bright Week" (week beginning with the Resurrection of Our Lord) was of a dignity and solemnity equal to that of Holy Week, meaning that Lesser Festivals falling therein were to be moved to the first Monday after Bright Week.

Thanks for this.  Why, if you know, isn't the Christmas season included in the list of Advent, Lent, and Easter as Sundays whose propers are never suppressed? 

As to "Bright Week" being like Holy Week , I get that.  My practice, without regular Monday services, would be to omit observance of the festival for that year.  And I wouldn't allow a festival bump the Feasts of the Ascension or Pentecost either, should that possibility arise.

[Weedon]

The old rule, LCMS87, had to do with how the so-called minor festivals were ranked: a double of the first or second class, a semi-double, a great double, or a simple festival. You can sort all that out according to Tridentine codifications, or you can apply this Lutherans simple rule which works the lion's share of the time:

The only Sundays that can be trumped by a festival wear the color green. That marks them as what Rome would now call "ordinary time" and when a festival falls on a Sunday of such, it is ordinarily observed if it is listed by us as a principal feast of Christ or may be observed if it is listed by us a festival.

As to what got ranked as feast vs. festival, to my knowledge LSB represents the first usage of such terms of distinction in LCMS liturgical history. I suspect the attempt was made to lift up the events of the Gospels (and All Saints) to a higher status than the generic "minor festivals" language allowed.

[John_Hannah]

LCMS87

You really need an Ashby Calendar (Lutheran Edition). It will be a great help until they do the LSB whatever it's to be called. The Ashby Lutheran editor, Phatteicher helps you make intelligent choices based on best practices of the church through the ages.

Ashby Company
PO BOX 2051
Erie, PA 16512

1-800-413-5550
www.ashbypublishing.com

Peace, JOHN

Pr. Hannah,

Thanks for the suggestion and link.  I went to it and checked the Lutheran calendar page.  Shipping wasn't higher than the calendar cost so I ordered one.  For the time being it might well be of some help. 

Unfortunately, I don't simply want an authority I can follow.  I want to understand what rules are being followed and why.  For instance, at the link they show the January 2015 calendar page.  There, clear as day, are the 18th and 25th of January with a diagonal from top right to bottom left with white above and green below.  I already know there are festivals on those dates.  I assume the diagonal indicates freedom to choose one color or the other to go along with the festival propers or the Sunday propers.  (I'll be able to verify that once I receive the calendar, and figure out what the difference is between a diagonal line and a horizontal line--see the image.)

More important to me is the reasoning for the judgment, and why there's freedom on those Sundays but not on 30 November or 21 December.

Having served as a missionary, I understand that asking "why" regarding a cultural practice is as likely as not to be unanswerable.  My instructor in language acquisition techniques warned that the answer might well be the one he got, "Because the sky is high."  Answers to questions about cultural practices and beliefs are often unknown and unknowable even to the people of that culture.  It's just the way it is, the way it's always been, never considered or questioned except by some outsider who wants to understand something novel to him.  But if that's the case, then an LSB resource is even more important, because it would provide our cultural standards.

Yes, the diagonal line (as on 18 & 25 January) means either celebration is permitted.

Otherwise ask Will Weedon for the LCMS rule, if there is one.

Peace, JOHN

[J. Thomas Shelley]

Thanks for this.  Why, if you know, isn't the Christmas season included in the list of Advent, Lent, and Easter as Sundays whose propers are never suppressed? 

I did not write the rubrics, only interpreted them.

However, the Christmastide exception in LBW may have come from, first, an awareness that to do otherwise would mean that the Circumcision and Name of Jesus would not celebrated should January 1 be a Sunday; and second, that the Second through Fourth days of Christmas have Festivals of sufficient gravity that they were worthy of Sunday celebration.   The first concern could have been addressed through a ranking of "Festivals of the Lord" based, as Fr. Weedon notes, on Tridentine practice.  But it was simpler to make a general principle that Festivals are to be observed on Sundays during "green seasons" and the days of Christmastide.

Regarding the gravitas of the Festivals of the Second through Fourth days of Christmas consider this piece by Adolph Adam:

Even the oldest liturgical calendars already have a series of saints festivals directly following on Christmas.  The Middle Ages saw these saints as a cortege of honor accompanying the Christ-child, and gave them the name Comites Christi (“Companions of Christ.”)   In the [western] liturgy these companions are Stephen the first martyr on December 26, St. John the Apostle and Evangelist on December 27, and the children whom Herod slew in Bethlehem on December 28...the feast of St. Stephen dates from the fourth century in the East, in the West it is known from the beginning of the fifth...The feast of John the Apostle and Evangelist also goes back to the fourth century in the East...The feast of the Holy Innocents on December 28 seems to be a Western creation.  The first mention of it occurs in the calendar for the North African city of Carthage in 505.

Also this, by Edith Stein:

As yet heaven and earth are not united.  The star of Bethlehem is a star shining in a dark night, even today.  On the second day the church already lays aside her white festive vestments and clothes herself in the color of blood, and on the fourth day in the purple of mourning.  For the crib of the child is surrounded by martyrs......

What does it mean?  Where is now the rejoicing of the heavenly hosts, the silent bliss of this holy night?  Where is the peace on earth?  Peace on earth to those of good will.  But not all are of good will.  For the Son of the eternal Father descended from the glory of heaven, because the mystery of antiquity had shrouded the earth in the darkness of night.

I'm starting a new discussion on this topic titled "The Comites Christi days".

[Weedon]

P.S. If you don't like the color scheme, another way of getting at it is this: if the Sunday uses a "common" preface, i.e., it has no particular proper preface assigned to it, it is a Sunday that a festival WITH its own unique proper preface can trump.