Modern Liturgy
Jan. 18th, 2006 09:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yrieithyddYesterday, I read the following exchange on a a thread about bringing back the prayer book Angloid wrote:
to which Callan responded:
and followed the link![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
curig had posted to the Churches together in Britain and Ireland material for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and in the evening attended the the Goth Eucharist. As I lay awake trying to sleep these things prompted some thoughts about liturgy and propaganda and why I dislike much modern liturgical stuff.
There is a sense in which liturgy is propaganda; liturgy forms what we believe, lex orandi, lex credendi, and so the aim of liturgists is to set out right doctrine in the liturgy. However, I still felt that Callan's response was unfair and that there was a sense in which the BCP 1662 Communion service was far more propagandist than his other examples.* With the BCP, you have a big change of structure from the tradition and it is that which makes it more like propaganda. It is not a gradual development to that structure and a process of refining but it is a deliberate break with what had gone before and an attempt to inculcate a particular set of Reformation beliefs.
This led me on to reflecting why it was that I dislike many modern services (such as the CTBI material) but found that I did not have a bad reaction to the Goth Eucharist. It comes go to the obviousness of the agenda. So much of the modern stuff has a fluffy modern agenda and it is obvious. I felt that the Goth Eucharist avoided that, well an obvious agenda -- I doubt it would be fluffy! -- although it was aimed at a particular sub-culture. It drew on previous liturgies and on the concerns of the sub-culture and did not feel too forced.
*Oh, and I'm not sure why CW is described as pelagian!
1662 (Communion, I'm not discussing M or EP) is not 'traditional liturgy' but a bit of reformation propaganda masquerading as liturgy.
to which Callan responded:
Presumably the Tridentine Mass is Counter-Reformation propaganda masquerading as liturgy, the liturgy of St John Chysostom is Byzantine propaganda masquerading as liturgy and Common Worship is middle class English pelagian propaganda masquerading as liturgy?
and followed the link
curig had posted to the Churches together in Britain and Ireland material for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and in the evening attended the the Goth Eucharist. As I lay awake trying to sleep these things prompted some thoughts about liturgy and propaganda and why I dislike much modern liturgical stuff.There is a sense in which liturgy is propaganda; liturgy forms what we believe, lex orandi, lex credendi, and so the aim of liturgists is to set out right doctrine in the liturgy. However, I still felt that Callan's response was unfair and that there was a sense in which the BCP 1662 Communion service was far more propagandist than his other examples.* With the BCP, you have a big change of structure from the tradition and it is that which makes it more like propaganda. It is not a gradual development to that structure and a process of refining but it is a deliberate break with what had gone before and an attempt to inculcate a particular set of Reformation beliefs.
This led me on to reflecting why it was that I dislike many modern services (such as the CTBI material) but found that I did not have a bad reaction to the Goth Eucharist. It comes go to the obviousness of the agenda. So much of the modern stuff has a fluffy modern agenda and it is obvious. I felt that the Goth Eucharist avoided that, well an obvious agenda -- I doubt it would be fluffy! -- although it was aimed at a particular sub-culture. It drew on previous liturgies and on the concerns of the sub-culture and did not feel too forced.
*Oh, and I'm not sure why CW is described as pelagian!
