Christianity

The Prayer Book Explained

To those who believe in One Holy Catholic Church wherein dwelleth the Holy Spirit, it will always be difficult to distrust the Service Book of any Branch of it. The old claim made at Jerusalem with regard to the vexed questions of the Church's infancy, _It seemed good to the H...

Chapters

29. Chapter 29

If we have understood the Method of Praise which, in these Services, uses ancient forms in an ordered variety, we shall be prepared to find similar order, and similar use of var...

27. Chapter 27

It may be said with truth that the Bible is a book which reads History, and the perplexities of Man, in the light of one great postulate, viz. that there is a God. The natural s...

25. Chapter 25

The position which the _Te Deum _occupies in the morning is that of Respond of the whole people to the message of the Old Testament. We have found that the _Te Deum_ is a Hymn o...

28. Chapter 28

A learned Professor once attacked the use of Creeds in Worship with the bitter words, that "they combine the maximum of offence with the minimum of worship." This utterance migh...

18. Chapter 18

The pronouns used in the Lord's Prayer are 'Thy,' 'us,' 'our.' It is the voice of a people speaking to God. Even in private we may not pray for self alone; we must include our f...

26. Chapter 26

The discussions which arose upon the Revelation of Himself, which God gave in His Son Jesus Christ, were carried on between people who lived far apart round the waters of the Me...

35. Chapter 35

16. The Council of the King of England had, from of old, the duty of making, or approving, the choice of the King, and advising him on matters of state, and of law. Many of its...

19. Chapter 19

It must not be supposed that these Services were composed suddenly in their present shape. They are indeed formed on the pattern given by the Lord's Prayer; and they make use of...

24. Chapter 24

This ancient Latin Hymn of the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ has in many Service-books been attributed to S. Ambrose and S. Augustine. One of the stories is that they san...

20. Chapter 20

Every part of the Praise portion of the Service has a Praise-Termination. We have already seen that the "intention" of the Lord's Prayer is marked for praise by a Termination, v...

36. Chapter 36

The Eastern Churches were opposed to the addition of the words, "and from the Son." The Western Churches were, mainly, in favour of it. The controversy lasted from the 5th to th...

34. Chapter 34

iii. and iv. The Sarum Litany had here 10 couplets of versicles and seven collects. Of these seven collects we may mention, _O God, whose nature and property_ &c., _the Prayer f...

30. Chapter 30

Anthems are of two sorts--simple Anthems and compound Anthems. A simple Anthem is one or more verses (often from Holy Scripture), used to give character to a Psalm. A compound A...

21. Chapter 21

The Bible is read in Church as an incentive to the praise of God. It supplies thoughts of God which are then offered up to Him, as Praise, in the words of the Canticles. It is t...

22. Chapter 22

Synagogue, the ruler of the Synagogue himself went with them to the worship and teaching which they carried on in a house hard by. It would not be surprising, then, if the worsh...

17. Chapter 17

The Services in the Prayer Book may be roughly classed as (1) those which are used every week: and (2) those which are used more rarely. The principal service is the Holy Commun...

23. Chapter 23

We are about to explain how Hymns are attached to Lessons for purposes of worship. It will be well therefore to consider what a Hymn is, and how we arrived at the present arrang...

31. Chapter 31

Origin of Litanies. Some of the Offices of Holy Communion--especially in the East--have had a portion after the Gospel very similar to what we call a Litany. Thus in the Liturgy...

16. Chapter 16

There is no such special merit in monotony as to require that the worship of God should be conducted wholly in one method rather than in several. Rather it must be acknowledged...

1. Chapter 1

To those who believe in One Holy Catholic Church wherein dwelleth the Holy Spirit, it will always be difficult to distrust the Service Book of any Branch of it. The old claim ma...

7. Chapter 7

The Lessons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 A. The Study of the Bible a help to worship: The Old Testament--1. Its agreement with the New . . . 48 2. Its teachi...

15. Chapter 15

The Service of Prayer. III. The Litany . . . . . . . . . 153 Ancient Litanies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Rogation Litanies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....

32. Chapter 32

The words, _Good Lord_, are spoken to Jesus: as we may easily infer from the words, _whom thou hast redeemed with thy most precious blood_; and from, _By the mystery of thy holy...

12. Chapter 12

Reason, History, and Revelation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 I. About God, _a._ What Reason has to say . . . . . . . . 101 _b._ What the Bible Revelation has to say . 104 II. A...

4. Chapter 4

The Model--The Lord's Prayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 _a._ Two kinds of Worship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 _b._ Praise and Prayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1...

14. Chapter 14

The Service of Prayer. II. Anthems . . . . . . . . . . . 146 _a._ Simple Anthems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147 Example. Advent setting of Venite . . . . . . . . . ....

33. Chapter 33

congregation; copying, in this respect, the setting of the Invocation at the beginning of Section i. The beginning of the Section being thus marked, the end of it is marked by t...

11. Chapter 11

The Creeds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 The Apostles' Creed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 Uses of Creeds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....

13. Chapter 13

The Service of Prayer. I. Preces and Collects . . . . . . 127 Worship-Forms in the Prayer Service . . . . . . . . . . . 128 The Prayer Service Rubrics . . . . . . . . . . . . ....

2. Chapter 2

5. Chapter 5

10. Chapter 10

3. Chapter 3

6. Chapter 6

9. Chapter 9

8. Chapter 8