Studia Liturgica

The daily prayer practices outlined in the Apostolic Tradition, their origins, and even the number of prayer hours, have been points of dispute among scholars. However, new sources of the Apostolic Tradition, as well as work on lay ascetical movement in Egypt, call for the reevaluation of this document, its dating, provenance, and interpretation. This article argues that the Apostolic Tradition is a composite document, whose daily prayer cycle in its current form has been shaped by a third- or fourth-century lay ascetical movement in Egypt. The document appears to outline prayer at rising, followed by a communal service of catechesis and prayer, prayer at the third, sixth, and ninth hours, as well as prayer at bed and in the middle of the night. Given the difficulties in interpreting the document it is unlikely that the document, or at least the daily prayer practices outlined in it, were celebrated as written.

This article provides a first look at the 2015 Book of Common Prayer produced by the Igreja Episcopal Anglicana do Brasil (in English, Episcopal Anglican Church of Brazil). This is the newest Book of Common Prayer published by an Anglican province, featuring some aspects that go beyond what has been done in terms of liturgical revision around the Anglican Communion, and suggesting some further steps that other provinces and churches might take, as they assimilate better the principles of the Liturgical Movement. It is a fully gender-neutral worship book, with expansive language to address the Divine, and a considerable amount of liturgies that deal with local customs. It also features prayers that address themes such as gender equality, environmental preservation and social justice for minorities.

This article focuses on the importance, and also on the possible value of the concepts of cognition and recognition for reflection on what should actually happen during celebration of Holy Communion. The vantage-point in this approach is that celebration has in its essence that it should be a meaningful experience. The meaningfulness consists of the intriguing fact that participants are participating in Christ’s body and in his blood while celebrating Holy Communion. In celebrating Holy Communion, people are engaging in a ritual that involves interaction with a variety of symbols. The methodological insights of Browning (1996) that described the lapse of a research activity ranging from description, to systemizing (exploring practical wisdom and understanding), to strategizing (practicing strategic practical theology) will be adhered to. The research problem for this research could be formulated in the following manner, namely: “Could the cognizance of the lenses of cognition and recognition of the deeper message of Holy Communion enrich the conscious appropriation of salvation while celebrating the sacrament of Holy Communion?” The research problem is addressed from the vantage-point of understanding sacraments from a Reformed paradigm. The concepts of cognition and recognition are highlighted from a brief historical description of what is a sacrament and also taking into account the insights from social psychology regarding the essence of the concepts of cognition and recognition. The article further elaborates on the functioning of the concepts of cognition (phronesis) and recognition (anamnesis). In the last section, the article utilizes a hermeneutical interaction between descriptive and systemizing perspectives in order to formulate strategizing perspectives on how a problematic praxis could possibly be addressed regarding people’s experiences on participation in Holy Communion through the meaningful lenses of cognition and recognition.

Liturgical mercy is the practice of refusing to exclude from eucharistic sharing those considered to be sinners. This essay argues that liturgical mercy is a practice that is (1) needed for the ongoing conversion of Christian communities while (2) simultaneously posing a risk that threatens the communion of Christian communities. By overcoming the biases that cause communities to exclude sinners, the practice of liturgical mercy facilitates the bodily encounters that are necessary for the self-transcendence of conversion. However, these encounters also threaten the identity of the community. As such, there is an unavoidable risk inherent in liturgical mercy. In the end, sustained by the theological virtue of hope, Christian communities must engage in the risk of liturgical mercy.

In most congregations, children participate in worship in various ways. In this article we pose the question: how can we describe and understand the variety in practices of worship with children? The case we consider is the Protestant context in the Netherlands. Archival research shows that since the introduction of differentiated worship for children, tension has arisen between worship with the entire congregation and worship aimed specifically at children. This tension between intergenerational worship and target-group worship persists; while most liturgists and youth work professionals argue for intergenerational worship, some defend the merits of target-group worship. However, in this ethnographic research we indicate that the portrayal of intergenerational worship as the ideal, and target-group worship as its opposite, or vice versa, leaves much of the normativity in worship with children hidden. We, therefore, deconstruct ideals of worship with children to open up other ways of understanding the variety of worship with children. In doing so, we argue that pedagogical and theological normativity influence worship practices in complex ways. Future research may advance this investigation by focusing on adults’ and children’s roles in shaping worship practices and exploring the theological implications of these practices in more depth and detail.

The “laws” of comparative liturgical development (Baumstark, Taft) are derived from pre-modern liturgical texts and the findings of early biology and linguistics. Yet Christian liturgy is not an organically evolving species; it is a ritual system, a cultural, political, self-regulating, self-reproducing set of rites that are used to interpret and correct one another. Focusing on the reception of new practices by practiced communities, a performance theory approach spotlights the systemic interrelationships of rites and the ritual habitus of human bodies. A ritual system makes particular meanings seem natural, permitting some new liturgical developments, impeding others. Ritualized bodies constrain rapid changes, while the entrance of bodies ritualized in a different system changes the environment, leading some to attempt to reinforce the status quo. Technologies for passing on liturgies are developed and used when a crisis demands change or imperils valued practice. Accounting for differences in liturgical recording, early and medieval liturgical reception may inform our understanding of the colonial expansion of liturgy, when technologies for transmitting liturgical rites were brought to bear on bodies ritualized in indigenous systems of the Americas, Africa, and Asia. Performative evidence from the colonial context may in turn help interpret ambiguous sources from earlier periods.

Is the liturgy local and contextual and growing from below, or is it controlled from above? Does the liturgy belong to the people and to the congregation, and are they allowed to use it in their own way? Or is the liturgy the property of the Church, which gives strict orders for its use? Is it powerful men and women, meaning those people with authority, and the institutions (for example, the Church Synod and the Bishops’ Conference) who define the methods and ways in which liturgy is enculturated? Or do the ways of inculturation involve development from below, from the common people, even the poorest and most humble believers, at the congregational level? The balance between these two aspects—top-down and bottom-up worship—has repeatedly shifted over the last three decades, and there have been tensions between them in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland. The goal of this essay is to clarify the reason for this confusing situation related to authority, fixed orders and the creative development of liturgical life.

In the article the political theologians William T. Cavanaugh’s and James K. A. Smith’s understanding of liturgy is analyzed and compared. In an effort to engage with public life from the perspective of theology, they both develop an understanding of liturgy that does not restrict it to a practice within a Christian context. Instead, they argue that liturgies are practices that also are observable within secular contexts. From this analysis, two understandings of liturgy are highlighted: liturgy as resistance and liturgy as dialogue. In conclusion, the article discusses what implications these understandings of liturgy have for the Church when confronting a contemporary pluralistic public context.