The first principle of the Ordinariate is then about Christian unity. St. Basil the Great, the Church’s greatest ecumenist, literally expended his life on the work of building bridges between orthodox brethren who shared a common faith, but who had become separated from one another in a Church badly fragmented by heresy and controversy. He taught that the work of Christian unity requires deliberate and ceaseless effort...St. Basil often talked with yearning about the archaia agape, the ancient love of the apostolic community, so rarely seen in the Church of his day. This love, he taught, is a visible sign that the Holy Spirit is indeed present and active, and it is absolutely essential for the health of the Church.

- Msgr. Jeffrey Steenson, Homily on the Occasion of his Formal Institution as Ordinary

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Outline of the new Ordinariate Eucharistic rite posted

On the web site of the Church of St. Michael the Archangel, Philadelphia, Fr. Ousley has posted a presentation that compares the new Ordinariate rite with the rite in the Book of Divine Worship. The presentation helpfully notes, not only the changes, but also the reason for the changes. In most cases, the changes represent a restoration of more traditional Anglican practices and formularies. The first page is shown below, but you can download the entire PDF of the presentation at the church's web site.

With the new Eucharistic rite's inauguration, the material in the Book of Divine Worship which remains normative has been further reduced. The funeral and marriage rites had been previously supplanted, as had Rite II of the Eucharist. All that remains as normative are the Daily Office, the Litany and Baptism. Doubtless, the Baptismal rite will be the next to be revised and published. I doubt we will see much change in the Litany, and so it remains to be seen what changes will come to the Daily Office. Currently the personal ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham uses the texts from the BDW, but uses the psalter from the Customary of Our Lady of Walsingham, owing to differences in the US and English versions of the Coverdale Psalter. There are other differences between the US and English Books of Common Prayer, which are reflected in differences found in the BDW and the Customary, and those differences will have to be addressed by the Anglicanae Traditiones commission.

1 comment:

  1. Thank you. I am much relieved after scanning through it and am glad for the consistency of style in the Tudor English. I had heard it was a 'hodgepodge' of Tudor/modern English.

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