Mike's musings

The congregation's expectations

It is an interesting question, and I'm not quite sure to which part of my post she was referring. There were a number of areas of practice which were not my usual last Sunday, so I guess I'll cover them one by one. I think there are 2 important points to mention first, however. The first of these is that I'm still in training, and am therefore very aware of the fact that I need to be very careful about making decisions or trying to introduce change without discussion. The second is that I wasn't in churches which are part of my team, but in a different benefice, so was very much a guest.

But to cover the particular points that I think Helen (and Sally) might like covered:

1. use of the Book of Common Prayer: I have no problem with the BCP, and, in fact, love using it. It's what was expected, and that was fine.
2. facing East for the prayer of consecration: well, I don't think I really had much of a choice: I didn't fancy celebrating from the North, and I don't think there was even room at Foxearth. I'm not sure whether I should have been facing East for the rest of the time I was up in the sanctuary, but with no microphone it would have been hard, and it felt wrong anyway. It was hard enough.
3. elevation of the host for the Fraction: here's the interesting one. As is my usual practice, I didn't elevate at the consecration, but I did, however, elevate at the Fraction (breaking of the bread). I had a memory of a discussion with my father about this being the one time that the congregation should specifically be able to see the host, and, on re-reading the rubrics this morning, I found out why. They say:

   When the Priest, standing before the Table, hath so ordered the Bread and Wine, that he may with the more readiness and decency break the Bread before the people, and take the Cup into his hands, he shall say the Prayer of Consecration, as followeth.

   So, it seems clear that the Bread should be broken "before the people", so that they can see it. I like this. If the rest of the act of consecration ends up being hidden from view, the sharing part of it is made visible. I'm not sure how it looked, and I've not yet had the opportunity to discuss it with my boss, but I'd be very interested in other people's views.

There's a larger question, also, of the extent to which we should follow the expectations of the congregation. There are a number of issues here, one of which is that it's their church - even if we're the incumbent - another that we have a duty to be true to doctrine - as we understand it - and true to ourselves and our faith. But we must also make sure that we're not mindlessly or unintentionally upsetting people, and should always be prepared to defend our practice.

I think there's more discussion to have here, and I look forward to having it.

Labels: doctrine, eucharist, services

# posted by MikeCamel @ 10:48 am