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A Liturgical Primer
A Parents’ Guide
The Rev’d Jerry D. Godwin, Rector
The Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration
Introduction
The Church of the Transfiguration and its Parish Episcopal Church are organized in the tradition of The Episcopal church, a Christian denomination that has a long, rich and diverse liturgical heritage extending back to it’s association with the Church of England and the Anglican Communion in the mid-sixteenth century and beyond that to the Roman Catholic tradition, out of which grew the Anglican Communion.
When we gather to worship God as a community, every community has a liturgy, that is, a stated form of how that worship will proceed. Liturgy literally means, “the work of the people.” Therefore, almost all worship in all denominations engages those worshipping in it. We stand and sing together. We sit to listen to God’s word read to us and hear a sermon on how God’s word applies to our daily living. We say, “Amen.” to conclude the prayers, indicating that we have made that prayer our own by that affirmation.
Worship engages the whole person – the whole, wonderful and intelligent creature God has created us to be.
At daily chapel services for the Hillcrest Campus of the Parish Episcopal School, our students fully participate in the liturgy – the worship. Some of the ceremonial traditions may not be familiar to all members of our Parish Episcopal School community. Please be assured, however, that our ceremonial practices are solidly within the tradition of the larger Christian heritage of which all Christians are a part.
Thank you for inviting me to offer these explanations of the ceremonies of our worship at the Parish Episcopal School
services. I welcome any member of the parent body who would like to learn more about these things to make an appointment for us to visit together. You may call my Administrative Assistant, Deanie Winstel at 972.233.1898, extension 223, or e-mail her at dwinstel@transfiguration.net.
May God bless you and your children richly with his love and grace as together we build for a better tomorrow for all the holy people of God.
Faithfully yours,
Jerry D. Godwin, Rector
The Church of the Transfiguration
Acknowledging the Presence of Christ and the Cross
Just as we are taught in this great land of ours to acknowledge our patriotism by saluting the flag of the United States, standing when it pass by and placing our hand over our hearts, so we teach respect for the cross and the presence of Christ represented by the altar in the church.
We slightly bow our heads when the cross passes by us as it comes down the aisle in the entrance and closing processions.
Many bow their heads, also, at the name of Jesus in the prayers as an ancient way of signifying our love of the Name and Person of our Lord.
As we enter the pew to say our prayers and prepare for worship, we acknowledge the special presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament reserved in the Tabernacle and represented by the great altar. We do this by a reverence which is either stopping just briefly before we move into the pew to bow our heads, or, if one wishes, to genuflect (i.e. kneel briefly by bending the right knee to touch the floor.) This reverence is also made as we leave the pew at the end of the service.
The Sign of the Cross
Over the ages of Christian life and practice, various communities of Christians have, while worshipping God in Trinity of persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, also developed worship or liturgical practices that are distinctive to that particular community. In the early years of Christianity, when Christians were persecuted, they may have drawn an “Icthus” or sign of a fish, in the dust to unobtrusively announce to another that he or she was a follower of the fisherman, Jesus. That sign may well have developed into another ancient sign for Christians, that is the sign of the cross.
In Reformation times, some Christians became aware that many of the signs and symbols used by the Church had begun to have superstition associated with them and that their use had become psychologically excessive rather than spiritually useful and so these signs fell out of favor among the churches of the Reformation. Until that time, most all Christians used some form of the sign of the cross, traced on themselves or hung in their homes, as a mark of the faith that they held in common.
Today, many liturgical churches such as the Roman Catholic Church, the Lutheran Church, the Episcopal Church and most Orthodox Churches continue to use this and other signs as physical reminders of the one who died for us and rose again. Indeed, other mainline Protestant churches have been restoring the use of ancient sign and symbol to their worship and are finding such use deeply and spiritually enriching.
At Transfiguration, we teach that one should only make these signs if they are spiritually meaningful to the individual person. No one should feel compelled to make the sign of the cross, yet every Christian should feel comfortable and welcome to do so as a sign of that special relationship we have with God in Christ Jesus.
The sign of the cross is a very powerful and profound sign for all Christians whether we hang it on the wall, wear it around our neck or trace it over ourselves. It must not be used lightly whenever it is used by faithful Christians. At Parish Episcopal School, we connect this most important sign of our faith with a prayer which summarizes for us what all prayer, indeed, our lives as people of faith should be about: “God be in my head. God be in my heart. God be in my right hand. God be in my left hand. God be in my whole life. Thanks be to God. Amen.” As we say this prayer, we touch first our forehead, then our chest, then our right and left shoulders and then make a circle around our mid-body as we ask that God be in our whole life. Finally we bring our hands together in a traditional prayer position as we give thanks to God for his love and care for us.
In prayer and worship we employ the “whole” person. While the hand movements in our Children’s Prayer do trace the sign of the cross over us, we are helped to learn to associate the cross of Christ with all our life.
Making the sign of the cross on themselves was so very important to Christians for many, many years, especially during the time after the persecution and the new freedom granted with the recognition of Christianity by Emporer Constantine. When we make the sign of the cross over our selves, we are always reminded that it is through the cross of Christ, implanted in our hearts at our baptism, that we are made inheritors of God’s kingdom and adopted as God’s children forever. All signs of the cross serve as profound reminders of our baptism into the body of Christ.
Reverent attitude inside the church or chapel
We believe that the church or chapel is a holy place – a place set apart by prayer – where God’s people are quiet and respectful not only of the God we meet in worship, but of each other. For this reason we teach our children to enter the holy space reverently. We discourage idle talk, running and pushing. We encourage quiet and prayerful attitudes so that we are ready to hear God speaking to us, and for us to speak with God, in our worship time. After worship, we try to leave the church taking that spirit of respectfulness away with us.
Water and the Font at the Entrance of the nave
Water holds a profound place in our sacred life as it does in our secular life. The Spirit moved over the waters in creation. God led the people of Israel through the waters of the Red Sea and out of their bondage in Egypt. Jesus was baptized by John in the waters of the Jordan and the Church brings into its membership, new souls through the waters of baptism. Water regenerates and heals and sustains us.
At the entrance to the church, we have a font of living or moving water. Those who wish may touch the water with their fingers and then, with those fingers, make the sign of the cross upon themselves. This action reminds us that through baptism we belong to God and that we were “…sealed with the Holy Spirit in baptism and marked as Christ’s own forever.” (The Book of Common Prayer, page 308). The action must should not be thought to be magic or superstition, for with our baptism we have been given awesome responsibility to live and act according to the example of Jesus, the Christ.
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