This book examines the struggle for Protestant consensus and unity through the work of John a Lasco (1499-1560). It is only in recent years that scholars have begun to recognize the importance of Lasco as one of the leading figures of the European Reformation, and a pivotal figure between Lutheran and Reformed theologians. The Polish reformer was among the most dynamic church organizers of the sixteenth century, dedicated to healing the divisions among evangelicals and searching for the key to Protestant unity in the example of the Apostolic Church. It was to this end that he published the Forma ac ratio in 1555, a work that recorded the rites and practices of the London Strangers' Church (of which he had been the first superintendent) and to provide a model for uniting the disparate Protestant communities on the Continent. Although some recent works have focused on aspects of Lasco's early career in Germany and England, this is the first book to provide a comprehensive analysis of the Forma ac ratio, and the reformer's reasons for writing it. This study also puts Lasco's distinct model for Protestant churches into the wider European context and assesses his impact on the struggle for unity through an examination of his correspondence, the reaction to his writings, and his influence on Protestant congregations across Europe.

This book explores the theological and textual connections among ancient and modern epicleses, primarily through analysis of a selection of epicletic texts in contemporary Western eucharistic prayers and the theological principles that shaped them.

The Liturgies of Quakerism explores the nature of liturgy within a form of worship based in silence. Tracing the original seventeenth century Quakers' understanding of the 'liturgy of silence', and what for them replaced the outward forms used in other parts of Christianity, this book explains how early Quaker understandings of 'time', 'history', and 'apocalyptic' led to an inward liturgical form. The practices and understanding of twenty-first century Liberal Quakers are explored, showing that these contemporary Quakers maintain the same kind of liturgical form as their ancestors and yet understand it in a very different way. Breaking new ground in the study of Quaker liturgy, this book contrasts the two periods and looks at some of the consequences for the study of liturgy in general, and Quakerism in particular. It also explores evangelical Quaker understandings of liturgy.

The Book of Common Prayer is the old and well-loved prayer book of the Anglican Church, in use since the 16th century. In this revised 1662 form, it has also become one of the classic texts of the English language, its prayers and expressions making English what it is today. Cambridge's new editions of the Prayer Book have been freshly typeset for the 21st century, using a modern digital typeface to give a clear printing image and greater readability. Nevertheless, the format and page layout follow the previous version of the Standard Edition Prayer Book (originally produced in the early 20th century) page for page. The book provides the complete 1662 services - including the traditional forms of the baptism and marriage services.This particular style comes in a red imitation leather hardcover binding, and is ideal for use in church.* economical book* same page numbers as previous edition* new, clearer typeface

What is the right way to worship? Right worship does not require a return to the identical forms found in the early church or later in Rome or after that in Westminster. What it calls for is a faithful response today to the God of our salvation in light of those biblically ordered and historically informed patterns. In this study Robbie Castleman uncovers the fundamental shape of worship. What she finds--outlined in Scripture, enacted in Israel, refocused in the New Testament community, guarded by the apostolic fathers, and recovered in the Reformation--is a grand narrative of redemption offering order and meaning to all worshiping communities down to the present day.

The first of four volumes, containing the edited texts, commentaries and source notes for each of the nearly nine hundred occasions of special worship and for each of the annual commemorations in Engand and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. Since the sixteenth century, the governments and established churches of the British Isles have summoned the nation to special acts of public worship during periods of anxiety and crisis, at times of celebration or for annual commemoration and remembrance. These special prayers, special days of worship and anniversary commemorations were national events, reaching into every parish in England and Wales, in Scotland and in Ireland. They had considerable religious, ecclesiastical, political, ideological, moral and social significance, and they produced important texts: proclamations, council orders, addresses and - in England, Wales and Ireland - prayers or complete liturgies which for specified periods supplemented or replaced the services in the Book of Common Prayer. Many of these acts of special worship and most of the texts have escaped historical notice. National Prayers. Special Worship since the Reformation, in four volumes, provides the edited texts, commentaries and source notes for each of the nearly nine hundred occasions of special worship and for each of the annual commemorations. The first volume, SpecialPrayers, Fasts and Thanksgivings in the British Isles 1533-1688, has an extended Introduction to the four volumes and a consolidated list of all the occasions of special worship. It contains texts and commentaries which revealthe origins of special occasions of national worship during the Reformation in both England and Scotland, the development of fast days and wartime prayers later in the sixteenth century, and what we know about the origins of special national worship in Ireland. It also shows how special worship became a recurrent focus and expression of religion and political contention during the seventeenth century. Edited by Natalie Mears, Alasdair Raffe, Stephen Taylor and Philip Williamson (with Lucy Bates).

A study of liturgy in Byzantium, Armenia, Syria and Palestine. The author shows how the central Christian liturgy, the Eucharist, poses all-too human problems of structure, text, history, context and meaning. For humankind's unfailing, incessant ritual repetition of the Lord's Supper down through the ages and across multiple Christian cultures in the liturgies of east and west, in obedience to Jesus' Last Supper mandate, Do this in remembrance of me, has, inevitably, given rise within the same recognizably common framework to innumerable diversities of shape, text, cultural context and theological interpretation. It has also given rise to debates, sometimes heated, among modern experts about the most suitable methods for resolving the problems arising from these differences. The work explores the theories of Anton Baumstark, Dom Gregory Dix and Josef Andreas Jungmann, and what we can derive from their insights. Their way of working, applied to the problems of cultural history, structural, historical and textual reconstruction, theological interpretation, and method involved in the modern scholarly debate on these issues, are the object of the author's studies in this volume.

The hunger for modern, relevant resources for the Christian seasons and celebrations is deep. Here is a book that will help to fill this need. Suitable for group worship or personal reflection, and with material for Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Mothering Sunday, Palm Sunday and Holy Week, it is a collection to accompany readers through Lent and Easter for many years. Eggs and Ashes includes a Lent discipline for those who care about the environment, liturgies, responses, prayers, poems, reflections, meditations, stories, stations of the cross, sermons, monologues and songs, with some all-age resources - written by Iona Community members, associates, friends and others. Ruth Burgess is the author of A Book of Blessings and Friends and Enemies, both published by Wild Goose Publications. Chris Polhill is a frequent contributor to Wild Goose books.

What is the point of the Lectionary? What are the problems and opportunities that it presents to those who use it? What are its strengths and weaknesses as an aid to worship? How can it be used and communicated most effectively today? These are among the key questions that Thomas O'Loughlin explores in this stimulating and much-needed guide.

The history of the Eastern liturgical rituals reveals the variety and splendour of the world of the Christian Orient, and the profundity of its theological thought. The ritual bears witness to the deep impact these liturgies made on the Mediterranean cultures and societies of Late Antiquity. Gabriele Winkler, a specialist in Oriental liturgies and Armenian studies, here explores the beginnings and early development of these rituals in their historical, philological, and doctrinal context. Her work elucidates the interdependence of the Syriac, Greek, and Armenian cultures; it also demonstrates the interest of this material for the religious and political history of the era.

The book should be seen in the context of Paul Bradshaw's earlier works: The Search for the Origins of Christian Worship and Eucharistic Origins. In this book he updates his thinking in this area.

Liturgical ritual was a major element of the Christian cultures of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. This was especially true of Byzantium, where court and church ritual, often intertwined, achieved a splendour unparalleled by any other aspect of civic or religious life. In this volume Robert Taft has brought together a series of studies on the formation and development of these rites and on the meaning they had for contemporaries. Particular articles look at the role of Jerusalem, Constantinople, then Mt Athos, in this process, and at the liturgy of St John Chrysostom. Also included are two important studies focusing on the role of the bema in the Syriac Church.

The two themes brought together in this volume - the canon law and the liturgy of the early medieval Latin Church - have close links, as these articles reveal. At the basis of this lies that fact that the collections and manuscripts with which Professor Reynolds is concerned provide the source material for both fields of study. In the book particular emphasis is given to the Irish Collection canonum hibernensis and its many derivatives, to works from Carolingian Salzburg and eleventh-century Southern Italy, and to liturgical collections. The whole illustrates the need for liturgiologists to be aware of the riches in medieval legal sources, and for legal historians to take account of the wealth of liturgical material that is a principal ingredient of the law of the Church; and demonstrates how much one field can contribute to understanding the development and to the dating of the other. Les deux themes reunis dans ce volume - le droit canon et la liturgie de l'Eglise Latine du haut moyan-Acge - ont, comme le revele ce groupe d'articles, des liens tres etroits. Ceci reposant sur le fait que les collections et manuscrits, auxquels le professeur Reynolds s'interesse, apportent la substance se trouvant A la source de ces deux terrains d'etudes. Dans le livre, une importance particuliere est donnee au Collectio canonum hibernensis irlandais et A ses multiples derivations, ainsi qu'aux travaux issus de Salzburg A l'epoque carolingienne A ceux provenant d'Italie meridionale au 11e s. et aux collections liturgiques. L'ensemble illustre la nesessite pour les specialistes en liturgie d'Atre conscients de l'abondance de sources legales medievales et pour les historiens du droit de tenir compte de la richesse en matiere liturgique et que forme l'un des ingredients principaux du droit de l'Eglise; il demontre aussi combien un domaine peut contribuer e la comprehension du developpement et A l'assignation de date

Art is an outworking of God's creative process, a tangible participation in the shaping of the world. Through our artistic endeavors, we both express our understanding of creation and imbue that creation with new meaning. Four artists in particular-the poet Czeslaw Milosz, filmmaker Terrence Malick, novelist Marilynne Robinson, and lyric essayist Annie Dillard-actively wrestle with a world that reflects God's glory while remaining at times deeply and troublingly obscure. In Lyric Theology, Thomas Gardner unfolds the ways these four important contemporary figures, drawing on modes of thinking rooted in lyric poetry, explore what the world looks like when seen as created and received as a gift. Lyric thinking, he argues, dramatizes a mind and spirit reaching toward a beauty and complexity that can never be fully grasped but yet can be lifted up in praise and wonder, bafflement and song. The specific lyric responses on display here- resisting meaninglessness, wrestling with contrary impulses to both celebrate and turn away, embracing as revelatory the failure to see fully, and redeeming the world by lifting its particulars into song-can be seen as acts of theological thinking, deepening and extending the doctrine of creation by living out its implications in the world. If the world were created out of nothing save the desire to extend the love expressed within the Trinity to creatures who might reflect it back in wonder and praise, lyric ways of making sense of the world-breaking free of straightforward conceptualization and argument and exploring inward, nuanced, and continually made and remade responses to the world's particulars-bring this idea forward as a living thing. Drawing on his own work as a literary scholar and a lyric essayist, Gardner here gives us the tools to both understand and join in performing creative theological explorations of great subtlety, beauty, and originality.

This book is an exploration of the biblical and theological themes in the Common Worship Eucharistic texts. The theological formation of many Christians takes place during their weekly celebration of the Eucharist. The language of the Eucharist has a deep impact on the way that people think about God and about themselves. The problem today is that fewer and fewer Christians have any idea about the content and significance of many of the allusions that can be found in the liturgical texts.

H. Delehaye's work on Greek hagiography remains fundamental and a collection of his research on the Byzantine sources has long been called for. This volume assembles his articles on the Metaphrastes' compilation brought up to date by Fr. Halkin with a bibliographical addendum, and the first publication of the foundation typica of two important monasteries in Constantinople - a mine of religious and prosographical information on the city and its upper classes in the Paleologan period.

The Catholic Liturgy is a mystery. It transcends time and space, re-presenting a sacrifice that happened once, but is seen every day. Fr. Jean Corbon gives a thorough exposition of many aspects of the Catholic Liturgy, ranging from the historical to the transcendant. Divided into three parts--

To complement the popular 'how to do it' publications, which give guidance on the move to Common Worship, a serious and scholarly commentary on the whole range of Common Worship texts is offered here. There is an historical survey of the origins and development of each rite from New Testament times, through the Middle Ages, the Reformation, and up to the present day. This is followed by a detailed commentary on the rite as a whole, and on each part of it, including a comparison with the ASB and other contemporary liturgies, and a short list of books for further reading.

The eucharistic celebration is a vital part of the life and ministry of every priest and deacon. At the same time, the Eucharist is also a compelling narrative of all that Christ is for the people of God. In this book, Fr. Scott Detisch explores a spirituality of holy orders through the eucharistic actions of Christ: take, bless, break, and give. These are more than ritual actions the deacon or priest performs within the liturgy. As they did for Jesus Christ, these eucharistic words define who a priest or deacon is for God's people.

Many in the church see worship leading and theological processing at opposite ends of a big room. Theology is considered the business of pastors and professors, while worship is the business of musicians and rock stars.
But a new wave of young worship leaders is hungry for something different, the desire to think not just pragmatically (sound, charts, guitars) but theologically (the gospel, justice, pastoral ministry) about worship. Likewise, pastors and churches increasingly desire to be led by thoughtful worship leaders who combine doxology and theology.
"Doxology and Theology" is a resource by worship leaders for worship leaders that clearly articulates how these two pieces join together. Contributions from eleven respected worship leaders around the country including Matt Papa (Summit Church, Raleigh-Durham), Aaron Keyes (Grace Church, Atlanta), Michael Bleecker (The Village Church, Dallas), and Zac Hicks (Cherry Creek Presbyterian Church, Denver) unite worship with themes of mission, disciple-making, the Word of God, the Trinity, family, and more.

Edition of complex and important early liturgical work. The highly complex combined sacramentary and pontifical presented here, preserved as Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France, lat. 12052, was apparently written to the order of Ratoldus, abbot of Corbie (d. 986), but in fact has along and complicated history. The sacramentary descends from a book compiled at Saint-Denis, later augmented with material relating to Dol (in Brittany) and Arras, while the pontifical, such as it is, descends in large part froma book drawn up for Oda, archbishop of Canterbury (941-58). Moreover, late-tenth and eleventh-century additions show that Corbie was merely the last link in a fascinating and sometimes puzzling chain. The work is thus of considerable importance to scholars and this edition, with introduction, will be warmly welcomed. Dr NICHOLAS ORCHARD is Deputy Slide Librarian at the Courtauld Institute of Art.