As a member of Societas Liturgica, on Tuesday I received the sad news that world-renowned liturgist Rev. Dr David Holeton has died (aged 75) in Prague. He was President of Societas Liturgica from 2005-2007. In the 1980s, I had read some of what he had written, and then in 1990, I was delighted that he was invited to be the Selwyn Lecturer when I was in my third year at St John’s Theological College – then the Anglican national seminary in New Zealand. The Selwyn Lectureship is a lecturing series which began in the 1960s with the idea of bringing visiting lecturers to Aotearoa New Zealand, following the pattern established by the Presbyterian Theological Hall with their Burns Lecturers.
David gave five talks:
- Christian Initiation: Baptism and Christian Nurture
- Confirmation: Some questions unresolved
- Liturgical Space: Environment and Art
- Worship and the Future: An unfinished agenda
- Worship: the formation of Christian Character
I found him confirming and encouraging of all the perspectives that I had been growing into. For example: all the baptised being able to receive communion (from the time of their baptism) was growing as a reality within NZ Anglicanism at that time – a movement I was fully supportive of, and David provided academic buttressing for that. The NZ Prayer Book had just been published. And the Book of Alternative Services of the Anglican Church of Canada had been published the year previous to that. David had been central to the development of the latter. It was an opportune time to compare and contrast both the processes and the products, especially as I was working on my thesis: The Anglican Eucharist in New Zealand 1814-1989. In summary: NZ Anglicanism had had a representative from each diocese – often different places came up with different rites for the same purpose. After going through the full committee process, these differences were included as options within the final book (hence, three complete sets of collects; three different wedding rites; three different eucharistic rites – with different responses to similar cues;…). Canadian Anglicanism, on the other hand, organised a committee of experts in music, liturgy, theology, and so forth, to draft their revised book. David was the liturgical expert at the heart of that process.
It was a privilege to be invited to a meal, with David as guest of honour, at a St John’s lecturer’s home. And then another evening to have David at a meal at my place.
His Let Us Give Thanks (a presider’s manual for the BAS Eucharist) by David Holeton, Catherine Hall, and Gregory Kerr-Wilson, became a model for my own Celebrating Eucharist – the production of which he strongly encouraged and gave advice for.
David was a gentle, encouraging, highly-gifted, deep-thinking person. He was clearly devout – not simply interested in liturgy for ritualistic sake. He had a delightful sense of humour, with a constant twinkle in his eye. We kept in touch over the years. In 2015, I was granted a sabbatical. I walked the Camino, and then received amazing hospitality from him in Prague at the time of the 600th anniversary of the martyrdom of Jan Hus (6 July 1415). Although, even then, David was struggling with his health and mobility, he had a photographic memory of how to get to significant places and would give detailed instructions for days of exploring.
Here, in Prague, he was incardinated as a priest in the Old Catholic Church (in full communion with the Anglican Communion), and, a great expert of the Czech Reformation, he was dean of the Hussite Theological Faculty at Charles University. On Sunday we went to the Kaple svate Maři Magdaleny (Chapel of St. Mary Magdalene) for the Eucharist – a fascinating seventeenth-century oval-shaped chapel that was saved by being moved in the 1950s.
Here is the church’s announcement:
It is with great sadness that we announce that Revd Can. Prof. Dr. David R. Holeton, Anglican and Old Catholic priest, pastor emeritus of St. Mary Magdalene in Prague, lecturer and former dean of the Hussite Theological Faculty, liturgist of world renown and great expert on the Bohemian Reformation, has left us forever. He died after a long and serious illness at the age of 75.
Starokatolická církev v ČR
May he rest in peace, and rise with Christ in glory.
