Glory to God in the highest,
and peace to God’s people on earth.
Gloria in excelsis Deo is one of the oldest Christian hymns still sung. In the East it forms part of the Office. In the West it was traditionally used early in the Eucharistic liturgy – just prior to the collect.
That’s the position it had in the first Book of Common Prayer, but 1552 BCP moved it to the conclusion of the Eucharist. And there it stayed. Right through the 1928 alternative. In NZ, the first contemporary revision, 1966 moved it not back to the 1549 and earlier position, but rather, right to the start of the service. It essentially became the gathering hymn. In practice, services probably went Hymn – greeting – Gloria…, and the Gloria probably was often said, rather than sung.
In NZ, little changed to this pattern in the 1970 revision. The rite had been designed so that the “first part of the service” (excluding the Ministry of the Sacrament) could stand alone as an office, led by lay persons.
By the 1984 revision there was an eye on RC revisions, other revisions, and presumably back to pre-1552 days. The text of the Gloria was printed directly after the greeting (as in 1966 & 1970) but the traditional position, prior to the collect, was permitted, but no text was printed there, so the book-bound would have to turn back.
In Celebrating Eucharist I wrote:
Each Eucharistic Liturgy provides for a hymn after the greeting and presents an option in the text (“Glory to God in the highest,” page 405; the Benedicite Aotearoa, page 457; and two options, pages 477 and 478). This first hymn functions as a “gathering song” and also sets the mood for the service (rather than needing to be strictly thematic). It is appropriate that the Glory to God be used for this during the Christmas season and from Easter Day through the Day of Pentecost. It is not used during the seasons of Advent and Lent. If necessary, various metrical versions of the Glory to God are available (which can be sung to well known tunes). Furthermore, during the Easter season it may be more appropriate to sing a joyful hymn which captures resurrection delight more immediately than the Glory to God.
Unless you are a community that recites hymns rather than singing them (yes, there are such communities) I suggest the Gloria be sung (reciting it should feel as unusual as reciting “Happy Birthday to you…”).
I suggest that unless the Gloria is used as the opening hymn, having it follow directly sung on another opening hymn, with a greeting wedged in between, can be improved upon. The Gloria, however, can be seen as a placeholder for the opening hymn.
Otherwise I suggest the traditional pattern works well:
Greeting
Gathering Hymn
Confession
Kyries (if used)
Absolution
Gloria
Bidding – silence – collect
Reading
Psalm
Reading
Alleluia verse
Gospel
…
What does your community do? What do you think works well? What do you think works badly? Why?
The rubric in our Canadian ‘Book of Alternative Services’ says ‘Then may follow an act of praise: one of the following hymns, or a canticle or other hymn.’ The ‘following hymns’ are ‘Glory to God’, ‘Kyrie Eleison’, and ‘Trisagion’.
Like you, Bosco, I felt for a long time that having an opening hymn, followed soon after by the Gloria, was a little redundant. Also, in our Eucharistic Rite the confession follows the prayers of the people so the opening hymn and the Gloria are even closer together. So for several years now at St. Margaret’s we’ve processed in, either in silence or to instrumental music, had the greeting and the collect for purity, and then sung the opening hymn in the traditional spot for the Gloria. We do occasionally sing a metrical version of the Gloria there, but usually another hymn of praise, as the rubric allows.
Thanks, Tim. The placing of the confession is an interesting other discussion – I would place it there if there has been significant preaching around it (eg for Ash Wednesday). I do not have the BAS infront of me, so don’t know if it is allowed, but have you thought of omitting the Collect for Purity? I love the prayer very much, and regularly use it for private devotion and preparation, and regularly encourage others to do so – but I would not generally use it to start corporate worship. Blessings.
Bosco, you can download the BAS and all of our Canadian Anglican liturgical texts as PDFs here:
http://www.anglican.ca/resources/liturgicaltextsonline/
No I have not thought of omitting the Collect for Purity. Why don’t you think it’s appropriate in that setting? To me it’s one of Cranmer’s most successful translations from Sarum, and I love it.
Thanks for the link, Tim. The Collect for Purity as I said, I agree, is a wonderful prayer – but its purpose was individual preparation rather than enhancing the sense of gathering community (as noted in some of the discussions here). It may deserve its own blog post, but I repeat here what I say in Celebrating Eucharist:
Blessings.
For my whole life I can remember the Gloria always coming after the Kyrie and prior to the prayer of the day/ collect. The Gloria has been interchangeable with with another “Hymn of Priase” for which the text begins: “This is the Feast of victory for our God.”
The Gloria is omitted in Advent and Lent, the Kyrie in Christmas and Easter.
Confession and Absolution is often done prior to the opening hymn, and in my ordained ministry, I have upheld Confession and Absolution as pre-rite. I do it very first thing on Sunday morning, and then a brief welcome and introduction to the day. the rest of the order looks like this:
Gathering Hymn
Apostolic Greeting
Kyrie
Gloria
Collect
Readings (1st, Psalm, Epistle)
Alleluia
Gospel Reading
etc…
That Ordo feels like is had been grated onto my bones… whenever I attend worship and that order is changed around, I feel like someone is trying to my arms into pant legs or my feet into a sweater. It just isn’t right… I guess that that is power of liturgy.
Thanks, Eric. The concept of “pre-rite” is one I will have to think more about. Blessings.
Without wandering too far off topic for long… our seminary’s Liturgy professor taught us that technically Confession and Absolution is rite unto itself, because it was done individually with the priest or council of deacons in the week leading up to a Sunday with the Lord’s Supper.
So as a nod to that tradition, we do it before anything else. Also as a reminder that we are sinners and forgiven (simul justus et peccator). In the new American and Canadian hymnbook, a “Thanksgiving for Baptism” was also added, similar to the Thanksgiving prayer in the baptismal rite. Absolution is rooted in God’s baptismal promises, and therefore we also begin worship with that reminder of our baptismal identity.
Eric, I have written quite a bit about confession, in Celebrating Eucharist and elsewhere on this site. I would be pleasantly surprised if many made the connection regularly and consciously to baptism. I have been present when non-baptised persons are absolved prior to being baptised! And I think there may be even less conscious noting that the Eucharist, the repeatable part of the Sacrament of Initiation, is “for the forgiveness of sins”.
I would also be cautious about letting the glue show too much from a theoretical understanding of the origin of parts of the Eucharist. A symphony has a flow, direction, and dynamic – it is one thing to analyse its components, it is another if those components distract from the overall integrity of the work.
I will try and lookout for those thanksgiving prayers you mention – are they online?
Blessings.
The “Thanksgiving for Baptism” is online… kind of. Augsburg Fortress, the publishing arm of the ELCA/ELCIC has it on their worship resource website – Sundaysandseasons.com – along with just about everything in our hymnals in digital format. However, it is copyrighted material behind a pay wall. I wouldn’t want to post something to your site without permission and get you in trouble. But some information on the worship resource can be found here: http://www.elca.org/Growing-In-Faith/Worship/Resources/ELCA-Worship-Books/ELW.aspx
You would have to purchase a hymnal, or have someone send the material another way.
Thanks, Erik. I will also check my collection of hymnals also. Blessings.
Have you tried rapping it?
You mean as a community, Christopher, or as an individual? Blessings.
Oh, you get the bidding (intercessions?) over with before the readings? Hmmm…
Over here in Scotland, using the 1982 liturgy it goes:
Introit Hymn
Welcome
Peace
Collect for Purity
Summary of the Law
Confession & Absolution
Kyrie or Gloria depending on season
Collect
OT/Reading1
Epistle/NT Reading
Hymn
Gospel
Sermon
Creed
Intercessions
Works for me, certainly. I particularly like the 1982 Credimus instead of Credo – having had several Collects prior, the congregation is duly collected together and so makes a corporate affirmation of its faith rather than individual.
One thing I particularly loathe in a liturgy: too much beseeching (grovelling!), begging for mercy, feeling “unworthy”, `prayer of humble access’, etc. We’ve got that out the way early-on with the confession and absolution so there’s no need for it later, *especially* *after* having been up to receive.
No, Tim, the intercessions come after the sermon. I have written a lot on the use of the collect (for example), and, at the very least suggest the bidding, “Let us pray” leading into silence collected by the collect.
I am interested in your positioning of the Peace. Worth another blog post perhaps…
Having said you loathe grovelling, you certainly include a lot! The either/or of kyrie or Gloria is interesting. And I’ve written plenty on removing the creed (start here).
Blessings.
Not used at our place apart from children’s service where the ‘Peruvian Gloria is sung before the collect. There are no kyries.
It’s sometimes seemed to me that singing the Gloria, in the absence of a single standard tune, can mean that visitors find it harder to participate.
Bosco, I wish to lodge a friendly protest regarding the “traditional” order you suggest, particularly the following segment:
Confession
Kyries (if used)
Absolution
You and I both know that the Kyries were/are not penitential in origin. “Lord, have mercy” is not an expression of contrition but the vestigial refrain of an intercessory litany addressed to Christ.
(Luke 18:39b-41a: “‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ [Υἱὲ Δαυίδ, ἐλέησόν με.] Jesus stood still and ordered the man to be brought to him; and when he came near, he asked him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’”)
Putting them between the Confession and Absolution is therefore very confusing.
I grant that there’s a tenuous BCP precedent for Anglicans. According to Dr. Cranmer’s 1552 rubric, in the Decalogue the people “shal after every Commaundment aske Gods mercy for theyr transgression of the same”. But he is too good a liturgist to try to turn this into a confession and absolution: it remains a litany, albeit of a very Protestant sort, and the Confession and Absolution happen later.
If the Kyrie is not allowed to function as part of the entrance procession, as in the medieval liturgy, then it is much better reserved for the Prayers of the People. Or am I committing myself to a heresy?
Agreed, Jesse, of course. To a degree.
My own understanding is coloured by Orthodox experience. Being in monasteries on Mount Athos as monks peel potatoes muttering “Kyrie eleison”… However hard I may have tried, I do not think I have ever convinced anyone into the experience of the Kyries (a component in our rite closely connected to confession/absolution) to be anything other than penitential.
The Kyries may have originated as a spanner, but everyone in the West who takes them out of the family box of tools now uses it as a hammer (Rome included!) However much you and I might protest its spanner origin, its use as a hammer continues. I am giving in and helping people use it as a hammer well.
And I’m not sure that re-using a stone that was first intended for a staircase now as a part of the wall of a new building is worse than not using that stone altogether…
Sorry.
Blessings.
Could we not at least agree that it’s bad craftsmanship to hold one’s hammer-spanner with the vice-grips of confession and absolution? 😉
Funny, I was taught the Jesus Prayer by one of its foremost Anglo-Sphere proponents (Bishop Simon Barrington-Ward, who confirmed me). For him it never came up as especially penitential (though the *presence* into which we are brought by the prayer “Kyrie Iesou Christe eleison me” is overwhelmingly forgiving and healing).
I must admit, I’m all for re-used stone. Have you visited the Anglo-Saxon crypt at Hexham Abbey? Carved and inscribed Roman-era stones, re-used for a Christian church: http://www.hexhamabbey.org.uk/visits-history/crypt/
Yes, Jesse, I brought up the Jesus Prayer to demonstrate its non-penitential use. Both Roman and Anglican re-using of the Kyrie as confession is firmly entrenched in contemporary liturgical revisions; one might explain its alteration from its original purpose and also help people to use it for its current purpose in the best way possible. Blessings.