www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Vote: Should Parishes Have Freedom to do Fuller Antiphons & Litanies?

This poll has to do with the implementation of the new Liturgy translation in the Ruthenian Metropolia. As has been discussed elsewhere on this Forum, one of the features of the new translation is to have the priest take most of what were silent prayers aloud. Due to time constraints that means the Antiphons will need to be abbreviated and some litanies omitted. In many parishes the Antiphons and litanies were already abbreviated. This new translation will make that uniform throughout the Metropolia as it appears no translation will be available for the complete Antiphons and the omitted/abbreviated litanies.

Vote: Should Parishes Have Freedom to do Fuller Antiphons & Litanies? single choice

Parishes should have the freedom to do fuller antiphons and include litanies from the traditional Liturgy. (90%, 44 Votes)

Parishes should not have the freedom to do fuller antiphons and include litanies from the tradtional Liturgy. (10%, 5 Votes)

Total Votes: 49 Voting on this poll ends: 05/22/05 09:54 AM

I think it is incorrect to say that "one of the features of the new translation is to have the priest take most of what were silent prayers aloud"; most of what was said privately will still be private.

As I pointed out before, this idea actually makes no sense; the time savings is trivial.

How will the present and older ones be made unavailable?

Thanks, DJS, for the feedback.

In the thread on the Faith & Worship section the idea was advanced that keeping the Liturgy down to one hour was part of the reasoning to continue abbreviating Antiphons and to omit some of the litanies. That was what I had reference to. I suppose if the time savings is trivial then it won't matter if parishes are able to do a fuller Liturgy.

My understanding is that the new translation will not include the full text for the Antiphons and the omitted litanies. If I'm mistaken, I'd welcome correction.

Thanks again!

Nec

Nec,

I think djs was alluding to the fact that it would require a concerted effort to gather up and discard all the existing books, which contain the fuller text - thus, they would still be available through use of those media.

Many years,

Neil

Perhaps I should have said:

"it appears no official translation will be available for the complete Antiphons and the omitted/abbreviated litanies."

Perhaps the Metropolitan Translation Committee could make a translation of the entire Liturgy available so that parishes which wish a fuller Liturgy could do so without supplementing from an older translation.

Sorry for the miscommunication.

Nec

The whole thing is a joke. The Orthodox wouldn't have any problems!

I guess it's only the Catholics who want to worshiop G-d only ONE hour using the time-watch to count the minutes to one hour.



G-d doesn't have a watch, nor does He keep track of time.

It makes me feel like the priest would say "Are you mark? Get ready. GO!" then "STOP".

SPDundas
Deaf Byzantine

Someone might say that polls on the forum are not fair samples (they might be right too.)

Is there any other way of judging how popular this will be among clergy and people if the Archbishop does revise the Liturgy?

Nicholas,

I don't think this Forum is a representative cross-section of the people in our parishes. Most of the people here are those who are among the more involved in our parishes.

Nonetheless, I think the sampling here is worth obtaining for it shows how those who are among the most involved feel on issues.

My question is not meant to be against the new Liturgy translation. It's assuming it will be fully implemented and is seeking how to deal with those parishes which may want a fuller celebration of the Liturgy.

Nec

Fair point. I didn't mean to change the direction of this thread.

Will parishes who want the full Liturgy, be able to use the old books?

But the old books aren't the "full liturgy" either. Where are the Beatitudes after Typica, and the little litanies after the antiphons?

Where are all the verses of the Lamplighting Psalms in Monsignor Lekvulic's books - especially Holy Week? Why do we only have two of the Six Psalms in the Good Friday Matins book? Why do we shorten the Matins canons to only a couple of Odes? (And why are so many of the odes in Tone 6 when they all have their own melodies in the Prostopinije books?)

Yet now we actually have an approved text of the ordinary of Vespers - with ALL the psalm verses. We have BOOKS WITH MUSIC for Vespers and Matins - and a number of parishes celebrating them. It looks like we will have a Divine Liturgy book from which we don't HAVE to cross out the "filioque" - a subject people were SO upset about when it was in brackets for Holy Week, only a little while ago, but which NO ONE mentions with the respect to a proposed new translation of the Divine Liturgy.

Look, we have had an abbreviated Liturgy for YEARS - most of the "now truncated" litanies were ones I never HEARD in years as a Byzantine Catholic. And what we did to Vespers and Matins was close to a crime. Sorry to get "het up", but we have NOT been celebrating the "full liturgy" for decades, and even in Slavonic our prayer books had abbreviations.

If you want more, ask the hierarchs RESPECTFULLY - and be out there, explaining to people why the Liturgy is now going to be 90 minutes long, and why this is a GOOD THING. But please don't tell me the books we have been using - ESPECIALLY Vespers and Matins - were anything like the full text of the official liturgical books for the Ruthenian recension.

Yours in Christ,

Jeff Mierzejewski

Adding a a few "restorations" but then doing a 360
degree turn to elimanate litanies in order to have silent prayers read aloud isn't really a return to our liturgical integrity. If our "heirarchs" are concerned about Eastern liturgical integrity, they wouldn't be worried about the length of Divine Liturgies.

Ungcsertezs

Good points, Jeff.

Some of these things I have heard in Byzantine Catholic setings but I readily acknowledge that it was not the norm. I particularly like singing the Beatitudes. Yes, there are some positive aspects of the new liturgy translation as you mention. The work of the Metropolitan Cantor Institute has been a great development for the Metropolia.

I'm not one to insist on taking every litany there is. Could we not, balancing pastoral needs and tradition at least have a rule that every unique part of the Liturgy should be celebrated at least once each Liturgy? Say, at least once have the Little Litany. At least once have the entire litany that has the "grant this, O Lord"? When a parish has catechumens then have the litany for them? Some would want more but this could be a balance between those who want the entire Liturgy and those who don't want too many repetitions.

Nec

Will the action that goes with the Antiphons ALSO be restored?

I mean, will each parish have a bishop present to lead them to several temples so they can sing the Antiphons?

What is the purpose of singing something when the liturgical action that went with it is no longer present?

We still hear, "The doors, the doors!" but is there still reason to guard the doors because of being persecuted by the Romans?

Joe

Joe,

I happen to like singing the Antiphons because they are from the Scriptures. I'm not sure why we would need to curtail them because of what some historians say. The Liturgy has evolved over time and the reasons we do some things now may not be the reason originally. Does that matter?

Nec

By the way - other than the two Little Litanies at the antiphons which weren't in the old "pew book" - which are the litanies that are being eliminated?

Yours in Christ,

Jeff Mierzejewski