www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization How to Get People to Attend Vespers/Orthros?

Hello All-

As per this thread, I am very interested in hearing people's ideas on how to get parishoners to attend Orthros and Vespers. In most Greek-usage parishes I've been to, both Catholic and Orthodox, people show up for Divine Liturgy but at most 10% of the congregation attends Vespers the night before or attend anything more than the last part of Orthros.

I think that persuading people to attend is very important. Does anyone (for instance, Fr. Serge )have ideas/experience in how to make such a thing work?

Looking forward to your thoughts,

Markos
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Oh Lord although I desired to blot out
With my tears the handwriting of my many sins
And for the rest of my life to please thee through sincere repentance;
Yet doth the enemy lead me astray as he wareth
Against my soul with his cunning.
Oh Lord before I utterly perish do thou save me!

- Sticheron of Repentance, Sunday Vespers, Tone 4

I would be curious too. I suspect that the appeal of attending Vespers has a lot to do with the appeal of the persoanlity of the pastor. (In contrast, attending Divine Liturgy is fulfillment of a commandment -- regardless of who the priest happens to be.) But, I might be wrong. Comments, from those who have experience with this?

-- John

John,

I would say the personality of the parish priest has little to do with this issue and more of an outright ignorance to what these services are and their importance to the spiritual life of not only the church, but to the faithful and clergy. If you ask some of the faithful that come from the Ruthenian or Carpatho Russian heritage about these services, most of the older ones will refer to it as "low" mass. I know because I have heard these references when visiting parishes of colleagues.

Where the focus has been mainly on educating the faithful regarding the liturgy, it has to be expanded on the parish level to include the cycle of prayer that has been a part of the Byzantine heritage for many centuries. If we do not try now, then the next to show the decline will be the liturgy itself. That may sound controversial, but 30+ years ago Vespers and Orthros were a part of the regular liturgical life of the parishes here. Now it is unusual to find it regularly celebrated in most traditions.

Just my thoughts.

In IC XC,
Father Anthony+

I think the priest has to really buy in to it. Without his enthusiasm (and by that I mean internally, not an external giddiness) over it, he won't be able to convince an entire parish to buy in as well.

One way to get people to attend would be an announcement in the bulletin such as, "We will have weekly pirohi and holubki dinners on Saturdays at 7:00 P.M. Dinners are $7.50 a piece, or free for those who attend the 6:00 P.M. Vespers.

The cause is certainly a good one. For openers, the priest himself must be firmly convinced of the spiritual need to do this (don't laugh - I've met far too many priests who are completely unconvinced of the idea), to the extent of setting aside everything else on Saturday evenings, and on Sunday morning before the Divine Liturgy. That in turn means:

a) no "Saturday evening Mass", please, or other lame excuses (such as "I can't do Vespers because often I have to go and bless the table at a wedding dinner"), and

b) a willingness to be in church at least 90 minutes ahead of the scheduled time for the Divine Liturgy (Orthros, vesting, and Prothesis will take 90 minutes).

In addition, it must be carefully expained that these are NOT the times to come to Confession - Confessions before or after Vespers are welcome, but not during the service - and the time for Orthros and Prothesis is not the time for people to seek to engage the Priest in conversation (it's amazing how many people will agree completely with this idea and then try to converse with the Priest Sunday after Sunday at the time when he should be able to serve Orthros and Prothesis in peace).

All that is just for openers!

One obviously needs a suitable space (normally the temple itself) in which to hold the services! This may sound like a "given", but unfortunately it isn't given in every situation.

One needs to provide usable texts for the chanters, the servers, and the people - and it's amazing how little that idea has penetrated, in these modern days of the Internet and the photo-copier.

One needs to have at least two or three singers - who have some idea of how to chant the service - who are willing, not only to commit themselves to coming and singing, regularly, dependably, and on time - but are even willing (Oh, shocking thought) to rehearse the music ahead of time.

Finally, one needs to publicize the service, both among the parishioners and beyond.

Does all this sound impossible? It's not. I know of several small parishes who manage to do it nicely, week in and week out.

I would not suggest providing free dinners to all comers! It's a nice idea, since one can usually sing better on an empty stomach, but . . . anyway, it is not unreasonable, however, to have a simple cup of tea and a discussion hour after Vespers - at least one parish of my acquaintaince does very well with this idea. In that parish, the attendance at Vespers is phenomenal.

Most of all, CARE!

Here's an example of caring: about 160 years ago, some clergy of the Church of England decided that they wanted to have the Holy Communion every Sunday (in those days, it was "normal" for the Church of England to have Holy Communion about 4 times a year). They tried - briefly - to have Holy Communion every Sunday instead of "Morning Prayer", only to find that the idea was roundly unwelcome; people would not come and instead invited the Vicar to take his talents elsewhere. Then some early Victorian minister had a brain wave: start another service (of Holy Communion) on Sundays at 8 �M. Get anybody you can find to come to it. And keep it up for years, week in and week out.

The first Victorian clergyman who unlocked his church 3 hours early on a Sunday morning must have been lonely, and probably felt like a fool. But 160 years later, we can all see that this strategy succeeded. In a matter of a few decades, the early Communion Service had become standard, and over time it spread.

Fr. Serge

Fr. Serge and Fr. Anthony, bless !

I think you have correctly identified the problem and the solution ! Thank you for your posts !

-- John

The overwhelmingly vast majority of OCA churches (especially in Ohio, PA, NY, etc.) are former Greek Catholic parishes that left in the early part of the last century. These churches were founded and built by our people. Isn't it interesting how the vast majority of these churches have matins and vespers and no Saturday evening liturgy, and how the churches that remained Greek Catholic can't get more than 10% to have vespers or matins. The point is that it can be done. St. Theodosius in Cleveland is a former Greek Catholic parish and current OCA parish that gets a nice turnout for Saturday evening Vespers (I've seen 50+ people there).

The way to get people to attend these services that I've seen work is to explain to the people that if they want to hear all about the current feast day, Sunday, etc. that most of the prayers and info about it are during Vespers and Matins and not in the Liturgy. I know a priest that did this before Christmas and there was a great turnout for vespers.

Obviously the first step is to have the services! But just having them won't accomplish much. Our people have been deprived of them for a few generations now. But by explaining what is in the services and why they are important, we can begin to get interest and attendance.

Why in the world the Cathedral, St. John's in Munhall, with a full time pastor and a qualified cantor who knows the hymns, doesn't set the example and begin this practice is beyond me. There's really no excuse for it at all.


Monomakh

It is striking, in that you have said this more than once, and in more than one context, that nobody, who reads here regularly, in any position to make excuses has anything at all to say about it.

I find the silence more interesting than any attempt to excuse the lack of practice...eh?

Speaking of intentions....

Mary

Mary,

It truly is fascinating. Because my whole life, all I have been told is that priests are now covering more than one parish and so they can't have Vespers and the ones that are full time at just one parish don't have a cantor that knows the music for the service.

The arguments fall completely apart at many of our parishes, case in point, the St. Johns Cathedral in Munhall, PA. Full time priest, more than qualified cantor who knows the music. Yet, what takes place, Saturday evening liturgy, and no Vespers at all. Also, the schedules that I've seen do not show Matins at all either. I could go on about the fact that the Great Canon of St. Andrew was not celebrated during the first week of the Great Fast as well. Yet, I guarantee that at orthodox parishes in the Munhall area that one could find a Vespers service, Matins, Great Canon, etc.

Where there's a will there's a way.

It's inexcusable, period.


Monomakh

Fathers Serge, Anthony-

Thank you for your insights. I do agree that there needs to be education on the "value" of the Hours for the parishoners. Once I was introducing my parish to someone with another parishoner, and I recommended "someone" to come for Orthros at 9:15. The other parishoner basically pooh-poohed the idea; "nobody goes to that". Such an attitude is very common, unfortunately.

Maybe it would help to not advertise Divine Liturgy times; i.e. say "Orthros and Divine Liturgy at 9:00" instead of "Orhtros 9:00 Divine Liturgy 11:00". It does make them look much more like an integrated service instead of "something only the fanatics wake up early for". If someone asks when DL starts, you can say "after the Doxology".

Monomakh-

An Horologion is not that expensive. The other books are generally not a huge extra expense, if you choose your translations intelligently. Why not hold readers Vespers/Orthros yourself, or with a few interested parishoners?

Markos

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh Lord although I desired to blot out
With my tears the handwriting of my many sins
And for the rest of my life to please thee through sincere repentance;
Yet doth the enemy lead me astray as he wareth
Against my soul with his cunning.
Oh Lord before I utterly perish do thou save me!

- Sticheron of Repentance, Sunday Vespers, Tone 4

The method of simply giving out the time of the beginning of Orthros is sometimes used by the Old Ritualists.

Fr. Serge

I agree, the priest must be convinced of the spiritual need.

At a former parish in 1994, I started Vespers alone on Saturday night. One woman was curious - I invited her to join me. After a while, she brought a friend. Within five years, we had between 20-30 people for Vespers every Saturday evening.

The time for vespers (6:00 pm at my parish) is immovable - just like the times of Divine Liturgy on Sunday morning. If I start to move the time of Vespers, then I show that "it is not that important." When the couples I marry ask for me to give the blessing at the marriage meal - I respectfully decline and explain that I have a Church service to start the Lord's Day. If there is time, I will show up at the marriage feast later in the evening (this is rare).

Father Michael (as usual) gets right to the heart of the matter. It has to come from the clergy first. The time needs to be predictable. In our mission we started in the homes of a couple of the families before we had the gift of liturgical space in a former RC parochial school.

The advertising is important as well. Our local RC parishes have been very open to putting notices of our Greek Catholic community events in the bulletins.

Getting the time right is a bit of a challenge - too early or too late doesn't work, and one wants to be consistent with the liturgical time as well (sunset, the singing of Phos Hilarion, etc). Five, five-thirty or six seem like reasonable times and are all after ninth hour (about three p.m.).

Yes, curious indeed - especially when places like St. Nicholas Cathedral in Chicago can manage to have Vespers in English and again separately in Ukrainian on Saturday evenings.