www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy The Revised Divine Liturgy I guess they are right again

Tim: As I have stated here before, my belief is that there has been NO ban on Church Slavonic imposed by the hierarchs. The RDL is the standard "English" version which is to be used. I am in agreement with Pilgrimcantor; finally we have an English standard to be used in every parish from the Atlantic to the Pacific. (It sure makes traveling between parishes easier.)

I have cantored in parishes where I have been told by the priest that I can use as much Slavonic as I wish, and I have been told in others to use none. Also, the Archeparchial Choir has even been asked to include hymns in Slavonic, including hierarchical liturgies. S o my feeling is that the use of Slavonic is up to each priest (who hopefully takes into consideration the wishes of the congregation).

Jeff

That's why I asked if you were implying. You really can't say anything about attendance growing because it isn't. Most of the RDL was being practiced by most BCA parishes in the past. The results of this were less than stellar to say the least. Anyone who can think for themselves can see that attendance is down, vocations are down, etc. Why in the world would anyone support a chopped up RDL replete with feminizations? You've taken the route of walking the tightrope on here of being in favor of the full Liturgy yet tolerating where the BCA is at because a few rituals were returned and wanting everyone to be thankful for all the 'progress' that has been made over the last 20 years. I guess that I'll just have to be labeled a complainer because I refuse to wait until I'm 156 years old when maybe, just maybe the BCA will have brains to follow Tradition. Chopped up liturgies have never been proven to work. Yet there are cases in the past where the full Ruthenian Rescension was followed and the parishes were thriving and/or growing. Instead of replicating the successful model, the inferior one was followed? The secularists win again, or do they?

For the life of me, I can't get over the absolute waste of time, energy, and money on the RDL when all of this could have been put into an evangelization and outreach program. A program that the BCA needed and needs more than ever. Those who tell tales of the hundreds of young people that are in favor of bringing inclusive language to the church will have to explain why parish after parish is closing down over the next 10-20 years in spite of a feminized inclusive language liturgy being in place. What will they say then?

The title of this thread is 'I guess they are right again'. If this is how is turns out when they're right, I'd hate to see how it would look if they were wrong.



Monomakh

Slava Isusu Christu!
Slava na Viki!

Zeeker--thanks for the information. That is confirming what I had been told and seemed to see for myself. I think it would be a terrible thing to abandon Slavonic permanently. But I would like to see it occasionally, as I have said before. So we all need to just ask our priest to include as much Slavonic as the congregation can comfortably deal with. Some parishes would go with a full on Slavonic Liturgy. I know I could handle it and would love it. Other parishes might only want a little bit. Others none at all. But I agree, I have never seen anything from the Bishops stating that Slavonic has been banned forever. I don't think they would ever do that. It is part of what makes us us. Just as Blessing of the Easter Baskets and pussy willows or performing a deep mytania, or going to the right shoulder first when making the sign of the cross.

We are who we are and to me, Church Slavonic is part of that. Even if I sing it to myself during Divine Liturgy (which I do, very softly) I will never give up on Church Slavonic. It's in my blood. And it is in my will that when I go, I want as much Slavonic in the service as can be done--and my tombstone will have "Tu Spucivo" as well as "Vicnaja Pamjat" on it. As well as a three bar cross. It's already in the will and my wife knows it.

S'nami Boh!

Tim

Zeeker: Thanks -- What we need are voices of reason and common sense...(was it Ben Franklin who said common sense is not all that common.)
I received an email earlier today from a person in Pittsburgh who told me I had rejected the living chant tradition, and thrown my hat in with revisionists. I have just reviewed my last entries, and do not find any evidence of hostility to anyone -- if I have offended anyone here, I sincerely apologize.
Just as a "reality check" -- I asked some clergy at Uniontown if they were threatened by the hierarchs to accept the new Liturgy; no one I spoke to was threatened. There is also no ban on Church Slavonic.
God IS with us -- we're just too busy complaining sometimes to see Him!

What is the source for, or point of reference that is alluded to by, (the quote?) "of everyone and by everyone"?

Dn. Anthony

Re: Deacon Anthony and AJK
In the Liturgy, after the Consecration, the priest prays:
"Remembering, therefore, this saving command and all that was done in our behalf: the cross, the tomb, the resurrection on the third day, the ascension into heaven, the sitting at the right hand, the secong coming in glory...
...Offering You your own, from your own, always and everywhere."
The Slavonic "Tvoja ot Tvoich, Tebi prinosim o vs'ich i va sja" ...(roughly, "Yours of your own, to You we bring, for us and everyone.." )
In the "old" days, I remember hearing "WE ( i.e., the priest AND the people) offer to You, yours of your own, in behalf of all and for all."
I think the "revised" translation makes better sense -- Offering You (God ) your own (your son, Jesus) from your own (children, or sons and daughters, if you prefer) always and everywhere.
The Liturgy is the prayer of all the people -- as AJ so aptly put it, "the engaged prayer of the entire people..." The Liturgy is not entertainment, it is a prayer -- and prayer can be work, sometimes!
Andy Kovaly --Florida Cantor "working" to get ready for St. Basil Liturgy this Sunday...( Let's see -- it took me about 5 years to learn the Slavonic "Basil Liturgy," and since then about three different English arrangements . Hope I get close, at least, this Sunday...)

Why if


is the correct translation of the Slavonic would one conclude



which has quite a different rendering at the end, i.e., "always and everywhere"?

Dn. Anthony

Yes, I too thought of the words at the elevation of the diskos and cup as the probable source for PrJ's "of everyone and by everyone."

If so, I thought, the irony is that he says he LOVES the New Liturgy '...as being "of everyone and by everyone"' for which the alluded phrase ("in behalf of all and for all" as noted above) is in fact no longer in the New Liturgy, it having been replaced in translation by the novel and rather speculative (and some would say inappropriate and even incorrect) rendering "always and everywhere."

Dn. Anthony

As an American historian, I was actually patterning my comments after "of the people and by the people" and not referencing anything in the Liturgy at all.

Sorry!

Tim: What is "Tu Spucivo"?

It means "Here lies", as on headstones. It's also spelled "Tu Spociva".

Not at all Father, and thank you for the clarification: an interesting confluence of rhetoric and prayer -- Lincoln and the Liturgy -- who would have thought.

Dn. Anthony

After 8 months of use I have to say that except for the change to "one in essence" in the creed, and a change to Theotokos in another section ( I don't have books on hand for exact pages and sections, sorry)I could easily return to the previous DL.

I have not a drop of Slavic blood in me, but more and more I think it was a grievous error to remove every last syllable of the Slavonic. My parish used to regularly sing the Cherubic hymn in both english and slavonic, but no more.

Also, is it true that the music sections was really done at the whim of the person in charge? In other words, he didn't like a historically accurate melody and instead skipped a few centuries until he found one that appealed to him better. I truly hope that this is not true.

Glory to Jesus Christ!


No, Indigo, it's not true. With one exception, the melodies used in the Green Book are the same melodies that were taught in the Seminary in the 1950's (we still have class notes from that era), and reprinted in a book that specifically ordered cantors and priests NOT to modify the melodies at their own pleasure (this book is still used every year at the Uniontown pilgrimage); or else were melodies that were ADDED in this country. The one exception is a festal Galician melody for which we used to sing a distorted version; that melody has been restored to its much more regular Galician form, basically matching the one in the new Ukrainian Catholic Anthology.

In some cases, the original Slavonic melodies were shortened or "tweaked" in the new settings to better serve the text; they were not simply used note for note - though it CAN seem so at first to those raised on the "dumbed down" rewritten melodies in English from the 1970's. There are actually rules in the chant tradition itself for how to make these modifications.

I would be happy to answer questions offline (Byzkat@stny.rr.com), or in another thread.

Yours in Christ,
Jeff Mierzejewski

I know of at least one Orthodox monk who keeps a large photo of Lincoln in his prayer corner and considers him a saint. He insists that when they exhumed Lincoln's body, it was incorrupt.