Serving God in the heart of our community since 1881

St Andrew's Church, Taunton

Review of Sunday Worship at 10am

by Reverend Jim Cox - Vicar of St. Andrew's - 26 April 2008

Introduction

For some time now this parish has felt the need to review patterns of worship at the main morning service. Having had a brief period of observation, as vicar, I made some suggestions which were modified by a sub-committee of PCC, presented to PCC and then to the Annual Meeting where some further comments were made.

It is proposed that any changes begin on the first Sunday in May and continue for a trial period of about 6 months when we, as a congregation, can review how it has gone.

My personal observations were that there was an overall sense of busyness in worship that might benefit from some simplification. The hope is that simplification will provide a sense of space and predictability that will assist our worship. In general this means fewer variations of worship patterns, fewer vessels on the altar and fewer people in the sanctuary.

1^st, 3^rd and 4^th Sundays

It is therefore proposed that there will be holy communion on the first four Sundays at 10am. These will be taken from the rite for the season (Lent or Christmas or Ordinary Time et c…) with only the second Sunday being different.

The sanctuary party will consist of 3 servers and 3 others. One will be celebrant, one will act as deacon and one will be a robed chalice assistant. One of these 3 will preach.

The deacon will usually take the first part of the service (Ministry of the Word) from the lectern with the celebrant continuing to do the Greeting, Absolution and Collect. The celebrant will then take over from the Peace. There will be only one team for distribution of communion (one paten/ ciborium and two chalices).

2^nd Sundays

On second Sunday a new service is being devised which will be a service of Holy Communion along the same pattern as other services but in a simpler form with a view to being more accessible for our children. The chalice assistant will not be robed for this service, but come up from the congregation when needed.

Arrangements in Sanctuary

The sense of space and focus and simplicity also needs to be reflected in where everyone sits and stands in the sanctuary.

In the first part of the service the altar is bare and our focus is on the lectern/pulpit. Later this is removed and the altar prepared.

To keep movement to a minimum the Celebrant and deacon will sit, along with the chalice assistant, in chairs against the short “north” altar rail near to the lectern. (This will mean there will be no distribution along this rail). The servers will sit opposite, and hopefully it will be possible to situate them also facing the altar. The choir have agreed to sit in the stalls near the pulpit in the main body of the church.

It is hoped that these changes will draw us all together as a congregation around the Word and around the Sacrament which are the central themes in our worship.

Other changes are that there will normally be three readings; that the gospel will be read from the body of the church and for the Celebrant to be led down the church at the end.

The Prayer of Thanksgiving

There is a continuing discussion over whether to stand for the prayer of thanksgiving at communion. Obviously within Anglicanism there is a very long tradition of kneeling for the whole of the service. The current fashion of standing was introduced from the 1970s onwards to emphasise that the whole congregation was involved in the prayers. Some physically cannot stand for that length of time, some are so disposed to kneeling that that is what they are most comfortable doing. We are unlikely to come to a common mind on this, but there are things to think about.

• The Church of England wants us to recognise that the whole Thanksgiving is a single prayer from “It is very meet, right …” (in the old BCP) right through to the final elevation and “Amen”. It is thought inappropriate to change from standing to kneeling after the “Holy, holy, holy”. 

• Crouching is considered undignified and if people sit it is better to sit up.

• Generally we are encouraged to look at the altar rather than our books throughout.

• The general norm in the Church of England is currently to stand.

• While we do need to have some sense of corporate togetherness as we worship it would be a shame if individuals felt so constrained that they were distracted from worship by the pressure to conform. Personally I would rather people knelt - or raised hands - in worship if it brought them closer to God.

I would ask that we give these modifications a go. If they don’t work or don’t feel right we must look again. Please make any comments to me or PCC members so we are aware of general feeling.

Jim

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