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Casting the first thurible reminds me of the story told by our local funeral director. The occasion was a requiem eucharist in one of our Anglo-Catholic parishes, when the thurifer, in procession, gave the thurible an enthusiastic swing, the chains let go, and the vessel went rolling up the nave. Red-faced thurifer, quick recovery action by said director. Fortunately the church was not provided with a carpet runner in the aisle.

Graham Smith
Christ Church, Mt Vincent
Kurri Kurri, NSW, AUSTRALIA
21 December 2015

 

You asked for liturgical blunders, and I can share a few:

Our congregation has come to be known as the one with the classic liturgical style. We chant much of the service most of the year, including a very nice setting of the Lord's Prayer. There are a few in our congregation who are not fond of this. We are told, "No one knows how to sing it. We want to say it so everyone can participate in this prayer." So during the season of Advent in keeping with the quiet mood of the season, we revert to the spoken Lord's Prayer.

Today (Advent IV) the celebrant got flustered when he began to chant the memorial acclimation from Eucharistic Prayer B in the middle of Prayer A and then could not get back on track. Finally, reaching the end of the Eucharistic Prayer, he takes a deep breath as the congregation sings the Great Amen; and with out looking back at the book *sings* "And now as our savior Christ has taught us, we are bold to say".

The choir director's eyebrows climb in that way that usually signals that some chorister has missed the repeat, but right on cue the whole congregation comes in with the familiar sung Lord's Prayer even though the music was not in the bulletin. So much for the idea that "Nobody knows how to sing it."

In a similar vein, The Rev. Dr. Lewis Weil, James F. Hodges and Harold and Rita Haynes Professor Emeritus of Liturgics at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, was fond of telling his students a story of a former student leading chapel prayers during Lent. For reasons I don't recall the recitation of the Apostles' Creed was elided during the season that year. The student, having forgotten this, change at the usual moment stood and confidently proclaimed, "I believe in God." To which the dean to the chapel immediately responded, "Not during Lent you don't."

John Miller
All Saints Episcopal Church, Sacramento
Sacramento, California, USA
21 December 2015

Liturgical blunder of the Advent Wreath sort—I look in vain in the BCP for a mention of such rite. Enhance the decoration of the chancel with such wreath if desired. The biggest blunder, I think, is adding a little ceremony of lighting the wreath to an already developed liturgy inherited from the Tradition. The wreath is modern and really doesn't add anything other than the chance of a "blunder" in getting it lighted "correctly."

Michael Merriman
Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration
Dallas, Texas, USA
21 December 2015

 

Coincidentally I had been discussing errors with a friend just before I read your editorial on liturgical blunders. I confessed to fluffing a run of quavers in a Bach prelude during a Christmas concert, but had followed the advice of our late Organist Emeritus: "if you make an error in performance, just smile and carry on". My friend, a fellow musician and a counsellor, said she thought this was good advice for life in general. :-)

Michael Leuty
St Peter's
Nottingham, UK
mike@leuty.eu
21 December 2015

 

Trying to be discreet, so as not to embarrass any one, but it was pretty bad. This was a small, mid week service. The priest started the service with the eucharistic prayer, got about a minute into it, then discovered the mistake, went back to the beginning to the liturgy of the word, and when it was time to read to lesson, started to talk about the saint of the day,and from there we proceeded to the eucharist, never having actually read the lessons. One of the strangest services I have ever attended.

Michelle C Jackson, ObJN
Sacramento, California, USA
astraeus@accessbee.com
22 December 2015

Several years ago, we had a visiting priest—well, he wasn't exactly an outsider—he was a regular substitute priest when our own Rector had to be out of town on Sunday. He was retired, and he learned the service and indeed spent most of his active ministry under our 1928 Version of the Book of Common Prayer (what do you expect when folks still refer to the 1979 Version as the "New Prayer Book" after— how long has it been?— 36 years?). Unbeknownst to him, he turned 2 pages of the Altar Book rather than just 1, and skipped over the entire Prayer of Consecration. Bless his soul: I don't think he ever realized just how he got to the Lord's Prayer so fast.

Donald Epley
St Christopher's
Portsmouth, Virginia, USA
22 December 2015

Once during Sunday Mass, when I was an assistant organist in high school, our elderly Monsignor jumped from the opening of the Consecration to "And now as our Saviour taught us..." No one joined in - and we waited, serenely, until Monsignor realized he had turned too many pages at once, and began the Canon once more.

Randy Mills
Trinity College School and St Mark's, Port Hope
Ontario, CANADA
rmills@tcs.on.ca
22 December 2015

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