Daily Readings and Prayers:
Saints/Martyrs/Heroes/Feasts/Fasts to be observed/commemmorated/celebrated: the Seventh Day of Christmas, John Wyclif, Reformer, 1384
John Wycliffe (pronounced /ˈwɪklɪf/; also spelled Wyclif, Wycliff, Wiclef, Wicliffe, or Wickliffe) (c. 1328 - 31 December 1384) was an English theologian, lay preacher, [1] translator, reformist and university teacher who was known as an early dissident in the Roman Catholic Church during the 14th century. His followers are known as Lollards, a somewhat rebellious movement, which preached anticlerical and biblically-centered reforms. He is considered the founder of the Lollard movement, [1] a precursor to the Protestant Reformation (for this reason, he is sometimes called "The Morning Star of the Reformation"). He was one of the earliest opponents of papal authority influencing secular power. [2]
Wycliffe was also an early advocate for translation of the Bible into the common tongue. He completed his translation directly from the Vulgate into vernacular English in the year 1382, now known as Wycliffe's Bible. [3] It is probable that he personally translated the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; and it is possible he translated the entire New Testament, while his associates translated the Old Testament. [4] Wycliffe's Bible appears to have been completed by 1384, [4] with additional updated versions being done by Wycliffe's assistant John Purvey and others in 1388 and 1395. [5]
Full name John Wycliffe
Born c. 1328
Ipreswell, England
Died 31 December 1384 (aged about 60)
Lutterworth, England
Era Medieval philosophy
Region Western philosophy
Notable ideas Wycliffe's Bible
Influenced by
Roger Bacon · William of Okham
Influenced
Jan Huss · Martin Luther · Robert Grosseteste · Thomas Bradwardine · Richard Fitzralph
1. Early life
John Wycliffe
Wycliffe was born in the factory village of modern-day Hipswell in the North Riding of Yorkshire, England in the mid-1320s. [6] His family was long settled in Yorkshire. The family was quite large, covering considerable territory, principally centered around Wycliffe-on-Tees, about ten miles to the north of Hipswell.
Wycliffe received his early education close to his home. [7] It is not known when he first came to Oxford, with which he was so closely connected until the end of his life, but he is known to have been at Oxford around 1345. He was influenced by Roger Bacon, Robert Grosseteste, Thomas Bradwardine, William of Occam, and Richard Fitzralph.[citation needed]
Wycliffe owed much to William of Occam's work and thought. He showed interest in natural science and mathematics, but applied himself to studying theology, ecclesiastical law, and philosophy. His opponents acknowledged the keenness of his dialectic, and his writings prove he was well grounded in Roman and English law, as well as in native history.[citation needed]
During this time there was conflict between the northern (Boreales) and southern (Australes) "nations" at Oxford. Wycliffe belonged to Boreales, in which the prevailing tendency was anticurial, while the other was curial. Not less sharp was the separation over Nominalism and Realism. He mastered most of the techniques.
Wycliffe became deeply disillusioned both with Scholastic theology of his day and also with the state of the church, at least as represented by the clergy. In the final phase of his life in the years before his death in 1384 he increasingly argued for Scriptures as the authoritative centre of Christianity, that the claims of the papacy were unhistorical, that monasticism was irredeemably corrupt, and like the Donatists that the moral unworthiness of priests invalidated their office and sacraments. [8]
2. Early career
2. 1. At Oxford
Wycliffe was Master of Balliol College, Oxford in 1360, and 1361. [9] In 1361, he was presented by the college with the parish of Fylingham in Lincolnshire. For this he had to give up the leadership of Balliol College, though he could continue to live at Oxford. He is said to have had rooms in the buildings of The Queen's College, Oxford. As baccalaureate at the university, he busied himself with natural science and mathematics, and as master he had the right to read in philosophy. Obtaining a bachelor's degree in theology, Wycliffe pursued an avid interest in Biblical studies. His performance led Simon Islip, Archbishop of Canterbury, to place him at the head of Canterbury Hall in 1365, where twelve young men were preparing for the priesthood. Islip had designed the foundation for secular clergy; but when he died in 1366, Islip's successor, Simon Langham, a man of monastic training, turned the leadership of the college over to a monk. Though Wycliffe appealed to Rome, the outcome was unfavourable to him. This case would hardly have been thought of again had not contemporaries of Wycliffe, such as William Woodford and Rev. John Woodbridge I, seen in it the beginnings of Wycliffe's assaults upon Rome and monasticism.[citation needed]
Between 1372 and 1384, he became a Doctor of Divinity, making use of his right to lecture upon systematic divinity, but these lectures were not the origin of his Summa. In 1368, he gave up his living at Fylingham and took over the rectory of Ludgershall, Buckinghamshire, not far from Oxford, which enabled him to retain his connection with the university. Six years later, in 1374, he received the crown living of Lutterworth in Leicestershire, which he retained until his death. He had already resigned as prebendary of Aust in Westbury-on-Trym.
3. Political career
Wycliffe's entrance upon the stage of ecclesiastical politics is usually related to the question of feudal tribute to which England had been rendered liable by King John, which was not paid for thirty-three years until Pope Urban V in 1365 demanded it. Parliament declared that neither King John nor any other had the right to subject England to any foreign power. Should the pope attempt to enforce his claim by arms, he would be met with national resistance.
Pope Urban apparently recognized his mistake and dropped his claim. The tone of the pope was, in fact, not threatening, and he did not wish to draw England into the maelstrom of politics of Europe. Harsh words were bound to be heard in England, because of the close relations of the papacy with France. It is said that on this occasion Wycliffe served as theological counsel to the government, composed a polemical tract dealing with the tribute, and defended an unnamed monk over against the conduct of the government and parliament. This would place the entrance of Wycliffe into politics about 1365-66.
Wycliffe's more important participation began with the peace congress at Bruges. There in 1374 negotiations were carried on between France and England, while at the same time commissioners from England dealt with papal delegates respecting the removal of ecclesiastical annoyances. Wycliffe was among these, under a decree dated July 26, 1374. The choice of a harsh opponent of the Avignon system would have broken up rather than furthered the peace negotiations. It seems he was designated purely as a theologian, and so considered himself, since a noted scriptural scholar was required alongside of those learned in civil and canon law. There was no need for a man of renown, or a pure advocate of state interests. His predecessor in a like case was John Owtred, a monk who formulated the statement that Saint Peter had united in his hands spiritual and temporal power - the opposite of what Wycliffe taught. In the days of the mission to Bruges Owtred still belonged to Wycliffe's circle of friends.
Wycliffe was still regarded by papal partisans as trustworthy; his opposition to the ruling conduct of the Church may have escaped notice. It was difficult to recognise him as a heretic. The controversies in which men engaged at Oxford were philosophical rather than purely theological or ecclesiastical-political, and the method of discussion was academic and scholastic. The kind of men with whom Wycliffe dealt included the Carmelite monk John Kyningham [10] over theological [11] or ecclesiastical-political [12] questions. Wycliffe's contest with Owtred and William Wynham (or Wyrinham or Binham) of Wallingford Priory and St Albans, the Benedictine professor of theology at Oxford, were formerly unknown, as were the earlier ones with William Wadeford. When it is recalled that it was once the task of Owtred to defend the political interests of England against the demands of Avignon, one would more likely see him in agreement with Wycliffe than in opposition. But Owtred believed it sinful to say that temporal power might deprive a priest, even an unrighteous one, of his temporalities; Wycliffe regarded it as a sin to incite the pope to excommunicate laymen who had deprived clergy of their temporalities, his dictum being that a man in a state of sin had no claim upon government.
Wycliffe blamed Wynham for making public controversies previously confined to the academic arena. But the controversies were fundamentally related to the opposition, which found expression in Parliament against the Curia. Wycliffe himself tells [13] how he concluded that there was a great contrast between what the Church was and what it ought to be, and saw the necessity for reform. His ideas stress the perniciousness of the temporal rule of the clergy and its incompatibility with the teaching of Christ and the apostles, and make note of the tendencies evident in the measures of the "Good Parliament" of 1376-77. A long bill was introduced, with 150 headings, in which were stated the grievances caused by the aggressions of the Curia; all reservations and commissions were to be done away, the exportation of money was forbidden, and the foreign collectors were to be removed.
4. Public declaration
Wycliffe speaking to Lollard preachers.
It was in this period that Wycliffe came significantly to the fore. He was among those to whom the thought of the secularization of ecclesiastical properties in England was welcome. His protector was John of Gaunt, who was acting as ruler at this time. He was no longer satisfied with his chair as the means of propagating his ideas, and soon after his return from Bruges he began to express them in tracts and longer works - his great work, the Summa theologiae, was written in support of them. In the first book, concerned with the government of God and the Ten Commandments, he attacked the temporal rule of the clergy - in temporal things the king is above the pope, and the collection of annates and indulgences is simony. But he entered the politics of the day with his great work De civili dominio. Here he introduced those ideas by which the good parliament was governed - which involved the renunciation by the Church of temporal dominion. The items of the "long bill" appear to have been derived from his work. In this book are the strongest outcries against the Avignon system with its commissions, exactions, squandering of charities by unfit priests, and the like. To change this is the business of the State. If the clergy misuses ecclesiastical property, it must be taken away; if the king does not do this, he is remiss. The work contains 18 strongly stated theses, opposing the governing methods of the rule of the Church and the straightening out of its temporal possessions. [14] Wycliffe had set these ideas before his students at Oxford in 1376, after becoming involved in controversy with William Wadeford and others. Rather than restricting these matters to the classroom, he wanted them proclaimed more widely and wanted temporal and spiritual lords to take note. While the latter attacked him and sought ecclesiastical censure, he recommended himself to the former by his criticism of the worldly possessions of the clergy.
5. Conflict with the Church
Theologically, his preaching was strong belief in predestination that enabled him to believe in the “invisible” church of the elect, made up of those predestined to be saved, rather than in the “visible” church of Rome. [15]
Wycliffe wanted to see his ideas actualized - his fundamental belief was that the Church should be poor, as in the days of the apostles. He had not yet broken with the mendicant friars, and from these John of Gaunt chose Wycliffe's defenders. While the Reformer later claimed that it was not his purpose to incite temporal lords to confiscation of the property of the Church, the real tendencies of the propositions remained unconcealed. The result of the same doctrines in Bohemia - that land but which was richest in ecclesiastical foundations - was that in a short time the entire church estate was taken over and a revolution brought about in the relations of temporal holdings. It was in keeping with the plans of Gaunt to have a personality like Wycliffe on his side. Especially in London the Reformer's views won support; partisans of the nobility attached themselves to him, and the lower orders gladly heard his sermons. He preached in city churches, and London rang with his praises.[citation needed]
The first to oppose his theses were monks of those orders that held possessions, to whom his theories were dangerous. Oxford and the episcopate were later blamed by the Curia, which charged them with so neglecting their duty that the breaking of the evil fiend into the English sheepfold could be noticed in Rome before it was in England. Wycliffe was summoned before William Courtenay, Bishop of London, on 19 February 1377, "to explain the wonderful things which had streamed forth from his mouth". The exact charges are not known, as the matter did not get as far as a definite examination. Gaunt, the Earl Marshal Henry Percy, and a number of other friends accompanied Wycliffe, and four begging friars were his advocates. A crowd gathered at the church, and at the entrance of the party animosities began to show, especially in an angry exchange between the bishop and the Reformer's protectors. Gaunt declared that he would humble the pride of the English clergy and their partisans, hinting at the intent to secularise the possessions of the Church. The assembly broke up and the lords departed with their protege. [16]
Most of the English clergy were irritated by this encounter, and attacks upon Wycliffe began, finding their response in the second and third books of his work dealing with civil government. These books carry a sharp polemic, hardly surprising when it is recalled that his opponents charged Wycliffe with blasphemy and scandal, pride and heresy. He appeared to have openly advised the secularization of English church property, and the dominant parties shared his conviction that the monks could better be controlled if they were relieved from the care of secular affairs.
The bitterness occasioned by this advice will be better understood when it is remembered that at that time the papacy was at war with the Florentines and was in dire straits. The demand of the Minorites that the Church should live in poverty as it did in the days of the apostles was not pleasing in such a crisis. It was under these conditions that Pope Gregory XI, who in January, 1377, had gone from Avignon to Rome, sent on 22 May five copies of his bull against Wycliffe, dispatching one to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the others to the Bishop of London, King Edward III, the Chancellor, and the university; among the enclosures were 18 theses of his, which were denounced as erroneous and dangerous to Church and State.
The reformatory activities of Wycliffe effectively began here: all the great works, especially his Summa theologiae, are closely connected with the condemnation of his 18 theses, while the entire literary energies of his later years rest upon this foundation.[citation needed] The next aim of his opponents - to make him out a revolutionary in politics - failed. The situation in England resulted in damage to them; on 21 June 1377, Edward III died. His successor was Richard II, a boy, who was under the influence of John of Gaunt, his uncle. So it resulted that the bull against Wycliffe did not become public till 18 December. Parliament, which met in October, came into sharp conflict with the Curia. Among the propositions Wycliffe, at the direction of the government, worked out for parliament was one that speaks out distinctly against the exhaustion of England by the Curia.
Wycliffe tried to gain public favour by laying his theses before Parliament, and then made them public in a tract, accompanied by explanations, limitations, and interpretations. After the session of Parliament was over he was called upon to answer, and in March, 1378, he appeared at the episcopal palace at Lambeth to defend himself. The preliminaries were not yet finished when a noisy mob gathered with the purpose of saving him; the king's mother, Joan of Kent, also took up his cause. The bishops, who were divided, satisfied themselves with forbidding him to speak further on the controversy. At Oxford the vice-chancellor, following papal directions, confined the Reformer for some time in Black Hall, from which Wycliffe was released on threats from his friends; the vice-chancellor was himself confined in the same place because of his treatment of Wycliffe. The latter then took up the usage according to which one who remained for 44 days under excommunication came under the penalties executed by the State, and wrote his De incarcerandis fedelibus, in which he demanded that it should be legal for the excommunicated to appeal to the king and his council against the excommunication; in this writing he laid open the entire case and in such a way that it was understood by the laity. He wrote his 33 conclusions, in Latin and English. The masses, some of the nobility, and his former protector, John of Gaunt, rallied to him. Before any further steps could be taken at Rome, Gregory XI died (1378). But Wycliffe was already engaged in one of his most important works, that dealing with what he perceived as the truth of Holy Scripture.
The sharper the strife became, the more Wycliffe had recourse to his translation of Scripture as the basis of all Christian doctrinal opinion, and expressly tried to prove this to be the only norm for Christian faith. To refute his opponents, he wrote the book in which he endeavored to show that Holy Scripture contains all truth and, being from God, is the only authority. He referred to the conditions under which the condemnation of his 18 theses was brought about; and the same may be said of his books dealing with the Church, the office of king, and the power of the pope - all completed within the space of two years (1378-79). To Wycliffe, the Church is the totality of those who are predestined to blessedness. It includes the Church triumphant in heaven, those in purgatory, and the Church militant or men on earth. No one who is eternally lost has part in it. There is one universal Church, and outside of it there is no salvation. Its head is Christ. No pope may say that he is the head, for he cannot say that he is elect or even a member of the Church.
6. Statement regarding royal power
It would be a mistake to assume that Wycliffe's doctrine of the Church - which made so great an impression upon famous priest Jan Hus - was occasioned by the western schism (1378-1429). The principles of the doctrine were already embodied in his De civili dominio. The contents of the book dealing with the Church are closely connected with the decision respecting the 18 theses. The attacks on Pope Gregory XI grow ever more extreme. Wycliffe's stand with respect to the ideal of poverty became continually firmer, as well as his position with regard to the temporal rule of the clergy. Closely related to this attitude was his book De officio regis, the content of which was foreshadowed in his 33 conclusions: One should be instructed with reference to the obligations in regard to the kingdom—to see how the two powers, royal and ecclesiastical, may support each other in harmony in the body corporate of the Church. The royal power, Wycliffe taught, is consecrated through the testimony of Holy Scripture and the Fathers. Christ and the apostles rendered tribute to the emperor. It is a sin to oppose the power of the king, which is derived immediately from God. Subjects, above all the clergy, should pay him dutiful tribute. The honors which attach to temporal power hark back to the king; those which belong to precedence in the priestly office, to the priest. The king must apply his power with wisdom, his laws are to be in unison with those of God. From God laws derive their authority, including those which royalty has over the clergy. If one of the clergy neglects his office, he is a traitor to the king who calls him to answer for it. It follows from this that the king has an "evangelical" control. Those in the service of the Church must have regard for the laws of the State. In confirmation of this fundamental principle the archbishops in England make sworn submission to the king and receive their temporalities. The king is to protect his vassals against damage to their possessions; in case the clergy through their misuse of the temporalities cause injury, the king must offer protection. When the king turns over temporalities to the clergy, he places them under his jurisdiction, from which later pronouncements of the popes cannot release them. If the clergy relies on papal pronouncements, it must be subjected to obedience to the king.
This book, like those that preceded and followed, was concerned with the reform of the Church, in which the temporal arm was to have an influential part. Especially interesting is the teaching which Wycliffe addressed to the king on the protection of his theologians. This did not mean theology in its modern sense, but knowledge of the Bible. Since the law must be in agreement with Scripture, knowledge of theology is necessary to the strengthening of the kingdom; therefore the king has theologians in his entourage to stand at his side as he exercises power. It is their duty to explain Scripture according to the rule of reason and in conformity with the witness of the saints; also to proclaim the law of the king and to protect his welfare and that of his kingdom.
7. Views on the papacy
The books and tracts of Wycliffe's last six years include continual attacks upon the papacy and the entire hierarchy of his times. Each year they focus more and more, and at the last, the pope and the Antichrist seem to him practically equivalent concepts. (A similar conclusion would be reached by Protestants more than a century later.)
Yet there are passages which are moderate in tone; G. V. Lechler identifies three stages in Wycliffe's relations with the papacy. The first step, which carried him to the outbreak of the schism, involves moderate recognition of the papal primacy; the second, which carried him to 1381, is marked by an estrangement from the papacy; and the third shows him in sharp contest. However, Wycliffe reached no valuation of the papacy before the outbreak of the schism different from his later appraisal. If in his last years he identified the papacy with antichristianity, the dispensability of this papacy was strong in his mind before the schism. It was this very man who laboured to bring about the recognition of Urban VI (1378-1389), which appears to contradict his former attitude and to demand an explanation.
Wycliffe's influence was never greater than at the moment when pope and antipope sent their ambassadors to England to gain recognition for themselves. In the ambassadors' presence, he delivered an opinion before Parliament that showed, in an important ecclesiastical political question (the matter of the right of asylum in Westminster Abbey), a position that was to the liking of the State. How Wycliffe came to be active in the interest of Urban is seen in passages in his latest writings, in which he expressed himself in regard to the papacy in a favorable sense. On the other hand he states that it is not necessary to go either to Rome or to Avignon in order to seek a decision from the pope, since the triune God is everywhere. Our pope is Christ. It seems clear that Wycliffe was an opponent of that papacy which had developed since Constantine. He taught that the Church can continue to exist even though it have no visible leader; but there can be no damage when the Church possesses a leader of the right kind. To distinguish between what the pope should be, if one is necessary, and the pope as he appeared in Wycliffe's day was the purpose of his book on the power of the pope. The Church militant, Wycliffe taught, needs a head - but one whom God gives the Church. The elector [cardinal] can only make someone a pope if the choice relates to one who is elect [of God]. But that is not always the case. It may be that the elector is himself not predestined and chooses one who is in the same case - a veritable Antichrist. One must regard as a true pope one who in teaching and life most nearly follows Jesus and Saint Peter.
8. Attack on monasticism
His teachings concerning the danger attaching to the secularizing of the Church put Wycliffe into line with the mendicant orders, since in 1377 Minorites were his defenders. In the last chapters of his De civili dominio, there are traces of a rift. When he stated that "the case of the orders which hold property is that of them all," the mendicant orders turned against him; and from that time Wycliffe began a struggle which continued till his death.
This battle against what he saw as an imperialised papacy and its supporters, the "sects," as he called the monastic orders, takes up a large space not only in his later works as the Trialogus, Dialogus, Opus evangelicum, and in his sermons, but also in a series of sharp tracts and polemical productions in Latin and English (of which those issued in his later years have been collected as "Polemical Writings"). In these he teaches that the Church needs no new sects; sufficient for it now is the religion of Christ which sufficed in the first three centuries of its existence. The monastic orders are bodies which are not supported by the Bible, and must be abolished together with their possessions. Such teaching, particularly in sermons, had one immediate effect - a serious rising of the people. The monks were deprived of alms and were bidden to apply themselves to manual labor. These teachings had more important results upon the orders and their possessions in Bohemia, where the instructions of the "Evangelical master" were followed to the letter in such a way that the noble foundations and practically the whole of the property of the Church were sacrificed. But the result was not as Wycliffe wanted it in England - the property fell not to the State but to the barons of the land. The scope of the conflict in England widened; it no longer involved the mendicant monks alone, but took in the entire hierarchy. An element of the contest appears in Wycliffe's doctrine of the Lord's Supper.
9. Relation to the English Bible
John Wycliffe portraited in Bale's Scriptor Majoris Britanniæ 1548.
National honor seemed to require an English translation, since members of the nobility possessed the Bible in French. Portions of the Bible had been translated into English as early as the seventh century under the auspices of the Catholic Church. While Wycliffe is credited, it is not possible exactly to define his part in the translation, which was based on the Vulgate. [17] There is no doubt that it was his initiative, and that the success of the project was due to his leadership. From him comes the translation of the New Testament, which was smoother, clearer, and more readable than the rendering of the Old Testament by his friend Nicholas of Hereford. The whole was revised by Wycliffe's younger contemporary John Purvey in 1388. Thus the cry of his opponents may be heard: "The jewel of the clergy has become the toy of the laity."
In spite of the zeal with which the hierarchy sought to destroy it due to what they saw as mistranslations and erroneous commentary, there still exist about 150 manuscripts, complete or partial, containing the translation in its revised form. From this, one may easily infer how widely diffused it was in the fifteenth century. For this reason the Wycliffites in England were often designated by their opponents as "Bible men." Just as Luther's version had great influence upon the German language, so Wycliffe's, by reason of its clarity, beauty, and strength, influenced the English language as the King James Version was later to do.
10. Activity as a preacher
Wycliffe aimed to do away with the existing hierarchy and replace it with the "poor priests" who lived in poverty, were bound by no vows, had received no formal consecration, and preached the Gospel to the people. These itinerant preachers spread the teachings of Wycliffe. Two by two they went, barefoot, wearing long dark-red robes and carrying a staff in the hand, the latter having symbolic reference to their pastoral calling, and passed from place to place preaching the sovereignty of God. The bull of Gregory XI impressed upon them the name of Lollards, intended as an opprobrious epithet, but it became, to them, a name of honour. Even in Wycliffe's time the "Lollards" had reached wide circles in England and preached "God's law, without which no one could be justified."
11. Anti-Wycliffe synod
In the summer of 1381 Wycliffe formulated his doctrine of the Lord's Supper in twelve short sentences, and made it a duty to advocate it everywhere. Then the English hierarchy proceeded against him. The chancellor of the University of Oxford had some of the declarations pronounced heretical. When this fact was announced to Wycliffe, he declared that no one could change his convictions. He then appealed - not to the pope nor to the ecclesiastical authorities of the land, but to the king. He published his great confession upon the subject and also a second writing in English intended for the common people. His pronouncements were no longer limited to the classroom, they spread to the masses. "Every second man that you meet," writes a contemporary, "is a Lollard."
In the midst of this commotion came the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. Although Wycliffe disapproved of the revolt, he was blamed. Yet his friend and protector John of Gaunt was the most hated by the rebels, and where Wycliffe's influence was greatest the uprising found the least support. While in general the aim of the revolt was against the spiritual nobility, this came about because they were nobles, not because they were churchmen. Wycliffe's old enemy William Courtenay, now Archbishop of Canterbury, called in 1382 an ecclesiastical assembly of notables at London. During the consultations on 21 May an earthquake occurred; the participants were terrified and wished to break up the assembly, but Courtenay declared the earthquake a favorable sign which meant the purification of the earth from erroneous doctrine, and the result of the "Earthquake Synod" was assured.
Of the 24 propositions attributed to Wycliffe without mentioning his name, ten were declared heretical and fourteen erroneous. The former had reference to the transformation in the sacrament, the latter to matters of church order and institutions. It was forbidden from that time to hold these opinions or to advance them in sermons or in academic discussions. All persons disregarding this order were to be subject to prosecution. To accomplish this the help of the State was necessary; but the Commons rejected the bill. The king, however, had a decree issued which permitted the arrest of those in error. The citadel of the reformatory movement was Oxford, where Wycliffe's most active helpers were; these were laid under the ban and summoned to recant, and Nicholas of Hereford went to Rome to appeal. In similar fashion the poor priests were hindered in their work.
On 18 November 1382, Wycliffe was summoned before a synod at Oxford; he appeared, though apparently broken in body in consequence of a stroke, but nevertheless determined. He still commanded the favour of the court and of Parliament, to which he addressed a memorial. He was neither excommunicated then, nor deprived of his living.
12. Last days
He returned to Lutterworth, and sent out tracts against the monks and Urban VI, since the latter, contrary to the hopes of Wycliffe, had not turned out to be a reforming or "true" pope, but had been involved in mischievous conflicts. The crusade in Flanders aroused the Reformer's biting scorn, while his sermons became fuller-voiced and dealt with what he saw as the imperfections of the Church. The literary achievements of Wycliffe's last days, such as the Trialogus, stand at the peak of the knowledge of his day. His last work, the Opus evangelicum, the last part of which he named in characteristic fashion "Of Antichrist", remained uncompleted. While he was hearing Mass in the parish church on Holy Innocents' Day, 28 December 1384, he was again stricken with apoplexy and died on the last day of the year. Shortly after his death, the great Hussite movement arose and spread through Middle Europe.
Burning Wycliffe's bones, from John Foxe's Book of Martyrs (1563)
The Council of Constance declared Wycliffe (on 4 May 1415) a stiff-necked heretic and under the ban of the Church. It was decreed that his books be burned and his remains be exhumed. The exhumation was carried out in 1428 when, at the command of Pope Martin V, his remains were dug up, burned, and the ashes cast into the River Swift, which flows through Lutterworth. This is the most final of all posthumous attacks on John Wycliffe, but previous attempts had been made before the Council of Constance. The Anti-Wycliffite Statute of 1401 extended persecution to Wycliffe's remaining followers. The "Constitutions of Oxford" of 1408 aimed to reclaim authority in all ecclesiastical matters, specifically naming John Wycliffe in a ban on certain writings, and noting that translation of Scripture into English is a crime punishable by charges of heresy.
None of Wycliffe's contemporaries left a complete picture of his person, his life, and his activities. The pictures representing him are from a later period. One must be content with certain scattered expressions found in the history of the trial by William Thorpe (1407). It appears that Wycliffe was lacking of body, indeed of wasted appearance, and physically weak. He was of unblemished walk in life, says Thorpe, and was regarded affectionately by people of rank, who often consorted with him, took down his sayings, and clung to him. "I indeed clove to none closer than to him, the wisest and most blessed of all men whom I have ever found. From him one could learn in truth what the Church of Christ is and how it should be ruled and led." Hus wished that his soul might be wherever that of Wycliffe was found.
Thomas Netter highly esteemed John Kynyngham in that he "so bravely offered himself to the biting speech of the heretic and to words that stung as being without the religion of Christ". But this example of Netter is not well chosen, since the tone of Wycliffe toward Kynyngham is that of a junior toward an elder whom one respects, and he handled other opponents in similar fashion. But when he turned his roughest side upon his opponents, as for example in his sermons, polemical writings and tracts, he met the attacks with an unfriendly tone.
13. Doctrines
John Wycliffe at work in his study
Wycliffe's first encounter with the official Church of his time was prompted by his zeal in the interests of the State. His first tracts and greater works of ecclesiastical-political content defended the privileges of the State, and from these sources developed a strife out of which the next phases could hardly be determined. One who studies these books in the order of their production with reference to their inner content finds a direct development with a strong reformatory tendency. This was not originally doctrinal; when it later took up matters of dogma, as in the teaching concerning transubstantiation, the purpose was the return to original simplicity in the government of the Church. But it would have been against the diplomatic practice of the time to have sent to the peace congress at Bruges, in which the Curia had an essential part, a participant who had become known at home by his allegedly heretical teaching.
Since it was from dealing with ecclesiastical-political questions that Wycliffe turned to reformatory activities, the former have a large part in his reformatory writings. While he took his start in affairs of church policy from the English legislation which was passed in the times of Edward I, he declined the connection into which his contemporaries brought it under the lead of Occam. Indeed, he distinctly disavows taking his conclusions from Occam, and avers that he draws them from Scripture, and that they were supported by the Doctors of the Church. So that dependence upon earlier schismatic parties in the Church, which he never mentions in his writings (as though he had never derived anything from them), is counterindicated, and attention is directed to the true sources in Scripture, to which he added the collections of canons of the Church. Wycliffe would have had nothing to gain by professing indebtedness to "heretical" parties or to opponents of the papacy. His reference to Scripture and orthodox Fathers as authorities is what might have been expected. So far as his polemics accord with those of earlier antagonists of the papacy, it is fair to assume that he was not ignorant of them and was influenced by them. The Bible alone was authoritative and, according to his own conviction and that of his disciples, was fully sufficient for the government of this world (De sufficientia legis Christi). Out of it he drew his comprehensive statements in support of his reformatory views - after intense study and many spiritual conflicts. He tells that as a beginner he was desperate to comprehend the passages dealing with the activities of the divine Word, until by the grace of God he was able to gather the right sense of Scripture, which he then understood. But that was not a light task. Without knowledge of the Bible there can be no peace in the life of the Church or of society, and outside of it there is no real and abiding good; it is the one authority for the faith.
These teachings Wycliffe promulgated in his great work on the truth of Scripture, and in other greater and lesser writings. For him the Bible was the fundamental source of Christianity which is binding on all men. Wycliffe was called "Doctor evangelicus" by his English and Bohemian followers. Of all the reformers who preceded Martin Luther, Wycliffe put most emphasis on Scripture: "Even though there were a hundred popes and though every mendicant monk were a cardinal, they would be entitled to confidence only insofar as they accorded with the Bible." Therefore in this early period it was Wycliffe who recognized and formulated one of the two great formal principles of the Reformation—the unique authority of the Bible for the belief and life of the Christian.
It is not enough realized that, well before Luther, Wycliffe also recognized the other great Reformation doctrine, that of justification by faith, though not in fully worked out form as Luther achieved. In Christ stilling the Storm he wrote: "If a man believe in Christ, and make a point of his belief, then the promise that God hath made to come into the land of light shall be given by virtue of Christ, to all men that make this the chief matter."
14. Basal positions in philosophy
Wycliffe earned his great repute as a philosopher at an early date. Henry Knighton says that in philosophy he was second to none, and in scholastic discipline incomparable. If this pronouncement seems hardly justified, now that Wycliffe's writings are in print, it must be borne in mind that not all his philosophical works are extant. If Wycliffe was in philosophy the superior of his contemporaries and had no equal in scholastic discipline, he belongs with the series of great scholastic philosophers and theologians in which England in the Middle Ages was so rich - with Alexander of Hales, Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, William of Ockham (Occam), and Bradwardine. There was a period in his life when he devoted himself exclusively to scholastic philosophy: "when I was still a logician," he used later to say. The first "heresy" which "he cast forth into the world" rests as much upon philosophical as upon theological grounds.
In Plato, knowledge of whom came to Wycliffe through Saint Augustine, he saw traces of a knowledge of the Trinity, and he championed the doctrine of ideas as against Aristotle. He said that Democritus, Plato, Augustine, and Grosseteste far outranked Aristotle. In Aristotle he missed the provision for the immortality of the soul, and in his ethics the tendency toward the eternal. He was a close follower of Augustine, so much so that he was called "John of Augustine" by his pupils. In some of his teachings, as in De annihilatione, the influence of Thomas Aquinas can be detected. So far as his relations to the philosophers of the Middle Ages are concerned, he held to realism as opposed to the nominalism advanced by Occam, although in questions that had to do with ecclesiastical politics he was related to Occam and indeed went beyond him. His views are based upon the conviction of the reality of the universal, and he employed realism to avoid dogmatic difficulties.
The uni-divine existence in the Trinity is the real universal of the three Persons, and in the Eucharist the ever-real presence of Christ justifies the deliverance that complete reality is compatible with the spatial division of the existence. The center of Wycliffe's philosophical system is formed by the doctrine of the prior existence in the thought of God of all things and events. This involves the definiteness of things and especially their number, so that neither their infinity, infinite extension, nor infinite divisibility can be assumed. Space consists of a number of points of space determined from eternity, and time of exactly such a number of moments, and the number of these is known only to the divine spirit. Geometrical figures consist of arranged series of points, and enlargement or diminution of these figures rests upon the addition or subtraction of points. Because the existence of these points of space as such, that is, as truly indivisible unities, has its basis in the fact that the points are one with the bodies that fill them; because, therefore, all possible space is coincident with the physical world (as in Wycliffe's system, in general, reality and possibility correspond), there can as little be a vacuum as bounding surfaces that are common to different bodies. The assumption of such surfaces impinges, according to Wycliffe, upon the contradictory principle as does the conception of a truly continuous transition of one condition into another.
Wycliffe's doctrine of atoms connects itself, therefore, with the doctrine of the composition of time from real moments, but is distinguished by the denial of interspaces as assumed in other systems. From the identity of space and the physical world, and the circular motion of the heavens, Wycliffe deduces the spherical form of the universe.
15. Attitude toward speculation
Wycliffe's fundamental principle of the preexistence in thought of all reality involves the most serious obstacle to freedom of the will; the philosopher could assist himself only by the formula that the free will of man was something predetermined of God. He demanded strict dialectical training as the means of distinguishing the true from the false, and asserted that logic (or the syllogism) furthered the knowledge of catholic verities; ignorance of logic was the reason why men misunderstood Scripture, since men overlooked the connection - the distinction between idea and appearance. Wycliffe was not merely conscious of the distinction between theology and philosophy, but his sense of reality led him to pass by scholastic questions. He left aside philosophical discussions which seemed to have no significance for the religious consciousness and those which pertained purely to scholasticism: "we concern ourselves with the verities that are, and leave aside the errors which arise from speculation on matters which are not."
16. Veneration
Wycliffe is honored in the Church of England on December 31 and in the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on October 30.
18. References
1.^ Chris Roberts (2006) Heavy Words Lightly Thrown: the reason behind rhyme, Thorndike Press ISBN 0-7862-8517-6
2.The Reader's Encyclopedia; 2nd ed., Vol. 2, p. 1105, New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1965, LCCN 65-12510.
3.Steinmetz, Sol (2008), Semantic Antics, New York: Random House Reference, ISBN 0375426124
4.^ Kenyon, Sir Frederic G. (1909). "English Versions". In James Hastings. A Dictionary of the Bible. http://www.bible-researcher.com/wyclif3.html. "Exactly how much of it was done by Wyclif's own hand is uncertain.".
5.Catholic Encyclopedia Versions of the Bible
6.He has conventionally been given a birth date of 1324 but Hudson and Kenny state only records "suggest he was born in the mid-1320s" (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography).
7.Dallmann, W. John Wiclif. Concordia Theological Quarterly XI. St. Louis: 1907. p. 41
8.Herring, George. Introduction To The History Of Christianity. New York: New York University Press, 2006.
9."Balliol College Archives & Manuscripts". Balliol College, Oxford. http://archives.balliol.ox.ac.uk/History/masters.asp. Retrieved 22 August 2009.
10.Cunningham; cf. Fasciculi Zizaniorum, p. 3, London, 1858
11.(utrum Christus esset humanitas)
12.(De dominatione civili; De dotatione ecclesiae)
13.Sermones, iii. 199
14.DNB, lxiii. 208-209.
15.John Wycliffe." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2009. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 16 October 2009
16.An excellent account of this dispute between the bishop and the protectors of Wycliffe is given in the Chronicon Angliae, the gist of which is quoted in DNB, lxiii. 206-207.
17.Walker, Williston.,A History of the Christian Church (New York, NY: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1958) 269
19. Sources
•Anne Hudson and Anthony Kenny, "Wyclif , John (d. 1384)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 6 May 2007
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Morning Prayer from
The Book of Common Prayer
Friday, 31 December 2010
The introduction to the service is used on Sundays, and may be used on any occasion. If the Introduction is not used, the service begins with the opening responses.
¶ Introduction
The minister may use a seasonal sentence before using one or more of the penitential sentences.
The minister introduces the service
Dearly beloved [brethren],
the Scripture moveth us in sundry places to acknowledge
and confess our manifold sins and wickedness;
[and that we should not dissemble nor cloak them before
the face of almighty God our heavenly Father;
but confess them with an humble, lowly, penitent and
obedient heart;
to the end that we may obtain forgiveness of the same
by his infinite goodness and mercy.
And although we ought at all times humbly to acknowledge
our sins before God;
yet ought we most chiefly so to do,
when we assemble and meet together
to render thanks for the great benefits that we have
received at his hands,
to set forth his most worthy praise,
to hear his most holy word,
and to ask those things which are requisite and necessary,
as well for the body as the soul.]
Wherefore I pray and beseech you,
as many as are here present,
to accompany me with a pure heart, and humble voice,
unto the throne of the heavenly grace, saying [after me]:
(or)
Beloved, we are come together in the presence of almighty God and of the whole company of heaven to offer unto him through our Lord Jesus Christ our worship and praise and thanksgiving; to make confession of our sins; to pray, as well for others as for ourselves, that we may know more truly the greatness of God's love and shew forth in our lives the fruits of his grace; and to ask on behalf of all men such things as their well-being doth require.
Wherefore let us kneel in silence, and remember God's presence with us now.
All Almighty and most merciful Father,
we have erred, and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep.
We have followed too much the devices and desires
of our own hearts.
We have offended against thy holy laws.
We have left undone those things
which we ought to have done;
and we have done those things
which we ought not to have done;
and there is no health in us.
But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders.
Spare thou them, O God, which confess their faults.
Restore thou them that are penitent;
according to thy promises declared unto mankind
in Christ Jesu our Lord.
And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake,
that we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life,
to the glory of thy holy name.
Amen.
A priest says
Almighty God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who desireth not the death of a sinner,
but rather that he may turn from his wickedness and live;
and hath given power, and commandment, to his ministers
to declare and pronounce to his people, being penitent,
the absolution and remission of their sins:
he pardoneth and absolveth all them that truly repent
and unfeignedly believe his holy gospel.
Wherefore let us beseech him to grant us true repentance,
and his Holy Spirit,
that those things may please him which we do at this present;
and that the rest of our life hereafter may be pure and holy;
so that at the last we may come to his eternal joy;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
or other ministers may say
Grant, we beseech thee, merciful Lord,
to thy faithful people pardon and peace,
that they may be cleansed from all their sins,
and serve thee with a quiet mind;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
All Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done,
in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
¶ Morning Prayer
The introduction to the service is used on Sundays, and may be used on any occasion. If the Introduction is not used, the service begins with the opening responses.
These responses are used
O Lord, open thou our lips
All and our mouth shall shew forth thy praise.
O God, make speed to save us.
All O Lord, make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son,
and to the Holy Ghost;
All as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
Praise ye the Lord.
All The Lord's name be praised.
Venite, exultemus Domino
1 O come, let us sing unto the Lord :
let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving :
and shew ourselves glad in him with psalms.
3 For the Lord is a great God :
and a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are all the corners of the earth :
and the strength of the hills is his also.
5 The sea is his, and he made it :
and his hands prepared the dry land.
6 O come, let us worship, and fall down :
and kneel before the Lord our Maker.
7 For he is the Lord our God :
and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.
[8 Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts :
as in the provocation,
and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness;
9 When your fathers tempted me :
proved me, and saw my works.
10 Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said :
It is a people that do err in their hearts,
for they have not known my ways.
11 Unto whom I sware in my wrath :
that they should not enter into my rest.]
Psalm 95
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
Psalmody
Psalm 144
1 Blessed be the Lord my strength :
who teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight;
2 My hope and my fortress, my castle and deliverer, my defender in whom I trust :
who subdueth my people that is under me.
3 Lord, what is man, that thou hast such respect unto him :
or the son of man, that thou so regardest him?
4 Man is like a thing of nought :
his time passeth away like a shadow.
5 Bow thy heavens, O Lord, and come down :
touch the mountains, and they shall smoke.
6 Cast forth thy lightning, and tear them :
shoot out thine arrows, and consume them.
7 Send down thine hand from above :
deliver me, and take me out of the great waters, from the hand of strange children;
8 Whose mouth talketh of vanity :
and their right hand is a right hand of wickedness.
9 I will sing a new song unto thee, O God :
and sing praises unto thee upon a ten-stringed lute.
10 Thou hast given victory unto kings :
and hast delivered David thy servant from the peril of the sword.
11 Save me, and deliver me from the hand of strange children :
whose mouth talketh of vanity, and their right hand is a right hand of iniquity.
12 That our sons may grow up as the young plants :
and that our daughters may be as the polished corners of the temple.
13 That our garners may be full and plenteous with all manner of store :
that our sheep may bring forth thousands and ten thousands in our streets.
14 That our oxen may be strong to labour, that there be no decay :
no leading into captivity, and no complaining in our streets.
15 Happy are the people that are in such a case :
yea. blessed are the people who have the Lord for their God.
Psalm 145
1 I will magnify thee, O God, my King :
and I will praise thy Name for ever and ever.
2 Every day will I give thanks unto thee :
and praise thy Name for ever and ever.
3 Great is the Lord, and marvellous worthy to be praised :
there is no end of his greatness.
4 One generation shall praise thy works unto another :
and declare thy power.
5 As for me, I will be talking of thy worship :
thy glory, thy praise, and wondrous works;
6 So that men shall speak of the might of thy marvellous acts :
and I will also tell of thy greatness.
7 The memorial of thine abundant kindness shall be shewed :
and men shall sing of thy righteousness.
8 The Lord is gracious, and merciful :
long-suffering, and of great goodness.
9 The Lord is loving unto every man :
and his mercy is over all his works.
10 All thy works praise thee, O Lord :
and thy saints give thanks unto thee.
11 They shew the glory of thy kingdom :
and talk of thy power;
12 That thy power, thy glory, and mightiness of thy kingdom :
might be known unto men.
13 Thy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom :
and thy dominion endureth throughout all ages.
14 The Lord upholdeth all such as fall :
and lifteth up all those that are down.
15 The eyes of all wait upon thee, O Lord :
and thou givest them their meat in due season.
16 Thou openest thine hand :
and fillest all things living with plenteousness.
17 The Lord is righteous in all his ways :
and holy in all his works.
18 The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him :
yea, all such as call upon him faithfully.
19 He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him :
he also will hear their cry, and will help them.
20 The Lord preserveth all them that love him :
but scattereth abroad all the ungodly.
21 My mouth shall speak the praise of the Lord :
and let all flesh give thanks unto his holy Name for ever and ever.
Psalm 146
1 Praise the Lord, O my soul; while I live will I praise the Lord :
yea, as long as I have any being, I will sing praises unto my God.
2 O put not your trust in princes, nor in any child of man :
for there is no help in them.
3 For when the breath of man goeth forth he shall turn again to his earth :
and then all his thoughts perish.
4 Blessed is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help :
and whose hope is in the Lord his God;
5 Who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that therein is :
who keepeth his promise for ever.
6 Who helpeth them to right that suffer wrong :
who feedeth the hungry.
7 The Lord looseth men out of prison :
the Lord giveth sight to the blind.
8 The Lord helpeth them that are fallen :
the Lord careth for the righteous.
9 The Lord careth for the strangers; he defendeth the fatherless and widow :
as for the way of the ungodly, he turneth it upside down.
10 The Lord thy God, O Sion, shall be King for evermore :
and throughout all generations.
At the end of each psalm these words are said or sung
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
Old Testament Reading
First Reading: Isaiah 59.15b-end
Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the Lord saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.
And he saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor: therefore his arm brought salvation unto him; and his righteousness, it sustained him.
For he put on righteousness as a breastplate, and an helmet of salvation upon his head; and he put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak.
According to their deeds, accordingly he will repay, fury to his adversaries, recompence to his enemies; to the islands he will repay recompence.
So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun. When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him.
And the Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, saith the Lord.
As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the Lord; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever.
Te Deum Laudamus
Either the Te Deum Laudamus (as follows) or Benedicite, omnia opera is said or sung.
We praise thee, O God; we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.
All the earth doth worship thee, the Father everlasting.
To thee all angels cry aloud, the heavens and all the powers therein.
To thee cherubin and seraphin continually do cry,
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth;
Heaven and earth are full of the majesty of thy glory.
The glorious company of the apostles praise thee.
The goodly fellowship of the prophets praise thee.
The noble army of martyrs praise thee.
The holy Church throughout all the world doth acknowledge thee:
the Father of an infinite majesty;
thine honourable, true and only Son;
also the Holy Ghost the Comforter.
Thou art the King of glory, O Christ.
Thou art the everlasting Son of the Father.
When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man,
thou didst not abhor the Virgin's womb.
When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death,
thou didst open the kingdom of heaven to all believers.
Thou sittest at the right hand of God, in the glory of the Father.
We believe that thou shalt come to be our judge.
We therefore pray thee, help thy servants,
whom thou hast redeemed with thy precious blood.
Make them to be numbered with thy saints in glory everlasting.
O Lord, save thy people and bless thine heritage.
Govern them and lift them up for ever.
Day by day we magnify thee;
and we worship thy name, ever world without end.
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin.
O Lord, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us.
O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us, as our trust is in thee.
O Lord, in thee have I trusted; let me never be confounded.
New Testament Reading
Second Reading: John 1.29-34
The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me: for he was before me.
And I knew him not: but that he should be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptizing with water.
And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.
And I knew him not: but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost.
And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God.
Benedictus
Either The Benedictus (as follows) or Jubilate Deo (Psalm 100) is said or sung.
1 Blessed be the Lord God of Israel :
for he hath visited, and redeemed his people;
2 And hath raised up a mighty salvation for us :
in the house of his servant David;
3 As he spake by the mouth of his holy Prophets :
which have been since the world began;
4 That we should be saved from our enemies :
and from the hands of all that hate us;
5 To perform the mercy promised to our forefathers :
and to remember his holy covenant;
6 To perform the oath which he sware to our forefather Abraham :
that he would give us,
7 That we being delivered out of the hands of our enemies :
might serve him without fear,
8 In holiness and righteousness before him :
all the days of our life.
9 And thou, child, shalt be called the Prophet of the Highest :
for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways;
10 To give knowledge of salvation unto his people :
for the remission of their sins;
11 Through the tender mercy of our God :
whereby the dayspring from on high hath visited us;
12 To give light to them that sit in darkness,
and in the shadow of death :
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Luke 1.68-79
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
The Apostles' Creed
All I believe in God the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth:
and in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, dead, and buried.
He descended into hell;
the third day he rose again from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father almighty;
from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Ghost;
the holy catholic Church;
the communion of saints;
the forgiveness of sins;
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting.
Amen.
Prayers
The Lord be with you.
All And with thy spirit.
Let us pray.
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done,
in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil. Amen.
O Lord, shew thy mercy upon us.
All And grant us thy salvation.
O Lord, save the Queen.
All And mercifully hear us when we call upon thee.
Endue thy ministers with righteousness.
All And make thy chosen people joyful.
O Lord, save thy people.
All And bless thine inheritance.
Give peace in our time, O Lord.
All Because there is none other that fighteth for us,
but only thou, O God.
O God, make clean our hearts within us.
All And take not thy Holy Spirit from us.
Three Collects are said.
The Collect of the Day
Almighty God, who hast given us thy only-begotten Son to take our nature upon him, and as at this time to be born of a pure Virgin; Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by thy Holy Spirit; through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit, one God, world without end.
All Amen.
The Collect for Peace
O God, who art the author of peace and lover of concord,
in knowledge of whom standeth our eternal life,
whose service is perfect freedom;
defend us thy humble servants in all assaults of our enemies;
that we, surely trusting in thy defence,
may not fear the power of any adversaries;
through the might of Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
The Collect for Grace
O Lord, our heavenly Father,
almighty and everlasting God,
who hast safely brought us to the beginning of this day;
defend us in the same with thy mighty power;
and grant that this day we fall into no sin,
neither run into any kind of danger,
but that all our doings may be ordered by thy governance,
to do always that is righteous in thy sight;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
The order for the end of the service may include:
¶ hymns or anthems
¶ a sermon
¶ further prayers (which may include prayers from here)
This prayer may be used to conclude the service
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God,
and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost,
be with us all evermore.
All Amen.
© The Archbishops' Council of the Church of England, 2000-2004
All of the official Common Worship publications are being published by Church House Publishing.
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Evening Prayer from
The Book of Common Prayer
Friday, 31 December 2010
The introduction to the service is used on Sundays, and may be used on any occasion. If the Introduction is not used, the service begins with the opening responses.
¶ Introduction
The minister may use a seasonal sentence before using one or more of the penitential sentences.
The minister introduces the service
Dearly beloved [brethren],
the Scripture moveth us in sundry places to acknowledge
and confess our manifold sins and wickedness;
[and that we should not dissemble nor cloak them before
the face of almighty God our heavenly Father;
but confess them with an humble, lowly, penitent and
obedient heart;
to the end that we may obtain forgiveness of the same
by his infinite goodness and mercy.
And although we ought at all times humbly to acknowledge
our sins before God;
yet ought we most chiefly so to do,
when we assemble and meet together
to render thanks for the great benefits that we have
received at his hands,
to set forth his most worthy praise,
to hear his most holy word,
and to ask those things which are requisite and necessary,
as well for the body as the soul.]
Wherefore I pray and beseech you,
as many as are here present,
to accompany me with a pure heart, and humble voice,
unto the throne of the heavenly grace, saying [after me]:
(or)
Beloved, we are come together in the presence of almighty God and of the whole company of heaven to offer unto him through our Lord Jesus Christ our worship and praise and thanksgiving; to make confession of our sins; to pray, as well for others as for ourselves, that we may know more truly the greatness of God's love and shew forth in our lives the fruits of his grace; and to ask on behalf of all men such things as their well-being doth require.
Wherefore let us kneel in silence, and remember God's presence with us now.
All Almighty and most merciful Father,
we have erred, and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep.
We have followed too much the devices and desires
of our own hearts.
We have offended against thy holy laws.
We have left undone those things
which we ought to have done;
and we have done those things
which we ought not to have done;
and there is no health in us.
But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us, miserable offenders.
Spare thou them, O God, which confess their faults.
Restore thou them that are penitent;
according to thy promises declared unto mankind
in Christ Jesu our Lord.
And grant, O most merciful Father, for his sake,
that we may hereafter live a godly, righteous, and sober life,
to the glory of thy holy name.
Amen.
A priest says
Almighty God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who desireth not the death of a sinner,
but rather that he may turn from his wickedness and live;
and hath given power, and commandment, to his ministers
to declare and pronounce to his people, being penitent,
the absolution and remission of their sins:
he pardoneth and absolveth all them that truly repent
and unfeignedly believe his holy gospel.
Wherefore let us beseech him to grant us true repentance,
and his Holy Spirit,
that those things may please him which we do at this present;
and that the rest of our life hereafter may be pure and holy;
so that at the last we may come to his eternal joy;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
or other ministers may say
Grant, we beseech thee, merciful Lord,
to thy faithful people pardon and peace,
that they may be cleansed from all their sins,
and serve thee with a quiet mind;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
All Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done,
in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
¶ Evening Prayer
The introduction to the service is used on Sundays, and may be used on any occasion. If the Introduction is not used, the service begins with the opening responses.
These responses are used
O Lord, open thou our lips
All and our mouth shall shew forth thy praise.
O God, make speed to save us.
All O Lord, make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son,
and to the Holy Ghost;
All as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
Praise ye the Lord.
All The Lord's name be praised.
Psalmody
Psalm 147
1 Praise the Lord, for it is a good thing to sing praises unto our God :
yea, a joyful and pleasant thing it is to be thankful.
2 The Lord doth build up Jerusalem :
and gather together the out-casts of Israel.
3 He healeth those that are broken in heart :
and giveth medicine to heal their sickness.
4 He telleth the number of the stars :
and calleth them all by their names.
5 Great is our Lord, and great is his power :
yea, and his wisdom is infinite.
6 The Lord setteth up the meek :
and bringeth the ungodly down to the ground.
7 O sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving :
sing praises upon the harp unto our God;
8 Who covereth the heaven with clouds, and prepareth rain for the earth :
and maketh the grass to grow upon the mountains, and herb for the use of men;
9 Who giveth fodder unto the cattle :
and feedeth the young ravens that call upon him.
10 He hath no pleasure in the strength of an horse :
neither delighteth he in any man’s legs.
11 But the Lord’s delight is in them that fear him :
and put their trust in his mercy.
12 Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem :
praise thy God, O Sion.
13 For he hath made fast the bars of thy gates :
and hath blessed thy children within thee.
14 He maketh peace in thy borders :
and filleth thee with the flour of wheat.
15 He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth :
and his word runneth very swiftly.
16 He giveth snow like wool :
and scattereth the hoar-frost like ashes.
17 He casteth forth his ice like morsels :
who is able to abide his frost?
18 He sendeth out his word, and melteth them :
he bloweth with his wind, and the waters flow.
19 He sheweth his word unto Jacob :
his statutes and ordinances unto Israel.
20 He hath not dealt so with any nation :
neither have the heathen knowledge of his laws.
Psalm 148
1 O praise the Lord of heaven :
praise him in the height.
2 Praise him, all ye angels of his :
praise him, all his host.
3 Praise him, sun and moon :
praise him, all ye stars and light.
4 Praise him, all ye heavens :
and ye waters that are above the heavens.
5 Let them praise the Name of the Lord :
for he spake the word, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created.
6 He hath made them fast for ever and ever :
he hath given them a law which shall not be broken.
7 Praise the Lord upon earth :
ye dragons, and all deeps;
8 Fire and hail, snow and vapours :
wind and storm, fulfilling his word;
9 Mountains and all hills :
fruitful trees and all cedars;
10 Beasts and all cattle :
worms and feathered fowls;
11 Kings of the earth and all people :
princes and all judges of the world;
12 Young men and maidens, old men and children, praise the Name of the Lord :
for his Name only is excellent, and his praise above heaven and earth.
13 He shall exalt the horn of his people; all his saints shall praise him :
even the children of Israel, even the people that serveth him.
Psalm 149
1 O sing unto the Lord a new song :
let the congregation of saints praise him.
2 Let Israel rejoice in him that made him :
and let the children of Sion be joyful in their King.
3 Let them praise his Name in the dance :
let them sing praises unto him with tabret and harp.
4 For the Lord hath pleasure in his people :
and helpeth the meek-hearted.
5 Let the saints be joyful with glory :
let them rejoice in their beds.
6 Let the praises of God be in their mouth :
and a two-edged sword in their hands;
7 To be avenged of the heathen :
and to rebuke the people;
8 To bind their kings in chains :
and their nobles with links of iron.
9 That they may be avenged of them, as it is written :
Such honour have all his saints.
Psalm 150
1 O praise God in his holiness :
praise him in the firmament of his power.
2 Praise him in his noble acts :
praise him according to his excellent greatness.
3 Praise him in the sound of the trumpet :
praise him upon the lute and harp.
4 Praise him in the cymbals and dances :
praise him upon the strings and pipe.
5 Praise him upon the well-tuned cymbals :
praise him upon the loud cymbals.
6 Let every thing that hath breath :
praise the Lord.
At the end of each psalm these words are said or sung
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
Old Testament Reading
First Reading: Jonah 3-4
And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying,
Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.
So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.
And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.
For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.
And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:
But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.
Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?
And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.
And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.
Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.
Then said the Lord, Doest thou well to be angry?
So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city.
And the Lord God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd.
But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered.
And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live.
And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death.
Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night:
And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
Magnificat
Either the Magnificat (as follows) or Cantate Domino (Psalm 98) is said or sung.
1 My soul doth magnify the Lord :
and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
2 For he hath regarded :
the lowliness of his handmaiden.
3 For behold, from henceforth :
all generations shall call me blessed.
4 For he that is mighty hath magnified me :
and holy is his Name.
5 And his mercy is on them that fear him :
throughout all generations.
6 He hath shewed strength with his arm :
he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
7 He hath put down the mighty from their seat :
and hath exalted the humble and meek.
8 He hath filled the hungry with good things :
and the rich he hath sent empty away.
9 He remembering his mercy hath holpen his servant Israel :
as he promised to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed for ever.
Luke 1.46-55
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
New Testament Reading
Second Reading: Colossians 1.24-2.7
Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church:
Whereof I am made a minister, according to the dispensation of God which is given to me for you, to fulfil the word of God;
Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints:
To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:
Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus:
Whereunto I also labour, striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily.
For I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for you, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh;
That their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ;
In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
And this I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words.
For though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit, joying and beholding your order, and the stedfastness of your faith in Christ.
As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him:
Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.
Nunc dimittis
Either the Nunc dimittis (as follows) or Deus misereatur (Psalm 67) is said or sung.
1 Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace :
according to thy word.
2 For mine eyes have seen :
thy salvation;
3 Which thou hast prepared :
before the face of all people;
4 To be a light to lighten the Gentiles :
and to be the glory of thy people Israel.
Luke 2.29-32
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
The Apostles' Creed
All I believe in God the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth:
and in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, dead, and buried.
He descended into hell;
the third day he rose again from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father almighty;
from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Ghost;
the holy catholic Church;
the communion of saints;
the forgiveness of sins;
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting.
Amen.
Prayers
The Lord be with you.
All And with thy spirit.
Let us pray.
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done,
in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil. Amen.
O Lord, shew thy mercy upon us.
All And grant us thy salvation.
O Lord, save the Queen.
All And mercifully hear us when we call upon thee.
Endue thy ministers with righteousness.
All And make thy chosen people joyful.
O Lord, save thy people.
All And bless thine inheritance.
Give peace in our time, O Lord.
All Because there is none other that fighteth for us,
but only thou, O God.
O God, make clean our hearts within us.
All And take not thy Holy Spirit from us.
Three Collects are said.
The Collect of the Day
Almighty God, who hast given us thy only-begotten Son to take our nature upon him, and as at this time to be born of a pure Virgin; Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by thy Holy Spirit; through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit, one God, world without end.
All Amen.
The Collect for Peace
O God, from whom all holy desires, all good counsels,
and all just works do proceed;
give unto thy servants that peace which the world cannot give;
that both, our hearts may be set to obey thy commandments,
and also that, by thee,
we being defended from the fear of our enemies
may pass our time in rest and quietness;
through the merits of Jesus Christ our Saviour.
All Amen.
The Collect for Aid against all Perils
Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord;
and by thy great mercy defend us
from all perils and dangers of this night;
for the love of thy only Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ.
All Amen.
The order for the end of the service may include:
¶ hymns or anthems
¶ a sermon
¶ further prayers (which may include prayers from here)
This prayer may be used to conclude the service
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God,
and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost,
be with us all evermore.
All Amen.
© The Archbishops' Council of the Church of England, 2000-2004
All of the official Common Worship publications are being published by Church House Publishing.
**************************************************************
An Order for Night Prayer
(Compline) in Traditional Language
Friday, 31 December 2010
Note
The ancient office of Compline derives its name from a Latin word meaning 'completion' (completorium). It is above all a service of quietness and reflection before rest at the end of the day. It is most effective when the ending is indeed an ending, without additions, conversation or noise. If there is an address, or business to be done, it should come first. If the service is in church, those present depart in silence; if at home, they go quietly to bed.
For further Notes, see here.
Preparation
The Lord almighty grant us a quiet night and a perfect end.
All Amen.
[Brethren,] be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil,
as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:
whom resist, steadfast in the faith.
1 Peter 5.8,9
But thou, O Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Thanks be to God.
Our help is in the name of the Lord
All who hath made heaven and earth.
A period of silence for reflection on the past day may follow.
The following or other suitable words of penitence may be used
All We confess to God almighty,
the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,
that we have sinned in thought, word and deed,
through our own grievous fault.
Wherefore we pray God to have mercy upon us.
Almighty God, have mercy upon us,
forgive us all our sins and deliver us from all evil,
confirm and strengthen us in all goodness,
and bring us to life everlasting;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
A priest may say
May the almighty and merciful Lord
grant unto you pardon and remission of all your sins,
time for amendment of life,
and the grace and comfort of the Holy Spirit.
All Amen.
O God, make speed to save us.
All O Lord, make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son,
and to the Holy Ghost;
All as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen.
Praise ye the Lord.
All The Lord's name be praised.
The following or another suitable hymn may be sung
Before the ending of the day,
Creator of the world we pray,
That with thy wonted favour thou
Wouldst be our guard and keeper now.
From all ill dreams defend our eyes,
From nightly fears and fantasies;
Tread underfoot our ghostly foe,
That no pollution we may know.
O Father, that we ask be done,
Through Jesus Christ, thine only Son;
Who, with the Holy Ghost and thee,
Doth live and reign eternally.
The Word of God
Psalmody
One or more of the following psalms may be used
Psalm 4
1 Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness :
thou hast set me at liberty when I was in trouble;
have mercy upon me, and hearken unto my prayer.
2 O ye sons of men, how long will ye blaspheme mine honour :
and have such pleasure in vanity, and seek after leasing?
3 Know this also, that the Lord hath chosen to himself
the man that is godly :
when I call upon the Lord, he will hear me.
4 Stand in awe, and sin not :
commune with your own heart, and in your chamber, and be still.
5 Offer the sacrifice of righteousness :
and put your trust in the Lord.
6 There be many that say :
Who will shew us any good?
7 Lord, lift thou up :
the light of thy countenance upon us.
8 Thou hast put gladness in my heart :
since the time that their corn, and wine, and oil increased.
9 I will lay me down in peace, and take my rest :
for it is thou, Lord, only, that makest me dwell in safety.
Psalm 31.1-6
1 In thee, O Lord, have I put my trust :
let me never be put to confusion, deliver me in thy righteousness.
2 Bow down thine ear to me :
make haste to deliver me.
3 And be thou my strong rock, and house of defence :
that thou mayest save me.
4 For thou art my strong rock, and my castle :
be thou also my guide, and lead me for thy name's sake.
5 Draw me out of the net, that they have laid privily for me :
for thou art my strength.
6 Into thy hands I commend my spirit :
for thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, thou God of truth.
Psalm 91
1 Whoso dwelleth under the defence of the Most High :
shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say unto the Lord, Thou art my hope, and my stronghold :
my God, in him will I trust.
3 For he shall deliver thee from the snare of the hunter :
and from the noisome pestilence.
4 He shall defend thee under his wings,
and thou shalt be safe under his feathers :
his faithfulness and truth shall be thy shield and buckler.
5 Thou shalt not be afraid for any terror by night :
nor for the arrow that flieth by day;
6 For the pestilence that walketh in darkness :
nor for the sickness that destroyeth in the noonday.
7 A thousand shall fall beside thee, and ten thousand at thy right hand :
but it shall not come nigh thee.
8 Yea, with thine eyes shalt thou behold :
and see the reward of the ungodly.
9 For thou, Lord, art my hope :
thou hast set thine house of defence very high.
10 There shall no evil happen unto thee :
neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.
11 For he shall give his angels charge over thee :
to keep thee in all thy ways.
12 They shall bear thee in their hands :
that thou hurt not thy foot against a stone.
13 Thou shalt go upon the lion and adder :
the young lion and the dragon shalt thou tread under thy feet.
14 Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him :
I will set him up, because he hath known my name.
15 He shall call upon me, and I will hear him :
yea, I am with him in trouble;
I will deliver him, and bring him to honour.
16 With long life will I satisfy him :
and shew him my salvation.
Psalm 134
1 Behold now, praise the Lord :
all ye servants of the Lord;
2 Ye that by night stand in the house of the Lord :
even in the courts of the house of our God.
3 Lift up your hands in the sanctuary :
and praise the Lord.
4 The Lord that made heaven and earth :
give thee blessing out of Sion.
At the end of the psalmody, the following is said or sung
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
Scripture Reading
One of the following short lessons or another suitable passage is read
Thou, O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name; leave us not, O Lord our God.
Jeremiah 14.9
(or)
Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
Matthew 11.28-30
(or)
Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well-pleasing in his sight; through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Hebrews 13.20,21
All Thanks be to God.
The following responsory may be said
Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
All Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
For thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, thou God of truth.
All I commend my spirit.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
All Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.
Keep me as the apple of an eye.
All Hide me under the shadow of thy wings.
Gospel Canticle
The Nunc dimittis (The Song of Simeon) is said or sung
All Preserve us, O Lord, while waking,
and guard us while sleeping,
that awake we may watch with Christ,
and asleep we may rest in peace.
1 Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace :
according to thy word.
2 For mine eyes have seen :
thy salvation;
3 Which thou hast prepared :
before the face of all people;
4 To be a light to lighten the Gentiles :
and to be the glory of thy people Israel.
Luke 2.29-32
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :
and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :
world without end. Amen.
All Preserve us, O Lord, while waking,
and guard us while sleeping,
that awake we may watch with Christ,
and asleep we may rest in peace.
Prayers
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us.
All Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done,
in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil. Amen.
Blessed art thou, Lord God of our fathers:
All to be praised and glorified above all for ever.
Let us bless the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost:
All let us praise him and magnify him for ever.
Blessed art thou, O Lord, in the firmament of heaven:
All to be praised and glorified above all for ever.
The almighty and most merciful Lord guard us and give us his blessing.
All Amen.
[Wilt thou not turn again and quicken us;
All that thy people may rejoice in thee?
O Lord, shew thy mercy upon us;
All and grant us thy salvation.
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this night without sin;
All O Lord, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us.
O Lord, hear our prayer;
All and let our cry come unto thee.]
Let us pray.
One or more of the following Collects is said
Visit, we beseech thee, O Lord, this place,
and drive from it all the snares of the enemy;
let thy holy angels dwell herein to preserve us in peace;
and may thy blessing be upon us evermore;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord;
and by thy great mercy defend us
from all perils and dangers of this night;
for the love of thy only Son, our Saviour, Jesus Christ.
All Amen.
O Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God,
who at this evening hour didst rest in the sepulchre,
and didst thereby sanctify the grave
to be a bed of hope to thy people:
make us so to abound in sorrow for our sins,
which were the cause of thy passion,
that when our bodies lie in the dust,
our souls may live with thee;
who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Ghost,
one God, world without end.
All Amen.
Look down, O Lord, from thy heavenly throne,
illuminate the darkness of this night with thy celestial brightness,
and from the sons of light banish the deeds of darkness;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
Be present, O merciful God,
and protect us through the silent hours of this night,
so that we who are wearied
by the changes and chances of this fleeting world,
may repose upon thy eternal changelessness;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
All Amen.
The Conclusion
We will lay us down in peace and take our rest.
All For it is thou, Lord, only that makest us dwell in safety.
Abide with us, O Lord,
All for it is toward evening and the day is far spent.
As the watchmen look for the morning,
All so do we look for thee, O Christ.
[Come with the dawning of the day
All and make thyself known in the breaking of bread.]
The Lord be with you
All and with thy spirit.
Let us bless the Lord.
All Thanks be to God.
The almighty and merciful Lord,
the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,
bless us and preserve us.
All Amen.
© The Archbishops' Council of the Church of England, 2000-2004
All of the official Common Worship publications are being published by Church House Publishing.
**************************************************************
Book of Common Prayer Daily Office Lectionary
December 31
December 31
Ps. 46, 48; Isa. 26:1-9; 2 Cor. 5:16-6:2; John 8:12-19
Psalm 46
God Is Our Fortress
To the choirmaster. Of the Sons of Korah. According to Alamoth. [1] A Song.
46:1 God is our refuge and strength,
a very present [2] help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way,
though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble at its swelling. Selah
4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
5 God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved;
God will help her when morning dawns.
6 The nations rage, the kingdoms totter;
he utters his voice, the earth melts.
7 The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress. Selah
8 Come, behold the works of the Lord,
how he has brought desolations on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease to the end of the earth;
he breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the chariots with fire.
10 “Be still, and know that I am God.
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth!”
11 The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress. Selah
Psalm 48
Zion, the City of Our God
A Song. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah.
48:1 Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God!
His holy mountain, 2 beautiful in elevation,
is the joy of all the earth,
Mount Zion, in the far north,
the city of the great King.
3 Within her citadels God
has made himself known as a fortress.
4 For behold, the kings assembled;
they came on together.
5 As soon as they saw it, they were astounded;
they were in panic; they took to flight.
6 Trembling took hold of them there,
anguish as of a woman in labor.
7 By the east wind you shattered
the ships of Tarshish.
8 As we have heard, so have we seen
in the city of the Lord of hosts,
in the city of our God,
which God will establish forever. Selah
9 We have thought on your steadfast love, O God,
in the midst of your temple.
10 As your name, O God,
so your praise reaches to the ends of the earth.
Your right hand is filled with righteousness.
11 Let Mount Zion be glad!
Let the daughters of Judah rejoice
because of your judgments!
12 Walk about Zion, go around her,
number her towers,
13 consider well her ramparts,
go through her citadels,
that you may tell the next generation
14 that this is God,
our God forever and ever.
He will guide us forever. [3]
Isaiah 26:1-9
You Keep Him in Perfect Peace
26:1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:
“We have a strong city;
he sets up salvation
as walls and bulwarks.
2 Open the gates,
that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in.
3 You keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on you,
because he trusts in you.
4 Trust in the Lord forever,
for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.
5 For he has humbled
the inhabitants of the height,
the lofty city.
He lays it low, lays it low to the ground,
casts it to the dust.
6 The foot tramples it,
the feet of the poor,
the steps of the needy.”
7 The path of the righteous is level;
you make level the way of the righteous.
8 In the path of your judgments,
O Lord, we wait for you;
your name and remembrance
are the desire of our soul.
9 My soul yearns for you in the night;
my spirit within me earnestly seeks you.
For when your judgments are in the earth,
the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.
2 Corinthians 5:16-6:2
16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. [4] The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling [5] the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
6:1 Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. 2 For he says,
“In a favorable time I listened to you,
and in a day of salvation I have helped you.”
Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
John 8:12-19
I Am the Light of the World
12 Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” 13 So the Pharisees said to him, “You are bearing witness about yourself; your testimony is not true.” 14 Jesus answered, “Even if I do bear witness about myself, my testimony is true, for I know where I came from and where I am going, but you do not know where I come from or where I am going. 15 You judge according to the flesh; I judge no one. 16 Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is true, for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father [6] who sent me. 17 In your Law it is written that the testimony of two people is true. 18 I am the one who bears witness about myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness about me.” 19 They said to him therefore, “Where is your Father?” Jesus answered, “You know neither me nor my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also.”
Footnotes
[1] 46:1 Probably a musical or liturgical term
[2] 46:1 Or well proved
[3] 48:14 Septuagint; another reading is (compare Jerome, Syriac) He will guide us beyond death
[4] 5:17 Or creature
[5] 5:19 Or God was in Christ, reconciling
[6] 8:16 Some manuscripts he
This reading plan is adapted from the Daily Office Lectionary found in The Book of Common Prayer.
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