File Name: "3-Step Plan Article #9 Conduct of the Service by ACP" (45 pages) THE CONDUCT OF THE SERVICE According to the Rubrics of The Lutheran Hymnal, The Lutheran Liturgy, The Lutheran Lectionary, and The Music for the Liturgy1 By Arthur Carl Piepkorn (1907-1973☩) Concordia Seminary Print Shop, 1965. 44 pages. Edited by Philip James Secker. Revised 3/17/19. 40 pages. Editor's Note: Arthur Carl Piepkorn's classic monograph The Conduct of the Service is primarily about the rubrics of the Service, but contains a great deal of information about what is in Piepkorn's 1962 classic monograph The Architectural Requirements of the Lutheran Cultus (which is in 3-Step Plan Article #7 The Full 3-step Plan). "Cultus" is a Latin loan word that refers to adiaphora, that is, things that are neither commanded nor forbidden by God such as architecture, altars, banners, baptismal fonts, candles, holy communion vessels and rails, hymnals, musical instruments, offering plates, pews, unleavened holy communion wafers, vestments, etc. So both monographs should be used together. The following book is now available as a computer searchable CD that can be searched for additional information on what is in those two monographs: The Sacred Scriptures and the Lutheran Confessions, edited and introduced by Philip J. Secker, Foreword by Robert Kolb, Volume 2 in The Selected Writings of Arthur Carl Piepkorn, CEC Press, 2007, 313 pages. This edition of The Conduct of the Service is Copyright©2018 Philip James Secker but may be reproduced as long as it is reproduced in its entirety. 1 The original has no subtitle, but I have added this one because that is what this monograph is about according to Piepkorn. Those books were published in 1941-1945. The Editor. The Conduct of the Service2 A WORD OF EXPLANATION The use of the Church-bodies composing the Evangelical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America is contained in four books -- The Lutheran Hymnal, The Lutheran Liturgy, The Lutheran Lectionary, and The Music for the Liturgy. A use consists of two parts, the text of the services, called the rite, and the directions for conducting the services, called the rubrics. One reason for the great diversity in the conduct of religious services in our churches is inadequate attention to the directions, or rubrics. Another is the difficulty which many pastors and parishes confess that they have in understanding and applying the rubrics. To help such people is the purpose of this pamphlet. One cardinal principle runs through this work: The rubrics are to be taken as they read not as the author of this guide thinks they ought to read! Accordingly, this is not a directory for a "liturgical" service, or for an "unliturgical" service. Where the rubrics of our use contradict one another, this pamphlet suggests a solution to the dilemma. Where the rubrics are inconsistent, this pamphlet tries to harmonize them. Where the rubrics permit various possibilities, this pamphlet indicates which possible choice has the best historical warrant. Where the rubrics say that something may or shall be done, but does not indicate how it is to be done, this pamphlet proposes a mode of procedure that accords with the best liturgical tradition of the Church of the Augsburg Confession. But this pamphlet takes the rubrics as they read! Only as our pastors and parishes do likewise can our churches achieve the degree of uniformity in our services that practical experience indicates is so desirable. A. C. P. 2This monograph is a revised edition that Piepkorn made of his Altar Decorum, Concordia Seminary Print Shop, 1963, 42 pages. I added a few footnotes but had to begin numbering them with footnote number 4. On pages 1 and 2 Piepkorn singles out two very important reasons for following the rubrics of the four books listed in the first paragraph of page 1: Uniformity and Reverence. He used very informal services in his four preaching stations around Chisholm, MN, in 1933-36, but urged the people who came to them to worship at Grace Lutheran, which used a service a lot like The Order of the Holy Communion in the 1941 The Lutheran Hymnal. He wrote that he was "profoundly skeptical of informal worship services," probably because he found them antithetical to both uniformity and reverence. (I have the quote but have not unpacked all of my boxes from a recent move. ) Philip James Secker. 3/6/18 $2 of $40 NOTES ON REVERENCE I There is really only one basic rule of good form: "Be courteous!" And similarly there is really only one basic rule of altar decorum: "Be reverent!" Every other rule is simply a practical amplification of this basic charge. To be reverent we must first of all be humble. We are ministers -- ministers of Christ, serving Christ in the form and in the name of fellow-sinners. We minister not because of any virtue in ourselves. Our sufficiency is of God. We minister as temples of the Holy Ghost, as being bound in sacramental union to the Lord of the Church, as kings and priests living in mystic communion with the Most Holy Trinity, as those whom Christ has chosen that we might be with Him and that He might send us forth to preach (St. Mark 3:13). We minister under the aspect of eternity and in the Presence of the Divine Majesty. Wherever we stand, we are on holy ground. In such a ministry there is no room for pride, only for all-pervading humility. To be reverent we must be prepared. We must know what we are doing, and why we are doing it. The physical preparations, as far as may be, should be taken care of well in advance. There should be no last-minute running to and fro, no hasty final preparation, no distressed paging about. A meditation, brief if need be, but as long as the time permits, ought never to be overlooked; spiritual preparation is more essential to reverence than the proper ordering of the physical adjuncts. To be reverent we must be calm. The unforeseen, the accidental, the disturbing must not be permitted to distract us. We are God's ambassadors and God's servants. We are speaking for and to God. Our entire lives ought to be, and our public ministry must be en Christō - in Christ! So must the calm peace of the changeless Christ in our souls be reflected in our outward demeanor. II The discussion of practical details which follows is intended to be neither "liturgical" nor "unliturgical." If certain individual suggestions seem to reflect a "liturgical" bias, it is because we are not persuaded that every parish and every parson must scale its or his ceremonial down to the lowest level in use among us. Those less "liturgically" inclined may depart from the norm suggested as widely as their vagrant fancy and their Christian liberty dictate, and they will unquestionably do so. These things are not matters of faith, and their doing or omission is neither mortal nor venial sin. In general, services should be conducted, rites performed, and the Holy Sacraments administered in the place set aside for that purpose, the Church. We need not ascribe intrinsic sanctity to a place or a building or an object to realize that devotion and reverence inevitably reflect surroundings and associations. $3 of $40 It is not a question of validity or efficacy. It is simply that it is usually easier to be reverent in Church, and so the Church should be the scene of our ministration except where inescapable exigencies direct that another place be employed. Our service allows a wide range of individual liberty and gives full scope to parochial peculiarities. But the very rubrics which provide this beautiful freedom become gins of irreverence and confusion for the feet of the unwary and the uninstructed. Each Church might well have its Orders of Service, as used, mimeographed or printed and placed in the hands of the worshipers before The Service or rite begins. III It is proper to light the altar candles for all services. The Lutheran use is to have two single beeswax candles, set near the extremities of the altar, either on the gradine or as close as possible to the back of the mensa, if there be no gradine. Six candles is a Counter-Reformatory Roman use. Candelabra as substitutes for the two single candles are a Protestant sentimentality. The Epistle candle is lighted first; the Gospel candle last; they are extinguished in reverse order. Lighting with a match held in the hand is not reverent: - extinguishing with puffs of breath from bloating cheeks is even less so. Use a lighter and snuffer. The lights may be lit by the officiant if there be no one to assist him, or by a choirboy, or by a server appointed for the purpose. In any case the individual performing this task should be decently vested. New candles should be started before the service, or they may cause embarrassing difficulties. Candles, altar linens, frontals, frontlets, superfrontals, dossals, riddels, and carpets should be changed out of service time. Cut flowers ( or potted plants) should not be placed on the altar, widespread practice notwithstanding. Flowers are best placed in pottery jugs on the floor of the sanctuary or on stands rather than upon the altar. This should be done at least fifteen minutes before the service begins. The same applies to setting markers; placing books on the credence, lectern, and pulpit, and changing hymn-board numbers. A credence table or bracket, preferably on the Epistle side of the sanctuary wall, is a convenience of such importance that it is almost a necessity.