Service notes: Trinity Church, Indianapolis

On the way from my parents' house to the Diocese of Barsetshire (whither I am returning to parley with my co-author and finish The Book) I spent a night in Indianapolis. I chose that particular way station because I know the music director at Trinity Church, Dr Michael Messina, and wanted to worship there and hear him play. (I met him at the fabled Mississippi Conference, where I also met Bruce Neswick and Shannon Johnston.) Needless to say, Michael wasn't actually there. There's something about my impending presence that causes people to scatter. Imagine if I actually warned them in advance!

Two Scripture verses come to mind: (1) "Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness," and (2) "The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him." At Trinity, which is a gorgeously appointed church, they largely understand (1); (2), not so much. I walked in about ten minutes before the service was to begin, and folks were chatting away like a bunch of Baptists. It was very hard to pray. It was hard even to listen attentively to the prelude: "Fantasia Chromatic," by J. P. Sweelinck, splendidly played by (I assume) the Assistant Organist.

A bell was rung, and a voice from the back proclaimed the opening acclamation. (Notice that I did not say the celebrant proclaimed it. We're coming to that.) After the collect for purity, the organist creatively introduced the hymn of praise: 372, "Praise to the living God." I'll say right now that his hymn-playing was consistently excellent -- the best I've heard in ages.

As the gaggle of priests passed by in procession, I got my first look at the owner of the voice from the back. She was wearing a broad stole that looked like a summer-camp crafts project gone awry. I wouldn't have been surprised if closer inspection had revealed that it was made partly of dry macaroni, painted and covered in glitter. She said the Collect of the Day, and we were seated.

After the first lesson, a simplified-Anglican-chant psalm that could have used a bit more zip, and a semi-butchered reading of the epistle, we rose to sing the sequence hymn: 529, "In Christ there is no East or West." Fantastically done, that hymn was.

Another priest -- not Our Lady of the Regrettable Vestments -- proclaimed the Gospel. But what is that I see just beyond the beautifully painted but roodless rood screen? Could it be -- yes, I think it is -- it's a woman with a stole draped significantly over her left shoulder. Why is a priest serving as Gospeller when there's a deacon in the house? I don't care that there was a gaggle of vested priests. You got a deacon, she needs to deac.

The Rector -- this is our third priest, for those who are keeping score at home -- preached. I was perhaps not in the most receptive state for this sermon, since one of the big themes of Fr Brosend's homiletics class was that we should avoid self-referential preaching whenever possible, and the bulk of the Rector's sermon was built on anecdotes from his own experience. For me, it was just Meh. I was also distracted by the name-tag pinned to his alb, which was partly obscured by his stole, which in turn was listing more and more to port as the service progressed, perhaps because the two loops in his cincture were so out of whack with each other.

The remainder of the Liturgy of the Word passed without incident. Our Lady of Arts and Crafts Hour offered us the Peace, and then we were all seated for the announcements.

An unnamed soloist presented Rene Clausen's "The Greatest of These Is Love," which I had never heard. It's the text of 1 Corinthians 13:1-8a, set very attractively. The Anonymous 1 had a lovely voice of the Broadway rather than operatic style, which frankly suits me just fine, and I Amen'd him afterwards. (I had also Amen'd the Sweelinck, which I recognize is a deeply odd thing to do.)

While that was going on and the offerings were being received, Priest Number Four was apparently crowned the winner of "Chasuble, chasuble, who's got the chasuble." Ah, so he's going to be the celebrant, I thought. Two points:

First, the Prayer Book does not assign the Opening Acclamation and various other bits of the Liturgy of the Word to "some priest or other." It assigns them to "the Celebrant." Having one priest preside at the Liturgy of the Word and another at the Table reinforces the wrong idea that there are actually two services here, rather than one. Apparently this morning the misbegotten notion that every vested priest has to "do something" in the service led not only to presbyteral usurpation of diaconal functions but to a loss of the unity and integrity of the rite as a whole.

Second, ditto for donning the chasuble at the Offertory. The whole service is a Eucharistic service, and so if you're going to wear Eucharistic vestments at all, you should wear them for the whole service.

Well, at least Priest Number Four could sing. We used the "Land of Rest" Sanctus, which I love, and then everybody, or at least everybody I could see, knelt. Kneeling after the Sanctus makes very little liturgical sense, but I love it. It's the liturgical equivalent of what H. W. Fowler called "sturdy indefensibles." Fowler wrote:

Many idioms are seen, if they are tested by grammar or logic, to express badly, and sometimes to express the reverse of, what they are nevertheless well understood to mean. Good people point out the sin, and bad people, who are more numerous, take little notice and go on committing it; then the good people if they are foolish, get excited and talk of ignorance and solecisms, and are laughed at as purists; or, if they are wise, say no more about it and wait.

Kneeling after the Sanctus is (among its other failings) an error akin to the donning of the chasuble at the Offertory. It denies the unity of the Eucharistic Prayer. Yet I loathe the one and love the other. I make no pretense to wisdom here.

I reproduce, without comment (because you know exactly what I would say), the first part of the bulletin's directions about receiving Communion:

The consecrated bread and wine are living signs of the presence of Christ in this gathering. All who seek God and are drawn to Christ are welcome to receive the bread and wine.

We sang 488, "Be thou my vision," at Communion, and how can you ever go wrong singing that? After the postcommunion prayer and blessing, we sang 344, "Lord, dismiss us with thy blessing" -- did I mention that the hymn-playing was superb? -- the deacon (thank goodness) dismissed us, and a spirited prelude and fugue competed in vain with the tongues that had been stilled for an hour but were now released.