Search -
St. Chrysostom's picture of the religion of his age
St Chrysostom's picture of the religion of his age Author:Unknown Author Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. DIVINE SEBVICES. Times.—Arrangements.—United worsliip.—Scripture lessons.—Sermon.—Liturgy.—Dismissal of non-communicants.—Kiss of peace.—Praye... more »rs ana! Hymns.—Administration of bread and wine.,—Posture.—Office of Deacons. —Minor arrangements.—How often persons communicated.—Excommunication.—Baptism.—Litanies.—Funerals.'—Individual piety.—Family and private devotions. Before we enter upon the description of Public Worship, as gathered from the writings of St. Chrysostom, it is necessary to remind the reader that we are setting forth a picture of the Greek Church at the close of the fourth century. It is obvious that there had by this time been a great departure from the simplicity of primitive worship. This had partly arisen from the employment of wealth and art in the service of a religion which, from being persecuted, had become dominant. Customs had also crept in from pagan sources; and there were marks of a reaction in the direction of Judaic modes of thought. Usages, too, harmless in themselves, but which were afterwards found to engender superstition, and were therefore laid aside by the wisdom of our Reformers, are found here in their infancy.1 The admirable chapter " On Ceremonies," in the Preface to our Book of Common Prayer, will be sufficient to guard us against any desire to re- introduce practices which have been by our own Church deliberately abandoned. It is, however, 1 Compare the following passages taken from "The Right Use of the Early Fathers," by the Kev. J. J. Blunt, late Margaret Professor of Divinity. "Inthe writings of Clemens (Romanus) may be detected the germ of several customs or opinions which eventually became corrupt as exercised in the Romish Church; but which, as presented to us in him, are generally little more than unauth...« less