Author Archives: Derek A. Olsen

Discussion Question on the Apostolic Faith

I ran across this recently and found it quite interesting. This is from the editor’s intro to the records of the Seven Ecumenical Councils in the Nicene/Post-Nicene Fathers series. See what you think…

The history of the Council of Nice has been so often written by so many brilliant historians, from the time of its sitting down to to-day, that any historical notice of the causes leading to its assembling, or account of its proceedings, seems quite unnecessary. The editor, however, ventures to call the attention of the reader to the fact that in this, as in every other of the Seven Ecumenical Councils, the question the Fathers considered was not what they supposed Holy Scripture might mean, nor what they, from à priori arguments, thought would be consistent with the mind of God, but something entirely different, to wit, what they had received. They understood their position to be that of witnesses, not that of exegetes. They recognized but one duty resting upon them in this respect—to hand down to other faithful men that good thing the Church had received according to the command of God. The first requirement was not learning, but honesty. The question they were called upon to answer was not, What do I think probable, or even certain, from Holy Scripture? but, What have I been taught, what has been intrusted to me to hand down to others? When the time came, in the Fourth Council, to examine the Tome of Pope St. Leo, the question was not whether it could be proved to the satisfaction of the assembled fathers from Holy Scripture, but whether it was the traditional faith of the Church. It was not the doctrine of Leo in the fifth century, but the doctrine of Peter in the first, and of the Church since then, that they desired to believe and to teach, and so, when they had studied the Tome, they cried out:

“This is the faith of the Fathers! This is the faith of the Apostles!…Peter hath thus spoken by Leo! The Apostles thus taught! Cyril thus taught!” etc.

Now—here’s Article XXI of the Articles of Religion as annoted by the current American BCP:

XXI. Of the Authority of General Councils.

[The Twenty-first of the former Articles is omitted; because it is partly of a local and civil nature, and is provided for, as to the remaining parts of it, in other Articles.]

The original 1571, 1662 text of this Article, omitted in the version of 1801, reads as follows: “General Councils may not be gathered together without the commandment and will of Princes. And when they be gathered together, (forasmuch as they be an assembly of men, whereof all be not governed with the Spirit and Word of God,) they may err, and sometimes have erred, even in things pertaining unto God. Wherefore things ordained by them as necessary to salvation have neither strength nor authority, unless it may be declared that they be taken out of holy Scripture.”

And now—two words to further stimulate conversation: Oral Torah.

Discuss…

Liber Usualis On-Line!!

Here’s a tender little-known fact from our courtship days lo these many years ago: the first big purchase that M and I made together–before we were married–was a Liber Usualis reprint from St. Bonaventure Publications. (That probably comes as little surprise to those who know us…)

I’m happy to pass on the news today via NLM that the CMAA is now offering the Liber as a complete PDF download.

What is the Liber, you ask? It’s a big collection of helpful and important plainchant settings for masses throughout the year and the Sunday Offices (and Lauds of Feasts) according to the Roman Use as of 1953. Here’s the technical details from the introduction:

This Edition with complete musical notation includes the following:
1. The Kyriale with Cantus ad libitum.
2. The Mass of the Sundays and Feasts including those of double rank throughout the year, with Vespers and Compline for the same.
3. Prime, Terce, Sext, None, for Sundays and Feasts of the First and Second Class.
4. Matins of Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, Corpus Christi; Lauds for Feasts of the First Class.
5. The Litanies: the Mass of Rogation Days, Ember Days, Easter and Whitsun weeks; the Vigils of Christmas, Epiphany and Whitsun.
6. The services of Ash Wednesday, the Triduum of Holy Week and Easter Day.
7. The principal Votive Masses and the Offices for the Dead.
In the beginning of the book will be found the Common Tones of the Mass and Office. Chants for special occasions, e. g. the Blessing of the Holy Oils, Ordinations, etc, are included in the Appendix.

If you do anything or have any interest in chant–you need this!! (And at this price, why not? :-D) It is, of course, in Latin with square notation but it has a fine English language introduction to the basics of chant and a full explanation and presentations of the 8+1 psalm tones.

While the Liber is very helpful for people doing research in medieval liturgy, I must warn you that anything you find here must be backed up by properly contemporary evidence as this really is the 1953 rite. For instance, its hymns are the hacked-up reformed versions promulgated by the Renaissance pope Clement VII.

I’m Not Dead Yet…

I’m just absolutely snowed under.

Minor Notes:

  • The Shore was good but I see that once again they have ignored my advice and decided to retain the whole “sand” thing. I plan to lodge a protest with the powers-that-be.
  • It only took an absence of a week or so before the p0rn-spam comments started appearing… (now deleted, of course…)
  • As I suggested here Dr. Nokes has indeed–if only indirectly–gotten in on the Disney princess action.
  • After our latest beer-ribs-‘n’-liturgy meet-up M found Lil’ G with blue and green marker drawings all over her arms. When queried why G responded so that she could have tattoos like [LutherPunk]. She’s also recently asked when she can get body piercings and real tattoos… Since she just turned four I told her that it would be a while.

The Anglican Rosary

I’ve never been a true fan of the Anglican Rosary. It’s always seemed like one of those half-measure flirts with our catholic roots that is neither one nor the other and ends up being a totally modern practice in search of a spirituality.

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve never been sold on the classical rosary either(instructions here include the new “Luminous Mysteries” add by JP II)… Those who know me won’t be terribly surprised at my reason–it’s one of those “recent” innovations. You know, a new-fangled 13th century thing that didn’t seriously catch on until the end of the 15th century… (See here for details.)

However, Catholic in the Third Millennium brings to our attention a devotion using the Anglican Rosary that I can really get behind–a means of praying the St. Patrick’s Breastplate. This hymn has long been a favorite of mine and holds a lot of personal meaning for me. It’s associated of General, was sung at M’s ordination and was one of the few things that would put Lil’ G to sleep as a baby. I had the *whole* thing [midi alert!]–not just the few verses that appear in the hymnal–memorized from singing them nightly for several months. (I’ve since forgotten bits…)

In any case, this may actually move me to try my hand with the Anglican Rosary…

Yet More on CWOB

To recap briefly, we’ve been discussing Communion Without Baptism quite a bit lately. One of the main engines of debate has been the Anglican Scotist’s attempts to connect CWOB with universal salvation and to argue that if we take our beliefs about the power of God to their logical conclusion the theological reasons for CWOB will become self-evident. It’s an intriguing argument but not one that wins me over–universal salvation being the first major stumbling block.

My main objection to the argument of the Scotist is that it comes in the form of syllogisms. While I do recognize the need for such things and acknowledge their proper place in theological reflection, logical syllogisms in their use of absolutes and extremes tend to wander away from the basic incarnate character of the life of faith. To my mind, they too easily enter the realm of speculation divorced from discipleship.And here, of course, I see one of the classic divisions between the Scholastic and the monastic.

Both Caelius and *Christopher have written great reflections that return the discussion from questions of universality and omnipotence to questions of daily Christian practice. *Christopher’s piece engages the Scotist’s invocation of the Eschaton and makes a distinction between the regular and extraordinary means of grace, paying special attention to their roles in communities of practice. Caelius’s piece touches on a range of issues, moving from an interesting discussion of the Eucharistic meal as a plunder-dividing party to a thoughtful reflection on exclusion and intimacy. If you haven’t already read them, I commend them to you highly.

Third Time’s a Charm?

*Sigh* I was planning to get a lot done tonight. Didn’t happen. I made a silly error on protocols for handling file extensions and ended up reinstalling the OS from scratch… On the upside–I’m trying a new OS. :-D

I started out with this box on Ubuntu. That was working okay. Then, I needed to install some stuff but cleverly forgot/couldn’t locate the root password. At that point I said–hey, I’m a Windows guy from before Windows existed–why use Ubuntu which uses Gnome as a graphical interface (a Mac clone)? Why not try Kubuntu which uses KDE–a Windows emulator? (Especially since the price is the same…) It was okay–I had no major problems but I did notice a performance difference. It was slower…

This is an *old* box I’m working off of.

When I made my goof tonight I said, well, why not round it out with Xubuntu which is designed for more basic systems. So, I spent what was supposed to be productive coding time reinstalling the operating system, retweaking Firefox, and setting up my lampp stack. And in case any one else is trying this, I *heartily* recommend this site and its download. After several days trying to manual compile a stack on my Windows unit I discovered their Windows version and was good to go in under an hour. This is the second time I’ve used it on this box (once with Kubuntu, now once with Xubuntu) and haven’t had a bit of trouble.

In the meantime, however while waiting on downloads/installs/and such I’ve been glancing through Oscar Cullman’s Essays on the Lord’s Supper, John Koenig’s New Testament Hospitality, and Luke Johnson’s Religious Experience in Earliest Christianity.

Much more important than these, though, I got to spend some quality time with M which I’ve been missing a lot recently because of my crazy schedule…