'The word is added to the element, and there results the Sacrament': the position of the Prayer of Humble Access in 1662
This, in the end, is where the Prayer of Humble Access leads: to union with Christ. This is the desideratum, the end that we seek, in coming to the Table of our merciful Lord. Or, perhaps it would be better - and more true to the spirit of Cranmer’s prayer - to say that this is why our Lord brings us to his banquet and bids us welcome at his Table: 'that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us'.
What, however, of the placing of the Prayer of Humble Access in the Communion liturgy? Yoder suggests that it has had "something of a nomadic existence, moving from place to place in the liturgy". In recent times, yes. However, from 1552/1559 until the 20th century, there was nothing at all nomadic about the location of this prayer: over these centuries, for the vast majority of Anglicans and Episcopalians, it was placed after the Sanctus and before the Prayer of Consecration. Here it was retained in Ireland 1878/1926 (and 2004 Order One) and Canada 1918. As Yoder himself states, "It remained in this same place in the first editions of the American prayer book (1789 and 1892)". In other words, the 1552-1559-1662 placing of the Prayer of Humble Access was a very stable part of Anglican liturgy and piety into the 20th century.
Cranmer's reason for placing the Prayer of Humble Access at this point, however, has not been widely considered. Yoder, for example, makes reference to a popular theory that - in my reading - has no basis at all in Cranmer's thought:
While Cranmer’s second placement of the prayer has its merits (perhaps especially because the movement from the Sanctus to the Prayer of Humble Access parallels the response of the prophet to his vision of the thrice-holy LORD in Isaiah 6), I prefer its original location as a Communion devotion, simply because this is where I know it.
What is more, there is no indication of any such understanding of the placing of the Prayer of Humble Access in the classical Prayer Book commentary tradition. Neither Sparrow, Wheatly, nor Mant relate the prayer to the Sanctus.
Let me suggest that the Sanctus has no role in understanding Cranmer's placing of the prayer. Rather, what is fundamental is that precedes what 1662 terms 'the Prayer of Consecration'. The Prayer of Humble Access prepares us to hear the Words of Institution and to receive the consecrated Bread and Wine. In doing so, it goes to the very heart of what a Sacrament is. In the words of Cranmer, in The True and Catholic Doctrine of the Lord's Supper, "these elements of water, bread, and wine, joined to God’s word, do after a sacramental manner put Christ into our eyes, mouths, hands, and all our senses" (emphasis added). The Words of Institution, therefore, are fundamental to the Sacrament, being "Christ's own promise and testament" to those approaching to receive the Holy Sacrament:
And yet he spoke not this to the intent that men should think, that material bread is his very body, or that his very body is material bread; neither that wine made of grapes is his very blood, or that his very blood is wine made of grapes; but to signify unto us (as St. Paul saith) that the cup is a communion of Christ’s blood that was shed for us, and the bread is a communion of his flesh that was crucified for us. So that although, in the truth of his human nature, Christ be in heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father, yet whosoever eateth of that bread in the supper of the Lord, according to Christ’s institution and ordinance, is assured of Christ’s own promise and testament, that he is a member of his body, and receiveth the benefits of his passion which he suffered for us upon the cross. And likewise he that drinketh of that holy cup in that supper of the Lord, according to Christ’s institution, is certified by Christ’s legacy and testament, that he is made partaker of the blood of Christ which was shed for us. And this meant St. Paul, when he saith, “Is not the cup of blessing which we bless, a communion of the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break, a communion of the body of Christ?”
In his Answer to Gardiner, Cranmer likewise pointed to Christ's "promise" of "effectual grace" in the Sacrament:
But how can he be taken for a good Christian man, that thinketh that Christ did ordain his sacramental signs and tokens in vain, without effectual grace and operation? For so might we as well say, that the water in baptism is a bare token, and hath no warrant signed by Scripture for any apparel at all: for the Scripture speaketh not of any promise made to the receiving of a token or figure only. And so may be concluded after your manner of reasoning, that in baptism is no spiritual operation in deed, because that washing in water, in itself, is but a token.
Placing the Prayer of Humble Access before the Prayer of Consecration prepares us to receive the word and promise of Christ, integral to the reception of the Sacrament. Cranmer is here invoking a thoroughly Augustinian sacramental understanding, particularly seen in Augustine's discussion of John 15:3, "you have already been cleansed by the word I have spoken to you":
Why does He not say, You are clean through the baptism wherewith you have been washed, but through the word which I have spoken unto you, save only that in the water also it is the word that cleanses? Take away the word, and the water is neither more nor less than water. The word is added to the element, and there results the Sacrament, as if itself also a kind of visible word.
It should also be noted that Aquinas quotes this passage from Augustine in understanding the relationship between word and sign in the Sacraments:
Augustine says: "The word is added to the element and this becomes a sacrament".
We might gently suggest that the 1549 placing of the Prayer of Humble Access somewhat obscures this fundamental relationship between word and element, coming as it does between the Words of Institution and reception of the Sacrament. The 1552-1559-1662 position, by contrast, beautifully and powerfully embodies it. We confess that we are not worthy to hear the gracious promise of Christ in the Holy Supper; and we petition that the word we hear and elements we receive may renew us in communion with the Redeemer. Having the Prayer of Humble Access before the Prayer of Consecration prepares us to rightly hear the promise of the Words of Institution:
so to eat the flesh of thy dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his body, and our souls washed through his most precious blood, and that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us.
As such, it cannot be meaningfully contended that the 1552-1559-1662 placing of this prayer is less of a Communion devotion than that in 1549. It prepares us to attend to the significance of the Words of Institution, inherent to reception of the Sacrament. As Hooker - who, of course, faithfully administered the holy Sacrament according to the 1559 rite - declares:
those mysteries should serve as conduits of life and conveyances of his body and blood unto them, was it possible they should hear that voice 'Take, eat, this is my body, Drink ye all of this, this is my blood' possible that doing what was required and believing what was promised, the same should have present effect in them, and not fill them with a kind of fearful admiration at the heaven which they saw in themselves? (LEP 67.4).
The 1662 placing also quite beautifully contributes to surrounding the word and elements with prayers which are oriented towards and flow from the "the inward part, or thing signified" in the Sacrament. The words of the Prayer of Humble Access before the Prayer of Consecration are reflected and echoed in the Prayer of Thanksgiving following the hearing of the word and the receiving of the elements:
Almighty and everliving God, we most heartily thank thee, for that thou dost vouchsafe to feed us, who have duly received these holy mysteries, with the spiritual food of the most precious Body and Blood of thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ.
Before and after, therefore, first in penitence, then with thanksgiving, we are brought to recognise the the gift of grace bestowed when "the word is added to the element".
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