'The reading of the Prayers aright': wisdom from Bishop Bull

In a 1708 Visitation Charge to his clergy, Bishop George Bull outlined "the principal parts and branches of the Pastoral office", noting five of these. The list begins as follows: "First, Reading Divine Service, or the Prayers of the Church". Reading divine service is placed ahead of preaching and, indeed, administering the Sacraments. Bull continues:

First, Reading Divine Service, or the Prayers of the Church. This some may think to be a slight and easy matter, that needs not any advice or directions; but they are very much mistaken. For to the reading of the Prayers aright there is need of great care and caution. The Prayers of the Church must be read audibly, distinctly, and reverently ... the Prayers of the Church are to be read with great reverence and devotion, so as to excite and kindle devotion in the congregation. Thus the Prayers of the Church are to be read, if we would keep up the reputation of them, and render them useful to the people.

As laudable Practice discussed in a previous post, 'reading Prayers' was a commonplace term over centuries to describe the role of Anglican clergy in divine service. Bull's counsel to his clergy is another reminder of how the phrase, and the spirituality it embodied, profoundly shaped Anglican piety over centuries. 

Why might those of us who value the Old High tradition seek to retrieve the term?

To 'read the Prayers' is suggestive of the significance of Sunday Matins as a main service - of how it can shape and form a worshipping community over years, alongside a regular administration of the Holy Communion. Confession and absolution, praise and petitions, psalms and scripture lessons: Sunday Matins offers an important means of shaping and sustaining the Christian life, Sunday by Sunday, as the years go by. As such, it also prepares for reception of the holy Sacrament, something missing almost entirely from the ecclesial landscape established by the Parish Communion Movement.

Note that the phrase is 'read the Prayers'. In other words, this is not a reference to Choral Matins or Evensong. This has a contemporary relevance. In many parishes across North Atlantic societies, a choral tradition is no longer possible. What is more, a parochial choral tradition was, in the vast majority of places, a Victorian development. Said Morning Prayer with metrical psalms functioning as hymns was the norm prior to this. To 'read the Prayers' reminds us that a choral tradition - while a joyous gift where it can be exercised and received - is not at all necessary to Matins and Evensong: reading these offices can be the means of sustaining the worshipping life of an Anglican Christian community.

There is also something deeply resonant about the phrase precisely because of its ordinary, prosaic character. To 'read the Prayers' symbolises the ordinary, prosaic ways in which we grow in and live out the Christian faith. It is not dramatic experiences and the claims of Enthusiasm which, for most Christians, define the faith. Rather we grow in faith in ordinary parish churches, surrounded by ordinary parishioners, living out the faith in ordinary lives marked by domestic and communal responsibilities, events, and challenges. To 'read the Prayers' signifies this in a quite moving way: in this quiet, ordinary, undramatic routine we are ministered to by, offer our prayers unto, and are drawn into the praises of the Triune God.

There is, therefore, a continued wisdom in Bishop Bull's counsel to his clergy. 'The reading of the Prayers aright' points to a practical way in which to re-centre Anglican worship post-Parish Communion Movement, in the light of the contemporary difficulties of ensuring the availability of priests, and the realities of smaller worshipping communities.