Serious Business of Worship

The Rev. Dr Simon Jones is Chaplain and Research Fellow at Merton College, Oxford, UK.

• Introduction; (Melanie C. Ross); Forword (lain Torrance); The Serious Business of Worship (Bryan D. Spinks); Part I: Early Church and Eastern Traditions; Introduction; Chapter 1: (Robert F. Taft): St. John Chrysostom, Preacher Committed to the Seriousness of Worship; Chapter 2: (Michael Daniel Findikyan): The 'Opening of the Door' Ceremony on Palm Sunday in the Armenian Church; Chapter 3: (Gregory Woolfenden): A Tension between Private and Public Prayer? Reflections on the origins of the day hours; Chapter 4: (Anthony Gelston): The East Syrian Eucharistic Prayers; Chapter 5: (Paul Bradshaw): Varieties of Early Christian Baptismal Anointing; II: Patristic and Reformation Eras Introduction; Chapter 6: (Kenneth Stevenson): The Transfiguration Sermon of Peter the Venerable, Abbot of Cluny; Chapter 7: (Gordon Jeanes): Is the Institution Narrative Necessary in the Eucharist? The opinion of Martin Bucer, Corpus Christi, Cambridge, MS 113, pp315-324; Chapter 8: (Robin A. Leaver): Metrical Psalms and Canticles, the Book of Common Prayer, and Thomas Cranmer; III: Contemporary Liturgical Renewal Introduction; Chapter 9: (Joseph Britton): The Berkeley Rite; Chapter 10: (Philip Tovey): Two Models of Inculturation and Eucharistic Prayers with Children; Chapter 11: (Simon Jones): 'Outward Ceremony and Honourable Badge': the Theological Significance of the Sign of the Cross in the Baptismal Liturgies of the Church of England and Scottish Episcopal Church; Chapter 12: (Siobhan Garrigan): Is Ecumenical Worship a Serious Business? (Two Case Studies and a Funeral); Chapter: 13 (Maxwell E. Johnson): Is Anything Normative in Contemporary Lutheran Worship?; Chapter 14: (Melanie C. Ross): The Serious Drama of Worship; Chapter 15: (John D. Witvliet): From 'DNA to Cellular Structure': Charting recent evangelical scholarly engagement with corporate worship practices; Bryan D. Spinks: Bibliography of Principal Works; List of Contributors.

‘What a joy to see the study of liturgy and with it the church's life of worship, taken with such seriousness. The breadth of the essays gathered in this Festschrift, and the scholarly commitments displayed here, witness to the vibrancy of this field of inquiry.  Here is liturgical studies at its best - deeply engaged with historical questions, theological convictions, and contemporary practices.' - Teresa Berger, Yale Institute of Sacred Music and Yale Divinity School, New Haven, CT, USA