At the installation yesterday, several folks asked: why green? Why not red? Dixie also asked in the comments under the previous post. I figured it was worth putting at the top of the blog.
Lutheran Service Book Agenda, on page 174, notes under The Rite in Detail, #4:
"When the propers for ordinations and installations are used, the color is red. When the propers of the Sunday or festival are used, the color is that of the day or season."
Hence, when we celebrated Vespers of Pentecost 21 yesterday, and used the propers for that celebration, we also used the color for that celebration.
One might also note that long-standing practice notwithstanding, there is simply NO provision for laying on of hands at an installation; that is reserved for ordination. I refuse to lay hand on the head of man being installed in office; I think it sends a confused message.
7 comments:
On a guess, red would seem to be the color. Actually, I appreciate how here the rubric distinguishes between installation and ordination. And the laying on of hands is totally unnecessary. Thank you for passing this on.
I have been arguing that we ought not lay on hands for an installation since I was on vicarage. What a confusing message to send.
Regarding the colour of the Service - is it not true that if the Service is seperate from the Divine Service - a Service unto itself that uses different propers - that red would be the colour? I have been caught a couple times showing up with green and haivng everyone else in red. You can be right but still look stupid :-). I just bring all my stoles now wherever I go!
But this is a "confusion" that goes back pretty far in some Lutheran traditions, is it not? I don't have my liberary before me as I write, but I think that, in the Church of Sweden, the laying-on of hands at installations goes back to the 17th Century, if not to the 16th.
Dr. Tighe,
I was referring to the fact that our Agenda does not provide for this practice. So if it is being done; it is being done beyond the rubrical guidelines that our Synod has published.
Fr Weedon,
The TLH agenda for installations has "The assisting Ministers in turn may lay their right hand on his head, and the officiating minister says:"
Could this be a hold over from the idea that ordination is nothing more than the first installation as Fritz points out in his pastoral theology?
Thankfullly, the LSB does not have this may rubric.
Rev. Matthew J. Uttenreither, SSP
I may be wrong on this, however if memory serves, ordination uses the laying on of both hands by the bishop. So, ordination would use both hands, whereas laying on of the right hand only would be a different gesture than ordination and therefore its use at installations.
Nota bene: I am not arguing for or against the practice, just pointing out a difference in laying on of hands for ordination as distinct from other uses.
Fr. Uttenreither,
Yes, I think it is exactly a reflection of that. One more point for LSB actually being a bit better, though I don't think (going from memory) that LW Agenda had reference to laying on of hands at installations either.
Post a Comment