Joint Liturgical Studies – serie

Joint Liturgical Studies offers a valuable contribution to the study of liturgy. Each issue considers a particular aspect of liturgical development, such as the origins of the Roman rite, Anglican Orders, welcoming the Baptised, and Anglican Missals. It is aimed at all with an academic interest in worship.It is published twice a year in partnership with the Alcuin Club, which promotes the study of Christian liturgy, and the Group for Renewal of Worship (GROW).

"Anglican Marriage Rites", edited by the late Kenneth Stevenson, offers three papers on issues relating to marriage and liturgy in the Anglican Communion. An essay by Kenneth Stevenson sets the scene and provides the necessary background. In two further essays Thomas Cooper and Philip Tovey explore some relevant theological, cultural and liturgical issues. The essays in this issue of "JLS" formed the basis for the discussions at the International Anglican Liturgical Consultation in Canterbury in August 2011.

Ordo Romanus Primus (ORP) is a descriptive account in Latin of the papal mass at Easter in Santa Maria Maggiore, probably at some time in the seventh or eighth century. It is the first such account, and differs from earlier evidence of the Roman rite by its relative disregard for the spoken text, which is usually only cited in ORP as providing cues for the ceremonial action. The ‘action’, however, is detailed, is often surprising, and gives a three-dimensional approach to a rite which, in its textual form, only tells the half of what was happening. The whole action is set on a large canvas, so that the account starts with the procession of the papal household from the Lateran. As Alan Griffiths put it ‘the nature of ORP is to be a key to ritual business, not to text’, and he adds ‘one might describe it as an “events management” document.’There has been no full edition of the text in English since that of Atchley in 1905, and his translation has today a highly dated look to it. Alan Griffiths has drawn upon the Latin text collated by Michel Andrieu in his French edition of the ordines Romani in 1948, and has provided his own fresh and contemporary translation of it into English, running in parallel columns with the Latin. It makes a valuable addition to the series of Joint Liturgical Studies which have made such a large range of patristic liturgical materials available to students who work largely in English.