What to Expect in an Episcopal Worship Service

The Place of Worship

 As you enter, you will notice an atmosphere of worship and reverence. Episcopal churches are built in many architectural styles, but whether the church is large or small, elaborate or plain, your eye is carried to the alter, or holy table, and to the cross. So our thoughts are taken at once to Christ and to God whose house the church is.

On or near the alter there are candles to remind us that Christ is the "Light of the World". Often there are flowers, to beautify God's house and to recall the resurrection of Jesus.

On one side of the front of the church, there may be a lecturn-pulpit, or stand, for the proclamation of the Word. Here the Scriptures are read and the sermon is preached. In many churches, however, the lectern is separate from the pulpit and stands on the opposite side ot the church.

 The Act of Worship

 Episcopal Church services are congregational. In the pews you will find the Book of Common Prayer, the use of which enables the congregation to share fully in every service. The large print is the actual service. The smaller print gives directions to minister and people for conduct of the service.

You may wonder when to stand or kneel. Practices vary - even among individual Episcopalians. The general rule is to stand to sing - hymns (found in the Hymnal in the pews) and other songs (many of them from the Holy Bible) called canticles or chants and printed as part of the service. We stand, too, to say our affirmation of faith, the Creed; and for the reading of the Gospel in the Holy Eucharist. Psalms are sung or said sitting or standing. We sit during readings from the Old Testament or New Testament Letters, the sermon, and the choir anthems. We stand or kneel for prayer to show our gratefulness to God for accepting us as children or as an act of humility before God.

Regular Services

The principal service is the Holy Eucharist (Holy Communion). In some Episcopal churches it is celebrated quite simply, without music, early on Sunday Morning. Weekday celebrations also are frequent without music, and without sermon. When celebrated at a later hour on Sundays, or on Holidays, such as Christmas, music and sermon are customary.

Another service is Morning Prayer. The parallel evening service is Evening Prayer. These services consist of psalms, Bible readings, and prayers; and may include a sermon. They may be with or without music.

While some parts of the services are always the same, others change. At the Holy Eucharist, for example, two or three Bible selections are read. These change each Sunday, as do the psalms and certain of the prayers.

We hope you will find the services of the Episcopal Church beautiful in their ordered dignity, God-centered, and mindful of the nature and needs of human beings. If the service is different to the worship service you are accustomed to, feel free to just close your eyes and allow the service to connect you to God and feel closer to heaven. We want you to experience God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit in your worship experience at Saint Timothy's.

Before and After Services

It is custom upon entering church to kneel or sit in one's pew for a prayer of personal preparation for worship. In many churches it is also the custom to bow to the altar on entering and leaving the church as an act of rverence for Christ. Remember, Christ gave his life on the cross for you and for me. We at St. Timothy's try to be ever mindful of this act and the grace if offers to each of us as we each walk toward a closer relationship with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Episcopalians often use the quiet time before a service for personal meditation and devotions. At the end of the service so persons kneel for a private prayer before leaving. Others sometimes sit and listen to the organ postlude.

Vestments

To add to the beauty and festivity of the services, and to signify their special ministries, the clergy and other ministers wear vestments. The clergy may wear a cassock (usually black) and a white, gathered over gown called a surplice.

Another familiar vestment is the alb; a white tunic with sleeves that cover the body from neck to ankles. Over it (or over the surplice) ordained ministers wear a stole, a narrow band of colored fabric. Deacons wear the stole over on shoulder, priests and bishops over both shoulders.

At the Holy Eucharist a bishop or priest frequently wears a chasuble (a circular garment that envelopes over the body) over the alb and stole. The deacon's corresponding vestment has sleeves and is called a dalmatic. Bishops sometimes wear a special head covering called a mitre.

Stoles, chasubles, and dalmatics, as well as alter coverings, are usually made of rich fabrics. Their color changes with the seasons and holy days of the Church Year. The most frequently used colors are white, red violet, and green.

The Church Year

The Episcopal Church observes the traditional Christian calendar. The season of Advent, during which we prepare for Christmas, begins on the Sunday slosest to November 30. Christmas itself lasts twelve days, after which we celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany (January 6).

Lent, the forty days of preparation for Easter, begins on Ash Wednesday. Easter season lasts fifty days, concluding on the Feast of Pentecost.

During these times the Bible readings are chosen for their appropriateness to the season. During the rest of the year - the season after Epiphany and the long season after Pentecost (except for a few special Sundays) - the New Testament is read sequentially from Sunday to Sunday. The Old Testament lesson corresponds in these with one of the New Testament readings.

The Bible redings are printed in advance in St. Timothy's monthly newsletter so you can read in advance of the worship service in preparation fo worship and so you can enrich your worship experience each week. Sunday school teachers do this to encourage children to discuss Sunday school with their parents as a true family experience. Pay attention in church, your child may ask you questions about what they learned in Sunday school.

Coming and Going

Greeters and Ushers will greet you. If you desire, they will briefly answer your questions about the service. Pews are usually unreserved at St Timothy's church.

Following the service, the Rector greets the people as they leave.

We Will Not Embarrass You

When you visit here, you will be our respected and welcome guest. You will not be singled out in an embarrasing way, nor asked to stand before the congregation or to come forward. You will worship God with us.

Should you wish to know more about the Episcopal Church or how one becomes an Episcopalian, the Rector will gladly answer your questions and suggest the way to membership.

Episcopal Worship Traditions

Worship Service Schedule

Worship Service Schedule

Sunday

8:00 a.m. Holy Eucharist Rite I, free nursery care provided

9:45 a.m. Children's Chapel followed by Sunday School

9:45 a.m. Teen Sunday School

10:00 a.m. Holy Eucharist Rite II with organ and choir, free nursery care provided

Thursday

10:00 a.m. Holy Eucharist Rite II or Morning Prayer

Nursery

The nursery is located through the red school gates, school rooms on the left. Care is provided for infants through age 4.

Lectionary

Lectionary Resources

Episcopal Church Revised Common Lectionary Page

Weekly Lectionary Readings

Revised Common Lectionary

The four scripture passages that are recited each Sunday come from a three-year rotation called the lectionary. Its goal is to break down the Old and New Testaments into readings that allow more than two-thirds of the Bible to be heard in worship every three years. The major advantage of this approach is that it ensures that the Bible is comprehensively read in worship. It takes the selec-tion of scripture out of the hands of individual clergy who will always be biased toward certain favorite passages and against others that they might prefer to sidestep. Another advantage is that Sunday readings are arranged to reinforce themes of the sea-sons of the church calendar year – especially Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, and Easter. A disadvantage of using the lectionary is that it is often hard to track from week to week. Although the lectionary does move through the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke in mostly se-quential order, passages from the other books mostly appear in a scattered order. Using the lectionary also makes it difficult to organize worship around topical themes, such as a sermon series on the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit cited in Galatians 5:22-23 or a month-long outreach effort that would best be reinforced by scriptures dealing with charity, compassion and service. The original lectionary used in Episcopal Churches was al-most identical to the one produced by the Roman Catholic Church in 1969. All three years of its readings can be found in the back of our Book of Common Prayer starting on page 888. Last year at this time we at St. Timothy’s switched from using the prayer book lectionary to the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL), an update produced by a consortium of North American and International Biblical Scholars. The primary distinction of the RCL is that it offers a new progression of Old Testament read-ings that flow more sequentially, like the Gos-pels. Under the original Roman Catholic and Episcopal lectionaries the Old Testament readings were nearly always thematically matched with the message of the Gospel passage for the day. The tradeoff for that was that they always jumped around. Neither approach is more right than the other. It simply comes down to understanding the goals of each and using them according to their inherent strengths. In addition to the Sunday lectionary, there is also a daily lectionary. As its name suggests, this series breaks down the Bible into daily, manageable passages that cover more than 95% of the entire Bible in two years. The daily lectionary is ideal for individuals or small groups who want to take on the discipline of daily Bible reading but feel overwhelmed by the prospect. Like the Sunday lectionary, the daily one is also found in the back of our prayer book starting on page 934. Each month in the St. Timothy’s Times we publish a table of the upcoming Sunday readings for the month. Taking time to read these scriptures before coming to church helps you to better understand the passages and their contexts when they are read and preached on in worship. Waiting to hear them cold and for the first time at church inevitably results in some of the meaning getting lost. Reading the scriptures ahead of time can really enhance the worship experience.