Relationship a ‘visible witness of the possibility of reconciliation’
With an evening Eucharist on Feb. 10 that blended elements of the liturgical and musical practices of both traditions, representatives of the Episcopal Church and the two provinces of the Moravian Church in North America formally inaugurated a full-communion relationship between the denominations.
The service at Central Moravian Church in downtown Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, the seat of the Moravian Church’s Northern Province, included a newly written Liturgy for Christian Unity from the Moravian Book of Worship and an Eucharistic prayer adapted from the 4th century liturgy attributed to St. Basil the Great (The Book of Common Prayer’s Eucharistic Prayer D). Most of the hymns came from the Moravian Book of Worship and while some hymns are also found in the Episcopal Church’s 1982 hymnal, many were unique to the Moravian tradition.
Close to a dozen Episcopal bishops, bishops of the Northern and Southern Provinces of the Moravian Church, members of the Episcopal Church’s Standing Commission on Ecumenical Relations and the Moravian-Episcopal Dialogue (the group that guided the development of the full-communion proposal), and representatives from ecumenical partners and from the Anglican Church of Canada participated in the Eucharist. A near-capacity congregation filled Central Moravian Church.
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and Moravian Provincial Elders Conference presidents, the Rev. Dr. Elizabeth D. Miller (Northern Province) and the Rev. David Guthrie (Southern Province) officiated at the service.
The service opened with the Liturgy for Christian Unity led by President of the Episcopal Church House of Deputies Bonnie Anderson and the Rev. Dr. William McElveen, co-chair of the Southern Province, who was part of the Moravian Episcopal Dialogue. The prayers, which according to the order of service conform to classical Moravian ecumenical theology, focused on the unity of faith, hope and love that exists among all Christians.
In addition to the Eucharist itself, a focal point of the service came when the Episcopal Church bishops knelt before the participating Moravian bishops, who laid hands on them and prayed. The prayer, from the Episcopal Church’s “Enriching Our Worship,” was repeated by the Episcopal Church bishops as they laid hands on the kneeling Moravian bishops.
— Report by The Rev. Mary Frances Schjonberg, national correspondent for the Episcopal News Service.
For fuller report on the background to this development see:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79425_127046_ENG_HTM.htm