Bit left out?

[Psalm Project]

How many of you experienced today's second reading with the first paragraph purposely omitted?
In my church there was a 'post-it' sticky note placed in the AMBO lectionary requesting all readers to omit the text highlighted in red below. All were instructed to begin with the words 'Husbands' after the red highlighted text. The church mass bulletin had the same abridged version. My problem was that I had my missal with me with the full text...
I understand that the first bit of this reading is wide open to provocation of all kinds... and for genuine reasons. For women, it is like a red rag to a bull.
The St Louis Liturgy website had an interesting article on how to deal with this contentious piece of scripture...
Anyone want to feed into this thread?

The reading is:
SECOND READING Ephesians 5:21-32

Give way to one another in obedience to Christ. Wives should regard their husbands as they regard the Lord, since as Christ is head of the Church and saves the whole body, so is a husband the head of his wife; and as the Church submits~ to Christ, so should wives to their husbands, in everything. Husbands should love their wives just as Christ loved the Church and sacrificed himself for her to make her holy. He made her clean by washing her in water with a form of words, so that when he took her to himself she would be glorious, with no speck or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and faultless. In the same way, husbands must love their wives as they love their own bodies; for a man to love his wife is for him to love himself. A man never hates his own body, but he feeds it and looks after it; and that is the way Christ treats the Church, because it is his body - and we are its living parts. For this reason, a man must leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one body. This mystery has many implications; but I am saying it applies to Christ and the Church.

[Gabriel]

Psalm Project, if I remember correctly the Irish bishops asked the Holy See an number of years ago (c. 7?) if it would be possible to omit this verse and two other similar passages, I think they cited the number of cases of domestic abuse in Ireland. Permission was given by the Holy See.

[SAUnison]

For women, it is like a red rag to a bull. (Psalm Project)

Hmm... a bit of generalisation there, I think.

We had the full text in my Church this morning and, as one member of the fairer sex, I managed to listen to it without responding in a bovine manner.

Just speaking for myself, I have no problem with the text itself - understanding it was written for a different society. My issue, I suspect would be with how it has been (and, perhaps continues to be) misinterpreted.

[SOP]

I am with SAUnison on this one.

We had a baptism during Mass this morning so the second reading was left out but I have never had a problem with this passage.

[Psalm Project]

Gabriel,
I must check that out - It is the first time I have been made aware of such.
I don't have a difficulty with the full version - Indeed, it provides an opportunity for explication etc.
Would you drive your car if one of the wheel nuts was missing?
It's there for a reason!
Taking that piece of text out of the reading was really like giving it a dose of Dettol!

[Nick Baty]

Indeed, it provides an opportunity for explication etc.

Speaking as one who shuddered when I heard it this morning, can anyone explain it to me?

[Psalm Project]

I am looking for a reference in the Irish 2008 ordo (liturgical calerdar) - something was mentioned in there about the exclusion of that passage. I may have more detail later this evening.
A web reference that might shed a little light on the subject is at http://liturgy.slu.edu/21OrdB082309/the ... tered.html - written by John Kavanaugh S.J.
The historical context is one thing - and likely needs explanation - I doubt that any unfortunate in a congregation today who may be in an abusive relationship would appreciate any explanation of the bit I am referring to!

[nazard]

Surely the inspired thing about this passage is that it puts a complete symmetry onto the relationship between a man and a woman. St Paul starts by telling the man and the woman that the man is in charge. This gives the overconfident the feeling that he may do as he pleases, and puts the woman in her place, and was, we assume, just what the first century husband wanted to hear, and presumably the twenty first century bully still does. But then St Paul tempers it by expounding on how the husband should love his wife as he loves himself, and then goes on to set an even higher expectation that the relationship between a man and a woman should be as that between Christ and His church. That is a pretty high standard. Combine these paragraphs of St Paul with his statement elsewhere that there are no differences between us any more, man and woman, jew and gentile, etc. I think his meaning is quite clear.

[Nick Baty]

Read with 1st century ears it makes sense.
Read as a description of Christ's relationship with the Church it makes sense.
But you don't have to be a bully to hear "so is a husband the head of his wife" to mean exactly what it says.
I have some good friends who are evangelical Christians and they take this quite literally, believing that R is the head of the household and that he's in charge. Try telling P that she is R's equal and she turns quite pale.

[SAUnison]

Psalm Project, forgive me being dense, but I'm not quite sure where this thread is leading...

Is your issue with this particular text or with the general idea of editing readings?

I can see why some would find the Ephesians text awkward to contemporary sensibilities, but I think most people can manage to look beyond the language and see the meaning behind it. I don't think omitting the first few lines takes anything significant away from the essence of the text.

On the wider issue of editing readings - while I would agree that readings shouldn't be cut just because there are some 'difficult' sections, there can be legitimate pastoral/practical reasons for cutting parts of readings or omitting them entirely and some of those reasons have been mentioned already on this thread.

Personally, as cantor for the Psalm yesterday, I felt mildly odd singing a pleasant tune about God crushing evil doers - but perhaps that's just me!

[oopsorganist]

I always think it means do not fight. And share information.
Like pressing submit.
It's not a good word submit, I wonder what the original text is?
Oops pressed preview?
Press submit again.

[Psalm Project]

The issue was more to do with the systematic exclusion of the opening part of the reading (as exists in most missals and in the lectionary).
The nature of the language could easily be misinterpreted in a modern context.
I've just discovered that this omission is permitted - This years liturgical calendar outlines the reason in a liturgical note #14. It permits the Ephesians reading to be 5:25-32 instead of 5:21-32
Regrettably, I am unable to attach a pdf of the copy I made of that page and Copy/paste does not seem to work from pdf into this forum!
I was disappointed that the opening part of the reading was excluded (v's 21-24) - I felt it is part and parcel of the entire reading. My wife and I had great fun discussing it earlier today.
If people are able to interpret and understand the style of the language used, then there should not be a reason to exclude that bit surely?
I can think of several other readings which contain strange texts - Should we 'adapt' them to make them more acceptable as well?
It's no big deal really but I simply found it unusual. Having studied the texts earlier in the week, I was curiously looking forward to see how our priest was going to deal with it in his homily especially at one of our later masses where there is a large proportion of relatively younger families!

[Gabriel]

Isn't it the nature of a Lectionary that it is a selection of texts, edited with a purpose. You only have to look at next Sunday to see that all three readings have omitted verses.

The Introduction to Lectionary states:

3. Difficult texts
76. In readings for Sundays and solemnities, texts that present real difficulties are avoided for pastoral reasons. The difficulties may be objective, in that the texts themselves raise complex literary, critical, or exegetical problems; or, at least to a certain extent, the difficulties may lie in the faithful’s ability to understand the texts. But there could be no justification for depriving the faithful of the spiritual riches of certain texts on the grounds of difficulty if its source is the inadequacy either of the religious education that every Christian should have or of the biblical formation that every pastor should have. Often a diffiult reading is clarified by its correlation with another in the same Mass.
4. Omission of texts
77. The omission of verses in readings from Scripture has at times been the practice in many liturgical traditions, including the Roman. Admittedly such omissions may not be made lightly, for fear of distorting the meaning of the text or the intent and style of Scripture. Yet on pastoral grounds it was decided to continue the tradition in the present Order of Readings, but at the same time to ensure that the essential meaning of the text remained intact. One reason for the decision is that otherwise some texts would have been unduly long. It would also have been necessary to omit completely certain readings of high spiritual value for the faithful because those readings include some verse that is unsuitable pastorally or that involves truly difficult problems.

[Deke]

From SSG Preparing the Liturgy 21st week.

Letter of Paul to the Ephesians 5:21–32
The apostle Paul writes in a time when women were treated
like chattels – mere possessions of their menfolk! In that time,
Paul’s words were revolutionary: ‘Husbands should love their
wives just as Christ loved the Church… [they] must love their wives
as they love their own bodies… a man never hates his own body,
but he feeds it and looks after it.’ Paul speaks of that fundamental
equality in Christ through our one baptism and through the
gift of the Spirit we share. ‘This mystery’, writes the apostle,
‘has many implications, but I am saying it applies to Christ and
the Church.’ No longer Greek or Jew, male or female, slave or
free, we are now equally one in Christ.
Reader: This is dense reading, so take your time making space
for Paul’s meaning to come through. Contrast the ‘wives’ and
the ‘husbands’ and later ‘Christ’ and the ‘Church’.