Mass in the Geez Rite

[HallamPhil]

On Saturday 5 December I was privileged to be part of a celebration of Mass in the Geez Rite (Ethiopia and Eritrea) at St Marie's Cathedral Sheffield. Fr Solomon from Eritrea is on the staff there and concelebrated with two colleagues. The Mass lasted 2 hours and 15 minutes but this did not concern me at all as all was conducted with such attention to detail and joy. The joy bit got me thinking of Bishop Michael Evans comments at the SSG Summer School regarding our often miserable disposition. Since the Mass was taking place at the usual time for the Saturday evening Mass of Sunday we felt we needed to include something for the regular congregation (hence my attendance). Since the organ is on the sanctuary we chose not to se this as this would have been too close to the 'holy of holies' so we, like our visitors, chose music that could be done a cappella. Clearly influenced by the orthodox rites interesting features included the homily shared by all priests present, the complex fraction rite (and intentional reassembling of the fractured bits!), the use of icons, and the intinction. The celebrations continued into the night ... well folk had travelled far and wide to attend so they neede to make a night of it!

[mcb]

Sounds like a rare treat. What was the language - English or Ge'ez?

[presbyter]

On Saturday 5 December I was privileged to be part of a celebration of Mass in the Geez Rite (Ethiopia and Eritrea).......Clearly influenced by the orthodox rites .........

In the Roman Empire - broad sweeping statement coming up here - Rite followed Patriarchate - and what you celebrated was probably the Alexandrian Rite (Liturgy of Saint Mark). There's a brief statement in Wiki - which is not that informative - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandrian_Rite - but it does give a link to this - http://www.faswebdesign.com/ECPA/Worship/Mark.html.

If anyone is ever in Rome - try Sunday Vespers at the Ethiopian College. It gets quite percussive in some places!

[Southern Comfort]

If I remember rightly, the Ethopian Rite is the one where the gifts of bread and wine are carried in inside a large hat?

And here's a YouTube video of part of a Ge'ez Rite Confirmation liturgy which I haven't watched yet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9G-r2N-w6g

[HallamPhil]

The language was predominately Geez and a reasonable amount of English but the 38 page booklet had translations to assist both parties. To answer SC I was not aware of a hat but I'd have to say the bread did look like bread ... none of this wafer thin stuff ... and so substantial as to suggest that no hat would have been sufficient. The Book of the Gospels was enshrouded in rich cloth somewhat akin to Jewish practice.

[HallamPhil]

Ovwe the summer I attended Greenbelt Festival and three lectures by Rita Brock drew my attention to there being no depictions of Christ dead or crucified in the early western Church art until 960AD. I did wonder if this was also behind the presiding Fr Solomon's insistence on using a 'bare' cross for his many blessings.

[gwyn]

The Book of the Gospels was enshrouded in rich cloth somewhat akin to Jewish practice.

The Jews have come a long way then.

[HallamPhil]

Ha ha .. deep belly laugh .. I think you know what I mean.