The Sarum Mass,
as published by St. Hilarion Press,
Defended

Reply to [Fr.] Benjamin Johnson, Antiochian Archdiocese, by Fr. Aidan (Keller), Russian Church Abroad

The Sarum Mass is the Liturgy of the old Roman rite as preserved in England. It is authorised for use in the eparchy of Abp. Hilarion of Sydney, Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia. The St. Hilarion Press (SHP) was an old calendarist Western rite press, which formerly issued a number of Sarum liturgical books, beginning in 1988. On Sept. 26, 2008, these St. Hilarion Press books were blessed by Metropolitan Hilarion of New York, Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, for actual use in church. The 45 Objections are to the historical accuracy of this Sarum liturgy as blessed by the Russian Orthodox Church.

Background:  In 2004 Ben Johnson, an advocate for the Antiochian Western rite, posted 45 public accusations against the SHP text. Below each objection is followed by a reply from the text's editor, Fr. Aidan (Keller). Mr. Johnson wrote his objections with the mistaken understanding that a certain e-text from St. Petroc's Monastery, Cascades, Tasmania (ROCOR), was a Sarum Mass. Therefore the replies below make reference to St. Petroc's Sarum-based mass-text, called "Usus Cascadae," or "Use of Cascades," as a more pertinent point of comparison and contrast. It has not been possible to determine whether or not Mr. Johnson became a clergyman of the Antiochian jurisdiction.
    

Objection 1:  The ROCOR specifies a different (and very familiar!) hymn to be sung during the entrance from your version.

Reply:  This is a Protestant hymn ("Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God almighty") written by R. Heber (+1826). I remember hearing this fine hymn at my grandmother's Methodist church when a boy. The Cascades Sarum text gives the same procedure as the SHP Sarum: the ancient Office ("officium") of the day is sung as the clergy enter.

Objection 2:  The authentic Sarum Rite does not prescribe bidding prayers; yours includes many elaborate prayers.

Reply:  Bidding prayers (called "preces dicendae") are appointed in every edition of the Sarum Processional. In the "Processionale ad usum Insignis ac Praeclarae Ecclesiae Sarum" printed at Leeds by M'Corquodale & Co., Ltd., in 1882, they are found on pp. 6-8.  In Legg's "The Sarum Missal Edited from Three Early Manuscripts, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1916, they are found on p. 13: "In stacione non dicatur antiphona de cruce ante inceptionem hystorie Deus omnium. sed finitis precibus consuetis quae omnibus dominicis solent dici... inchoetur resp." That is, "At the station the antiphon of the Cross is not said prior to the beginning of the history Deus Omnium, but once the prayers are finished which are accustomed to be said on all Sundays... the responsory is begun."

Objection 3:  The ROCOR Sarum has no censing after the kiss of peace; yours incenses the altar, relics, chancel, clergy, icons and then the people.

Reply:  The Cascades Sarum text does show the same procedure as the SHP Sarum: the kiss of peace at the entrance is following by the censing. Legg's Sarum Missal has, "Deinde osculetur diaconum et subdiaconum dicens Habete pacis osculum... postea accedat ad altare... Benediction super incensum... Tunc incenset altare," etc. In English: "Then he shall kiss the deacon and subdeacon, saying "Receive the kiss of peace"... after that he shall go to the altar... Blessing over the incense... Then he shall cense the altar," etc.

Objection 4:  The ROCOR Sarum Rite has the penitential nine-fold Gregorian Kyrie; yours has interpolated litanies.

Reply:  All Sarum Missals have interpolated litanies. In the Legg Missal they appear on pp. 1-5.  But it should be noted that often they were written in a separate part of the missal from the Ordinary (the order of service). These litanies are in all Old English rites, and were also used in France, Germany, Spain, and Italy, incl. Rome itself. St. Gregory the Great mentions them in his letter to Bp. John of Syracuse: "With us, it is said by the clergy and answered by the people... but in daily masses, we are silent from those things which are accustomed to be said, and we say only `Kyrieleyson' and Xpisteleyson.'"  (from `Fundamentals of the Liturgy,' by John H. Miller, CSC).

Objection 5:  There is no "second entrance" similar to that of the Byzantine Rite in the authentic Sarum Rite.

Reply:  There is; the Sarum Missale printed by F.H. Dickinson, Burntisland Press, 1861-1883, says in column 589: "Post introitum vero missae, unus ceroferariorum panem, vinum, et aquam, quae ad eucharistiae ministrationem disponuntur, deferat," etc.  That is, "After the entrance of the mass, one of the taper-bearers shall bring in bread, wine, and water, which are arranged for the ministration of the eucharist," etc.  This entrance with the eucharistic elements is characteristic of Old English uses.

... your rubrics call for the servers to pass "behind the altar," a physical impossibility in ROCOR WRITE churches, ...

Reply:  The original altar in the Sarum cathedral was free-standing, which is simply the usual pre-Schism and mediaeval usage in churches of England, France, Germany, Spain, and Italy (see `Fasti Sarisburienses' by Christopher Wordsworth).

 ... which traditionally have the altar against the wall. They have not "returned" to the Vatican II standing table.

Reply:  Western rite Orthodox people need not depend, in their liturgical sensitivities, upon Roman Catholicism's recent activities and issues. We have our own tradition, predating that of the Papacy. And in fact the old practice of the Roman church is the same as the Sarum practice shown in the SHP Sarum text - the altar was free-standing, and not placed against a wall. Of course, in smaller chapels, the altar may have to stand right against the east wall, and there is certainly no harm in that. In fact, some small Byzantine rite churches, such as the chapel of Sts. John of Rila and of Kronstadt at Jordanville, have the holy table directly against the east wall.

Objection 6:  Authentic Sarum retains the familiar, longer form of the Confiteor; you have a shortened form.

Reply:  The currently-posted Cascades text gives a shorter, Sarum-style confiteor. It differs only slightly from the SHP Sarum text. It is the SHP text which, of the two, is taken verbatim from Sarum books. The Burntisland missal says, in column 580: "Confiteor Deo, beatae Mariae, omnibus sanctis, et vobis; quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, locutione, et opere: mea culpa: precor sanctam Mariam, omnes sanctos Dei, et vos, orare pro me."  And that is exactly how the SHP text reads.

Objection 7:  Authentic Sarum does not specify the priest prays the first-person Ambrosian preparation prayers; yours does.

Reply:  Here it may be noted, that in the matter of devotional prayers the Priest may say before the Mass, which are a form of apologiae, it is rare for any two Sarum books to agree. Clearly, this is not a matter that defines the Sarum-ness of a text. Further, apologiae prayers are by their very definition ad libitum prayers, said by the Priest as he has inclination and time. By definition they may be omitted, or shortened, or other apologiae substituted, with no disruption to the Sarum order of service. For example, many Priests in olden days own books of apologiae and said them during Mass, with no attempt to particularly correspond to the local diocesan use. There are certain apologiae which were typical for Old English Priests to use, and those are provided in the Old Sarum Rite Missal. Those referenced in objection 7. are printed in "The Leofric Missal, as Used in the Cathedral, etc., ed. F.E. Warren, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1883, p. 8).

Objection 8:  Authentic Sarum does not prescribe the long, first-person "apologiae" yours does.

Reply:  They are prescribed in the Sarum Missal which was given to the church at Bromisgrove by the prior of Worcester Cathedral in 1511: "Oratio sancti Augustini dicenda a sacerdote in missa dum canitur Officium et Kyrie et Gloria in excelsis et Credo in unum, vel tota dicitur ante missam… Summe sacerdos et vere Pontifex, qui Te obtulisti Deo Patri hostiam vivam," etc. (Burntisland Sarum Missal, col. 567-572).  In English that is, "Prayer of St. Augustine to be said by the priest at mass when there is being sung the Officium and the Kyrie and the Gloria in excelsis and Credo in unum, or the whole prayer is said before the mass... "O High Priest and true Hierarch, Who didst offer Thyself to God the Father upon the altar of the Cross as a living Lamb," etc. Here it may be noted that the Cascades Sarum text is not faulty for omitting the prayer; this simply follows the authentic usage of certain other Sarum books.

Objection 9:  Authentic Sarum does not include the next long, first-person "apologiae" after the Sequence.

Reply:  It is a continuation of the above prayer. Also, remember, it is an apologia, a prayer which is ad libitum by its very definition.

Objection 10:  Your translation of the Creed says the Trinity is "adored and glorified"; the ROCOR Sarum has the more specific "worshipped and glorified."

Reply:  The words "adored" and "worshipped" are both accurate translations of the original Latin word "adoratur." 

... There are other differences in wording, as well, which, though not heretical, most Orthodox Christians - generally opposed to tampering with the wording of the Creed - would find unwise and unwelcome.

Reply:  This "unwise and unwelcome" translation is precisely that which was used by the faithful of the Antiochian Patriarchate's Western rite mission in England in the early part of the 20th c.  It is an accurate 19th century translation, without the Filioque.

Objection 11:  Once again, the authentic Sarum does not include the long, first-person "Apologiae" before the Secret Prayers.

Reply:  In the SHP Sarum text, there are no apologiae before the Secret Prayers.

Objection 12:  Authentic Sarum has no Byzantine-style "Dismissal of the Catechumens." ("Let the Catechumens depart out of the doors!")

Reply:  This is not a Byzantine-style but a Western-style dismissal, and was the standard practice of the Roman rite in England, France, and elsewhere till at least the 12th c.  The precise text, even, is given in Latin by Master John Beleth in his "De Officiis," British Library MS. Reg. 7, C VII: "Prima pars, usque Offertorium, dicitur Missa Cathecuminorum vel Neophytorum, quod fere idem est. Cathecuminus dicitur noviter instructus nondum vero baptizatus… amplius enim non licet eis interesse, neque Judeis, neque Gentibus, quoniam nondum sunt membra Ecclesiae. Sed tunc diaconus stans in pulpito alta voce debet dicere, `Exeant catechumini foras!' "  In English, that's: "The first part, up to the Offertory, is called the Mass of the Catechumens or Neophytes, which is essentially the same thing. We call one instructed but not yet baptized a catechumen... for it is not right for them to be in attendance after that point, and not Jews either, nor Gentiles, because they are not yet members of the Church.  But at that point the deacon, standing in the rood-loft, is required to say in a loud voice, `Let the catechumens depart out the doors!' " Of course this dismissal is not a function of one diocesan use or another, not a Sarum vs. York feature, for example, but an overarching pastoral directive. This highlights one advantage of using the older forms of the Roman rite: there is much that is pastorally useful to today's situation on the ground.

Objection 13:  The ROCOR Sarum has a different Cherubic hymn before the Suscipe.

Reply:  The SHP Sarum does not have a cherubic hymn at all; the Cascades Sarum text has both the offertory (which is Sarum) and an imported cherubic hymn, "Let all mortal flesh keep silence." "Let all mortal" is a 19th century Protestant hymn text, of which some fifteen percent is taken from a cherubic hymn belonging to the ancient  Liturgy of St. James. No Sarum liturgical book has a cherubic hymn.

Objection 14:  After the Suscipe, the ROCOR Sarum Rite has no Ambrosian apologiae prayer. (Seeing a trend?) Another translation has a confession prayer, but not the one you included.

Reply:  This apologia "Ignosce Domine" is known to have been said at this point in England, and this was true regardless of the local use. To remind, apologiae are by definition not fixed to a particular use (say, Sarum vs. York), and are ad libitum prayers. It might raise fewer eyebrows to simply omit any apologiae from the SHP Sarum text, but then the richness of the Mass as practiced before 1200 A.D. would not be so well communicated. (The year 1200 is the rough time-frame when the practice of saying apologiae fell away--in favour of the Priest's repeating what the choir has already sung.)  "Ignosce Domine" is found in the Leofric Missal, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1883, p. 9, and in other older books.

Objection 15:  Authentic Sarum has no procession of faithful placing their own bread, wine and gifts in the priest's hand, kissing it as he prays they'll get a hundred-fold more money back as they give.

Reply:  To take the second point first, the SHP text does not mention money, and the interpretation of the "hundredfold" quote from Matt. 19:29 as worldly financial gain, is not the Patristic one (the "hundredfold" are the riches of spiritual life in Christ).  Nextly, the fact that this procession was part of the Sarum use and other Old English uses is documented by Dr. Rock in his "Church of Our Fathers," vol. 4. It is in the 2nd Sarum Pontifical, and in Canon Simmons' "Lay-folks' Mass-Book, p. 236). British Library Harleian MS. 561, a Sarum liturgical book, says, ""Tunc accedat diaconus et offerat episcopo patenam et calicem... Offerentes vero... osculantes ejus manum dexteram... Dicat interim singulis sic: Centuplum accipies et vitam aeternam possidebis, in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti, amen." That is, "Then let the deacon come and offer the bishop the paten and chalice... But the offerants... kissing his right hand, ... Let him say meanwhile to each of them this: Thou shalt receive a hundredfold, and possess eternal life, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen." According to the old Western canons, the lawful gifts are bread, wine, candles, and other items for use in church.

Objection 16:  After the Lavabo, ROCOR Sarum has no "In the spirit of humility," although another Sarum translation does.

Reply:  The Cascades Sarum text has "In the spirit of humility," just as the SHP Sarum text has.

Objection 17:  Again, here the ROCOR Sarum and yours truly differ; they include the "Protestant, Cranmerian" memorials before the Sursum Corda; yours proceeds directly to it.

Reply:  The Cascades Sarum text reflects the same order at this point as that found in the SHP Sarum text.

Objection 18:  The ROCOR Sarum does not instruct the priest to kiss the Missal and recite "Adorate."

Reply:  The Cascades text does not, it is true, include this directive or this prayer, which is "Adoramus," not "Adorate." But this practice is well-documented for the Sarum use. In the Sarum Missal printed in 1489 at Basle by M. Wenssler, we find just before the Canon of the Mass: "Adoramus te christe and benedicimus tibi quia per sanctam crucem tuam redemisti mundum." This is provided, in English, in the SHP text. Like nearly all printed Sarum missals, there is a kissing-cross printed at the foot of the full-page crucifixion. What was done with these kissing-crosses in Old English usage is made clear by an explicit rubric in the Hereford missal: "Sanctus... Postea sacerdos adorans crucifixum dicat Adoramus," etc. That is, "Sanctus... Afterwards the priest, venerating the Crucified, shall say Adoramus," etc. That this was the custom across England was confirmed for me by the librarian at Westminster Abbey (the abbey's great missal has a kissing-cross in it).

Objection 19:  Again, ROCOR Sarum uses Cranmer's canon.

Reply:  This reference is to the Book of Common Prayer anaphora. The Cascades Sarum text does in fact give the Sarum canon, as does the SHP text.

Objection 20:  There is no authentic Sarum rubric instructing the choir to chant Psalms 19, 24, 50, 89, and 90 during the canon of "Low Masses" where the canon is read silently.

Reply:  In the SHP Sarum text which Ben was examining, as well as in the Old Sarum Rite Missal (OSRM), there is no directive to sing these Psalms, though in the OSRM they are appended separately. In the Liturgy booklet Ben was examining, there is a footnote which identifies this as an alternative practice. Different ways of doing the Canon are known in the historical periods of Sarum usage: (a) old Roman (Canon sung aloud); (b) 10th c. Anglo-Saxon (soft canon with singing of Psalms); (c) 10th-12th c. practice in England (soft canon, elongated Sanctus tropes meantime); (d) later Sarum practice (soft canon with nothing else sung meantime). The laity book does, however, show the Psalms.  It should be noted that a "low mass" practice is absent both from the historical Sarum books and from the SHP Sarum books.

Objection 21:  Authentic Sarum does not have your odd, alternate reading for the Memento.

Reply:  Here is another ad libitum issue. In various Sarum missals, the Priest pauses here and commemorates the living faithful ad libitum.  The words he is to say are not usually specified, though sometimes an outline is given (first, for himself; next, for his father and mother; next, for particular friends; etc.). What I did was help the priest by providing a specific text for these ad lib prayers, from the 10th c. Canterbury missal called the "Leofric" ("The Leofric Missal," F.E. Warren, Oxford, Clarendon, 1883, the commemoration wording is on p. 175).

Objection 22:  Authentic Sarum does not have the long, first-person intercession during the canon. Despite your professed devotion to the Gregorian Liturgy, YOU HAVE TAMPERED WITH THE CANON!!   [emphasis and exclamation marks in the original]

Reply:  Ben was referring to the apologia prayer "Remember me, I pray Thee, O Lord," which is in all the oldest English liturgical books. It was a standard Old English apologia, so it is fitting to reproduce in the missal. It can also be omitted without compromising the service in any way (see previous remarks on apologiae and how they function in the Old English rites). But it was the pre-Schism Anglo-Saxon clergy, not I, who "tampered" with the Canon here. Roman Catholic traditionalists of today often have stressed the concept that the Canon is an unchanging form into which nothing can be added or changed with the exception of the Communicantes and Hanc Igitur prayers. But prior to the 13th c. it was quite common to insert into the Canon apologiae, or additional Saints' names. In fact, this older practice of adding to the Canon is mentioned approvingly by Fr. John Connely, Dean of the Antiochian Western Rite Vicariate, in his article "Lux Occidentalis." On p. 11 of his article, as it appears at www.westernorthodox.com, having quoted the Canterbury missal of Abp. Robert of Canterbury--which includes additional Saints' names in the Canon--he writes, "Perhaps the names of Aetheldreda and Gertrude might be restored to the "Orthodox Missal" (the AWRV service book)."

Objection 23:  In authentic Sarum, after "Through Him, with Him, in Him," the people are not instructed to "prostrate and kiss the ground." That is a Byzantine rubric.

Reply:  It is not a Byzantine but an English rubric.  "Lay-Folks Mass Book," edited by Canon Simmons, explains that the usage of many English churches was to kneel here. As documented in Eamon Duffy's "Stripping of the Altars," the method of "kneeling" in Old England (called "prostratio" in the Latin of the rubrics) was to (a) kneel on both knees; (b) trace a cross on the ground with the thumb; (c) bend forward to kiss the cross so traced; (d) rise to his feet. This practice is also referred to by Dr. Rock in "Church of Our Fathers," Vol. III, p. 274. The practice of kissing the ground is not found in the Byzantine rite.

... Moreover, the priest is instructed only to elevate the Eucharist slightly; your rubrics are not spelled out here, but I anticipate the elevation is more significant than the authentic rubrics call for.

Reply:  That the elevation at this point, towards the end of the Canon, precedes the devised elevation inserted after the Schism into the Canon, and originally was considered the more important, is documented in J. Wickham Legg's "Tracts on the Mass" and, if I recall correctly, Jungmann's "Sollemnia Missarum."  But surely the issue of whether a Priest's arms are raised to the chest or above the shoulders is really a discussion of ceremonial taste, rather than the integrity of a rite.

Objection 24:  ROCOR and traditional Sarum translate the Our Father "forgive us our trespasses," not "debts/debtors," technically a correct translation but one in the West with a decidedly Protestant ring.

Reply:  "Traditional Sarum" was in Latin and has "debita" and "debitoribus." The most accurate translation of these words into English is "debts" and "debtors."  On the other hand, if a community is already used to "trespasses," they can easily continue with the wording familiar to them. 

Objection 25:  The authentic Sarum "Libera Nos" (your "Byzantinization" in the St. Andrew's Service Book!) does not commemorate "Thy chosen Archangels Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael" as yours does, nor does it mention John the Baptist, nor John the Baptist, [sic] much less "John the Baptist Thy Forerunner"! That's a pronouncedly Byzantine title.

Reply:  The printed Sarum books do not refer to the archangels nor to St. John the Baptist here. However, the Sarum Pontifical of Bishop Osmund (actually a 10th-c. book belonging to Bishop Osmund later) specifically says that other names may be added here, so it is not out of keeping with Sarum procedure to add names. The specific form of commemorating these specific Saints is verbatim from a purely Latin, Gregorian text found in the Vatican liturgical scholarly series "Studi e Testi."  No Byzantine text is involved.

Objection 26:  Immediately before the Agnus Dei, the ROCOR Sarum Rite includes the prayer, "Christ our Paschal Lamb...."

Reply:  While this prayer is found in some Anglican books, it is not found in any Sarum book. Thus, it is not found in the SHP Sarum text.

... The ancient Sarum does not include the prayer, "O Lord Jesus Christ, Who didst say to Thine Apostles...." I'll give you that one, though; I love that prayer.  :)

Reply:  I too love this prayer. It is found in earlier Sarum books (J. Wickham Legg, "The Sarum Missal from Three Early Manuscripts," Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1916, p. 226). Other, later Sarum books omit it, as does the Cascades text. This latter usage is a legitimate Sarum practice also.

Objection 28:  Immediately before the "Domine non sum dignus," the ROCOR Sarum Rite includes the dreaded Cranmerian "Prayer of Humble Access"!

Reply:  The Cascades Sarum text does not include the BCP Prayer of Humble Access, just as the SHP Sarum does not. In fact, the Cascades Sarum text does not have a "Domine non sum dignus" at all.

Objection 29:  Peculiarly, the ROCOR Sarum Rite has the "Ecce Agnus Dei" immediately before communion, rather than before the "Domine non sum dignus." Your service does not include this prayer.

Reply:  The Cascades Sarum text locates "Ecce Agnus Dei" just before the Agnus Dei and not just before communion. But no Sarum missal includes "Ecce Agnus Dei"--which is from the Tridentine use of the Roman rite.  

Objection 30:  Although it is an established Gregorian custom, neither translation of the Sarum Rite agrees with your rubric of exchanging a Confiteor before the communion of the faithful.

Reply:  As was true across Europe towards the close of the middle ages in the Roman rite, the communion of the people dropped entirely out of the Mass in the later forms of the English uses. Though it seems very odd to ponder this today, Communion was actually given outside of service times, at a side altar. Still, in England, when people communed, the confiteor was recited first. The Customary of St. Augustine's, Canterbury, says of communicants, "Dicent Confiteor... et tunc accedent ad sanctam communionem." That is, "They say the Confiteor... and then they go to Holy Communion." The older Sarum practice of communing during Mass is profitable and the ROCOR Sarum liturgies show the same procedure (of communing during Mass) as the SHP text gives.

Objection 31:  Certainly, no translation of the Sarum Rite has your rip-off of the Byzantine Rite's exhortation. Your words, "with fear and faith, let us draw near...let us give glory to Him, crying with the Angels, alleluya!" [sic.] The first part is immediately recognizable as the priest's exhortation from the Liturgy of St. John Chryostom, "In the fear of God, with faith and love draw near." The latter part echoes the Byzantine communion hymn, "Praise the Lord in heavens, praise Him in the highest, alleluia!"

Reply:  The communion antiphon referred to is not Byzantine at all, but is the "antiphona cum plebs communicet" in the 1st and 2nd Winchester Tropers and the Canterbury Troper (pre-Schism books of extra add-on chants for the Mass as sung in larger churches). So this antiphon was sung for the people's communion back when people still communed during Mass in England. The same antiphon was used in the Roman rite in France (see the famed St. Martial Troper, 10th c.). So it is simply a Gregorian chant of the Western Church. For the Latin see "The Winchester Troper," W. H. Frere, London, 1894, p. 19.

Objection 32:  No authentic Sarum liturgy has the priest commune the faithful with a spoon and a cloth under the chin.

Reply:  Communing with the spoon is not a Sarum rubric (remember, there is no Sarum rubric for giving communion to the people at all). The reason for communing with a spoon is mainly a pastoral one--for example, in the parish where I served Western rite for nearly a decade, many Orthodox from Russia, Ukraine, Belorussia, and Romania would attend, and--especially when their relatives were visiting from the old country--it was found too jarring for them to receive Communion in a different mode. The practice of holding a cloth under the chin, however, is authentically Sarum and is found in Old English manuscript illuminations. It was called, in England, the "houseling cloth." The same practice with the cloth was followed in France and other Roman rite countries.  It may also be noted that the Body of Christ was lowered into a chalice and drawn out to commune the sick, in Sarum usage.

Objection 33:  The next Byzantine rip-off comes while communing. The ROCOR Sarum translation has the priest say, "The Body (Blood) of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is given for thee. Preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life." Your "Sarum" rite has the priest say, "Servant of God X, may the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ profit thee for the remission of all thy sins and for everlasting life." The Byzantine liturgy has the priest say, "The servant of God X partakes of the precious and all-holy Body and Blood of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, unto the remission of sins and unto life everlasting."

Reply:  The "profit thee for the remission of all thy sins and for everlasting life" is not from the Byzantine rite, but the usage of Westminster Abbey in London (the Sarum use prevailed at London, it may be noted, from about the year 1400 onward). Note that Sarum missals don't mention what to do or say when communing the people. But a variety of wordings is documented from pre-Reformation English books. The wording in the Westminster missal is, "Corpus et sanguis Domini nostri Ihesu Xpisti prosit tibi ad remissionem omnium peccatorum tuorum et ad vitam aeternam, amen" ("Missale ad usum Ecclesie Westmonasteriensis," J. Wickham Legg, London, 1893, Vol. 2, column 520). This is precisely the wording of the SHP Sarum text. The communicant's name ("N.") is inserted for sheerly pastoral reasons (see reply to Objection 32).

Objection 34:  There is no "ablution wine" in ROCOR/ancient Sarum usage. There is, however, in the Byzantine rite.

Reply:  I am not sure what is meant here by "ablution wine." It could refer to the wine which was given to communicants for "ablution of the mouth" after communion in England and France, a very well-documented custom contemporaneous with the Sarum use, or to the wine poured over the priest's fingers in Sarum usage after all the communions, to rinse any remaining particles into the chalice. Either way,
ablution wine is a documented Sarum practice.

Objection 35:  In the ROCOR Sarum Rite, after the communion of the faithful, the priest exchanges a salutation. Then all pray CRANMER'S Prayer of Thanksgiving. (Shouldn't you have excommunicated your co-equal ROCOR brethren by now for this repeated, "Zwinglian" abuse of "your" liturgy?)

Reply:  In the Cascades Sarum text, just as in the SHP Sarum text, and the historical Sarum books, this prayer is not found. (No one I have ever spoken to wishes to excommunicate anybody, much less dear brothers amongst the clergy who are struggling within the Western tradition.)

Objection 36:  A few of your Thanksgiving prayers match ancient Sarum; however, no source has the Gregorian "Quod ore sumpsimus," and certainly not your odd "Blessed be thou by thy Son, O Lady, for by thee have we partaken of the Fruit of life." The prayer is unknown in any rite, to the best of my knowledge.

Reply:  The "Quod ore" is in all the Sarum books, and it is found in the Cascades Sarum text as well. The prayer "Blessed be thou by thy Son, O Lady," is found in older Sarum missals (see Legg, "The Sarum Missal from Three Early Manuscripts, etc., p. 228). The Latin text is "Benedicta tu a Filio tuo Domina, quia per te Fructum vitae communicavimus." The SHP Sarum is a faithful translation into English.

Objection 37:  Again, no translation of Sarum except your invention has a "Prayer of Bowed Heads" anywhere, much less after the Postcommunion, much less said facing the people. The Byzantine rite has several prayers of bowed heads, but they are considered highly penitential and hence are said during preparation for communion; the rubric is entirely unfit for the joyful postcommunion thanksgivings - which is why our Holy Western Orthodox Fathers never put it there.

Reply:  Quite to the contrary, all books of the old Roman rite have a "Prayer of Bowed Heads," or "Super Populum," done after the postcommunions and done facing the people. See Legg's "The Sarum Missal from Three Early Manuscripts," etc., pp. 53-102. The older English liturgical books for the Roman rite even have, for Sundays and feasts, Super Populum prayers of a joyful and celebratory spirit.

Objection 38:  Neither Sarum translation varies the "Ite Missa Est" based on whether the Gloria was sung or spoken, as your liturgy does.

Reply:  This is a misinterpretation of the SHP text. First of all, the Gloria, when done, is always sung by the choir. For this reason the directive to do "Benedicamus Domino" when the Gloria was not earlier "sung" at Mass, refers only to the entire omission of the Gloria, not to its spoken execution versus a sung execution. The SHP rubric is directly from the Sarum missals.

Objection 39: No authentic Sarum translation gives the priest the potential to end the Liturgy without blessing the people!! Yours offers a blessing only on "Double Feasts."

Reply:  Almost all the extant Sarum missals direct the Priest to end the Mass without an explicit blessing of the people. Only at the very close of the 15th century do we see some Sarum books adding a prayer for blessing of the people, and then only on special occasions. A blessing of the people with the chalice is given in one late-15th c. Sarum Graduale for double feasts. None of the Sarum missals collated in Legg's "The Sarum Missal from Three Early Manuscripts" gives such a blessing. None of the Sarum missals drawn upon in William Maskell's "The ancient Liturgy of the Church of England," Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1882, gives such a blessing. And this is not surprising, seeing that old Western liturgical commentators (such as Amalarius, Honorius of Autun, Sicardus, etc.) consider the Priest's last "Lord be with you" to constitute a blessing--in fact, to their minds this "Lord be with you" re-enacts Christ's blessing of His disciples just before He ascended into the heavens.

Objection 40:  No translation of Sarum has the priest bless the people with chalice in hand (that's from the Byzantine rite).

Reply:  This is not from the Byzantine rite but from Sarum manuscripts.  The Nero Graduale, a late
15th-c. Sarum manuscript in the British Library, says, "Deinde accipiat sacerdos calicem, corporali et patena superpositis, et conversus ad populum dicat hoc modo: Benedicat vos divina majestas," etc.  In
English this is: "Then let the priest take up the chalice, with the corporal cloth and paten set atop it, and being turned to the people let him say this: The Divine majesty... bless you," etc.

Objection 41:  Both authentic Sarum translations have the priest give the traditional blessing "The peace of God, which passeth all understanding..." not your strange, "May the Divine majesty bless you, the one Godhead, Father, Son and Holy Spirit."

Reply:  The SHP text, "May the Divine majesty," etc., is an exact translation of the Latin Sarum text given in the Nero Graduale:  "Benedicat vos divina majestas et una deitas, Pater et Filius et Spiritus Sanctus, amen." The formula "The peace of God, which passeth all understanding," etc., is an Anglican usage found in no Sarum text (it is not present in the Cascades Sarum text). 

Objection 42:  The authentic Sarum Rite translations follow the mandatory final blessing with the Last Gospel, which you omit.

Reply:  First, the Last Gospel is a 13th-c. addition to the Sarum use, made under influence from the Roman Catholic church on the continent, and the stated editorial principle of the OSRM is to remove those kind of imported elements--which are few and easily-identified. Second, in all the Sarum books the Last Gospel is used not as a final blessing but as a private prayer the priest says as he walks from the altar back to the vestry. The people never heard it, since the choir by then had begun singing the ensuing Hour of the Divine Office, as the Sarum rubrics appoint.

Objection 43:  At "the end of the immediate service" following the blessing of Eulogian bread in the ROCOR Sarum Rite, the priest recites the prayer, "O Lord, we pray Thee, forgive the imperfections of our Service...." Your liturgy differs (as it seems to everywhere), omitting the prayer.

Reply:  No Sarum book gives this prayer here, and the Cascades Sarum text doesn't give it either.  We can see, by now, that nearly all the differences between what the servant of God Ben was calling the "ROCOR Sarum" and the SHP Sarum text stem from one of two sources--(a) the misapprehension of St. Petroc's "English Liturgy" as representing a Sarum mass text, or (b) historical variations between different, authentic Sarum missal texts.  

Objection 44:  As authentic Western Rite churches have no "Holy Doors" (as one can clearly see from the pictures on the ROCOR website), ROCOR does not instruct they be shut now, as yours does.

Reply:  This is a good point. Sarum books give no instructions on roodscreen doors. Yet there are churches in England which do have roodscreen doors. What is done with them is sheerly a matter of local custom. Now, old Ordines Romani give hints that the curtains of the ciborium (an architectural predecessor of the roodscreen) were closed for the Canon, since starting then the priest does not turn to the people for the greeting "Dominus vobiscum."  And we might say, if looking for some hint of when to best open and close the doors, that this provides a little flicker of guidance. But it is just local custom, and thus it is in the little priest's handbook but not found in the more formal Missal book.

Objection 45:  The ROCOR priest's Thanksgiving prayers after the service is over are different than yours. ROCOR includes the song of the Three Children, but not Psalm 150, nor the Nunc Dimittis (a Byzantine communion Thanksgiving tradition), nor an Our Father (something you imported from Byzantine Trisagion prayers recited in their Thanksgiving?), nor several of the concluding Thanksgiving versicles and prayers you decree.

Reply:  The SHP text simply transmits the prayers found in the majority of Sarum missals: "Antiph. Trium puerorum. Ps. Benedicite... Ps. Laudate Dominum in sanctis... Nunc dimittis cum Gloria Patri et Sicut erat. Deinde dicitur tota ant. Trium puerorum... Kyrie" (Sarum Missal of 1492). The SHP Sarum text translates these prayers faithfully into English. The shorter Cascades Sarum thanksgiving is also quite legitimately Sarum; it appears this way in some older Sarum manuscripts, such as the 13th c. Missal of Lord Crawford. 

Concluding remarks:  It would be good, as a prophylaxis against misunderstandings of the sort documented above, for the Western rite texts of all jurisdictions to include footnotes or endnotes which show the origin of all prayers and texts. Such a score-card was published for the Gallican rite of the Orthodox Church of France, and is projected for the 2nd edition of the Old Sarum Rite Missal. For example, the Antiochian Liturgy of St. Tikhon uses prayers from a variety of Eastern and Western rites, and these origins have been explained and defended in useful essays written by Orthodox proponents of this form of liturgy. Their explanations would be more accessible and helpful if collated into a single, clear presentation printed together with the liturgies themselves. With such an editorial approach on the part of many, the varied practices of various Western rite brethren can become transparent. Each Western rite grouping can then be more fully aware of what the others are doing and why.

The fact that these issues require discussion may provoke concerns that the Western rite is disparate, even not sufficiently settled, in its practices. But in reality, many of these same types of issues are of concern to faithful of disparate ethnoi within the Byzantine rite, and are avidly discussed in certain circles; indeed, these are just the sort of issues that arise when real communities of faithful pray together in the here and now. The resolution of them over time is a natural and foreseen part of the process whereby Western culture is being reclaimed for the Orthodox Faith. That process, in its broad terms, should be a cause of rejoicing and glorification of God by all Orthodox people. So let us thank Our Lord, Who is having mercy on the Western peoples by the prayers of their Saints. Regardless of whether the nets are breaking (as in the Gospel), they are certainly being cast by the Holy Church as she seeks and enacts the salvation of all people through the infinite love of our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

Click here to see a Sarum Mass photojournal.

Click here to see the Cascades Sarum-based Mass text blessed for use in the Russian Orthodox Church.

Click here for English Liturgy, produced at Cascades, blessed for use in the Russian Orthodox Church.

Click here for the St. Hilarion Press-published Sarum text blessed for use in the Russian Orthodox Church.

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