Wednesday, March 14, 2018

Wednesday, March 14, 2018
Reading: 1 Timothy 2:1

"First of all, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone,…so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity."

            During the season of Lent we use either the Great Litany or the Kyrie, which is an Orthodox litany or ektenia, for the entrance rite. Litany is from the Greek, litaneia, meaning "supplication". Luther developed litanies, both in Latin and German (1529), based primarily on the Roman church's Litany of All Saints. This is the form that we sing to open the liturgy during Lent. In 1544, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, compiled and crafted The Exhortation and Litany, which was the first liturgy in English, commissioned by Henry VIII. The liturgy was used for processions, and was requested by Henry when he witnessed the poor response of the people to the existing Latin processions. He decreed that there were to be "set forthe certayne godly prayers and suffrages in our natyve Englyshe tongue." Cranmer used part of the Sarum processional, Luther's litany, and the Orthodox litany. It has come down to the present Book of Common Prayer in much of its original form. Kyrie, we pray, in both the Great Litany and the Kyrie. Kyrie eleison. Lord, have mercy. Kyrios was the Greek word chosen by translators to stand for the Hebrew name of God: YHWH. When we pray Kyrie eleison, we are proclaiming God as Lord, and putting our lives in God's care.


  • Pray the Litany.

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