[Magdalen] Epiphany

[Jay Weigel]

I grew up in a church that had an Epiphany pageant and my brothers and I
all participated. I don't recall that either of my brothers ever got to be
Joseph but they were both Magi. I was Mary once. I never got to be Gabriel
(always played by a girl) because I wasn't tall enough. The church in which
I raised my kids for years had their Christmas pageant on the last Sunday
of Advent in place of the service. The kids would come in, in costume, as
part of the procession, and sit in the front pews, and after the pageant
would return to their parents, still in costume, for the rest of the
service. It was always very sweet and enjoyable, with those things which
characterize Christmas pageants....wandering angels, a tiny shepherd with
his teddy bear, a wise man tripping on his robe, etc. The one I remember
best was one year when we had a live baby Jesus who got a little fussy;
Mary, who was the oldest in her family, attempted to soothe him in the
makeshift manger and when that didn't work, picked him up and rocked him.
Not a dry eye in the house! That all stopped when the next priest (the one
who caused me to leave that parish) came in and sniffed, "Angels and
shepherds in Advent? Not in MY church!" and changed the pageant to the
early service on Christmas Eve (commonly known as the "zoo mass" because of
the parents who brought their kids who otherwise never darkened the door of
the church and had no idea of how to act). I never saw one after that as we
dropped our kids off to sing in the kiddie choir and picked them up
afterward until they aged out of that. The youth at Reformation Lutheran do
a Christmas play on the last Sunday of Advent but if there is a Christmas
pageant it must be at the "family service" which is at 4 pm on Christmas
Eve. I didn't hear about any such.

On Tue, Jan 6, 2015 at 9:44 AM, Jim Guthrie <jguthrie at pipeline.com> wrote:

> From: Cantor03--- via Magdalen
>
>  in general.  When I look around during the course of the  reading,
>> all eyes are riveted on their own copies in the service leaflet.   It's
>> unusual to see anyone just sitting back and listening to the  readings.
>>
>
> They often have to read the shop-a-tree-for-Christ version because the
> reader is
> frequently unintelligible.
>
>  In contrast, RC congregations do not have a written copy to refer to
>>
> and are all thus by default looking up and listening.  This is  not to
> imply that they understand the aural lessons better than Anglicans,
> but only to point out the denominational differences.
>
> Again -- TEC parishes do things in different ways from parish to parish.
> Some
> depend on their group of really fine readers and do not bother with the
> inserts
> or printing the lessons. I really think the Bulletin Inserts are an
> admission
> that the parish's readers gifts are elsewhere.
>
>  The only way I've experienced to get Episcopalians to pay much
>> attention to spoken scripture texts is to chant them.  Then they  will
>> look up from their written copies.
>>
>
> I used to agree -- chanted the Epistle quite a few times once upon a time.
> But
> I've come the conclusion that chanting does not serve the same purpose as
> it did
> when most all the congregation were illiterate and could remember the
> lessons
> better if they were presented musically.
>
> Just like most of us can remember lyrics to a hundred songs ( let alone a
> verse
> or two of a hundred hymns) accurately, but could not recite a hundred
> Biblical
> Verses. But now we can read so the catchy tune encourages what we can
> learn.
>
> One of the most interesting examples of this in Anglicanism was embodied
> in the
> change of theology from the God the Hanging Judge to God the friend of
> Children
> (and Jesus Our Brother, for that matter). Amidst the hundreds of "hymns for
> children" that spoke of death (in a time when children's deaths were so
> common),came Mrs. Alexander with her "Hymns for Children" in 1848.
>
> Many of those hymns survive today, are very popular, and I bet most of us
> can
> sing a verse or two or all of the ones we've encountered in church over the
> years. Her goal was to have a hymn for children that would teach, in great
> detail, the Apostle's Creed, the Ten Commandments send the Lord's Prayer.
>
> Think:
>
> "Maker of Heaven and Earth" --
> 405 - All things bright and beautiful
>
> "Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary" --
> 102 - Once in royal David's city
>
> "Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried" --
> 167 - There is a green hill far away.
>
> Who here doesn’t know these today, even if we've discounted the aim of
> Fanny
> Alexander in favor of the nice tune and memorable in their own sake lyrics?
>
> And apparently it worked for teaching the basics of faith -- it went
> through 69 printings by the end of the Nineteenth Century. How many Hymnals
> today could claim that?
>
> See it all on Google  Books:
>
> https://archive.org/details/hymnsforlittlech00alex
>
> Cheers,
> Jim
>