The garments of heaven

Jan 9, 2022 by

by Peter Mullen, TCW:

[…]  Of course it’s easy to make fun of this sort of stuff, but vestments – the outward appearance of religion – have a serious side which is a million miles from silly old Harry Williams and the adolescent camp fantasies of the St Stephen’s House fashion show.

First and at the lowest level, vestments are like school uniforms, which were invented so that rich kids could not swagger about in superior clothing to that of the poor. Everybody was levelled, rightly, to the same. When you see a priest at the high altar in his glorious vestments, the apparel is not for his adornment. It is simply the uniform of the priest. You do not see an individual. You see the priest. Anonymous. A functionary.

Let us look at some of these garments. The chasuble is the paenula of the Greek and Roman era. It was worn by priests at the Holy Communion from the earliest times and it is prescribed in the Protestant Cranmer’s 1549 Prayer Book and its usage taken for granted by the Ornaments Rubric of the Church of England’s 1662Book of Common Prayer. The garment that goes under the chasuble is the white alb, a symbol of purity, and when the priest – unworthy as we all are – puts it on he prays: ‘O Lord, make me white as this garment.’ I can tell you, when you contemplate what you are about to do at the altar, you need some protective clothing like this!

That prayer has been prayed since the days of St Thomas Aquinas. Such strength of tradition is a great comfort and encouragement to the priest as he prepares to celebrate the Holy Communion. I wonder what you think the priest feels like when he leads this service? I’ll tell you: terrified, overawed, puny. Any scrap of solidarity he can get from a long tradition helps him through what is frankly always a traumatic experience. Think about it: how can anyone stand there and say the words of Christ, ‘This is my body . . . this is my blood’ without feeling thunderstruck – and absurd?

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