{"id":46669,"date":"2019-03-27T13:22:30","date_gmt":"2019-03-27T18:22:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=46669"},"modified":"2019-04-02T12:52:35","modified_gmt":"2019-04-02T17:52:35","slug":"when-did-priests-start-saying-mass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2019\/03\/27\/when-did-priests-start-saying-mass\/","title":{"rendered":"When did priests start saying Mass?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>by Paul Bradshaw<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It has traditionally been\naccepted that Ignatius of Antioch in the early second century was the first\nChristian writer to refer explicitly to a threefold order of bishops,\npresbyters, and deacons. But it is doubtful that Ignatius understood those\nterms to mean the same as they did to much later generations. A \u201cbishop\u201d is\nmore likely to have been the leader of a small local congregation or individual\nhouse-church, rather than the chief minister over a whole city or larger area. How\nelse could the bishop have been the normal presider at the Eucharist and\nminister of baptism if he was responsible for more than one congregation?\nIgnatius says in his Letter to the Smyrneans, \u201cLet that be deemed a valid Eucharist,\nwhich is (administered) either by the bishop, or by one to whom he has\nentrusted it\u2026. It is not lawful without the bishop either to baptize or to hold\nan <em>agape<\/em>\u2019 (8.2). Seemingly,\neucharistic presidency by others was an exception rather than the rule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Similarly, the \u201cpresbyters\u201d that he mentioned do not seem\nto have been subordinate liturgical ministers (for what would they normally\nhave to do in the liturgy?), but rather leading members of the congregation who\nprovided advice and counsel to the bishop. Other early sources support that\ninterpretation. The First Epistle of Clement, for example, states that the\nApostles appointed \u201cbishops and deacons\u201d to replace them, not presbyters (42.4);\nand the so-called <em>Apostolic Tradition of\nHippolytus<\/em> describes presbyters as receiving \u201cthe spirit of grace and\ncounsel of the presbyterate\u201d at their ordination, and denies that a deacon is a\n\u201cparticipant in the counsel of the clergy\u201d (7.2: 8.3).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; So just when, therefore, did presbyters begin to preside more\nregularly at the Eucharist? It is difficult to be sure because early Christian\nwriters tend to use Greek terms for \u201cpresider\u201d in this connection rather than the\nmore precise name of an office, as for example Justin Martyr (<em>proest\u014ds, <\/em>usually used of one who was\nhead of a philosophical school), Ignatius of Antioch (<em>prokathemenos<\/em>, literally, the one seated), or <em>Hermas<\/em> (<em>proistamenos<\/em>, the\none set over). But we may reasonably presume that the practice began to develop\nin the late second century when the term \u201cbishop\u201d started to refer to one who\nhad jurisdiction over all the churches of a city or region. Some presbyters would\nthen have assumed responsibility for individual congregations and become the\npresiders at their Eucharists. But that does not mean that all presbyters did\nso. In Rome, for example, for several centuries the Pope sent pieces of bread\nconsecrated at the Eucharist he was celebrating (the <em>fermentum<\/em>) to the other churches within the city walls to effect\nthe consecration of the elements there for presbyters to distribute in\ncommunion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; And when did presbyters begin to be called priests? The Latin liturgical books continued to use the term presbyter down to the late Middle Ages, but bishops began to be spoken of as a priest (<em>sacerdos<\/em>) or high-priest (<em>summus sacerdos<\/em>) as early as the third century, with presbyters then described as sharing in the bishop\u2019s priesthood or as exercising a lesser priesthood (see the classic Roman ordination prayer for a priest). As centuries passed and presbyters rather than bishops were seen as the normal presidents at the Eucharist, they came to be called <em>sacerdotes<\/em> unequivocally. Although the titles may have remained constant, their meaning and the functions of the ministries changed in response to the changing situations in which the Church found itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Paul Bradshaw, priest of the Church of England, is a specialist in the early history of Christian liturgy who has taught at the University of Notre Dame since 1985. He has written or edited over twenty books and has contributed more than one hundred articles or essays. For eighteen years he was chief editor of the international journal,&nbsp;<\/em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"http:\/\/www.societas-liturgica.org\/subscribe-to-studia-liturgica\/\" target=\"_blank\">Studia Liturgica<\/a>,&nbsp;<em>and he is also a former President both of&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"http:\/\/www.societas-liturgica.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">S<\/a><\/em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"http:\/\/www.societas-liturgica.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">ocietas Liturgica<\/a><em>&nbsp;and of the&nbsp;<\/em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"http:\/\/www.naal-liturgy.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">North American Academy of Liturgy<\/a>.<em>&nbsp;His book,&nbsp;<\/em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Search-Origins-Christian-Worship-Sources\/dp\/0195217322\" target=\"_blank\">The Search for the Origins of Christian Liturgy<\/a>,<em> has become a standard textbook. It has gone through two editions (New York: Oxford University Press 1992, 2002), and has been translated into French, Italian, Japanese, Polish and Russian.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Featured Image: from <a href=\"http:\/\/clipart-library.com\/\">Clip Art Library<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ministries changed in response to changing situations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":46675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[3117,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-scholarship-new-ws","category-ordained-ministry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>When did priests start saying Mass? 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