Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year

Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Salvation Army

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Worship in the Salvation Army does not include sacraments or observance of the traditional church year. Salvationists regard these practices as unnecessary to the life of consecration to God, experienced through the inward power of the Holy Spirit. They do, however, believe in the importance of ceremonies such as child dedication, enrollment of soldiers (members), and commissioning of officers (clergy), events that recognize and celebrate decisive moments in an individual’s spiritual life.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in Roman Catholic Churches

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The practice of the church year, which has developed over centuries in the Roman Catholic tradition, underwent major revision as a result of the Second Vatican Council. The changes were designed to recover the primacy of the “paschal mystery” of Christ’s death and resurrection in both of the major cycles, the Christological and the sanctoral.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Reformed Episcopal Churches

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The Reformed Episcopal Church (REC) embraces the English liturgical tradition as expressed in The Book of Common Prayer. The denomination has retained the Christian year primarily because of its commitment to the Word of God, first and foremost. REC worship leaders take the Pauline injunction to “redeem the time” (Eph. 5:16) to mean that the daily, weekly, and seasonal cycles of time created by God should all be sanctified through worship.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Reformed Church in America

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The extent to which congregations in the Reformed Church in America (RCA) practice the church year varies widely. A few churches observe only Christmas, Easter, and Palm Sunday. More than 80 percent keep Advent, Lent, Maundy Thursday, and Pentecost. About three-quarters observe Good Friday, around 40 percent celebrate Epiphany, Ascension, and Ash Wednesday, and almost a quarter mark Trinity Sunday.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in Progressive National Baptist Convention

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Churches in the Progressive National Baptist Convention follow a worship calendar reflecting the African-American experience of God as liberator and sustainer, rather than the conventional Christian year. Annual observances include Christmas and Easter, but most Sundays are designated to focus on aspects of the church’s ministry and role in society.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Presbyterian Church in America

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Ministers in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) hold the preaching of God’s Word in the highest possible regard. Given their denomination’s creedal stance, this outlook is understandable! The Westminster Confession of Faith declares: “The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man’s salvation, faith, and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture” (I:6). Since in part it is the nature of Scripture to convey the eternal purposes of God and his gracious plan for redemption, it is only logical that the confession emphasizes the importance of preaching the Scriptures: “The reading of the Scriptures with godly fear, the sound preaching and considerable hearing of the Word … are all parts of the ordinary worship of God” (XXI:5).

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the Presbyterian Church (USA)

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Presbyterians have been gradually recovering the Christian year and most congregations now observe at least Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter. Observance frequently takes the form of family-centered activities, study programs, and a wide variety of artistic and cultural expressions.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in the National Baptist Convention of America

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Observance of the Christian year has greatly increased in the National Baptist Convention of America, Inc. during the past twenty years. A growing number of well-trained pastors, educational resources offered by the denomination, and innovative use of art forms have all been instrumental in overcoming the historic Baptist resistance to such observance.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in National Baptist Convention, USA

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The worship calendar in most congregations of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. combines important days of the Christian year with numerous annual days—memorial observations and celebrations of various functions and organizations in congregational life and the black community. These days were established primarily because of economic and social needs rather than scriptural mandates. The number of annual days has declined in recent years, and a new emphasis on Christian education as the basis for giving is emerging.

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Worship and Sacred Actions Throughout the Year in Messianic Synagogues

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One of the characteristics shared by all the congregations of the Messianic Jewish movement is a high view of Scripture and a consequent determination to order congregational life according to what was in the 1970s often called biblical kashrut and is now more simply designated Torah. Therefore, Messianic Jews share a virtually universal adherence to the Jewish liturgical calendar that is mandated in the Torah itself. This approach differs significantly from the older Hebrew Christian philosophy, which taught that having been set free from the “burden” of the law by the Messiah, it would be wrong to practice the liturgical year whose very existence derives from that law. The Hebrew Christian practice had been to mention at a Sunday service that, during the following week, a Jewish holiday would occur.

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