# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Juli 1862_S207
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Report on the Right Mean of the Lutheran Liturgy. 207

a) Introit, Kyrie, Gloria, etc.: "The additions of the earliest fathers,
who prayed with hushed voice something like a psalm or two, as one reads,
before they blessed the bread and wine — as it is reckoned that
Athanasius and Cyprian did — would be well worth commending. —
After that, I am well pleased with those who added the Kyrie eleison;
for we read that in the time of Basil, whom they call "the Great," the Kyrie
eleison was in common use among all the people. — That
Epistles and Gospels are read in the Mass is not only commendable
but has always been, and still is, necessary — except that it is a fault that one does not
read them in the language that would be understood by the common man. —
But after singing came into use in the church, the psalms were
transformed into the Introit, and thereafter there was also added the English
hymn of praise, Gloria in excelsis Deo, likewise the Gradual,
the Alleluia, the Patrem — that is, the articles of the faith, composed at the
Council of Nicaea — also the Sanctus, Agnus Dei, Communion, etc.,
all of which are of such a kind that one cannot find fault with them, especially those
sung "de tempore," according to the season, or on Sundays, for those
days alone have thus far shown the old purity in divine service,
excepting the Canon of the silent Mass." (Weise, on how to conduct a Christian Mass,
Jen. A. 332b, 333ff.)

b) The preceding and other pieces, but especially
the Agnus Dei: "Much of the singing in the Mass is finely and gloriously
made for thanking and praising, and has remained in use until now, such as Gloria in excelsis
et in terra, the Alleluia, the Patrem, the Preface,
the Sanctus, the Benedictus, the Agnus Dei. In these
pieces you find nothing of sacrifice, but pure praise and thanks; therefore
we too have kept them in our Mass. And in particular the Agnus,
above all the other chants, serves the sacrament extremely well, for it clearly
sings and praises Christ for having borne our sins,
and with fine, short words powerfully and lovingly presses home the
remembrance of Christ. And, in sum, whatever is evil in the
Mass comes from the sacrifice and the work; and God has wonderfully arranged it
that nearly all of it is read secretly by the priest, and is called the silent Mass. But what is publicly
sung by the choir and among the crowd is almost entirely good and
praiseworthy, as though God meant to say by this very deed that he wished to spare his Christians
the silent Mass, so that their ears need not hear such an abomination,
and thus lets the clergy alone be plagued with their own abomination." J. A. 5,
196b.

c) The Creed and the pericope sermon: "After the Gospel, the whole
church sings the Creed in German: We all believe in one God.
After that follows the sermon on the Sunday's or festival's Gospel.
And it seems to me that if one had the German postils [available] all the year round, it would be
best that one ordain that the day's postil, whole or in part,
be read to the people out of the book — not only for the sake of the preachers,