h0LY COMMUNION &
THE DAILY OFFICE
Holy Communion
The Service of Holy Communion is from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer and is often accompanied by beautiful choral music sung by the Cathedral Choir.
Holy Communion, sometimes called the Eucharist or the Mass, has been the Church's principal service for nearly 2,000 years. The first part of the liturgy is based upon the synagogue service which earliest Christians continued to attend after Christ's resurrection. It consists of prayers, scripture readings, and sermon.
The second part involves an act of self-sacrifice. Bread and wine, representing the lives of the people, are placed upon the altar. There they are joined to Christ's absolute act of self-sacrifice and offered up to God. Our lives are then returned to us, imbued with Christ's own life force. His very Body and Blood.
By partaking of the Eucharist, the congregation literally fulfills the word of Romans 12:1: "I appeal to you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship."
The Daily Office
The Offices of Morning and Evening Prayer from the 1928 Book of Common Prayer are offered daily in the beautiful Mary Chapel within the Cathedral church.
Morning and Evening Prayer, known as the Daily Office, are the devotional services that Archbishop Thomas Cranmer crafted in the 16th century to provide a daily devotional life for every person. These services were developed from the daily and hourly devotions that the monks in the monasteries observed as they remained in continual prayer. Cranmer believed that all Christians, as a kingdom of priests, should have the opportunity to offer a daily sacrifice of prayer to God and so he fashioned Morning and Evening Prayer for that purpose.