There is wonderful book published by Ignatius Press called Parochial and Plain Sermons which are sermons preached by John Henry Newman while an Anglican priest. One of the nice things about this expensive little book (about $70.00 new) is that it is arranged according to the traditional BCP lectionary, so those of us who use the old prayer book can read his sermons as the Church year progresses. It also contains "plain" sermons that are topical in nature. There are many things that could be said of this book and how useful and interesting it is. This past Sunday, after preaching for the Feast of the Circumcision, I came home and decided to read the Newman sermon for that day to see what he had to say. His topic was the "Ceremonies of the Church". He argues that while Paul and the early Church clearly did not believe the Old Testament Law and rituals to have any value in terms of adding to our salvation in Christ, they clearly had a great deal of respect for the rituals of the Jewish "church" - especially circumcision. Custom was a sufficient reason to maintain them in most cases. Paul circumcised Timothy himself, shaved his head because he made a vow, and more. Jesus did the same thing, of course - paying the Temple tax, telling people to offer the sacrifices commanded by Moses, etc.
Newman uses this as a jumping off point in discussing the ceremonies of the Church. Quite often people ask: "Why do we bow at the Holy Name? Why do we kneel at the Holy Communion?" Because ceremonies and actions like that are not "in the Bible", they either remain indifferent to them or deride them. The most extreme example of this is the unsound teaching held by some extreme Reformed Christains known as the "regulative principle in worship." Simply put, this corrupt doctrine teaches that worship can only consist of things that are positively commanded for corporate worship in scripture. This teaching is based on a faulty understanding of the nature of revelation and the scriptures. There are many things that we prohibit that scripture is completely silent on, such as suicide. Yet no one would argue that suicide is okay. And there are many things that we do that scripture is silent on. We find out about these things in other ways (e.g. Paul: through nature). Newman says that the Bible gives us the spirit but that the Church must provide the body in which that spirit is to be lodged. It tells us what to believe and aim at, but not how to do it. Scripture talks about meeting for prayer, but it doesn't say where, or for how long, or what to pray for, or who should pray first, etc. The wisdom of the Church in her tradition, and human experience guided by God's Holy Spirit tells us these things.
Newman says that when people attempt to worship God in the excessively "spiritual" way described above that they very often end up not worshipping God at all. The mindset that goes, "Why pray at mass when I can stay home and pray in bed?" in most cases eventually leads one to neglect of prayer altogether! But the ceremonies of the Church give flesh and blood to the biblical admonitions on prayer and worship. They give them form, and help us remain faithful to the teachings of scripture and to God. Newman says that when "profane persons scoff at our forms" we can say: "These forms, even were they of mere human origin (which learned men say is not the case, but even if they were), are at least of as spiritual and edifying a character as the rites of Judaism. Yet Christ and His Apostles did not suffer these latter to be irreverently treated or suddenly discardeed. Much less may we suffer it in the case of our own; lest, stripping off from us the badges of our profession, we forget there is a faith for us to maintain, and world of sinners to be eschewed."
