By: Father Brian+
One thing you’ll notice about Grace is the prominence we give to color in our worship of the Lord. We use colors in our worship as visual reminders of the church season. The main liturgical colors include red, green, blue, purple, white, and to a lesser extent gold and black.
You’ll notice that the colors are displayed in particular places: on the altar frontal; on the pulpit and lectern frontals; on the stoles of the ministers and other vestments worn.
The colors change with the season of the church calendar. The current season is Advent. This Sunday is the second of four Advent Sundays. The color for Advent is blue.
Blue is reminiscent of the sky and the sea, two parts of creation that bring hope and encouragement to us.
Blue during Advent was historically the liturgical tradition for the Church of England. Interestingly, many churches in Europe preferred to use purple for Advent, and so confusion has arisen over the difference. One explanation: purple dye was expensive, so churches used blue or a variant of blue and called it purple. Go figure.
For more information on Advent blue, ask your friendly priest, deacon, or altar guild member. If you really want to dig deep, I found this article helpful: https://romananglican.blogspot.com/2019/12/blue-for-advent-anglican-tradition.html
Check out the Episcopal glossary: https://www.episcopalchurch.org/glossary/
I think it’s pretty cool to be able to wear all these bold colors. The seasonality makes it fun and the structure brings comfort to me as I lead you in worship.
Thanks for noticing our colors!
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