Liturgical prayers

Liturgical prayers are those that have a certain form and a certain place in the course of the Christian liturgy ( Holy Mass , Divine Liturgy , Last Supper , Liturgy of the Hours and the dispensing of the sacraments ). They can be sung or spoken.

In the liturgy, the distinction between ordinarium and proprium plays an essential role.

• The ordinarium includes the liturgical texts that are fixed for each service. B. Kyrie , Gloria (on feasts , high feasts and Sundays outside of Advent and Lent ), Credo (on Sundays and high feasts ), Sanctus , words of institution or in the Orthodox churches the Chrysostom anaphora , Our Father , Agnus Dei , in the Liturgy of the Hours Benedictus or Magnificat .
• The proprium, on the other hand, consists of those liturgical texts that change depending on the Sunday or feast day, B. the introitus , the daily prayer (collection prayer), responsory , hallelujah call (in Lent Christ calls), intercessory prayer , troparion .

Many of these prayers are either taken from the Bible (such as the Psalms and the Lord's Prayer) or emerged in the course of church history in the tradition of the church (such as the Credo) and are therefore fixed in their wording. Some have a structured structure (such as the orations or the intercessory prayer ), others are free in their formulation in some denominations. In the ancient oriental and orthodox churches, the liturgy is literally determined by tradition, there are no freely formulated prayers. In the Roman Catholic Church, too, the liturgical prayers established by tradition predominate. They are found in missions , agendas, and other liturgical books .

literature

• Ferdinand Probst : Doctrine of liturgical prayers. Breslau 1885, 2nd edition 1892