elapse between Baptism and Confirmation, and the permissible age was raised from one to seven years. Bishops were allowed to confirm on the roadside if children presented themselves to them for that purpose. In 1604 the English rubric laid down no limit of age, but directed that candidates should be able to render an account of their faith according to the Catechism following. When the service was brought into its present form in 1661 these words were altered into come to years of discretion. The present Roman Catholic rule is the same as our own, but in some parts of Italy the custom of confirming infants still lingers. The custom of postponing Confirmation until the age of fourteen and upwards was certainly not contemplated by the authors of the Prayer Book. It was introduced within living memory into certain dioceses where the bishops found the children of the peasantry to be abnormally ignorant. Early in the eighteenth century and also early in the nineteenth children were confirmed at the age of eleven and upwards. The Sarum Order of Confirmation is very brief and simple and may thus be translated: The Confirmation of Children and other Baptized Persons. First let the bishop say: Our help, etc. The Lord be with you. Almighty everlasting God, Who hast vouchsafed to regenerate this Thy servant (or these Thy servants), by water and the Holy Spirit, and Who hast given to them remission of all sins: send upon them the sevenfold Spirit, the Holy Paraclete, from heaven. Amen. The Spirit of wisdom and understanding. Amen. The Spirit of knowledge and goodness. Amen. The Spirit of counsel and strength. Amen. And fill them with the Spirit of the fear of the Lord. Amen. And sign them with the sign of the holy cross confirm them favourably with the chrism of salvation unto eternal life. Amen. Then having inquired the name of each one and anointed his thumb with chrism, let the bishop make a cross on the forehead of each separately, saying: I sign thee N. with the sign of the cross and confirm thee with the chrism of salvation. In the Name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Let there follow the Psalm. Lo thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord. The Lord from out of Syon shall so bless thee that thou shalt see the prosperity of Jerusalem all thy life long. Glory be to the Father, etc. Vers. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be made. Resp. And thou shalt renew the face of the earth. Peace be to thee. Let us pray. O God, Who didst give unto Thine apostles the Holy Ghost, and Who didst will that He should be bestowed through them upon their successors and the rest of the faithful: favourably regard the family of our human nature, and grant that the hearts of these whose foreheads we have marked with the consecrated chrism, and signed with the sign of the holy cross, may be fitly perfected by the advent and indwelling of the same Holy Ghost to be a temple of His glory. Through our Lord, etc. May the Almighty God, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost bless you. Amen. And if his age demand it, let the bishop communicate him, saying: The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve thy body and thy soul unto everlasting life.1 Amen. This being done let some priest enjoin that the godfathers and godmothers pray some set prayer for the good estate of the lord bishop, and for the souls of his father and mother, and for the souls of all the faithful departed, and that they come on the third day with the children to the church to lay down the chrisoms—and so let them depart in the Name of the Lord. It will be observed that in this Sarum Office there is no definite mention of the laying on of hands. It is probable, however, that the bishop laid his hand upon the child's head while anointing his forehead with the thumb of the same hand. This was the old Italian custom as is shown in the Roman Pontifical printed at Venice in 1520. The Roman Pontifical of the year 1888 in a new Office for the confirmation of 1 These words were taken by the Reformers for the words of administration in the Order of Communion. The medieval English formula in ordinary use ran, preserve thy body unto everlasting life,' and did not contain the words 'thy soul." one person directs this. But the ordinary Roman custom, when a larger number of persons is confirmed, is to omit the laying on of the hand while anointing, although the bishop extends his hands towards the candidates just previously. The use of the sign of the cross in Confirmation was continued in England long after the Reformation, and in the eighteenth century it was practised in Scotland, sometimes with the addition of the Chrism itself. The First English Prayer Book neither mentioned the use of Chrism nor forbade it. After the versicles and the first prayer the Office proceeded thus: Minister. Sign them, O Lord, and mark them to be Thine for ever, by the virtue of Thy holy cross and passion. Confirm and strength them with the inward unction of Thy Holy Ghost, mercifully unto everlasting life. Amen. Then the Bishop shall cross them in the forehead, and lay his hand upon their heads, saying: N. I sign thee with the sign of the cross, and lay my hand upon thee: In the Name of the Father, etc. And thus shall he do to every child one after another. And when he hath laid his hand upon every child, then shall he say, The peace of the Lord abide with you. Answer. And with thy spirit. The collect 'Almighty everliving God, Who makest us,' etc., was taken in 1549 from a collect in the Order of Confirmation of Archbishop Hermann of Cöln. In 1552 the whole of this beautiful form from 'Sign them' to 'with thy spirit' was omitted, and there was inserted the present prayer: Defend, O Lord, this child with Thy heavenly grace, that he may continue Thine for ever, and daily increase in Thy Holy Spirit more and more until he come unto Thy everlasting kingdom. Amen. In 1661 the Office was expanded. The Our Father was inserted immediately after the laying on of the bishop's hand, and before the blessing was placed the 1 Cf. the present Roman manner of ordaining a priest, see p. 265. ancient collect, 'O almighty Lord, and everlasting God.' At the beginning of the Office there was printed the present rubric, preface, and interrogation by the bishop. This preface in the previous editions of the Prayer Book existed in the form of opening rubrics to the Order of Confirmation. The shifting of it in 1661 has led to a deplorable mistake. It states that children 'ratify and confirm' ('confess' 1549) when they come to the years of discretion what their godfathers and godmothers promised for them in Baptism. So long as this statement occurred only in the rubrics it was hardly possible for it to cause any misunderstanding, as it came at the head of the Catechism which was printed as a preliminary to the Order of Confirmation. But the insertion of it in the actual Order of Confirmation had led the ignorant to confuse the two senses in which the word 'confirm' is employed, and even to imagine that the Church of England teaches that 'to be confirmed' by the Holy Spirit means no more than 'to confirm' by our own breath what our godparents promised. י It is to be feared that some of the clergy have been guilty of a mistake only less serious in requesting their bishop to permit the singing of a hymn immediately before the laying on of his hand. Inasmuch as the laying on of the hand depends directly upon the previous prayer for the gifts of the Spirit, such an interpolation is a liturgical error of the gravest kind. It is difficult to find a parallel to it except in the action of the ignorant bishops of the later Middle Ages, who recited the ancient Roman prayer for the ordination of a priest without any intention of ordaining the candidates until several additional ceremonies had been performed. 6 The rubric at the end of the service which enjoins that none shall be admitted to the Holy Communion, until such time as he be confirmed, or be ready and desirous to be confirmed,' corresponds almost precisely with the medieval canon passed under Archbishop Peckham. It appears that in some parts of the Continent the Anglican clergy give Holy Communion to Presbyterians and German Lutherans. It should be remembered that both these denominations have repudiated the episcopate, and with it any genuine confirmation. It is therefore a direct violation of the rules of our Church to administer the Eucharist to such persons. |