The Liturgy is made up of many different parts that all work together to accomplish a full and total service of prayer and praise and supplication. In the Western Eucharistic Liturgy, which we call the Mass, there are two main groupings of parts, the Ordinary and the Propers. The Ordinary of the Mass is that collection of prayers and declarations and songs that stay the same each Mass. The Propers of the Mass are those portions that are variable, which change from Mass to Mass.
Even within this group of parts called the Propers, there’s a further distinction between Propers which are either spoken or simply chanted aloud, and Propers which are meant to be sung to a melody. We could call these the choral Propers. And on the third Sunday after the Feast of Epiphany, something unique happens to the choral Propers that doesn’t happen again at any other time of the year: they freeze.
For up to four weeks, the Sunday choral Propers (Introit, Gradual, Alleluia, Offertory, and Communion) are all the same. (If there are any further Sundays before Septuagesimatide, they pick up the Propers for the last Sundays after Pentecost/Trinity which will be cut off that year to begin Advent). Given that the Propers for each Mass are generally uniquely chosen in order to bolster the unique Gospel story or theme or Saint of that Mass, how can the same four choral Propers be expected to do their job over the course of four Sundays with changing Epistle and Gospel readings, Collects, and post-communion prayers?
I think it’s because the Season of Epiphany (that’s right, it’s not just a single Feast Day but a whole season) is meant to have a unified character. The Feast of Epiphany, its Octave day, and the Sunday following the Octave make up a very unified three-fold theme of the beginning of the revelation of Jesus to the world (with the Sunday between Epiphany and its Octave also fitting in snuggly with that theme). That brings us up to the third Sunday after Epiphany when the choral Propers lock in place this theme, as well as anticipating what will follow this season on the Liturgical calendar. So let’s look at them.
The Introit [Adorate Deum] runs: “Worship God , all ye angels of his: Zion heard and rejoiced, and the daughters of Judah were glad. The Lord is King, the earth may be glad thereof: yea, the multitude of the isles may be glad thereof. Glory be…” Both this Introit and the Alleluia verse (“Alleluia, alleluia. The Lord is King, the earth may be glad thereof: yea, the multitude of the isles may be glad thereof. Alleluia.”) come from Ps. 97, a psalm that emphatically declares the Lord to powerfully reign over the whole earth. But as a sung Proper of the Mass in the season of Epiphany, the mention of angels worshiping God recalls to mind the birth of Christ and how it’s the Nativity season that is the cause and immediate precursor to Epiphany. In, “Zion heard and rejoiced,” we have a powerful foil to “When King Herod heard, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him (Matt. 2:3),” from the Gospel reading for Epiphany, as these psalm words now are Eschatological, referring to the Church, the heavenly Zion. In referencing the whole earth being glad about the true King, we of course are reminded of the “three kings” from afar worshipping the Christ-child and bringing him gifts.
The Gradual verse is: “The heathen shall fear thy Name, O Lord: and all the kings of the earth thy majesty. When the Lord shall build up Zion, and when his glory shall appear.” Again, the visitation of the Magi immediately is brought to mind in this context. But the appearing of glory also resonates with the approving Voice of the Father and the descent of the Spirit as a dove at Jesus’ baptism (Octave of Epiphany), as well as the fact that in the miracle at Cana—turning water into wine (Second Sunday after Epiphany)—St. John explicitly tells us that this “manifested forth [Jesus’] glory.”
The Offertory is: “The right hand of the Lord bringeth mighty things to pass, the right hand of the Lord hath exalted me: I shall not die but live and declare the works of the Lord,” from Psalm 118. Again, Jesus’ first example of the miracles he would perform throughout his ministry is certainly a mighty thing brought to pass by the hand of the Lord.
And finally, the Communion verse: “All wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of the mouth of God.” Though coming from Luke 4:22 in the context of his teaching in the synagogues, as an Epiphany season Proper we’re most immediately reminded of the way he spoke to the elders in the Temple as a twelve-year-old (first Sunday after Epiphany).
But each and all of these Propers, in addition to together perpetuating a general Epiphanytide motif, also support each of the Gospel pericopes for the Sundays they cover. Both “mighty things to pass” in the form of miracles, and “gracious words proceeding from the mouth of God” in the form of teachings and parables are shown to us in the Gospels of the third through sixth Sundays after Epiphany—and all for the purpose of revealing the character, the vocation, and the divine identity of Jesus. And as the season moves us, Sunday by Sunday, closer to the next season, the Offertory chant’s “I shall not die but live,” clues us into Lenten secret: all that looks deathly, in Christ, becomes life. This, too, is his Epiphany to us and to all creation.