Book details

Liturgy the Illustrated History

Keith F. Pecklers

9780809106042

1/09/2012

Father Keith Pecklers' remarkable new book is a history of liturgy from its origins in the second century, when it came to be associated with Christian worship, to its manifestations in the present day church. Written by one of the foremost liturgical scholars, this exceptional book is a geography of Christianity, analyzed period by period. For example, the differences occurring among the Ambrosian, the Roman, the Mozarabic, the Gallican, and the Celtic rite outline the cultural landscape before the ninth century.

And this is an anthropological history of the church that involves relationships with architecture, art, literature, culture, pastoral and ecclesiastical government as well as with its connections with the civil power and the organization of society.

Liturgy develops a nonlinear way, and it helps to understand an epoch better than doctrines themselves do. A work like this is a tool that doesn't exist yet. It aims to place the development of Christianity in different historical-anthropological contexts, but also to underline the creativity of Christianity itself and of the Christian community in their search for new expressive forms of faith.

This volume is a bridge among various disciplines, and its illustrative documentation will enable the reader to range from architecture to music, from politics to linguistic cartographies, and from ecclesiastic to monastic history. It features a colorful design and vast array of extraordinarily produced illustrations and maps in full color and is sure to appeal to lovers of history as well as liturgy professionals.