People who are annoyed by small liturgical questions:  tune out now.

So I’ve been having a debate with my rector about what color is appropriate for the Liturgy on Maundy Thursday.  He says blood red with the rest of Holy Week (and as the parish tends to put the emphasis on the footwashing rather than the institution of the Eucharist).  I say white… but I’m not sure if I have good reasons other than that’s what I’ve been told.  I am not sure that different ceremonial books make cases for each.  What think ye?

In my parish, led by Fr. Dan Martins,  we just wear whatever tie we want.  He’s taught me that you really shouldn’t get all caught up in whether it is a red tie or a white tie.  The color doesn’t really matter, as long as it matches your suit, and doesn’t clash with the colors of your PowerPoint.

Thanks, Craig   Though I’m pretty sure that if the Celebrant wore a tie it would cause baby Jesus to cry…  (And that doesn’t exactly please Our Lady, so she might strike you down.)

Well, Fr. Dan only wears a tie on the major feast days.  During ordinary time, particularly in the summer, he simply insists that the celebrant’s shirt have a collar, and no socks with sandals (if you’re the celebrant).  The guitar players and drummers have a more casual dress code.

Well if that’s what Fr Dan does then I should stop making my acolytes wear shoes.  And I’ll pull out my cassock with the running Christmas lights.

And when he’s on vacation, the laity who preside during the Eucharist in his place don’t have to wear a tie either.

I hope these laity who preside are not baptized.  If they were, people might mistake you for fundamentalists.

Our people really don’t buy into those archaic traditions that really just exclude people from fellowship. It’s time to get real.  We live in the 21st century, don’t we?  We’re all bound together by common law aren’t we? Who are we to exclude someone on the basis of their religious preference? As Fr. Dan always says, “Open hearts, open minds, open table, open wallets.”

Oh Craig.  (It would be deeply amusing for us to serve at the same parish someday in the future.  Nothing quite beats a good ecclesiastical spat.)

Seriously, if anyone else wants to jump in to this, it’s a real question.  (Vestments colors for Maundy Thursday.)

We have used white in the past, but I overheard a discussion last Sunday between two of the Altar Guild ladies about this, and one thought red was better. However, her reasoning was not based on being “liturgically proper”....she thought the red looked better and we needed to use it more often.

I tend to agree with the wisdom of our priest, which is to never get in between two Altar Guild ladies in a disagreement.

A serious answer (although I am very tempted to join the less serious path):

Looks like you can get an authoritative answer for any color you want! Even green seems to have been used because of some German traditions of carrying green branches as a sign of victory.

Wear red up until the Eucharist and then white to Celebrate. This would be particularly effective if you then strip the altar at the end of the service.

Here’s a serious answer, Craig’s upstream characterizations of me notwithstanding!

I know there is ample precedent for white—as there is for the use of Gloria in excelsis. This is based on the notion of M.T. being the “birthday of the Blessed Sacrament,” and, hence, a festival, albeit a restrained one.

My own choice, however, is red—not a festival red, but a designated Holy Week red set, preferably an oxblood hue. Under this paradigm, endorsed by the late liturgical scholar Boone Porter, M.T. is the “eve of Good Friday.” I use the same vestments from Palm Sunday through Good Friday, giving a sense of visual unity to the entire week. (And these vestments are used at no other time.)