Roman-Anglican Advent Service Held
Diocesan Press Service. December 10, 1964 [XXVII-4]
Hundreds of persons jammed the historic Christ Episcopal Church for a joint Roman Catholic-Episcopal Advent service, believed to be the first of its kind in the nation.
The Rt. Rev. Anson Phelps Stokes, Bishop of Massachusetts, and the Most Rev. Thomas J. Riley, Auxiliary Bishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, delivered sermons at the 70-minute service.
In addition to the crowd in the main church, 275 persons listened to the service by loudspeaker in an adjacent auditorium. Many others crowded the hallways or stood in the brisk late afternoon air outside the main door. About 200 to 300 were turned away.
The idea for the service stemmed from conversations between chaplains and directors of Catholic and Episcopal student choirs, who approached Bishop Stokes and Richard Cardinal Cushing, Archbishop of Boston. Both granted permission for it to take place "on this occasion."
The Rev. Joseph I. Collins, Catholic chaplain at Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges, and the Rev. William J. Schneider, Episcopal chaplain at the two schools, noted that the texts used in the service were "for the most part held in common by Episcopalians and Roman Catholics. Those texts used which are not held in common are acceptable to both."
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