My response to Monomakh, in case byzcath deletes it...

Monomakh,

I haven't searched the archives yet. Does your own parish, If BCC, serve Matins? How many OCA parishes serve matins? How many ACROD parishes? The problem is more widespread than just the BCC.

As to on verses of the antiphons.....sigh.... I had hoped that there would be restoration of the full antiphons. Sadly in our church's history there has bee one verse of the antiphons for far too long. The last 100 years seems to be too far back in our church's history to find REGULARLY sung multiple verses of the antiphons. Yes maybe 1% of our parishes did sing all three antiphons with all three verses on a REGULAR basis.

Too often we here seem to be like the three blind men describing an elephant based upon the limited information we can gather by what we experience. To extrapolate our parish experience to all the Metropolia will always be incomplete. Some parishes celebrate a fuller cycle of liturgical services than do others. This seems more a function of the priests (and to some small extent the laity) in the individual parishes. Would that our Bishops mandate better consistency in the celebration of Liturgies throughout our Eparchies!!! {oh wait, they did and many rebelled!!!} Would that our Bishops followed the Orthodox celebration of the liturgical cycle. Would that all BCC's wish for such a renewal!

To call this restoration akin to the "Democratic People's Republic" of North Korea is somewhat misleading and extreme. Perhaps you could cite when in our history as a church the people (laity) have ever had so much say in how the liturgy is celebrated?

This, my unworthy $.0002 opinion,

Steve