Welcome, and thank you for joining us in our second year of field testing!
The sanctoral calendar was one of the most difficult things to narrow down in our research, as a balance was desired between the rather sparse Lutheran calendars (largely feasts of Christ and those of the apostles, with a few more here and there) and the voluminous medieval uses. After a great deal of time, discussion, and research, the basis for the calendar linked below is the Betbüchlein of Martin Luther, first published in 1522 and published in successive editions for the next few decades, even after his death. This calendar corresponds, in large part, to the most widely celebrated saints on the calendar throughout late medieval Germany and Western Christendom as a whole. We compared Luther’s calendar with our database of medieval calendars and eliminated a few observances which were more localized and not universal (e.g.: St. Gotthard on May 5th, St. Ulrich on July 4th), and adjusted the date of at least one saint to a more commonly observed date (St. Euphemia from April 13th to September 16th).
We expanded Luther’s calendar by the addition of historically well-attested vigils for feasts of Christ, the apostles, and a handful of others. These serve to complete the lectionary, as the readings assigned for a feast frequently assume the readings for the vigil are also assigned. So, for example, the Gospel for the Feast of St. Andrew is Matthew 4:18–22, the calling of Sts. Andrew, Peter, James, and John to be apostles; and the Gospel for the Vigil of St. Andrew is John 1:35–51, which recounts St. John the Baptist pointing St. Andrew to Christ, the Lamb of God. Neither of these Gospels appear elsewhere in the lectionary. In a similar way, the Gospel for the Nativity of St. John the Baptist is Luke 1:57–68, recounting his birth, and the Gospel for the Vigil is Luke 1:5–17, recounting the angel’s visit to Zechariah in the temple. Again, these readings are found nowhere else in the lectionary.
We also expanded Luther’s calendar by the addition of some saints that were not well-attested in medieval German use, but are Scriptural (e.g.: St. Joseph) or have found widespread recognition today (e.g.: St. Patrick), as well as some of the saints in the calendar of Lutheran Service Book that are well-attested in medieval use, if not in Luther’s calendar (e.g.: St. Jerome). We also added Reformation and post-Reformation figures such as Luther, Melanchthon, Chemnitz, Walther, Loehe, and a handful of others.
In all, the proposed sanctoral calendar is a robust but not overwhelming catalog of the cloud of witnesses who have gone before us, those “of whom the world was not worthy.” In addition to those listed by name, there will also be the various commons of martyrs, virgins, doctors, confessors, and so on, which will afford the materials necessary for local commemorations not found on our calendar. However, if there is a saint that has been, in your estimation, wrongly excluded from the calendar, please feel free to submit his or her name and a rationale for your suggestion in the form linked at the bottom of this page.
Here is the 2023-2024 Liturgical Calendar for your use. The lections are listed in the calendar, but they will also be provided in the Sanctoral Lectionary PDF (coming soon! in the meantime, see the lectionary texts file below), though many of them can already be found in the Temporal Lectionary PDF. Both of these are formatted for printing and placing in a three ring binder. Whenever possible, the readings are formatted so that you can print all of the readings for any given day on the front and back of an 8.5×11 sheet of paper. The PDF will be updated regularly with further readings as time goes on. If you encounter any typographical errors, please let us know so that we can fix them.
Here are the unformatted Temporal and Sanctoral Lectionary Texts, provided so that you can easily paste them into your service leaflets as desired.
When you have feedback you would like to submit, you can do so HERE.
The Lutheran Missal 