Crucifer

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File:Crucifer.jpg
A crucifer carrying a cross

A crucifer or cross-bearer is, in some Christian churches (particularly the Roman Catholic Church, Lutheran Churches, Anglican Communion, and Methodist Churches), a person appointed to carry the church's processional cross, a cross or crucifix with a long staff, during processions at the beginning and end of the service.<ref name="Armentrout1999">Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> In these Christian denominations, the crucifer is a role assigned to a certain acolyte or altar server.

EtymologyEdit

The term "crucifer" comes from the Latin crux (cross) and ferre (to bear, carry). It thus literally means "cross-bearer". Use of the term "crucifer" is most common in the Lutheran and Anglican churches, as well as in certain Catholic congregations.<ref name="Concordia2025">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In the Catholic Church, the usual term is "cross-bearer", which is employed in certain Lutheran congregations as well.<ref name="ce">Patrick Morrisroe, "Cross-Bearer" in The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York 1908)</ref>

Role by Christian denominationEdit

Roman Catholic ChurchEdit

In the Latin Catholic Church the function of the crucifer/cross-bearer was generally carried out by a subdeacon until Pope Paul VI decreed in his motu proprio Ministeria quaedam of 15 August 1972 that "the major order of subdiaconate no longer exists in the Latin Church". In line with that document, the functions previously assigned to the subdeacon are now entrusted to the acolyte and the reader.<ref>Pope Paul VI, Ministeria quaedam</ref>

A seventeenth-century Council of Milan stated that a crucifer should, when possible, be a cleric and that, if a lay person be selected, that "the most worthy of the laity should be selected for the office." For more solemn processions, the cleric should be vested in amice, alb, and tunic. On less solemn occasions he may just be vested in surplice. During the procession the staff is held with both hands such that the cross is well above the head. The cross-bearer leads the procession except when there is a thurifer and is accompanied by two servers on the more solemn occasions.<ref name=ce/>

File:Brooklyn Museum - Double-Sided Processional Cross - Master of Monte del Lago.jpg
Brooklyn Museum – Double-Sided Processional Cross – Master of Monte del Lago

Lutheran ChurchesEdit

In the Lutheran Churches, the crucifer is an acolyte who carries the processional cross.<ref name="Concordia2025"/> Torchbearers stand to the side of the crucifer.<ref name="Concordia2025"/> During the procession and the recession, the crucifer "holds the cross in an elevated and dignified manner".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Anglican CommunionEdit

In the Anglican Communion, the crucifer is an acolyte who carries the processional cross.<ref name="Armentrout1999"/>

See alsoEdit

ReferencesEdit

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