Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom

The Liturgy most Orthodox Christians have stood through week after week, served whenever the Liturgy is celebrated through the year, except on the ten days that belong to St Basil and the weekdays of Great Lent. Its anaphora, the great eucharistic prayer, is the tradition of Antioch and Constantinople, and its core has a good claim to be the prayer of St John Chrysostom himself; the rest grew around it over centuries, with the Cherubic Hymn and the Creed added in the sixth. It opens with the preparation of the gifts at the table of oblation, then gathers the people around the Word with the antiphons, the Little Entrance, the Epistle and the Gospel, and then offers the gifts: the Great Entrance, the kiss of peace, the Creed, the anaphora with its epiclesis, the Lord’s Prayer and communion. Before communion the prayer is said, I believe, O Lord, and I confess, that Thou art truly the Christ, which names each communicant as the first of sinners.