Using the planner

What you will find here

Choose a day and an office, and the planner lays out Morning Prayer, Noonday Prayer, Evening Prayer, or Compline using the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. It fills in the appointed psalms and readings and offers seasonal choices for canticles, Suffrages, collects, and the ending of the service.

Prayer Book page numbers are shown beside the relevant sections so you can check the service as you prepare it.

1. Choose the date and office

Use the date control at the top of the page, or use the arrows to move one day at a time. Then choose one of the four offices:

• Morning Prayer is the Church’s principal office for beginning the day.
• Noonday Prayer is a brief service with a psalm, short reading, prayers, and collect.
• Evening Prayer is the principal office for the close of the day.
• Compline is prayer at the end of the night and includes its own psalms, readings, and Song of Simeon.

The date determines the Church season, liturgical color, Daily Office lectionary appointments, and any commemoration shown by the selected calendar.

2. Understand Rite I and Rite II

Morning and Evening Prayer may be prepared in Rite I, which uses traditional language such as “thee” and “thou,” or Rite II, which uses contemporary language. Noonday Prayer and Compline have their own Prayer Book forms, so the Rite selector is not shown for those offices.

You may separately choose the traditional or contemporary form of the Lord’s Prayer.

3. Review the suggested choices

For Morning and Evening Prayer, the planner fills in an opening sentence, Invitatory Antiphon, Venite or Jubilate, canticles, Suffrages, dismissal, and concluding sentence. The suggestions follow the season and the character of the day’s readings and psalms.

To use a different authorized text, open “Override the guide’s service selections.” The season buttons narrow the menus to choices for that season. The Invitatory Antiphon is the officiant’s sentence before the Invitatory Psalm; it is separate from the Venite, Jubilate, or Christ our Passover.

4. Choose lessons and Scripture text

Morning and Evening Prayer display the Old Testament lesson, New Testament lesson, and Gospel appointed by the Daily Office lectionary. Select the lessons you intend to use; many weekday gatherings use two rather than all three.

The Scripture menu controls what appears in the downloaded bulletin. Public-domain translations may load automatically. API.Bible translations depend on the versions available to this site. Choose References only when the reader will use a separate Bible. If licensed NRSV text is needed, paste the authorized text into the provided fields before downloading.

Always compare the Scripture references with the parish’s preferred lectionary source before the service.

5. Choose commemorations and prayers

The holy-person calendar menu lets you choose among the available Episcopal calendars. When an approved, open church source supplies a biography or collect, it may be included. If no suitable open biography is available, the bulletin leaves it out.

After the Suffrages, select any additional Prayer Book prayers your gathering needs. You may also type local intercessions or thanksgivings in the custom-prayer box. Those words appear in the prayers near the end of the selected service, before its concluding prayers or dismissal. Mark the worship leader as clergy only when the priestly absolution is appropriate.

6. Read through the service

The service appears below the controls in order. Rubrics show who says each part: the officiant, the people, or everyone together. The cross beside “Glory to the Father” marks the Gloria Patri. Use the jump links to move to the Opening, Psalms, Lessons, Creed, Prayers, or Dismissal.

Once the choices are set, you can hide the options. The office buttons remain available at the top.

7. Download a bulletin

Add the parish name and worship leader, select a Scripture setting, and choose a bulletin format:

• Full service bulletin contains the complete prepared rite for leaders and participants.
• Condensed two-page handout gives a shorter outline with Prayer Book pages, Scripture references, canticles, and selected collects.
• Congregation service copy emphasizes the words and responses spoken by the congregation while omitting most leader-only material.

Select Download bulletin PDF. The file downloads directly without opening a print dialog. Review every page before distributing it, especially page breaks, Scripture text, images, and the Gloria Patri following psalms and canticles.

Funeral Service Planner

The Funeral Service Planner is a separate planning tool for The Burial of the Dead in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. It is designed for a parishioner, family member, or parish leader to prepare choices for review with the clergy and parish. Information entered in the planner stays in the browser and is not stored by the site.

Open Service options to enter the name of the deceased, parish, date, location, rite, participants, notes, and whether the service includes Holy Eucharist or the Commendation. The planner provides the Prayer Book’s appointed Old Testament, New Testament, Gospel, and Psalm choices, plus a custom Scripture range when the parish has approved another passage.

Use the hymn section to fill each place in the rite, including a psalm or hymn after the Old Testament or Epistle, offertory, Sanctus, Fraction Anthem, Communion hymns, and recessional. Selecting a hymn in a new place clears it from its former place. The hymnal list includes approved index metadata only, not hymn text or music. A parish may also add a CSV or JSON hymn index for the current browser session.

When Eucharist is selected, choose Rite I or Rite II and the appropriate Eucharistic Prayer. The prepared bulletin includes the Eucharistic Prayer, selected Sanctus and Fraction Anthem in their proper places, Communion material, Postcommunion Prayer, blessing, and dismissal. If no Sanctus or Fraction Anthem is chosen, the spoken Prayer Book text remains.

The planner can download either a full service bulletin or a one-page church planning form. Review all choices with the clergy before use, especially the opening forms, Collects, lessons, music, Eucharistic Prayer, and decisions about the Commendation or Committal.

Sources and support

This is an independent project, not an official publication of The Episcopal Church. The Book of Common Prayer is in the public domain. Scripture translations and other resources may have their own notices and permissions.

The site is still being developed, and the calendar is being reviewed. You may support the project through PayPal at @openserviceplanner. For help or corrections, email support@openserviceplanner.com.