There is an intra -pastoral squabble about the “historic 1 yr lectionary” and the 3 yr lectionary. Our Chruch uses the 3 yr lectionary which focuses on a specific Gospel throughout the year. The 1 year leactionary covers more stories in one year, but doesn’t go as in depth into specific books. There are pros and cons. The problem is that the squabble typically degenerates into who is more pure than who. Yes, pastors are sinful people too. We just often pick more silly things to sin about.
This file 1yr-vs-3-yr-gospels contains the review putting the three year texts up against the 1 yr texts. From this comparison there are three passages in the 1 year lectionary that do not get read anywhere in the 3 year cycle: the feeding of the 4000 (not the 5000), Jesus testimory about himself from John and the Healing of the officials son. There are 12 spots that the 3 year lectionary covers the text from a parallel passage (i.e. same basic story but a different Gospel). The rest are all covered by the 3 year lectionary – some more than once. The three year lectionary also gives the congregation and the minister the opportunity to become deeply familiar with each gospel by covering much that the 1 yr does not touch.
To be fair the advocates of the 1yr will complain that the 3 yr cycle comes out of Rome, is only about 50 years old and is touched by Higher Criticism (boo-hiss). I do not think those criticism carry much weight, but they do have some validity.
Anyway, this post is more to make the file available for that community.
