Rite of Home Blessing

We Lutherans sometimes fall victim to the “too Catholic” superstition. We are ashamed of our venerable traditions of blessing people and objects, even when they appear in our Small Catechism, such as when Luther instructs us: ““bless yourself with the holy cross,” and in the Large Catechism when he encourages the “blessing and thanksgiving at meals” and “the practice of children to cross [German: “segne” - “bless”] themselves when anything monstrous or terrible is seen or heard.” Note that we are not instructed to sheepishly explain to standers-by that we aren’t Roman Catholic, nor is there a soliloquy about how we do this in Christian liberty, that it is optional, an adiaphoron, etc.

Some might argue that such practice “isn’t in the Bible,” that such liturgical blessings are not sacraments, and that Christ hasn’t instituted or authorized any such thing - and therefore the Lutheran should avoid such things. Of course, to say so is to be more Lutheran than Luther, and more confessional than the confessions. It is to squander our Christian liberty by reverse-judaizing: by imposing a ritual non-ritual upon the consciences of the faithful.

But we who believe in the power of the Word to sanctify, and we who take our office of shepherd seriously with the understanding that there exists in our world the creedal “invisible,” that we are in a state of spiritual warfare, that angels and demons are not psychological projection but are actually real entities - we simply maintain the traditions handed over to us from our apostolic and reformation fathers without sorrow or shame.

One such custom is the blessing of homes - which is traditionally done by the parish pastor in the season of Epiphany, a sort of new year spiritual housecleaning. It is, for all intents and purposes, an exorcism. And no, we don’t have to go on a long discourse about how exorcism is not like the Linda Blair movie and replace the simple rite of blessing with a tedious matrix of handwringing qualifications, explanations, equivocations, and other hems and haws that detract from the rite itself.

Just “say the black” and “do the red.”

Our Pastoral Care Companion has a rite of “Blessing of a Home” on page 148 - approved by Mother Synod and published by CPH - having met the sacred canons of Doctrinal Review.

The explanatory rubrics suggest this rite “when a new home is occupied, when a family moves to another home, or at other appropriate times (e.g., following a robbery or vandalizing of a home, following an assault or murder in the home, following fire or other destruction, following renovation of a home).”

And even when there has been nothing “monstrous or terrible” happen in the home, it is still fitting that “homes may be blessed annually. Usually this is done during the season of Epiphany due to the connection of the visitation of the Magi to the home of the infant Christ (Matt. 2:1-11; John 1:14). On such annual observances of this rite, the Magnificat with antiphon (see page 150) may be chanted in place of the Psalmody.”

The rubrics indicate that “one or more individual rooms may be blessed.” The rite gives options for various rooms of the home (154-156).

And this is the job of the pastor:

“The pastor of the congregation presides. He may vest in his customary vestments, using the color of the day or the season.” The nature of this rite as an exorcism is shown in the prayer on page 157: “Drive from here the snares of the evil one and send Your holy angel to guard, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this home.”

In cases where the home has been explicitly subjected to demonic influence, the Pastoral Care Companion provides resources that can be used as well in the section “Occult Practices and Demonic Affliction” on page 354.

In our age of technology, entertainment, secularism, and unbelief, we do well to remember that we are in the crossfire of the ancient and unseen war, and we should revive traditions that have fallen into disuse because of our rationalistic superstition and lack of faith in the power of the Word of God and prayer to sanctify (1 Tim 4:5).