Procession of Palms.—Alb, amice, purple stole, purple cope, mitra simplex.
Procession of Corpus Christi.—Alb, amice, stole, tunic, dalmatic, white cope; a mitra pretiosa borne behind. In England and in France red was the colour.
Rogation Days.—Alb, amice, purple stole, purple cope, mitra simplex.
In occasional services, such as baptism, a surplice and stole are worn. At baptisms two stoles are used, one of violet, which is worn at the first part of the service, and the other of white, which is substituted for the first in the course of the office. This observance has a symbolical meaning; violet being the colour which typifies sin and penitence, and white being associated with ideas of purity, the change in the stole is emblematic of the regenerating change which the rite of baptism is supposed to work. A reversible stole, violet on one side and white on the other, is sometimes used for this service. In processions and benedictions at the altar (i.e., blessings of wax, images, etc.) the cope must be worn. In other benedictions stole and surplice are sufficient.
The cope must also be worn at an absolution after a mass for the dead; the colour of the cope for such a service is black, the ministers lay aside their dalmatics, and when the celebrant assumes the cope he must lay aside his maniple. If for any reason a cope be not obtainable, these rites (benedictions, absolutions, etc.) must be performed in alb and crossed stole only, without chasuble or maniple.
Should it be found necessary to celebrate high mass without the aid of a deacon or subdeacon, the Epistle is ordered to be sung by a lector vested in a surplice.
We must now approach an important branch of this complex subject—the varieties in the colour of the vestments depending on the character of the day, in other words, the liturgical colours of the vestments.
It does not appear that the definite assigning of particular colours to particular days is of older date than Innocent III's time; but before him, and even as far back as the time of the fathers of the church, we find that the early Christians had symbolical associations with colours, which have formed the foundation on which the elaborate structure of later times was built.
It is a matter of common knowledge that there are associations of sentiment and colour which are practically indissoluble. Black and sorrowful, white (or bright) and joyful, are synonymous terms, and similar expressions are universal.
White, in the first ten centuries of Christianity, typified purity and truth. Saints, angels, and Our Lord are for that reason represented clothed in white. As we have seen, the earliest vestments were probably white; the newly-baptized wore white during the week after baptism, and the dead were shrouded in white; the latter, however, probably more for convenience than for any symbolic reason.