Christ Church

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Epiphany is the season of teaching. It speaks profoundly to the nature of education at King’s-Edgehill. Teaching and learning concern the whole person and the formation of character. Such is the recurring emphasis on gentleness and learning, respect and dignity. So too with Epiphany. The question implies that there are things that we should know or at least come to know.

In the Christian understanding, the teaching is about the essential divinity of Christ. In other words, something about the idea and nature of God is made known through Christ. The stories of the Epiphany season illustrate the wisdom, the power and the eternity of God manifest in the words and deeds of Christ. The further point is that through the teachings about the nature of God something is shown to us about ourselves; indeed, something about the vocation of our humanity.

The lesson from Isaiah 42 read on Monday and Tuesday is the first of the four so-called ‘suffering servant’ songs in Isaiah. Powerful poetry, the prophet presents God as saying, “behold, my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen in whom my soul delights; I will put my Spirit upon him, he will bring forth justice to the nations.” The servant can be understood individually as a Messiah figure or collectively as the people of Israel. The vocation of Israel is as God’s servant, charged with “establishing justice in the earth,” as being “a covenant to the people”, “a light to the nations,” as “opening the eyes of the blind,” as “bringing the prisoners out of the dungeon”, “from the prison those who sit darkness.” The images speak to the redemption of our humanity and ground the vocation of our humanity in the life of God. For Christians the song is seen in relation to the Baptism of Christ understood as an Epiphany of Christ’s divinity, an Epiphany of the Trinity. Jesus “coming out of the waters of Jordan” “sees the heavens open and the spirit like a dove descending upon him.” He hears “a voice from heaven saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” It is the voice of the Father. The imagery draws explicitly upon Isaiah and continues the theme that the teaching of God’s Word and Will shapes human thought and action.

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Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased

“There came a voice from heaven”, Mark tells us, just after Jesus “com[es] up out of the water” “baptized of John” in the river Jordan, and sees “the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him”(Mark 1. 10). The Baptism of Christ is an epiphany, a making known of the essential divinity of Christ, thus an epiphany, too, of the Trinity. As such The Baptism of Christ is an integral feature of the Epiphany; its propers provided for within The Octave of the Epiphany (BCP, p. 119).

Epiphany is the season of teaching, hence the imagery of light. Advent, too, is the season of teaching with an equal emphasis upon the imagery of light. The difference is that Advent focuses on the Light of Godcomingdown to our world of darkness; Epiphany focuses upon the Light of Godnowin the world. The emphasis is on the nature of God revealed in Jesus Christ. The “voice from heaven” is the Father’s voice which proclaims “Thou are my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”(Mark 1.11). This is the beloved “servant, whom I uphold, mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth,” God says in Isaiah, the one upon whom “I have put my spirit” (Isaiah 42.1).

On the one hand, the servant here is Israel in her divine vocation as  “a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles” tasked “to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness” (Isaiah 42.6,7). Powerful images that signal human redemption as grounded in God. On the other hand, the servant is the Son in whom the Father is “well pleased” because the vocation of Israel is only fulfilled in Christ.

The Gospel for The First Sunday after the Epiphany, which this year is also The Octave Day of Epiphany, is the unique story of the boy Jesus engaged with the doctors of the Law in the temple at Jerusalem, “sitting in their midst,” “both hearing them and asking them questions”(Luke. 2. 46). It is a scene of wonder. “All they that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers”(Lk. 2. 47). It is unique in one way because it is the only story in the New Testament about the childhood or boyhood of Christ. But it is uniquely important in another way. Here is Jesus as Divine Teacher and human student. It is an epiphany about who Christ really is. His question to Mary and Joseph highlights his mission and divine identity. “Wist ye not” – did you not know? – “that I must be about my Father’s business?” (Lk. 2. 49). Some translations have “in my Father’s house.” Literally, it is “the things of my Father.” In any event, it is a telling phrase which points to the temple, to the church, as a place of teaching. Teaching and learning, and living the teaching that is learned. That is the Epiphany in us.

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Monday, January 14th
4:35-5:15pm Confirmation Class – KES

Tuesday, January 15th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
7:00pm Christ Church Book Club – Coronation Room: In Search of a Better World: A Human Rights Odyssey by Payam Akhavan and Tears of Salt: A Doctor’s Story by Pietro Bartola and Lidia Tilotta

Thursday, January 17th
6:30-8:00pm Sparks in Parish Hall

Friday, January 18th
6:00-7:30pm Pathfinders & Rangers – Parish Hall

Sunday, January 20th, Second Sunday after the Epiphany
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Upcoming Event:

Sunday, February 10th
Pot-Luck Luncheon and Annual Parish Meeting following 10:30am Holy Communion

The collect for today, the First Sunday after the Epiphany, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O LORD, we beseech thee mercifully to receive the prayers of thy people which call upon thee; and grant that they may both perceive and know what things they ought to do, and also may have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Romans 12:1-5
The Gospel: St. Luke 2:41-52

Artwork: Jacques Stella, Jesus found in the Temple by his Parents, c. 1640. Oil on canvas, Museum of Fine Arts, Lyon, France.

The collect for a Doctor of the Church, Poet, or Scholar, on the Feast of Saint Benedict Biscop (c. 628-89), Founder of the monasteries of Wearmouth and Jarrow, Scholar, Patron of the Arts, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962);

O GOD, who by thy Holy Spirit hast given unto one man a word of wisdom, and to another a word of knowledge, and to another the gift of tongues: We praise thy Name for the gifts of grace manifested in thy servant Benedict Biscop, and we pray that thy Church may never be destitute of the same; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lesson: Daniel 2:17-24
The Gospel: St. Matthew 13:9-17

Saint Benedict Biscop is remembered as a church leader instrumental in preserving and disseminating Western civilisation during the so-called “Dark Ages”.

Born into a noble Northumbrian family, Benedict spent many years in Frankish monasteries, becoming a monk at the Abbey of Lérins, off the southern coast of France. He also travelled to Rome six times. At the conclusion of his third visit in 668, he accompanied St. Theodore of Tarsus, the Greek monk newly commissioned as Archbishop of Canterbury, to England. For two years, Benedict served as abbot of the monastery of St. Peter & St. Paul (later St. Augustine’s), Canterbury, but soon wanted to establish his own foundation.

Receiving papal approval to establish monasteries in Northumbria, Benedict founded the twin monasteries of St. Peter’s at Wearmouth in 674 and St. Paul’s at Jarrow in 681. He travelled to Rome and returned with an “innumerable collection of books of all kinds”. He also brought with him John the Chanter, Archcantor of St. Peter’s, Rome, who taught the monks the Roman liturgy and Gregorian chant.

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The collect for today, the commemoration of The Right Rev. John Horden (1828-1893), first Bishop of Moosonee, Missionary to the First Nations of Canada:

O God,
the Desire of all the nations,
you chose your servant John Horden
to open the treasury of your Word
among the native peoples of Canada.
Grant us, after his example,
to be constant in our purpose and care
for the enlargement of your kingdom;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

Source of collect: Give Us Grace: An Anthology of Anglican Prayers, compiled by Christopher L. Webber. Anglican Book Centre, Toronto, 2004, p. 456.

Born in Exeter, England, to humble Christian parents, John Horden resolved to be a missionary while a young boy at school and, when he was 23, the Church Missionary Society (CMS) offered him a post as a teacher and missionary at Moose Factory on James’ Bay. He and his young wife set sail on 8 June 1851, arriving at Moose Factory on 26 July.

Horden gave himself whole-heartedly to his task. Within eight months he was able to teach and preach to the indigenous people in the Cree language. In the summer of 1852, Bishop David Anderson of Rupert’s Land travelled 1500 miles to visit his new minister, initially planning to bring him to Red River for theological training. The young man’s conscientiousness and maturity were so impressive, however, that Bishop Anderson changed his plans, ordaining John Horden priest on 24 August.

Rev. Horden ministered to the James Bay Cree and Hudson Bay Company employees for many years, visiting indigenous peoples all around the James Bay region. He translated the Gospels, a hymnal, and a prayer book into Cree, and sent them to England for printing. Because no one was competent to proof-read the master copies, the CMS sent him a printing press and told him to print the books himself. Horden needed many long, frustrating days to teach himself how to assemble and operate the press. His printing press was soon producing other Christian literature in Cree. He also wrote a grammar of the Cree language.

In 1872, Bishop Robert Machray of Rupert’s Land decided that his diocese had grown too large and should be sub-divided. Thus, at Westminster Abbey on 15 December 1872, the Archbishop of Canterbury consecrated John Horden the first Bishop of the Diocese of Moosonee.

Bishop Horden continued to travel across his vast diocese. By the end of his life, most of the Cree of James Bay had been converted, as well as many Ojibwa, Chipewyan, and Inuit. Also, he laboured on translating the Bible into Cree until he died unexpectedly on 12 January 1893. He is buried at Moose Factory.

Biographies of John Horden are posted here and here.

The collect for today, the commemoration of William Laud (1573-1645), Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr (source):

Keep us, O Lord, constant in faith and zealous in witness, that, like thy servant William Laud, we may live in thy fear, die in thy favor, and rest in thy peace; for the sake of Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

The Epistle: Hebrews 12:5-7,11-14
The Gospel: St. Matthew 10:32-39

A Prayer for the Church by William Laud:

Gracious Father, I humbly beseech thee for Thy holy Catholic Church, fill it with all truth; in all truth with all peace. Where it is corrupt, purge it; where it is in error, direct it; where it is superstitious, rectify it; where in anything it is amiss, reform it; where it is right strengthen and confirm it, where it is in want, furnish it; where it is divided and rent asunder, make up the breaches of it; O Thou Holy One of Israel. Amen.

Source: Give Us Grace: An Anthology of Anglican Prayers, compiled by Christopher L. Webber. (Anglican Book Centre, Toronto, 2004), p. 55.

Artwork: William Laud, stained glass, Chester Cathedral, Chester, England.

They departed into their own country another way

Christmas ends and Christmas begins! Such is the point of Epiphany, known as “The Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles”; in other words, to the world. The central story is about “the magoi from Anatolia,” the wise men from the East coming to Bethlehem. With the coming of the Magi-Kings, Christmas goes global. It is omni populo, for all people. For Eastern Orthodoxy, Epiphany is Christmas. Such is the significance of what is one of the most intriguing and most beloved stories of Christmas.

And, perhaps, the most challenging. Why? Because it challenges so many of our assumptions about knowing. The Magi-Kings, as we have come to think of them, come from the east, following a star, Matthew tells us. How many and when exactly they came no one knows anymore than anyone knows for sure when Christ was born. Such things are hidden in what Prospero in The Tempest calls “the dark backward and abyss of time.” But the idea of the wise ones seeking to know is powerful. “They saw … they came … and they worshipped.” They present gifts, “sacred gifts of mystic meaning,” as one hymn puts it. The gifts teach. They signal something about the one to whom the gifts are given. The gifts are all part of the manifestation, the making known of the mystery of God with us. Christ is God, and King, and Sacrifice. Epiphany is Theophany, a making known of God.

This story which has so captured the imaginations of artists and musicians brings out the universal aspect of the Christmas story. What it offers is something for all regardless of our different faith or non-faith perspectives. In a way, the story shows the real meaning of education. The wise ones are the ones who seek to know and who are committed to  learning. Students are those who embark on the journey of learning, a journey with their teachers who are also always students, always seeking to learn (otherwise they aren’t teachers!). The wise ones are in pursuit of truth before which they fall down and worship.

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The collect for today, the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O HEAVENLY Father, whose blessed Son Jesus Christ did take our nature upon him, and was baptized for our sakes in the river Jordan: Mercifully grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may also be partakers of thy Holy Spirit; through him whom thou didst send to be our Saviour and Redeemer, even the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lesson Isaiah 42:1-8
The Gospel: St. Mark 1:1-11

Artwork: Rogier van der Weyden, Baptism of Christ (central panel of St. John Altarpiece), 1455-60. Oil on oak panel, Staatliche Museen, Berlin.

“They saw … they came … and worshipped him”

Unlike Caesar who proverbially came, saw and conquered, the Magi-Kings saw, came, and adored. They were conquered by what they saw. They “fell down and worshipped.” They beheld, through the leading of a star, the child-King of Bethlehem. In their adoration, they “opened their treasures and presented unto him gifts; gold, frankincense, and myrrh,” ‘sacred gifts of mystic meaning,’ as one of our hymns wonderfully puts it. Such really is the real origin of gift-giving, the giving of gifts in honour of the gift that is given in Christ’s holy Nativity.

Epiphany marks the completion of Christmas. Everything which belongs to sight and sound, to art and music, to prayer and praise is finally gathered together. The imaginary of Bethlehem is now a crowded place of images derived at once from holy scripture and from holy imagination. With “the adoration of the magi”, the pageant of Christmas is now wonderfully complete.

And over. At least, the account of what we have come to call Epiphany marks both the completion of the mystery of Christmas and inaugurates a new and different consideration. The Journey of the Magi impels, in fact, another journey, one that conveys a profound sense of disquiet and unease. “Being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way,” Matthew tells us. “No longer at ease,” T.S. Eliot suggests, because they are profoundly changed by the mystery which they beheld in Bethlehem. Somehow what they worshipped and adored stays with them and has its way within them. Something has changed. There is a questioning wonder about what we have been given to see. As Eliot’s poem, the Journey of the Magi, puts it:

Were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.

The awareness of our limitations, of which death is the greatest and ultimate limitation, is the birth of philosophy. It is an ancient theme, constantly reworked and replayed in myriad ways. The death of Enkidu gives birth to Gilgamesh’s quest for wisdom in The Epic of Gilgamesh and launches him on a journey through the realms of the deep darkness of death, the home of the sun which in the ancient understanding arises out of the darkness and sets into the darkness. The death of Patroclus occasions a philosophical crisis for Achilles in Homer’s Iliad. And so for Plato, for Augustine, for Dante, for Shakespeare, for Descartes, the list goes on and on, but in one way or another, the awareness of human limitations gives birth to reflection and wisdom.

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