Christ Church

“Woman, behold thy Son…then to the disciple, behold thy Mother”

Christ crucified beholds us in his love for the Father. At one point he looks down from the cross. He looks down upon us and bids us look upon one another. It is the third word from the cross: “Woman, behold thy Son; and then, to the disciple, behold thy Mother.” These are, we may say, the words of the Good Shepherd. They are the words of his care for us.

The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He does not flee like the hireling – the wage slave – in the face of danger. No. The Good Shepherd endures the danger and overcomes it. His endurance means his suffering and death. His victory means his resurrection and life. He lays down his life for the sheep so that his life might live in us. That life is the life of the resurrection. It flows out in his care for us through the Church.

We hear talk all the time about “caring communities”. But I wonder if we know what it really means. We forget, I think, the lessons of the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Ultimately, there can be no true caring without the care of Christ. The crucifixion and the resurrection reconstitute the human community and give it life and meaning.

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“They were afraid”

It is known as the short ending to The Gospel according to St. Mark because some of the earliest texts of St. Mark’s Gospel end at verse eight of the sixteenth chapter rather than with the accounts of the resurrection that take us to verse twenty. To be sure, the canonical gospel, the gospel that is authoritative for orthodox Christians, includes those additional twelve verses. The shorter ending does not mean that Mark does not believe in the doctrine of the resurrection or that the additional verses are somehow unrelated and disconnected to the rest of his gospel and unfaithful to it. Quite the contrary.

But what are we to make of that shorter ending? From a literary point of view, I think, it is powerful and poignant ending, and serves to make the doctrinal point about the resurrection even more strongly. After all, it is only in the light of the resurrection that the story of Jesus makes any sense at all. The resurrection captures the imaginations of the gospel writers and compels them to see things in a new light without which they would never have written what they have written about Jesus at all.

The additional verses serve as an epilogue and as a further point of confirmation, whether as added by Mark or by someone else later on is entirely uncertain and unknowable, and, I might add, quite irrelevant to our understanding of the Christian Faith.

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Tues., April 27th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
6:30-7:30pm Brownies’ Mtg. in the Hall

Thursday, April 29th
1:30-3:00pm Seniors’ Drop-In

Fri., April 30th
6:15pm KES Cadet Choral Evensong

Sunday, May 2nd, Easter IV
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
4:30pm Evening Prayer at KES

This morning we will dedicate a new Pulpit Bible – King James Version – which has been kindly donated by Bev & Jacoba Morash!  This article by Fr. David Curry calls attention to the significance and importance of the King James Version of the Bible.

A raft of books dealing with the King James Version of the Bible – Alistair McGrath’s In the Beginning, Benson Bobrick’s Wide as the Waters, and Adam Nicolson’s God’s Secretaries, for instance – all witness to a revival of interest and scholarly appreciation for the remarkable achievement of the King James Bible. Among publishers’ phantasmagoria of biblical translations available in bookstores, it is still possible to find the King James Version of the Holy Scriptures. But is it being read? Is it being heard?

The Pocket Canons is another project that calls attention to the significance of the King James Bible. A publishing initiative by Grove Press, New York, books of the King James Version of the Bible are published individually in small volumes, each 4 1/8” by 5 5/8” in size. They can also be purchased in box sets; thus far two sets are available covering a range of Old and New Testament books. But what is really outstanding and of interest is the way this initiative undertakes to engage contemporary culture in all its diversity. Each volume is provided with an introduction by a contemporary writer.

The range of writers is remarkable. They include such figures as P.D. James writing on The Acts of the Apostles – an interesting twist on the genre of the whodunit; Charles Frazier of the novel Cold Mountain, now a movie, writing about another struggle of epic proportions, the struggles of Job; the novelist, non-fiction and short-story writer Doris Lessing on Ecclesiastes; the author, poet, journalist and literary critic par excellence of The Spectator and the Sunday Times, Peter Ackroyd on the Book of Isaiah; the Dalai Lama on the Epistles of James, Peter, John and Jude; novelist Joanna Trollope on the books of Ruth and Esther; the mystery writer Ruth Rendell on The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans; Karen Armstrong, famed for, among other things, The History of God, writing on The Letter to the Hebrews; Thomas Cahill, author of such books as The Gift of the Jews, The Desire of the Everlasting Hills, How the Irish Saved Civilisation, and Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter writing on The Gospel according to John; and without exhausting the list of writers but bringing it to some sort of finale, last but not least, singer and writer, humanitarian and activist and sometime court jester at the coronation of Paul Martin, Paul David Hewson, better known as Bono of the rock-band U2 writing, appropriately enough, on the Psalms!

Intrigued? You should be for what is on offer through these writers is more than Oprah fluff and puff. Here are some pretty high-powered writers engaging in a lively, serious and reflective manner with the most formative translation of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament in the English speaking world. What is amazing is the depth of the engagement. They are not biblical scholars, mercifully, but they more than do the job of providing informative and satisfactory introductions to the often very complex texts that are before them. Along the way they reveal, if not a yearning, then at least, an openness to the sacred and a profound respect for the language of revelation and its formative power that reaches, thankfully, beyond institutional religion to literature and the arts. Paradoxically, that reach of the transforming Word is often through exposure to the Word proclaimed in the life of the Church.

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The collect for today, The Feast of Saint Mark the Evangelist, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O ALMIGHTY God, who hast instructed thy holy Church with the heavenly doctrine of thy Evangelist Saint Mark: Give us grace, that, being not like children carried away with every blast of vain doctrine, we may be established in the truth of thy holy Gospel; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Ephesians 4:11-16
The Gospel: St Mark 13:1-10

Artwork: Agnolo Bronzino, Saint Mark, c. 1525. Oil on wood, Cappella Capponi, Santa Felicita, Florence.

The collect for today, The Third Sunday After Easter, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

ALMIGHTY God, who showest to them that be in error the light of thy truth, to the intent that they may return into the way of righteousness: Grant unto all them that are admitted into the fellowship of Christ’s religion, that they may forsake those things that are contrary to their profession, and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same; through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St Peter 2:11-17
The Gospel: St John 16:16-22

Artwork: Andrea del Castagno, The Last Supper, 1447. Fresco, Sant’Apollonia, Florence.

The website administrator will be away travelling for the next two months. During this time, I will have occasional access to the internet and will keep the site up to date as I have opportunity, but delays can be expected in posting sermons, week at a glance, and other items. I apologise in advance for any inconvenience.

Posts with propers and artwork for Sundays and major festivals have been prepared and will appear on schedule.

Jesus said, “I am the Good Shepherd.”

What distinguishes a good shepherd from a bad shepherd? The answer is care. The good shepherd cares for the sheep. Unlike the parable of the Good Samaritan, which does not explicitly identify the Samaritan as the Good Samaritan, let alone naming Jesus as the Good Samaritan of our wounded humanity, par excellence, this Eastertide Gospel is clear and unambiguous. Jesus identifies himself as the Good Shepherd. But what, then, is the care that defines the Good Shepherd?

The care is that Jesus lays down his life for the sheep. The Good Shepherd is the sacrificial Lamb of God. His sacrifice is the cure for our sins and it also imparts his care for our lives.

The pastoral ministry of the church is rooted in this sense of care as “the cure of souls.” It goes beyond the superficial and external matters of comfort and ease to address the radical distempers of our souls. There is no pastoral care without the naming of the cure and there is no cure without the acknowledgement of our need to be cured in the very root of our being.

Today’s Collect speaks of Jesus as being “unto us both a sacrifice for sin and also an example of godly life.” He is the sacrifice for sin. He is the cure, the Good Shepherd who gives his life for the sheep. He stands in the face of the destroyer of the sheep; ultimately our sins are his destroyer. Our lives are scattered lives. Sin scatters us from ourselves and from one another. Grace gathers and redeems our scattered lives. The grace is the grace of the Good Shepherd who wills to be struck so that he may gather us to himself. He gathers us through his care for us. He cares for us through his cure for us.

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Tuesday, April 20th
3:30pm Holy Communion – Windsor Elms
6:00pm Prayers & Praises – Haliburton Place
6:30-7:30pm Brownies – Parish Hall

Thursday, April 22nd
1:30-3:00pm Seniors’ Drop-In
6:30pm Christ Church Cinema Paradiso – “Chariots of Fire”

Friday, April 23rd
11:00am Holy Communion – Dykeland Lodge
3:30pm Holy Communion – Gladys Manning Home

Sunday, April 25th, St Mark/Third Sunday after Easter
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
2:00pm AMD Service of the Deaf
4:30pm Evening Prayer at KES

Upcoming Events:
Friday, April 30th, 6:30pm: Choral Evensong with KES Cadet Corps
Saturday, May 8th, 4:30-6:30pm: 5th Annual Lobster Supper. Click here for more information.

The collect for today, The Second Sunday After Easter, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

ALMIGHTY God, who hast given thine only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life: Give us grace that we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit, and also daily endeavour ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St Peter 2:19-25
The Gospel: St John 10:11-16

Artwork: The Good Shepherd, 3rd century. Marble, Pio Christian Museum, Vatican Museums.