Christ Church

“Be ye kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another,
even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”

It is, I think, a most compelling and touching scene, at once a story of friendship and forgiveness and of healing and restoration. In so many ways, it illustrates what St. Paul is telling us in the Epistle. Do we not see here in this Gospel scene the kindness of friends towards one another? Do we not hear in this Gospel Christ’s words of forgiveness to the man sick of the palsy? Is it not the tender-heartedness of Jesus that we see displayed here in all of its wonder and power?

Well, to be sure and wonderfully so. And yet there is something more, something of a more sombre and disturbing nature. There is as well in this Gospel scene the vanity of minds, the darkening of the understanding, the hardness of hearts, the corruption of souls; in short, all the other things that the Epistle mentions. There is an evil in the heart which resents and opposes the good that might be done to others.

The soul is the battlefield between good and evil. And we all stand convicted or better yet, in the imagery of the Gospel, we all lie paralysed, unable to move, our palsied limbs reflecting a deeper paralysis of the soul which we see in the resistance and opposition of the scribes to Christ’s words of forgiveness to the one who was paralysed. They say nothing, but “Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?”

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Monday, October 31st
4:45-5:15pm World Religions/Inquirer’s Class – Room 204, King’s-Edgehill School

Tuesday, November 1st, All Saints’
10:30am Holy Communion

Thursday, November 3rd
1:30-3:00pm Seniors’ Drop-In
6:30-7:30pm Brownies’ Mtg. – Parish Hall

Sunday, November 6th, Octave of All Saints’ / Trinity XX
8:00am Holy Communion (followed By Men’s Club Breakfast)
9:30am Holy Communion at KES
10:30am Holy Communion
4:00pm Evening Prayer at Christ Church

Upcoming Events:

Friday, November 11th, Remembrance Day Services
10:00am KES Cenotaph
11:00am Windsor Cenotaph

Saturday, November 19th
4:30-6:00pm Annual Parish Ham Supper

Tuesday, November 22nd
7:30pm Christ Church Book Club: Incidents in the Life of Markus Paul, by David Adams Richards

The next Choral Evensong will be on Sunday, November 27th, the First Sunday in Advent. The Advent/Christmas Services of Carols and Lessons with King’s-Edgehill will be on Sunday, December 4th, the Second Sunday in Advent, at 4:30pm, here at Christ Church (Gr.7-11) and at 7:00pm at the Chapel (Gr. 12). On Sunday, December 18th at 7:30pm there will be a special Christmas Concert featuring Paula Rockwell and others. Come and join us!

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

O GOD, forasmuch as without thee we are not able to please thee; Mercifully grant, that thy Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Ephesians 4:17-32
The Gospel: St. Matthew 9:1-8

Artwork: Sir Anthony Van Dyck, Christ Healing the Paralytic, c. 1619, Buckingham Palace, London.

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Simon the Zealot and Saint Jude, Apostles, with Saint Jude the Brother of the Lord, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O ALMIGHTY God, who hast built thy Church upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the head corner-stone: Grant us so to be joined together in unity of spirit by their doctrine, that we may be made an holy temple acceptable unto thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The collect for the Brethren of the Lord, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O HEAVENLY Father, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning: We bless thy holy Name for the witness of James and Jude, the kinsmen of the Lord, and pray that we may be made true members of thy heavenly family; through him who willed to be the firstborn among many brethren, even the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: St. Jude 1-4
The Gospel: St. John 14:21-27

Read more about Saint Simon and Saint Jude here.

Artwork: Ugolino di Nerio, Saint Simon and Saint Thaddeus (Jude), c. 1324-25. Egg tempera on wood, National Gallery, London.

A poster for Choral Evensong and Commemoration of the 400^th Anniversary of the King James Bible, to be held at Christ Church at 4:00pm on Sunday, 30 October:

Click here for a larger version suitable for downloading and printing.

“And one turned back… giving him thanks”

God is extravagant with his mercies; we are miserly with our thanks. October is the month of thanksgiving, especially harvest thanksgiving. But thanksgiving is something more and greater than our thanks for the great bounty of God’s creation and the fruit of human labours. This Gospel story opens us out to the deeper meaning of thanksgiving and its importance with respect to the understanding of our humanity as spiritual creatures. Just note.

There were ten “that lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us”. But only one turned back “and he was a Samaritan”. In short, there are many who cry out for mercy but few who return to give thanks.

To give thanks is more than good manners; it is to acknowledge the mercy freely given and received and to esteem the giver of the mercy freely and supremely. No doubt we have good reason to cry out for mercy like the ten lepers and yet God’s mercy is not given simply for us to take and run away with it. In returning and giving thanks we are more than healed; we are saved or made whole for then we enter into the motions of God’s own love: the going forth and return of the Son to the Father in the bond of the Holy Spirit. We enter precisely into the thanksgiving of the Son to the Father. That is the greater mercy and point of all God’s mercies towards us.

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“Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward”

The patience of Job is one of those familiar proverbs or sayings that remain with us even in a less than biblically literate age. Some have pointed out though that Job is anything but patient. He seems remarkably impatient. Yet patience here is not about the quality of our waiting so much as it is about suffering. To be patient is to be acted upon.

The patience of Job is actually a way of talking about the sufferings of Job. And, Job has more than his share of suffering.

The whole book is a kind of drama, a moral drama about suffering and grace. The Book of Job interrogates certain ancient and modern assumptions about suffering. The passage this morning is from the first speech of the three comforters of Job. The phrase ‘Job’s Comforters’ is another one of those once familiar phrases. The phrase is ironic, referring to the patter of pious platitudes which are more annoying than comforting and fundamentally wrong in the way in which suffering is viewed.

This morning’s second lesson suggests a certain way of looking at the human experience of suffering. It opens us out to the idea of redemptive suffering. “After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish and strengthen you.” Comfort, it should be noted really means strengthen. The so-called “comfortable words” in the Communion Service are strengthening words, we might say.

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“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God”

“Religion,” a comedian once said, “is only guilt with different holidays”. No doubt there is something in the comment. No doubt sin and guilt are among the great commonplaces of religion and especially of the Christian religion.

Right up there with sin and guilt is another great and important Christian commonplace, that much used, much abused, much confused, big, little word, ‘love’, so commonplace as to be found plastered even on bumpers! “Smile, God loves you”. No doubt, it is terribly well-meant, but I wonder whether it evokes anything more than either cute sentimentality or aesthetic revulsion! However nice smiles may be, even as frozen upon the faces of God’s chosen frozen, the love of God, surely, does not reduce itself to mere smiles and happy faces! Love in the gospels, I venture to say, is not about niceness, however nice that might seem to be! It was once complained about a friend of mine that he was not nice, to which he replied “God is not nice and neither am I,” which actually was quite true.

Love constrains us to speak of love. It seems such a commonplace thought. Yet, I wonder if we do not altogether miss the absolutely extraordinary thing about this commonplace. I wonder if we do not altogether fail to see how special, how precious, how extraordinary Christ’s lesson is for us here in this gospel. It goes to the heart of the matter, to the heart that was willing to be pierced and broken for you and for me, indeed, for the whole world.

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Monday, October 24th
4:45-5:15pm World Religions/Inquirer’s Class – Room 204, King’s-Edgehill School

Tuesday, October 25th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place

Thursday, October 27th
1:30-3:00pm Seniors’ Drop-In
3:00pm Service at Windsor Elms
6:30-7:30pm Brownies’ Mtg. – Parish Hall

Friday, October 28th
11:00am Holy Communion – Dykeland Lodge
3:30pm Holy Communion – Gladys Manning Home

Sunday, October 30th, Trinity XIX
8:00am Holy Communion
9:30am Holy Communion at KES
10:30am Holy Communion
2:00pm Holy Baptism at Hensley Memorial Chapel, KES
4:00pm Special Choral Evensong with Combined Choirs
Commemoration of the 400th Anniversary of the King James Bible (1611-2011)
Sponsored by the Prayer Book Society of NS/PEI, Guest speaker: Dr. Jim Gow
Reception to follow in the Parish Hall

Upcoming Events:

Saturday, November 19th
4:30-6:00pm Annual Parish Ham Supper

The next Choral Evensong will be on Sunday, November 27th, the First Sunday in Advent. The Advent/Christmas Services of Carols and Lessons with King’s-Edgehill will be on Sunday, December 4th, the Second Sunday in Advent, at 4:30pm, here at Christ Church (Gr.7-11) and at 7:00pm at the Chapel (Gr. 12). On Sunday, December 18th at 7:30pm there will be a special Christmas Concert featuring Paula Rockwell and others.

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

LORD, we beseech thee, grant thy people grace to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and with pure hearts and minds to follow thee the only God; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 Corinthians 1:4-8
The Gospel: St. Mark 12:28-37