Christ Church

“Whose is this image and superscription?”

A coin? A bitcoin? No. An actual coin, a physical object, and not the term coined, if you will pardon the pun, for a computational algorithm belonging to the realm of bits and bytes in the digital world. All this fuss about a coin? Well, yes, it seems so. “Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar or not?” The Pharisees and the Herodians ask Jesus but only so as to “entangle him in his talk”. All this fuss about a coin turns on an image and a superscription, a picture and the words which surround or are about an image on a coin. Coins as physical objects have a powerful symbolical significance. Jesus uses something as ordinary and basic as a coin, a penny, to teach us something powerful about our identities and the structuring of our loyalties.

The picture is an image, a depiction of Caesar, the ruling authority of the political world of Jesus’ day. The superscription identifies in writing that authority. Our coins, to the extent that we still have them, are stamped with the image of the Queen – the sovereign principle of this nation of Canada. All on a coin. It suggests the interplay between politics and economics.

It is a much vexed problem which we can never entirely escape. The challenge is to think the relation between economics and politics, on the one hand, and, far more importantly, the relation between them both and spiritual life, on the other hand. It is the latter about which Jesus is most concerned. In a way, it is a question about what is the fundamental nature of reality. Is the real simply the social, the economic and the political? Or does the spiritual and the intellectual, the philosophical and the theological point us to the reality of God which in turn engages the realms of the social, the economic and the political?

This gospel story, like so many of the gospel stories, challenges our assumptions. They disquiet and disturb us. This gospel story confronts us with the fundamental question about our spiritual identity. In a way, Jesus’ question is really asking about us in relation to God. Whose image and superscription are we? The analogy here is between the coin, symbolizing economic and political might, and ourselves as made in the image of God as spiritual and intellectual creatures.

But if we define ourselves primarily and essentially by money, property, and power then we deny the one in whose image we are made and remade. It is the challenge and the issue for contemporary culture. What is a means to end, a medium of exchange, becomes instead the defining reality of our lives. We forget what money really is because we forget who we truly are. The consequences are enormous and inescapable.

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Monday, October 31st
4:35-5:05pm Bible Study/Inquirer’s Class – Room 206 KES

Tuesday, November 1st, All Saints’ Day
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
6:30-8:00pm Girl Guides – Parish Hall
7:00pm Holy Communion

Wednesday, November 2nd, All Souls’ Day
6:30-8:00pm Brownies – Parish Hall

Friday, November 4th
6:00-9:00pm Pathfinders & Rangers – Parish Hall

Sunday, November 6th, Trinity XXIV/In the Octave of All Saints
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
4:00pm Choral Evensong, St. Peter’s Cathedral, Charlottetown, sponsored by the PBSC NS/PEI, Fr. Curry preaching

Upcoming Events and Changes to the Tentative Schedule:

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

Tuesday, December 20th
7:00pm, Capella Regalis Concert, “To Bethlehem with Kings”.

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

O GOD, our refuge and strength, who art the author of all godliness: Be ready, we beseech thee, to hear the devout prayers of thy Church; and grant that those things which we ask faithfully we may obtain effectually; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Philippians 3:17-21
The Gospel: St Matthew 22:15-22

Artwork: Mattia Preti, The Tribute Money, c. 1640. Oil on canvas, Brera, Milan.

The collect for today, the commemoration of James Hannington (1847-85), first Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa, Missionary to Uganda, Martyr (source):

Precious in your sight, O Lord,
is the death of your martyrs
James Hannington and his companions,
who purchased with their blood a road into Uganda
for the proclamation of the gospel;
and we pray that with them
we also may obtain the crown of righteousness
which is laid up for all
who love the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 3:14-18,22
The Gospel: St. Matthew 10:16-22

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

In the various New Testament lists of the Twelve Apostles (Matthew 10:2-4; Mark 3:16-19; Luke 6:14-16; Acts 1:13), the tenth and eleventh places are occupied by Simon and Judas son of James, also called Thaddeus.

To distinguish Simon from Simon Peter, Matthew and Mark refer to him as Simon the Cananaean, while Luke refers to him as Simon the Zealot. Both surnames have the same signification and are a translation of the Hebrew qana (the Zealous). The name does not signify that he belonged to the party of Zealots, but that he had zeal for the Jewish law, which he practised before his call. The translation of Matthew and Mark as Simon “the Canaanite” (as, e.g., KJV has it) is simply mistaken.

The New Testament contains a variety of names for the apostle Jude: Matthew and Mark refer to Thaddeus (a variant reading of Matthew has “Lebbaeus called Thaddaeus”), while Luke calls him Judas son of James. Christian tradition regards Saint Jude and Saint Thaddeus as different names for the same person. The various names are understood as efforts to avoid associating Saint Jude with the name of the traitor Judas Iscariot. The only time words of Jude are recorded, in St. John 14:22-23, the Evangelist is quick to add “(not Iscariot)” after his name.

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The collect for today, the Feast of St. Alfred the Great (849-899), King of the West Saxons, Scholar (source):

O God our maker and redeemer,
we beseech thee of thy great mercy
and by the power of thy holy cross
to guide us by thy will and to shield us from our foes,
that, following the example of thy servant Alfred,
we may inwardly love thee above all things;
through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord,
who liveth and reigneth with thee,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Lesson: Wisdom 6:1-3,9-12,24-25
The Gospel: St. Luke 6:43-49

Artwork: Hamo Thornycroft, Alfred the Great, 1899. Bronze, Winchester, England.

The collect for a Bishop or Archbishop, on the Feast of St. Cedd (c. 620-664), Abbot of Lastingham, Bishop of the East Saxons, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O GOD, our heavenly Father, who didst raise up thy faithful servant Cedd to be a Bishop in thy Church and to feed thy flock: We beseech thee to send down upon all thy Bishops, the Pastors of thy Church, the abundant gift of thy Holy Spirit, that they, being endued with power from on high, and ever walking in the footsteps of thy holy Apostles, may minister before thee in thy household as true servants of Christ and stewards of thy divine mysteries; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Lesson: Acts 17:22-31
The Gospel: St. Luke 10:1-16

The collect for a Martyr, on the Feast of Saint Crispin and Saint Crispinian, Martyrs (d. c. 285), from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O GOD, who didst bestow upon thy Saints such marvellous virtue, that they were able to stand fast, and have the victory against the world, the flesh, and the devil: Grant that we, who now commemorate thy Martyrs Crispin and Crispinian, may ever rejoice in their fellowship, and also be enabled by thy grace to fight the good fight of faith and lay hold upon eternal life; through our Lord Jesus Christ, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 4:12-19
The Gospel: St. Matthew 16:24-27

Crispin and Crispinian are believed to have been brothers and Roman noblemen martyred for their faith during the persecution of Emperor Maximian.

Artwork: Ambrosius Francken (I), Martyrdom of the Saints Crispin and Crispinian of Soissons, c. 1610. Oil on panel, Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp.

“That your love may abound yet more and more”

Abundant love. Super-abundant love. The love which cannot be numbered. The love which cannot be constrained. It is a beautiful concept. How is it to be realised in us? In a way, that is the great question of the Trinity season. How are the living words of Christ to be made alive in us? How will we act out of what we have heard and seen? Will we? The point is that we hear and see things that require a response in us.

The Gospels often provide us with powerful illustrations about our human failings, on the one hand, and God’s redeeming grace at work in us, on the other hand. The Gospel for the 22^nd Sunday after Trinity is one such example. It begins with a question from Peter to Jesus about how often do you forgive the one who has sinned against you. Is there a set number? Can forgiveness be limited to an algorithm, to a mathematical formula? Everything else is in our world and day, it seems. We are quite content to let the algorithms of Googledom send us birthday greetings and tempt us with endless advertisements programmed to our supposed interests, not to mention letting the entire stock market be run by algorithms. So why not forgiveness? Why not seven times?

Jesus’ response is about abundant love. “I say not unto thee, until seven times; but until seventy times seven.” Literally? Four hundred and ninety times? And, then, at the four hundred and ninety-first time, what? Forget it, your allotment of forgiveness is up? Tough luck, buddy. It is, of course, a deliberate exaggeration. Who, after all, is going to keep track of such a number? Why, you would need some sort of algorithm just to do the numbering! But that misses the entire point. Forgiveness is not something that can be quantified. To think that it can misses the whole meaning of forgiveness. Ultimately it is something from God that is meant to live and move in us, if we will let it.

There is the crux of the matter brought out in the parable which Jesus tells to illustrate the point about the immeasurable nature of forgiveness. It is the parable of the unforgiving servant who having been forgiven a great debt of “ten thousand talents”, a huge sum, turns around and refuses to forgive a lesser servant a far, far, smaller debt owed to him, a mere “hundred pence”. It is a brilliantly clear example of someone being forgiven who does not forgive in turn; the complete opposite of the petition in the Lord’s Prayer. “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us.”

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Monday, October 24th
4:35-5:05pm Bible Study/Inquirer’s Class – Room 206, KES
6:30-8:00pm Sparks – Parish Hall

Tuesday, October 25th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
6:30-8:00pm Girl Guides – Parish Hall

Wednesday, October 26th
6:30-8:00pm Brownies – Parish Hall

Thursday, October 27th
3:15pm Service at Windsor Elms

Friday, October 28th
6:00-9:00pm Pathfinders & Rangers – Parish Hall

Sunday, October 30th, Trinity XXIII
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Changes to the Tentative Schedule:

‘Phantom of the Pipes’ concert scheduled for October 28th: cancelled

Tuesday, December 20th
7:00pm Capella Regalis Concert, “To Bethlehem with Kings”.