Year: 2016

Prayers and liturgy

The Nativity of Our Lord

The collect for today, the Nativity of our Lord, or the Birth-day of Christ, commonly called Christmas Day, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

ALMIGHTY God, who hast given us thy only begotten Son to take our nature upon him, and as at this time to be born of a pure Virgin: Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by thy Holy Spirit; through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

The Epistle: Hebrews 1:1-12
The Gospel: St. John 1:1-14

Bronzino, Adoration of the ShepherdsArtwork: Agnolo Bronzino, Adoration of the Shepherds, c. 1546. Oil on poplar, Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.

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Sermons

Sermon for Christmas Eve

“And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us”

She was an old woman, weary and worn, burdened with the cares and worries of life. She paused for a moment before a Crêche scene in the park of a big city. It was a time when such things were more common and were yet to be regarded as politically incorrect. She put her bags down and looked upon that quiet scene in the midst of the city’s bustle. I watched as she slowly crossed herself before picking up her bags and shuffling on. A Christmas blessing, I thought.

Christmas seems sometimes just too much. Perhaps some of you know what I mean. Kathy and Scotty Cameron have a pillow inscribed with the letters OCD meaning Obsessive Christmas Disorder! All the hustle and bustle, all the frantic press and bother, all the manic shopping and travel, all the tinsel and wrap; all too much. Not to mention the great plethora of images, the sights and sounds that surround this thing we call Christmas. Not to mention the sad array of images of violence and destruction, of war and sorrow that equally confront us and which stand in such glaring contrast to the claims of peace and prosperity, goodwill and charity. All too much, it seems. No time to stop and think.

Such a rich fullness of images. Are we simply to pick and choose whatever suits us or whatever happens to come to the surface of our hearts and minds? Are we like Dylan Thomas in his celebrated poem “A Child’s Christmas in Wales” simply to plunge our hands “into that wool-white bell-tongued ball of holidays resting at the rim of the carol-singing sea” and see what comes out? What comes out is “Mrs. Prothero and the firemen” attending a kitchen fire on Christmas day, a memorable event, no doubt, but it is the question which Jim’s aunt raises, Miss Prothero, who “said the right thing, always” which frames the narrative. “Would you like anything to read?” she asks.

Christmas Eve is about something read. “How do you read?” Jesus asks a questioning lawyer, meaning how do you read the Law, the Torah? He draws out of him what is known as The Summary of the Law, the ethical and spiritual teaching which is at once common to Judaism and Christianity, to Islam and to Greek philosophy and which connects to the teachings of the great religions of the world. The love of God and the love of humanity are somehow inescapably bound together. The lawyer’s answer, itself a collation of passages from Deuteronomy and Leviticus, two of most your favourite books, I am sure, leads to another question by the lawyer, “and who is my neighbour?” Jesus responds with the parable of the Good Samaritan. It is, we might say, part of the Torah of Jesus. Torah properly means instruction or guidance, an instruction and a guide for life. How you read is also about what you read. It leads to how we live. As we read so we do, as it were. In the mystery of Christmas, God becomes neighbour.

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Prayers and liturgy

Christmas Eve

The collect for today, Christmas Eve (source):

Almighty God,
who makest us glad with the yearly remembrance
of the birth of thy only Son Jesus Christ:
grant that, as we joyfully receive him as our redeemer,
so we may with sure confidence behold him
when he shall come to be our judge;
who liveth and reigneth with thee
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Epistle: Titus 2:11-15
The Gospel: St. Luke 2:1-14

Caravaggio, Nativity with St. Francis and St. Lawrence

Christmas Eve
(a poem by Christina Georgina Rossetti)

Christmas hath darkness
Brighter than the blazing noon,
Christmas hath a chillness
Warmer than the heat of June,
Christmas hath a beauty
Lovelier than the world can show:
For Christmas bringeth Jesus,
Brought for us so low.

Earth, strike up your music,
Birds that sing and bells that ring;
Heaven hath answering music
For all Angels soon to sing:
Earth, put on your whitest
Bridal robe of spotless snow:
For Christmas bringeth Jesus,
Brought for us so low.

Artwork: Caravaggio, Nativity with St. Francis and St. Lawrence, 1609. Oil on canvas,
Formerly in Oratorio di San Lorenzo, Palermo. Missing since theft on 18 October 1969.

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Sermons

Sermon for the Feast of St. Thomas

“And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not”

“Drive the dark of doubt away”. These are the familiar words from the Hymn to Joy, set to Beethoven’s masterpiece Ode to Joy in his Ninth Symphony, by the American author, Rev’d Henry Van Dyke. Darkness and doubt seem so inescapably entangled. And yet there is the wonderful paradox of The Feast of St. Thomas the Apostle which coincides with the winter solstice and heralds the Nativity of Christ. Light and darkness, doubt and certainty, faith and understanding are all wrapped up in the readings of this day.

Thomas the doubter, it seems, but equally, it is the Thomas the questioner whose questions belong to the mystery of Advent, itself the season of profound questions which challenge and illumine the mysteries of faith. “Art thou he that should come or do we seek another?” John the Baptist asked in the wilderness of prison, the victim/victor of truth which speaks to power. “How shall this be seeing I know not a man?” asked Mary, being “troubled at this saying” of the Angel’s salutation at the Annunciation, “cast[ing] in her mind what manner of salutation this should be”. A crescendo of questions pour down upon John the Baptist in the Gospel for The Fourth Sunday in Advent about him, questions which he turns about to point us to Christ as “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world”.

And here, on The Feast of St. Thomas? Just as The First Sunday in Advent recounts Christ’s triumphal entry in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday with the question “Who is this?”, so the Gospel for The Feast of St. Thomas takes us to the Resurrection accounts in John’s Gospel by which Jesus makes himself known; in short, a testimony to the Incarnation through the Resurrection. Thomas hears about Jesus making himself known to the other disciples behind closed doors. He says that “Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.” He questions what others have said. He demands to know for himself.

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Prayers and liturgy

Saint Thomas the Apostle

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

ALMIGHTY and everliving God, who for the more confirmation of the faith didst suffer thy holy Apostle Thomas to be doubtful in thy Son’s resurrection: Grant us so perfectly, and without all doubt, to believe in thy Son Jesus Christ, that our faith in thy sight may never be reproved. Hear us, O Lord, through the same Jesus Christ, to whom, with thee and the Holy Spirit, be all honour and glory, now and for evermore. Amen.

The Epistle: Ephesians 2:19-22
The Gospel: St. John 20:24-29

Signorelli, Christ and Doubting ThomasSt. Thomas’s name is believed to come from an Aramaic word meaning twin, but it is not known whose twin he was. He is included in all the lists of the twelve apostles, but he is mentioned most often in St. John’s Gospel, where he is called “Didymus” (“twin” in Greek) three times (11:16; 20:24; 21:2).

St. Thomas appears to have been an impulsive man. He says he is prepared to go with Jesus to the tomb of Lazarus even if it means death (John 11:16). At the Last Supper, however, he confesses his ignorance about where Jesus is going and the way there (John 14:5). In response, Christ said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

After the resurrection, Thomas was unwilling to believe his fellow disciples that Jesus had risen from the dead (John 20:24). He would not believe, he declared, unless he actually touched the wounds. Eight days later, Jesus gave “Doubting Thomas” the evidence he had asked for, whereupon Thomas confessed him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus then pronounces a blessing on all who have not seen and yet believe.

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Events, Month at a Glance

Christmas at Christ Church, 2016

Saturday, December 24th, Christmas Eve
7:00pm Children’s Crêche Service
9:30pm Christmas Eve Communion Service

Sunday, December 25th, Christmas Day
10:00am Christmas Morning Communion Service

Monday, December 26th, St. Stephen
10:00am Holy Communion

Tuesday, December 27th, St. John the Evangelist
10:00am Holy Communion

Wednesday, December 28th, Holy Innocents’ Day
10:00am Holy Communion

Sunday, January 1st, 2017, The First Sunday after Christmas/Octave Day of Christmas
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

O God, who makest us glad with the yearly remembrance of the birth of thy only Son Jesus Christ: Grant that as we joyfully receive him as our Redeemer, we may with sure confidence behold him when he shall come again to be our Judge; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, now and ever. Amen.

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Sermons

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Advent

“He was not that light, but was sent to bear witness of that light”

We will hear these words on Christmas Eve in the great Gospel of the Incarnation. But today, on The Fourth Sunday in Advent, we hear precisely about that one who is “sent to bear witness of that light” without whom we can hardly understand anything of the mystery of Christmas. The Gospel today is known as “the record” or “the witness of John”, the witness of John the Baptist who points us directly to the meaning of Christ’s coming. “Behold the Lamb of God,” he says, “which taketh away the sin of the world.”

In the darkest time of nature’s year, we look to the light, but it is not the light of nature that concerns us so much as the light of God’s Truth and Word. That is the greater light which “shines in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not”. Light overcomes darkness and not the other way around. The darkness is more than the longest night of nature’s year in the winter solstice which falls in the middle of this week, this longest week in the longest possible Advent season, marking the slow, slow turn towards spring. No. There is the far greater darkness of human sin and evil countered by the far, far greater light of God.

The readings for today are centuries old. They signal a sense of expectancy and heightened anticipation. The darkness of sin and judgment already gives way to a sense of joy and gladness. All the questions of Advent, that season of holy questions, reach a kind of crescendo in the Gospel of “the witness of John”, in the intensity of the questions about John which turn us to Christ. The Epistle reading from Philippians, too, conveys this sense of joyous anticipation in its repeated insistence on the notes of rejoicing and peace all of which counter the darkness of our anxieties. In every way, these readings speak to our contemporary dilemmas and concerns. We are, I am afraid, deeply anxious and uncertain, afraid and troubled about our world and day and about ourselves. Yet the winters of our discontent are really always about ourselves.

What these readings highlight are matters of the soul. They speak to the radical meaning of Christ’s coming as redeemer and saviour. That makes no sense at all if we somehow assume that we are all-sufficient in and of ourselves. The awareness of the darkness not only of nature but of human endeavour should provide a necessary reality check on that score. It is ancient biblical wisdom that “it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves”. “We are his people,” the psalmist says, “and the sheep of his pasture.” Therein lies a note of rejoicing as well. “Jubilate Deo”, “O be joyful in the Lord!”(Ps. 100).

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Events, Month at a Glance

More than a Week at a Glance, 19 December – 1 January

Monday, December 19th
6:00-7:00pm Sparks – Parish Hall

Tuesday, December 20th
7:00pm Christmas Concert: Capella Regalis Men & Boys Choir, “To Bethlehem with Kings”. $12.00. Pulled Pork Supper & Concert (5:30-6:30, concert at 7:00) $ 20.00; (Supper only – $ 10.00).

Wednesday, December 21st, Feast of St. Thomas
7:00pm Holy Communion

Saturday, December 24th, Christmas Eve
7:00pm Children’s Crêche Service
9:30pm Christmas Eve Communion Service

Sunday, December 25th, Christmas Day
10:00am Christmas Communion Service

Monday, December 26th, St. Stephen
10:00am Holy Communion

Tuesday, December 27th, St. John the Evangelist
10:00am Holy Communion

Wednesday, December 28th, Holy Innocents’ Day
10:00am Holy Communion

Sunday, January 1st, 2017, The First Sunday after Christmas/ Octave Day of Christmas
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Xmas Lessons & Carols

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Prayers and liturgy

The Fourth Sunday in Advent

The collect for today, the Fourth Sunday in Advent, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

RAISE up, we beseech thee, O Lord, thy power, and come among us, and with great might succour us; that whereas, through our sins and wickedness, we are sore let and hindered in running the race that is set before us, thy bountiful grace and mercy may speedily help and deliver us; who with the Father and the Holy Spirit livest and reignest, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Epistle: Philippians 4:4-7
The Gospel: St John 1:19-29

Bosch, St. John in the WildernessArtwork: Hieronymous Bosch, St. John in the Wilderness, c. 1489. Oil on panel, Museo Lázaro Galdiano, Madrid.

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Prayers and liturgy

Ignatius, Bishop & Martyr

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Ignatius (d. c. 107), Bishop of Antioch, Martyr (source):

Feed us, O Lord, with the living bread
and make us drink deep of the cup of salvation
that, following the teaching of thy bishop Ignatius,
and rejoicing in the faith
with which he embraced the death of a martyr,
we may be nourished for that eternal life
which he ever desired;
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 Epistle: Romans 8:35-39
The Gospel: St. John 12:23-26

Piastrini, St. Ignatius Condemned by TrajanIgnatius, who became Bishop of Antioch c. 69, is a key witness of the early church in the era immediately following the apostles.

Nothing certain is known of his episcopate before his journey from Antioch to Rome as a prisoner condemned to death in the arena. Arrested during the persecution of the emperor Trajan, he was received in Smyrna by Bishop (later Saint) Polycarp and delegates from several other churches in Asia Minor.

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