Month: May 2021

Sermons

Meditation for Ascension Day

“I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”

Jesus’ famous words to Mary in the stories of the Resurrection already point us to the culmination of the Resurrection in the Ascension of Christ. Such is the mystery of God’s essential life opened out to us precisely through the words of the Rogation Gospel on Sunday past. “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father”  (Jn. 16. 28). God is made known to us and for us in the comings and goings of Christ, the Word and Son of the Father. There is the going forth of the Word in Creation and now there is the return of the Word in Redemption signaled most completely in the Ascension.

The Ascension is the homecoming of the Son to the Father. The idea of homecoming is a rich and arresting idea. Home has such a powerful resonance and meaning. It speaks at once to the places in which we live but even more to the sense of spiritual identity and purpose. Who we are is grounded in Christ, in his going forth and return to the Father in the bond of the Spirit, the ever-present third, which belongs to the dialogic structure of all thought and reality. The Ascension marks the end, in the sense of purpose, of all creation. Its end and thus our end is found in the return of the Son to the Father. We abide in those eternal motions of heavenly love. Exitus et reditus. A going forth and a return. Everything is gathered back to God and has its meaning and purpose in God.

The Ascension teaches us the deeper meaning of prayer: “God’s breath in man returning to his birth,” as Herbert puts it. Creation redeemed has its crowning expression in the Ascension of Christ. Yet this feast, almost invariably lost to view falling, as it does, on the fortieth day after Easter and, thus, on a Thursday, highlights the radical and deep meaning of prayer. Prayer belongs to our homecoming in Christ’s homecoming. “We ascend in the ascension of our hearts,” as Augustine wonderfully puts it. Prayer is the motion of the Ascension in us. “Lift up your hearts.”

Far from being a flight from the world, it celebrates the redemption of all creation as returned to God in whom it has its being and meaning, its beginning and end. The very structure of some of our church buildings, such as Christ Church, architecturally speaking, illustrates the very motion of the Ascension. We go from the font to the altar in a kind of ascension that leads us up through the nave to the chancel steps and under the Rood Screen (under the Cross) to the sanctuary and altar. Such a movement in space and structure is the form of our participation in Christ’s going to the Father. The very beams of the building proclaim Christ as the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end of all things. We are embraced in those wooden beams symbolic of Christ’s sacrifice and life and its culmination in the return of the Son to the Father. Such is the Ascension.

Our liturgy, too, in its ritual acts symbolizes the going forth of God’s Word proclaimed in the Gospel and the gathering of our souls to God’s Word made visible in the Sacraments. In every sense, there is the lifting up our souls and our world to God in prayer and praise, in Word and Sacrament, in service and sacrifice.

In the conditions of the latest lockdown, we may not be able to gather together in person but my hope is that we are together in prayer, the prayer that gathers all things to the care of God and that places ourselves in that care for one another. We live in the endtimes of all things by abiding in God’s eternal life opened out to us through the comings and goings of Christ. That is our joy and our strength even in difficult and uncertain times.

“I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”

Fr. David Curry
Ascension 2021

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Prayers and liturgy

The Ascension Day

The collect for today, The Ascension Day, being the fortieth day after Easter, sometimes called Holy Thursday, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

GRANT, we beseech thee, Almighty God, that like as we do believe thy only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to have ascended into the heavens; so we may also in heart and mind thither ascend, and with him continuously dwell, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Lesson: Acts 1:1-11
The Gospel: St. Mark 16:14-20

Barnaba da Modena, The AscensionArtwork: Barnaba da Modena, The Ascension, 1372-74. Tempera on panel, Capitoline Museums, Rome.

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Prayers and liturgy

Florence Nightingale, Nurse

The collect for today, the commemoration of Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), Nurse, Social Reformer (source):

Francis William Sargent, Florence Nightingale MemorialLife-giving God, who alone hast power over life and death, over health and sickness: Give power, wisdom, and gentleness to those who follow the example of thy servant Florence Nightingale, that they, bearing with them thy Presence, may not only heal but bless, and shine as lanterns of hope in the darkest hours of pain and fear; through Jesus Christ, the healer of body and soul, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

The Lesson: Isaiah 58:6-11
The Gospel: St. Matthew 25:31-46

Artwork: Francis William Sargent, Florence Nightingale Memorial, 1913. Main Cloister, Basilica di Santa Croce, Florence. Photograph taken by admin, 17 May 2010.

Florence Nightingale was born in Florence to an English couple touring Europe. Her parents loved the city so much that they gave its name to their daughter.

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Prayers and liturgy

Cyril and Methodius, Missionaries

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Cyril (826-69) and Saint Methodius (c. 815-85), Apostles to the Slavs (source):

O Lord of all,
who gavest to thy servants Cyril and Methodius
the gift of tongues to proclaim the gospel to the Slavic people:
we pray that thy whole Church may be one as thou art one,
that all who confess thy name may honour one another,
and that from east and west all may acknowledge one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
and thee, the God and Father of all;
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: Ephesians 3:1-7
The Gospel: St. Mark 16:15-20

Oleg Supereco, Cyril & MethodiusSt. Cyril and St. Methodius were brothers born in Thessalonica who went to Constantinople after being ordained priests. (Cyril was baptised Constantine and did not become known as Cyril until late in his life.) Around AD 863, Emperor Michael II and Patriarch Photius sent the brothers as missionaries to Moravia, where they translated into Slavonic the Gospels, the Psalms, and the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. With his brother’s help, Cyril created an alphabet that later developed into Cyrillic, thus laying the foundation for Slavic literature.

German missionary bishops in the area celebrated the liturgy in Latin and opposed the brothers’ use of the vernacular. In 867, Cyril and Methodius participated in a debate in Venice over the use of Slavonic liturgy and were soon received with great honour in Rome by Pope Hadrian II, who authorised the use of Slavic tongues in the liturgy.

In 868, Cyril became a monk and entered a monastery in Rome, but died soon afterward and was buried in the church at San Clemente. Shortly after Cyril’s death, Methodius was consecrated archbishop of Sermium and returned to Moravia where he ministered for another fifteen years. He continued the work of translation and evangelisation, while continuing to face opposition from German bishops. Before his death in 885, he and his followers completed translations of the Bible, liturgical services, and collections of canon law.

St. Cyril and St. Methodius are honoured for evangelising the Slavs, organising the Slavic church, and pioneering the celebration of liturgy in the vernacular. For these reasons, in 1980 Pope John Paul II named them, together with St. Benedict, patron saints of all Europe.

Artwork: Oleg Supereco, Cyril & Methodius, 21st century (source).

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Sermons

Sermon for Rogation Sunday

Click here to listen to audio file of Matins & Ante-Communion for Rogation Sunday

“And the Lord showed him all the land”

Rogation Sunday celebrates the redemption of creation and our place in the landscape of creation redeemed. The Resurrection is cosmic in scope. It concerns the whole world as ordered to God. This acts as a kind of corrective with respect to our modern attitudes and approaches to the natural world as something which is just there to be manipulated and used. Rogation is prayer. Prayer does not separate us from creation but belongs to the gathering of all creation to God.

Thus prayer is an activity of redeemed humanity and happens in the land where we have been placed. Our places in the land are to be the places of grace. How? By prayer. Rogationtide embraces the world in prayer. The world is comprehended in the relationship of the Father and the Son in the bond of the Holy Spirit, as seen most wonderfully in today’s Gospel and which culminates in the Ascension. What is overcome is sin, the world as turned away from God and as turned against God, the world as infected and stained by our sinfulness, by our forgetfulness of our place and of ourselves in the landscape of creation redeemed, and of our forgetfulness of one another. The consequences are our disrespect for the land and the sea, for the world in which we have been placed, and for one another. We make a mess of it. We forget the place of creation in the will of God; we forget the redemption of creation and our place in it.

Rogation Sunday recalls us to a kind of theology of the land. In the story of Creation, the earth, the dry land, is said to be good (Gen.1.9,10) and the whole of creation not only good but “very good”. Such is the creation which God the Creator sees. And we, who are made in the image of God, are also formed out of the dust, “from the ground” (Gen.2.7). We are placed in the garden of creation. The garden is the land of paradise.

In the story of the Fall, our disobedience not only alienates us from God but also from the land. The land of paradise becomes the land of sweat and toil. “Cursed is the ground because of you … In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to the dust you shall return” (Gen.3.17,18). “And the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken” (Gen.3.23). That means to work with the land in accord with the will of God in creation. In the story of Cain and Abel, the land becomes the land of blood. Cain slays Abel in the field: “The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground,” God says (Gen.4.10) in a particularly powerful and poignant image. These stories are altogether fundamental to what unfolds in the story of salvation in the Old and New Testaments.

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Prayers and liturgy

The Fifth Sunday After Easter

The collect for today, The Fifth Sunday After Easter, commonly called Rogation Sunday, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O LORD, from whom all good things do come; Grant to us thy humble servants, that by thy holy inspiration we may think those things that be good, and by thy merciful guiding may perform the same; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: St. James 1:22-27
The Gospel: St. John 16:23-33

Nikolai Ge, The Last SupperArtwork: Nikolai Ge, The Last Supper, 1863. Oil on canvas, State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

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Prayers and liturgy

Gregory of Nazianzus, Bishop and Doctor

The collect for today, the Feast of St. Gregory of Nazianzus (329-89), Monk, Bishop, Theologian, Doctor of the Eastern Church (source):

Antonio Cifrondi, St. Gregory of NazianzusAlmighty God, who hast revealed to thy Church thine eternal Being of glorious majesty and perfect love as one God in Trinity of Persons: Give us grace that, like thy bishop Gregory of Nazianzus, we may continue steadfast in the confession of this faith, and constant in our worship of thee, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who livest and reignest for ever and ever.

The Lesson: Wisdom 7:7-14
The Gospel: St. John 8:25-32

Artwork: Antonio Cifrondi, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, c. 1705. Oil on canvas, Chiesa di Sant’Antonio Abate, Caprino Bergamasco, Italy.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections

KES Chapel Reflection, Week of 6 May

When you pray, say Our Father

It is known as the Lord’s Prayer at once distinctively Christian and yet profoundly connected to the thinking that is the essence of all prayer. “Prayer signifies all the service that ever we do unto God,” as the theologian Richard Hooker puts it. It signifies an orientation, an outlook and an attitude, a perspective that is unitive and comprehensive. It is about our participation in the essential life of God. As Origen, the great 3rd century theologian of Alexandria observes, “the whole of our life says Our Father.” Rowan Williams, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, suggests that all prayer is about “letting Jesus pray in us.” The essential life of God in us is prayer.

We say this prayer at every Chapel service. It is, in that sense, a familiar prayer, even in a post-Christian age, but like so many things that are familiar their real significance is often overlooked. Why the Lord’s Prayer? Because it is the prayer which Jesus himself gives us to pray: “When you pray, say Our Father”. This reminds us of Jesus’ words to Mary, “I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God,” essentially quoting Ruth. As Aquinas says “God himself taught us this prayer,” thus establishing the connection between God and Christ, and arguing that this prayer is “the most perfect” and “the most preeminent” of all prayers, the prayer that underlies and informs all prayer. Simone Weil, the 20th century philosopher of attention, builds on this concept. She notes that “the Our Father contains all possible petitions; we cannot conceive of any prayer which is not already contained in it. It is to prayer what Christ is to humanity. It is impossible to say it once through, giving the fullest possible attention to each word, without a change … taking place in the soul.”

Origen, Augustine, and Aquinas, to name but a few, all note the special character of the Lord’s Prayer in terms of its structure and its unique form of address. We do not find in the Jewish or Hebrew Scriptures the practice of praying to God as Father. “Nowhere is there found a precept for the people of Israel,” Augustine states, “that they should say ‘Our Father,’ or that they should pray to God as a Father, but as Lord He was made known to them.” Few indeed are the references in the Hebrew Scriptures to God as Father and even fewer, to God as Mother. Such terms are metaphors for our relation to God.

Lancelot Andrewes, a 17th century Anglican preacher and theologian, offers a helpful explanation. The Lord’s Prayer begins with “a Father, not a Lord/ One being a name of love./ The other of dignity … One being, a name of Goodness, Comfortable … the other of Power, Terrible” (in the sense of awe and wonder) and grounds its daring use in Christ’s command to us. His Father is Our Father. A powerful and poignant intimacy.

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Prayers and liturgy

Monnica, Matron

Benozzo Gozzoli, St. MonicaThe collect for today, the Feast of Saint Monnica (c. 331-387), mother of Saint Augustine of Hippo (source):

O Lord, who through spiritual discipline didst strengthen thy servant Monnica to persevere in offering her love and prayers and tears for the conversion of her husband and of Augustine their son: Deepen our devotion, we beseech thee, and use us in accordance with thy will to bring others, even our own kindred, to acknowledge Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever.

The Lesson: 1 Samuel 1:10-11,20
The Gospel: St. Luke 7:11-17

Artwork: Benozzo Gozzoli, St. Monica, 1465. Fresco, Sant’Agostino Church, San Gimignano, Italy.

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Sermons

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Easter

Click here to listen to audio file of Service of Matins & Ante Communion for the Fourth Sunday after Easter.

“Behold, I make a covenant”

The lesson from Exodus recalls us to the Covenant that God makes with our humanity even in the midst of “a stiff-necked people”. It provides the ground for the marvel and wonder that is the further extension of that Covenant in the Resurrection. In the parade of readings today we see the wonder of God as essential life and what that means for us in our lives.

It is a challenge, of course, to read and think these readings particularly given the tendencies of a culture of many who are largely ‘unreaders’. If nothing else during the ups and downs of the pandemic, however, we might just learn to sit and think. ‘Don’t just do something, sit and think’ could be the most important lesson for us. It is ancient wisdom that contemplation is really the highest activity of our humanity. We need to ponder the wisdom that is more than knowledge and information and certainly more than the idolatry of the practical which so often consumes and destroys us. When ‘science’ becomes technology, science as knowledge is diminished and lost. Even more the philosophical wisdom that it presupposes is lost to view.

This is just to suggest that pondering these readings speaks profoundly to our current culture. It is, to use Jesus’ saying to Martha, the one thing necessary, unum necessarium, the better part that Mary has chosen. The Mary of the Martha and Mary story complements the Mary who is the mother of God, the Mary who sets the agenda and vocation of our humanity: “Be it unto me according to thy word.” That captures in nutsche, in a nutshell, the underlying logic of the classical Book(s) of Common Prayer in the patterns of reading that belong and have developed within that tradition.

So what do we see in the readings at Matins and Ante-Communion on the Fourth Sunday after Easter? The reading from Exodus presents the idea of the Covenant between God and Man written on two tablets of stone a second time. Why the second time? We are meant to recall our disobedience and betrayal of the Covenant of the Ten Commandments after they were initially given to us through Moses. That is the story of the golden calf, the story of our refusal to contemplate what is made known by God for our humanity. It led to Moses breaking the tablets of the Law because of our idolatry. We deny the universality and truth of the Law by turning to our immediate interests and concerns. The image of that betrayal is quite revealing. We make images of cows as the symbol of deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Why cows? Because they pulled the carts of the Israelites in the Exodus from Egypt. But a golden calf is simply a dead cow. This idolatry ignores and denies the active will of God moving in us that belongs to the deeper truth of the Exodus and which ultimately takes expression in the Ten Commandments; in short, the Covenant between God and man.

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