Year: 2021

Prayers and liturgy

William Tyndale, Translator and Martyr

Embankment Statue, William TyndaleThe collect for today, the commemoration of William Tyndale (c. 1495-1536), Priest, Translator of the Scriptures, Reformation Martyr (source):

O Lord, grant to thy people
grace to hear and keep thy word
that, after the example of thy servant William Tyndale,
we may both profess thy gospel
and also be ready to suffer and die for it,
to the honour of thy name;
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: St. James 1:21-25
The Gospel: St. John 12:44-50

Artwork: Sir Joseph Edgar Boehm, William Tyndale statue, 1884, Victoria Embankment Gardens, London. Photograph taken by admin, 30 September 2015.

Inscription on bronze plaque:
William Tyndale
First translator of the New Testament into English from the Greek.
Born A.D. 1484, died a martyr at Vilvorde in Belgium, A.D. 1536.
“Thy word is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my path” – “the entrance of thy words giveth light.” Psalm CXIX. 105.130.
“And this is the record that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his son.” I. John V.II.
The last words of William Tyndale were “Lord! Open the King of England’s eyes”. Within a year afterwards, a bible was placed in every parish church by the King’s command.

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Prayers and liturgy

St. Francis of Assisi

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi (1182-1226), Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor (source):

O God,
who ever delightest to reveal thyself
to the childlike and lowly of heart,
grant that, following the example of the blessed Francis,
we may count the wisdom of this world as foolishness
and know only Jesus Christ and him crucified,
who liveth and reigneth with thee,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

The Epistle: Galatians 6:14-18
The Gospel: St. Matthew 11:25-30

Lucas Cranach the Elder, St. Francis Receiving the StigmataArtwork: Lucas Cranach the Elder, St. Francis Receiving the Stigmata, 1502. Oil on panel, Picture Gallery of the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna.

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Prayers and liturgy

Audio file of 8:00am Holy Communion service, Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity

Click here to listen to an audio recording of the 8:00am service of Holy Communion at Christ Church on the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity.

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Sermons

Sermon for the Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity

“Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently”

This remarkable scene from Mark echoes the gospel setting for Luke’s Parable of the Good Samaritan. Yet one of the scribes hearing Jesus reasoning with others asks not “what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” but rather “which is the first commandment of all?” There is a difference in the tone and intent of the questions. Unlike the scene in Luke where Jesus, asking two questions about “how readest thou?” and “what is written in the Law?” draws out of the cynical lawyer the truth itself, here Jesus responds himself and gives us the actual form of the words which we know in our liturgy as the Summary of the Law, part of the Jewish Shema.

Unlike the lawyer in Luke’s account, the unnamed scribe is genuinely interested in the truth of what is being said and responds with a kind of commentary which brings out the understanding of the radical nature of the unity of the love of God and the love of neighbour. In other words, the scribe explicitly draws out the meaning of what Jesus calls “the first commandment” and “the second as being like it” about which “there is none other commandment greater than these.” The scribe recognizes that this ethical teaching is the truth of the spiritual life “better than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices.” It is this ethical insight that impels Mark’s  statement, “Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently,” meaning wisely or prudently.

The dialogue here and in what follows points out that God’s commandment to love is not arbitrary. It challenges the underlying premise of the ideology of liberalism, the reigning world-view of our times, which sees freedom entirely in terms of something negative, a freedom from all and every form of restraint and limitation. The paradox is that such a view leads to despotic authority that negates the true authority of divine reason. What is absent is any kind of positive freedom, a freedom to the good; such is the point of the Mosaic law which has to be the good for all and not just for the benefit of the few, as Plato, too, teaches. The struggle is to understand what the good is. That requires a true openness to the spirit of the law so that we may be, as Paul puts it, “enriched by [Christ], in all utterance, and in all knowledge.” The commandments here reveal the eternal truth of God as the truth for us in our lives as spiritual and intellectual beings. It is to be grasped by our minds. It is there for the understanding as shown by the scribe. It is itself wisdom.

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Prayers and liturgy

The Eighteenth Sunday After Trinity

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

Juan de Juanes, El SalvadorLORD, 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

Artwork: Juan de Juanes, El Salvador, c. 1550. Oil on canvas, Prado, Madrid.

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Prayers and liturgy

Remigius, Bishop

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Remigius (c. 438-533), Bishop of Reims, Apostle to the Franks (source):

O God, who by the teaching of thy faithful servant and bishop Remigius didst turn the nation of the Franks from vain idolatry to the worship of thee, the true and living God, in the fullness of the catholic faith; Grant that we who glory in the name of Christian may show forth our faith in worthy deeds; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

The Epistle: 1 St. John 4:1-6
The Gospel: St. John 14:3-7

Giuseppe Bezzuoli, Saint Remigius Baptising King ClovisRemigius was consecrated bishop of Reims at age 22. The pagan Clovis I, who had married the Christian princess Clothilde, began his reign as king of the Franks about 20 years later, in 481.

Before entering combat against German tribes at Tolbiac, Clovis prayed to “Clothilde’s God” for victory. His soldiers won the battle, and Clothilde asked Remigius to teach the king about Christianity. Clovis was amazed by the story of “this unarmed God who was not of the race of Thor or Odin”. In the words of Remigius, the king came “to adore what he had burnt and to burn what he had adored”.

In 496, Remigius baptised Clovis in a public ceremony at Reims Cathedral. Three thousand Franks also became Christians. Under the king’s protection, Remigius was able to spread the gospel and build churches throughout Gaul.

Artwork: Giuseppe Bezzuoli, Saint Remigius Baptising King Clovis, 1821. Oil on canvas, Church of San Remigio, Florence.

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Prayers and liturgy

Jerome, Doctor and Priest

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Jerome (c. 342-420), Priest, Monk, Translator of the Scriptures, Doctor of the Church (source):

O Lord, thou God of truth, whose Word is a lantern to our feet and a light upon our path: We give thee thanks for thy servant Jerome, and those who, following in his steps, have labored to render the Holy Scriptures in the language of the people; and we beseech thee that thy Holy Spirit may overshadow us as we read the written Word, and that Christ, the living Word, may transform us according to thy righteous will; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

The Epistle: 2 Timothy 3:14-17
The Gospel: St. Luke 24:44-48

Anthony van Dyck, Saint JeromeOne of the most scholarly and learned early church fathers, St. Jerome devoted much of his life to accurately translating the Holy Bible from the original languages of Hebrew and Greek into Latin.

Born near Aquileia, northeast Italy, of Christian parents, Jerome travelled widely. He received a classical education at Rome and travelled to Gaul where he became a monk. He later moved to Palestine, spending five years as an ascetic in the Syrian desert. In 374, he was ordained a priest in Antioch. He then pursued biblical studies at Constantinople under Gregory Nazianzus and translated works by Eusebius, Origen, and others.

Travelling to Rome in 382, Jerome became secretary to the aged Pope Damasus. By the time the pope died three years later, Jerome had become involved in theological controversies in which he antagonised many church leaders and theologians. He left Rome under a cloud, returning to Palestine where he lived as a monk in Bethlehem for the rest of his life.

Over several decades, Jerome wrote biblical commentaries and works promoting monasticism and asceticism. Most importantly, he produced fresh Latin translations of most of the Old and New Testaments, based on the original biblical languages. This work formed the basis of the Vulgate, which remained the standard Scriptural text of the western church for over a millennium.

Artwork: Anthony van Dyck, Saint Jerome, 1615-16. Oil on canvas, Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections, Statements and other writings

‘Truth and Reconciliation’ Presentation at King’s-Edgehill

At every Chapel service we pray “that a spirit of respect and reconciliation may grow among all nations and peoples.” That is very much our prayer for the indigenous peoples of Canada and for all of us not just today but for the foreseeable future. Here is the Canadian folk singer Bruce Cockburn singing the first verse of Jesous Ahattonia, Canada’s first and oldest Christmas song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrd4Sw0peZg

The words which he is singing were originally written in the Huron/Wendat language by the French Jesuit missionary and martyr, Fr. Jean de Brébeuf, probably in 1642. He was a linguist who took the time and care to learn the language of the Wendat people and to appreciate their thought and culture in interaction with Christian ideas and themes.

We know and use this hymn at King’s-Edgehill in a later English translation (by J. Edgar Middleton, 1926). In singing it in the Wendat language, Cockburn builds upon the work of Brébeuf who, like many early and largely French missionaries, began the project of providing alphabets and thus a written form for the various first nations’ peoples, something which has continued even into more recent times with the Inuit. This shows a very different kind of relationship between cultures and languages than what took place in the nineteenth and into the twentieth centuries with the Indian Act (1876 – the present) which makes the native peoples “wards of the state,” and, particularly, with the notorious Residential Schools programme (1876-1996). Such things reveal a much more aggressive and destructive form of imperial colonialism derived from Britain and America in the 19th and 20th centuries. The Indian Act and the Residential Schools programme were intended to assimilate the native peoples into Canadian life but entirely and often brutally at the expense of the cultures and languages of the native peoples themselves. Assimilation was the buzz word of the times but in the view of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission it was “cultural genocide,” a policy undertaken “to kill the Indian in the child” (TRC Report, 2015).

The Residential Schools were “the most aggressive and destructive of all Indian Act policies” (Bob Joseph, 21 Things You May Not Know about the Indian Act, 2018, p. 52). It was a government programme managed by the churches – Roman Catholic, Anglican, Methodist, subsequently the United Church, and Presbyterian – and a government wanting to be freed from financial responsibility towards the native peoples. It was a sad and shameful time in our Canadian history that reveals a betrayal of care by those who were entrusted with the care of over 150,000 children, more than 6,000 of whom either died or disappeared. There were as well incidents of sexual and physical abuse. The numbers of the missing children are imprecise because neither the government nor the churches kept records, hence the heart-rending spectacle of the discovery of unmarked graves this past spring and summer. It is as if they didn’t matter, didn’t exist.

The Indian Act programme of assimilation was part of the so-called “progressive” thinking of the late 19th century in America and in Canada along with eugenics, racial theories about immigration, and discriminatory practices with respect to social services.

The Schools were chronically underfunded. “The buildings were drafty and unsanitary and food for the children was insufficient and often rotten … the schools were also breeding grounds for diseases such as tuberculosis and influenza” (Bob Joseph, 21 Things, p. 58). Most of the children died from tuberculosis. The problem, though known, highlighted for instance by Dr. Peter Bryce who called it in 1922, “a national crime”, was largely overlooked and denied. All to our shame.

Chief Robert Joseph, an outstanding native leader, provides a moving portrayal of the sufferings endured by many indigenous students who were forcibly taken from their families and communities and placed in Residential Schools far away from their homes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_jUXiOSbp4

We can only confess our own sins, not the sins of others, but that does not mean ignoring the mistakes and wrongs of the past and their legacy in the present. It also means a commitment to the reconciliation and the recognition of the indigenous peoples of Canada as full and integral members of Canada. Reconciliation is not an indigenous problem; it is a Canadian problem which can no longer be ignored but requires commitment to the difficult but essential process of reconciliation. In some ways, it is about dignity and respect towards the native peoples of Canada.

Has anything been done? In 2005, a $1.9 billion compensation package was announced for former residential school students; in 2007, the largest class action settlement in Canada, the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, was implemented. All of this built upon a growing awareness of the appalling sufferings of the native peoples in the Schools that began to come to the fore in the 1990s and which led to the creation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2007. Apologies were made by the United Church in 1986, the Anglican Church in 1993, the Presbyterian Church in 1994. In 2009, Phil Fontaine, National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations met with Pope Benedict XVI who expressed sorrow for the abuse and deplorable treatment of indigenous students, and on September 24th, 2021, the Conference of Canadian Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church also offered an “unequivocal apology” for the wrongs and abuses done to those in their charge, and committing as of yesterday, $30 million towards reconciliation. Prime Minister Stephen Harper apologized on behalf of Canada in 2008; Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2017 extended a further apology to indigenous peoples in Labrador and Newfoundland who had not been included in the previous federal apology.

More needs to be done, certainly. The task of reconciliation remains before us and is, I think, quite movingly stated, again by Chief Robert Joseph, in words which touch upon the ideals and life of our School. It is his words which we need to hear.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJQgpuLq1LI

(Rev’d) David Curry
Chaplain, Head of English and ToK Teacher
September 29th, 2021
Michaelmas

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Sermons

Meditation for Michaelmas

“And they overcome him by the blood of the Lamb”

The serpent of the Genesis story has become “the dragon,” “that old serpent, called the devil and Satan which deceiveth the whole world.” These are key images that reach back to the serpent’s cunning question, “Did God say?” The question seeks to undermine the truth that is known. Sin and evil is about that contradiction and division within ourselves between what we know and what we do, between our reason and our will. We are made in the image of God and are called to act accordingly. But what happens if we don’t?  We are rational creatures to whom God gives a commandment. But what happens if we disobey?

Both Genesis at the beginning of the Scriptures for both Jew and Christian and Revelation at the end of the Christian Scriptures show us that all evil is a negation and privative of the Good. It has no power in itself; it is always a distortion, a deception. The various terms for what opposes the truth of God reveal this contradiction either in terms of Satan as the tempter, trying to insinuate and undermine the order and truth of things, or the deceiver, trying to trick us, or Lucifer, the light-bearer who denies his very being, turning away from the light of God to be the Prince of Darkness. Evil arises from the turning away of rational creatures from God, the source of all being and knowing.

The lesson from Revelation is especially powerful because it makes it abundantly clear that “there was war in heaven,” not there is, and that evil has been radically overcome “by the blood of the Lamb,” a reference to Christ in his sacrifice and love for us. The strong reminder is that the Good is greater than all and every evil. What that means for us is to will that Good in our own lives as the counter to the sins and follies that so easily beset us. Michaelmas signals the victory of Good over evil and reminds us of the company we keep, “the angels moving the imagination and strengthening the understanding,” as Aquinas puts it.

To think is to think with the angels who are the thoughts of God in creation. They are the invisible reasons for the visible things of the created order. Paradoxically this reminder to us of the larger spiritual community of which we are a part “with Angels and Archangels and all the Company of heaven” is not a denial or a flight from the concrete world of our embodied existence. To think with the angels is to affirm our creation, our bodies, and our world, and not to be alienated from nature or our bodies through some sort of illusion. The Genesis point is emphatic; creation is good in its parts and as a whole. Evil comes from us when we put ourselves at the centre and try to will a lie, a deceit.

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