Day: March 30, 2023

Sermons

Lenten Programme III: The Book of Homilies

On the Holy Spirit

The Second Book of Homilies (1563) contains a number of homilies which are attributed to Bishop John Jewel (1522-1571). Among those is “An Homily concerning the coming down of the Holy Ghost; for Whitsunday”. It establishes a number of the basic themes which would be taken up and enlarged upon by others after him, such as Lancelot Andrewes’ remarkable series of fifteen sermons on the sending down of the Holy Spirit prepared and preached before King James I in the first three decades of the 17th century. As with Cranmer, Jewel’s homily complements the Articles of Religion, in this case, Article V, “Of the Holy Ghost”.

Jewel first locates the Scriptural sources for the liturgical Feast of Pentecost or Whitsuntide in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament; in each case highlighting their divine authorship. It belongs to the Exodus story of deliverance and to the giving of the Law, on the one hand, and to the descent of the Holy Ghost on the disciples in Jerusalem, on the other hand, both observed on the same day, the fiftieth day after Easter and the Jewish Passover. Jewel then considers “what the Holy Ghost is” and what the Holy Ghost does, namely, “his miraculous works towards mankind”.

This establishes the classical Anglican teaching about the Holy Spirit, emphasizing first, the essential divinity of the Holy Spirit, as attested by Scripture and Creed understood in tandem, and, secondly, the western understanding of the double procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son (filioque). This, too, is the burden of Article V.

The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.

Thus Jewel states that “The Holy Ghost is a spiritual and divine substance, the Third Person in the Deity, distinct from the Father and the Son, and yet proceeding from them both,” as witnessed by “the creed of Athanasius,” and by the witness of Christ’s baptism in Jordan and by the dominical injunction “to baptize all nations, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.” Jewel notes that “his proper nature and substance … is altogether one with God the Father, and God the Son; that is to say, spiritual, eternal, uncreated, incomprehensible, almighty; to be short, he is even God and Lord everlasting … the Spirit of the Father” who “is said to proceed from the Father and the Son.” From this consideration of Deus in se, he moves on to the works of the Holy Ghost, Deus pro nobis, “which plainly declare unto the world his mighty and divine power”.

The first of those works concerns the illumination and inspiration of the Patriarchs and Prophets by the Holy Spirit. Prophecy comes “not by the will of man;” but “as they were moved inwardly by the Holy Ghost.” Secondly, there is the work of the Holy Ghost “in the conception and nativity of Christ our Saviour.” Thirdly, there is the work of the Holy Ghost “by the inward regeneration and sanctification of mankind.” The works of the Holy Ghost are understood in connection and communion with the Father and the Son. “For, as there are three several and sundry persons in the Deity; so have they three several and sundry offices proper unto each of them: the Father to create, the Son to redeem, the Holy Ghost to sanctify and regenerate.” This echoes the instructions in the classical Prayer Book Catechisms about the Apostles’ Creed.

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Administrative, Events

Tonight’s Lenten Programme cancelled

Due to uncertainties regarding the weather, tonight’s Lenten Programme on the Book of Homilies has been cancelled.

The meditation on the homily pertaining to the Holy Spirit will posted on the website shortly.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections

KES Chapel Reflection, Week of 30 March

Five barley loaves and two small fishes

“But what are they among so many?” The story of the feeding of the multitude in the wilderness along with the story of the Canaanite woman who seeks the healing of her daughter “grievously vexed with a devil” are important teachings for us. For we, too, are in the wilderness. The question is about what is learned in the wilderness. These stories in the Christian scriptures recall the Exodus in the Hebrew scriptures.

Wisdom, Thomas Aquinas observes, is spiritual refreshment. Wisdom takes three forms. There is the wisdom that belongs to teachings of the ancient philosophers. There is the wisdom that belongs to the Law of Moses. But both those forms of wisdom are limited and incomplete, partial truths, we might say. Why? Because of sin and evil. Thus creation, though good, is not perfect and the Law, though good, is not perfect. Indeed, the Law, as Paul observes, is sin in the sense that it convicts us of what we would like to be but are not. Something more is needed, namely, grace. In the Christian understanding, Christ is “the power and the wisdom of God.” Both these stories show us that power and wisdom and in intriguing ways. Both are about what is learned in the wilderness, itself a powerful metaphor for the human condition.

How do we deal with the realities of suffering and evil? Wilderness is imagined in a number of different ways: as a kind of pristine paradise of nature but sometimes without the presence of humans, as a refuge and a retreat from the “madding crowd” of the city, as the urban jungle of contemporary life, or as a “wasteland,” to use T.S. Eliot’s famous image for his poem, The Waste Land. He saw our modern world as a desolating wilderness of destruction and emptiness following the devastations of the First World War. Dante, in the early 14th century, says that he awoke to find himself in a selva obscura, a selva selvaggia, a dark and savage wood. And yet he says that there he discovered “a great good”. There are things to be learned in the wilderness. That is the point of the Exodus for Israel that provides the larger context that informs the stories read in Chapel this week. It is really about what can be learned in the wilderness journey of our lives. Wisdom is spiritual refreshment.

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