Month: April 2024

Events, Month at a Glance

Month at a Glance, April – May

Sunday, April 28th, Fourth Sunday after Easter
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Sunday, May 5th, Fifth Sunday after Easter
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Thursday, May 9th, Ascension Day
7:00pm Holy Communion

Sunday, May 12th, Sunday After Ascension Day
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Tuesday, May 14th
7:00pm Parish Council Meeting

Sunday, May 19th, Pentecost
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Sunday, May 26th, Trinity Sunday
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

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Prayers and liturgy

The Third Sunday After Easter

The collect for today, The Third Sunday After Easter, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

ALMIGHTY God, who showest to them that be in error the light of thy truth, to the intent that they may return into the way of righteousness: Grant unto all them that are admitted into the fellowship of Christ’s religion, that they may forsake those things that are contrary to their profession, and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same; through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 2:11-17
The Gospel: St. John 16:16-22

Pietro Perugino, Last SupperArtwork: Pietro Perugino, Last Supper, 1493-96. Fresco, Cenacolo di Foligno, Florence.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections

KES Chapel Reflection, Week of 19 April

To Govern Is To Serve

I often think of Chapel as a miracle in the morning. Somehow within ten minutes servers and readers are found and organized and then it all happens. But only and all because of the willingness and support of the students and, especially, the leadership and service of the cohort of Chapel Prefects.

Wednesday afternoon was a miracle in the afternoon with the Church Parade at Christ Church. The School as a Corps marched down through the streets of Windsor, resplendent in their Highland Reds. There had been little to no time for rehearsal, just directions. Yet a battalion of servers and readers stepped up and took their places and illustrated and embodied precisely the theme of the Parade: To Govern Is To Serve. It was impressive; I couldn’t be more pleased.

Jacob Fines-Belcham led the procession with Acolytes Spence Armstrong and Chelsea James; followed by Alexandra Urtheil carrying the wooden cross with Acolytes Kelsea Griffiths and Sokha Ebert. Caleb DeCoste carried the Gospel Book with grace and aplomb leading the cadre of readers for the Reflections. Ewan Shaw preceded Mr. Joe Seagram, and Lily-Beth Fisher, the Chaplain. The Colour Party followed the Procession and presented the Regimental Colours and the service unfolded after the first hymn.

Head Girl, Ava Shearer, read the first lesson from The Song of Songs, a lovely passage with powerful images about the passing of winter into spring, and of the idea of the garden of creation as the place of love and delight. Head Boy Spencer Johnson read the second lesson from The Gospel According to St. John about Christ the Good Shepherd. Following the Apostles’ Creed, the classic and catholic statement of the Christian Faith for the many different forms of Christianity, a series of reflections were presented by students positioned at the Lectern and the Pulpit.

Vinnie Armstrong, Sadie O’Callaghan, Gabby Shaw, Alex Graham, Sofia Ning, Skye Hussey, and Jack Sangster read effectively and with conviction about the concept of service and sacrifice belonging to the image of Christ the Good Shepherd in contrast to power as domination. The reflections were centered on the paradox of the shepherd: “the sacrifice of one for all and the sacrifice of all for one,” as Michael Foucault puts it. (This is ironic since Foucault following Nietzsche’s “will to power,” regards all forms of social and institutional order in terms of power and domination).

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Prayers and liturgy

Alphege, Archbishop and Martyr

Martyrdom of St AlphegeThe collect for today, the Feast of St Alphege (c. 953-1012), Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr (source):

O GOD, who dost support and defend us with the glorious witness of thy blessed martyr Alphege: Grant us to go forward in his footsteps, and ever to rejoice in fellowship with him; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lesson: Revelation 7:13-17
The Gospel: St. Luke 12:4-12

Artwork: Martyrdom of St Alphege, carved painting, Canterbury Cathedral.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections, King's-Edgehill School Sermons

Reflections for King’s-Edgehill School Cadet Church Parade, 2024

Church Parade Reflections 2024: To Govern Is To Serve

To Govern Is To Serve I

The image of the Shepherd is everywhere a symbol of government both divine and human. It is a powerful feature of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Scriptures of the New Testament. It is also an image for kingship in the ancient world, from The Epic of Gilgamesh through to Homer’s Iliad and beyond. For the ancient Greeks, the image of shepherding in terms of kingship reflects the divine government of the world itself. It is “a natural and an universal symbol of divine and human government“. Divine and human meet in the image of the Shepherd guiding and caring for the sheep. It is most powerfully captured in the image of Christ the Good Shepherd which we heard in the lesson which Spencer read. The critical emphasis is on the idea of the “good” shepherd.

In The Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest literary works of our humanity, Gilgamesh is at first portrayed as a bad king because he uses the people of Uruk for his own self-interest. The people see his behaviour as the antithesis of what he should be: “The king should be the shepherd of his people … wise, comely and resolute,” they say. To be a bad king is to be a bad shepherd in terms of human government because it does not respect or care for the good of the people. The bad shepherd serves only himself at the expense of all others. In a profound image, Enkidu is created to be Gilgamesh’s friend and equal, his second self. Why? So that Gilgamesh can come to learn what it means to be a good king, a shepherd to his people.

The theme of the divine shepherd is emphasized in the Hebrew Scriptures: “Hear, O thou Shepherd of Israel, thou that leadest Joseph like a sheep.” We heard these words at the opening of the Advent Christmas services in our School Chapel. It is the idea of God as a Shepherd, the Shepherd of Israel, which in turn shapes the imagery of human rule in imitation of God’s rule, such as David as the Shepherd King or the prophet Isaiah looking for the redeemer and deliverer of Israel as one who will “lead his flock like a shepherd, and gather the lambs into his bosom.” Lovely images.

Plato, too, explores the theme of government through the idea of the shepherd in the Republic, building on the question which The Epic of Gilgamesh raises about what it means to be a shepherd. The sophist Thrasymachus claims that the shepherd is only out for himself but Socrates shows that is what it means to be a false shepherd. The true and good shepherd is one who looks out for and cares for the sheep of his flock, first and foremost. It means acquiring the art of care which seeks the best for those under the shepherd’s charge. To serve them, not oneself, belongs to good order and justice.

Such images and ideas have influenced and contributed to the idea of Christ as the Good Shepherd. It builds on those earlier images but intensifies the idea of care in a most radical way. The Good Shepherd is equally the Lamb of God. “The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep.” This challenges our thinking about rule and order; it is not about dominating others but serving one another. To govern is to serve.

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Prayers and liturgy

Audio file of 8:00am Holy Communion service, Second Sunday after Easter

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

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Sermons

Sermon for the Second Sunday after Easter

“The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep”

The image of the shepherd, as Fr. Crouse puts it, is “everywhere a symbol of divine and human government,” the latter in imitation of the former. The image of Christ the Good Shepherd is especially familiar to many Christians and to many others. It is frequently depicted in art and music down throughout the ages. There is something at once compelling and comforting about the image. Yet we forget, perhaps, its radical meaning and significance.

It is not by accident that it is read in the classical eucharistic lectionaries of the Western Church on the Second Sunday after Easter. It is read in the context of the resurrection and reveals its deeper meaning. Last week marked both the natural phenomenon of the solar eclipse and the end of Ramadan for the Islamic world. The fast of Ramadan ended with the Feast of Eid al-Fitr, much like Lent and Easter. Ramadan commemorates the giving of the Qur’an to Mohammed, a reminder about the various traditions of revelation in which God is made known. Easter, too, is about what is made known to us through the resurrection, the central doctrine of the Christian faith that opens us out to the radical nature of the divinity and the humanity of Christ and of the life of God as Trinity.

The Eastertide readings offer a kind of inverse of the eclipse. And so, too, with the readings for today. Simply put, the resurrection does not eclipse the passion; rather it makes visible what is hidden and present in the passion, namely, light in darkness, life in death. It makes wonderfully explicit an insight shared by a great number of religious and spiritual traditions about the primacy of the eternal life of God. In other words, the passion and resurrection of Christ witness to the powerful idea of the principle of life itself which is greater than sin and death, greater than suffering and evil which they, in fact, presuppose.

It means that we have to think the passion and the resurrection together. The Collect is very clear. God has given his “only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life.” Death and resurrection. The Epistle reading is from 1st Peter 2, part of the Mattins reading for Holy Saturday morning. It explicitly highlights Christ crucified, who “suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow his steps” and “who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness.” The reading ends, too, with an image of the shepherd and sheep. “For [we] were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.” Such language reflects the double theme of divine and human governance symbolized repeatedly, albeit in different registers of intensity, in the Scriptures and in art and culture in terms of the shepherd, but most powerfully in the image of Christ the Good Shepherd.

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Events, Month at a Glance

Week at a Glance, 15 – 21 April

Wednesday, April 17th
3:00pm Church Parade with the KES Cadet Corps

Sunday, April 21st, Third Sunday after Easter
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

(Christ Church Book Club for April 23rd, postponed)

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Prayers and liturgy

The Second Sunday After Easter

The collect for today, The Second Sunday After Easter, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

San Lorenzo fuori le mura, Christ the Good ShepherdALMIGHTY God, who hast given thine only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin, and also an example of godly life: Give us grace that we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit, and also daily endeavour ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 2:19-25
The Gospel: St. John 10:11-16

Artwork: Christ the Good Shepherd, detail of mosaic, Tomb of Pope Pius IX, San Lorenzo fuori le mura, Rome.

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KES Chapel Weekly Reflections

KES Chapel Reflection, Week of 12 April

Peace and forgiveness

Ideas matter, especially ideas that transform vision and give meaning and purpose. In Chapel, during this week which began with the phenomenon of the solar eclipse, there was a kind of inverse of the eclipse in pondering some of the intriguing stories about the resurrection. Simply put, the resurrection does not eclipse the passion of Christ; rather it makes visible what is hidden but present in the passion, namely, light in darkness, life in death. In an insight which belongs to a number of philosophical and religious traditions, the passion and resurrection witnesses to the powerful idea of the principle of life itself which is greater than sin and death, greater than suffering and evil which they in fact presuppose. The resurrection accounts in the Gospels show how that idea comes to be known by the disciples.

This week also marked the end of Ramadan with the Feast of Eid al-fitr for the Islamic world, itself a celebration of what is made known through the giving of the Qur’an to Mohammed. Once again the focus on what is made known about God through the forms of revelation in the various spiritual traditions of faith.

The stories of the resurrection belong to the process of education itself: how ideas are made real and live in us as students and teachers. The 20th chapter of John’s Gospel is particularly compelling in the image of the disciples huddled in fear behind closed doors “on the same day at evening” and eight days later, again behind closed doors. The image speaks to our culture of fear and anxiety. We are in fear and confusion behind the closed doors of our minds, literally and metaphorically closed in ourselves, even buried in ourselves. Our minds are like tombs where we are dead in ourselves and to one another. Yet this is the setting where Jesus comes into the midst and proclaims peace and forgiveness. He makes visible what was hidden but present in his crucifixion and death: the peace which God brings and the forgiveness which God alone gives.

A striking feature of John’s account is the emphasis upon the reality of the passion. “He showed unto them his hands and his side.” The marks of the crucifixion are central to the teaching; they become the marks of love, the love which transforms us and sets us in motion. “Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord.” The first moment is on “the same day at evening,” meaning Easter day in the evening and in the same Upper Room as the Passover meal on the night of Christ’s betrayal. The second moment is a week later but again behind closed doors. With the first moment it is as if time has slowed and we are in the moment, the eternal now of divine life itself. “Peace be unto you,” Jesus says, twice on this occasion and then a third time a week later. The first moment ends with the theme of forgiveness bestowed and entrusted to the disciples upon whom Jesus breathed his spirit, the Holy Spirit. They are sent to proclaim forgiveness, to make his forgiveness known to all who seek it. They are made apostles, those who are sent.

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