Christ Church

Blessed are you

Eudaimonia is Aristotle’s word for happiness, especially in the Nicomachean Ethics. It means a great deal more than what we might mean by happiness which is usually subjective and personal as well as passive and accidental. For Aristotle it is much more objective and substantial. Simply put, happiness is a life lived in accord with virtue. It consists in the activity of the rational soul acting in accord with virtue or excellence. The highest or primary form of happiness is contemplation, an intellectual good, while politics is about moral actions and is secondary. That highest form of happiness approximates the life of the gods because the highest power in us is the mind. “We ought, so far as in us lies, to put on immortality, do all that we can to live in conformity with the highest in us”, which is the life of intellect. “The life of the gods is altogether happy”, he says, “and that of man is happy in so far as it contains something that resembles the divine activity”. The idea is that the human good seeks what lasts and is complete rather than what passes away. But the word he uses here is makarios which means blessedness, the idea of a blessed life.

We go from the giving of the Law to Moses in the Ten Commandments, the universal moral code for our humanity, to the Beatitudes of Christ in the Sermon on the Mount, the Summum Bonum, the highest good for our humanity. They are the blessednesses. The word in Greek is makarios and is used nine times in twelve verses by Jesus in Matthew’s Gospel. Jesus “opens his mouth” and teaches what belongs to the highest good for our humanity. While Aristotle recognizes pleasure as a feature of happiness, pleasure is indeterminate: it takes many different forms. He does not deny the place of sensual pleasures as contributing to our happiness but he doesn’t make them essential to happiness since they do not last.

The Beatitudes extend that thinking to a remarkable degree. They argue for a greater degree of inwardness: a blessedness in spite of and in the face of hardships and suffering. The first and last Beatitude illustrate this and frame the whole set of the Beatitudes. In other words, there is a structure here that revolves around the paradox of difference for most of the Beatitudes except for the paradox of the same in the fifth Beatitude. The first and last have the same ‘reward’: “the kingdom of heaven” is promised to “the poor in spirit” and to those who are “persecuted for righteousness’ sake”. The kingdom of heaven contrasts with both the poor in spirit and those who are persecuted. That promise belongs to the idea of a life of blessedness that transcends the world but without negating it.

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The collect for today, the commemoration of James Hannington (1847-85), first Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa, Missionary to Uganda, Martyr (source):

Precious in your sight, O Lord,
is the death of your martyrs
James Hannington and his companions,
who purchased with their blood a road into Uganda
for the proclamation of the gospel;
and we pray that with them
we also may obtain the crown of righteousness
which is laid up for all
who love the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 3:14-18,22
The Gospel: St. Matthew 10:16-22

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Simon the Zealot and Saint Jude, Apostles, with Saint Jude the Brother of the Lord, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O ALMIGHTY God, who hast built thy Church upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the head corner-stone: Grant us so to be joined together in unity of spirit by their doctrine, that we may be made an holy temple acceptable unto thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The collect for the Brethren of the Lord, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O HEAVENLY Father, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning: We bless thy holy Name for the witness of James and Jude, the kinsmen of the Lord, and pray that we may be made true members of thy heavenly family; through him who willed to be the firstborn among many brethren, even the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: St. Jude 1-4
The Gospel: St. John 14:21-27

In the various New Testament lists of the Twelve Apostles (Matthew 10:2-4; Mark 3:16-19; Luke 6:14-16; Acts 1:13), the tenth and eleventh places are occupied by Simon and Judas son of James, also called Thaddaeus.

To distinguish Simon from Simon Peter, Matthew and Mark refer to him as Simon the Cananaean, while Luke refers to him as Simon the Zealot. Both surnames have the same signification and are a translation of the Hebrew qana (the Zealous). The name does not signify that he belonged to the party of Zealots, but that he had zeal for the Jewish law, which he practised before his call. The translation of Matthew and Mark as Simon “the Canaanite” (as, e.g., KJV has it) is simply mistaken.

The New Testament contains a variety of names for the apostle Jude: Matthew and Mark refer to Thaddaeus (a variant reading of Matthew has “Lebbaeus called Thaddaeus”), while Luke calls him Judas son of James. Christian tradition regards Saint Jude and Saint Thaddaeus as different names for the same person. The various names are understood as efforts to avoid associating Saint Jude with the name of the traitor Judas Iscariot. The only time words of Jude are recorded, in St. John 14:22-23, the Evangelist is quick to add “(not Iscariot)” after his name.

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

“You all are partakers of my grace”

The Morning Prayers readings from Wisdom 11 and from Luke 13 complement rather wonderfully this morning’s eucharistic readings from Paul’s letter to the Philippians and Matthew’s Gospel. The Gospel reading might seem rather forbidding and dark and yet it illustrates the deeper meaning of the prayer of Paul “that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgement”. The parable of the unforgiving servant shows the meaning of not acting out of the infinite mercy and forgiveness of God, in effect negating the very mercy which he himself has received.

Forgive even as you have been forgiven. In complete contrast to the unrighteous servant who was paradoxically the example of acting with prudence, as you may recall, the unforgiving servant shows the true meaning of human wickedness to illustrate what we should not do. With the words of the forgiveness for which he had asked still ringing in his ears, he refuses to forgive another of much smaller debt, as one of the Fathers, John Chyrsostom, I think, noted. The parable is told in response to Peter’s question about the limits of forgiveness. How often shall I forgive the one who has sinned against me? Is there a number? Can forgiveness be quantified?

This speaks to our age which mistakes data and information for knowledge and understanding. This is to focus on the finite and limited, the quantitative, at the expense of the forms of our participation in what is infinite and eternal, namely, the wisdom and grace of God, the substantial. This is where the lessons from such texts as Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus in the Apocrypha help to deepen our understanding of the infinite mercy of God. To be made aware of this is all our joy; to negate it is all our misery. “Thou art merciful to all”, Wisdom tells us, “for thou canst do all things, and thou dost overlook men’s sins, that they may repent, for thou lovest all things that exist, and hast loathing for none of the things that thou hast made”.

This is a wonderful affirmation of the essential goodness of creation and of our humanity even in its disorders. “Thou sparest all things, for they are thine, O Lord who lovest the living”. With great insight, the reading from Wisdom concludes: “For thy immortal spirit is in all things. Therefore thou dost correct little by little those who trespass, and dost remind and warn them of the things wherein they sin, that they may be freed from wickedness and put their trust in thee, O Lord”. Is it not in this spirit that we may best understand the Gospel story of the unforgiving servant? It is told for our correction, for our good, to remind us of the freedom and love of acting out of the mercies and forgivenesses which we have received. It is told to awaken us to the infinite mercy of God which knows no limits. God is all good and his goodness is for all. But it means that we have to act in the likeness of God’s acts of mercy. It is what we pray.

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Tuesday, October 29th
7:00pm Christ Church Book Club – Coronation Room: At The End of An Age, John Lukacs, 2002, and The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences, Jason A. Josephson-Storm, 2017.
(Note: date transferred from Tuesday, Oct. 22nd)

Sunday, November 3rd, Twenty-Third Sunday after Trinity
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Upcoming Events:

Sunday, November 10th, Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Trinity
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion

Monday, November 11th, Remembrance Day
11:00am Remembrance Service, Windsor Cenotaph
12:15pm KES Cenotaph

Saturday, November 16th
4:30-6:00pm Annual Ham Supper – Parish Hall

Also please take note of the annual Missions to Seafarer’s Campaign for 2024. More information will be forthcoming in the next few weeks.

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

LORD, we beseech thee to keep thy house hold the Church in continual godliness; that through thy protection it may be free from all adversities, and devoutly given to serve thee in good works, to the glory of thy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Philippians 1:3-11
The Gospel: St Matthew 18:21-35

Artwork: Parable of the Unmerciful Servant, stained glass, Scots’ Church, Melbourne.

The collect for today, the Feast of St. Alfred the Great (849-899), King of the West Saxons, Scholar (source):

O God our maker and redeemer,
we beseech thee of thy great mercy
and by the power of thy holy cross
to guide us by thy will and to shield us from our foes,
that, following the example of thy servant Alfred,
we may inwardly love thee above all things;
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 Lesson: Wisdom 6:1-3,9-12,24-25
The Gospel: St. Luke 6:43-49

Artwork: John Birnie Philip, Alfred the Great, 19th century. Stone and gold, Parliamentary Art Collection, House of Commons, London.

The collect for a Bishop or Archbishop, on the Feast of St. Cedd (c. 620-664), Abbot of Lastingham, Bishop of the East Saxons, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O GOD, our heavenly Father, who didst raise up thy faithful servant Cedd to be a Bishop in thy Church and to feed thy flock: We beseech thee to send down upon all thy Bishops, the Pastors of thy Church, the abundant gift of thy Holy Spirit, that they, being endued with power from on high, and ever walking in the footsteps of thy holy Apostles, may minister before thee in thy household as true servants of Christ and stewards of thy divine mysteries; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the same Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Lesson: Acts 17:22-31
The Gospel: St. Luke 10:1-16

The collect for a Martyr, on the Feast of Saint Crispin and Saint Crispinian, Martyrs (d. c. 285), from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O GOD, who didst bestow upon thy Saints such marvellous virtue, that they were able to stand fast, and have the victory against the world, the flesh, and the devil: Grant that we, who now commemorate thy Martyrs Crispin and Crispinian, may ever rejoice in their fellowship, and also be enabled by thy grace to fight the good fight of faith and lay hold upon eternal life; through our Lord Jesus Christ, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Epistle: 1 St. Peter 4:12-19
The Gospel: St. Matthew 16:24-27

Crispin and Crispinian are believed to have been brothers and Roman noblemen martyred for their faith during the persecution of Emperor Maximian.

Artwork: P. Cayeul, Saints Crispin and Crispinian in Prison, 1683. Church of St. Martin & St. Blaise, Chaudes-Aigues, France.