Week at a Glance, 27 May – 2 June
Tuesday, May 28th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
Thursday, May 30th, Ascension Day
6:30-7:30pm Sparks – Parish Hall
7:00pm Holy Communion
Friday, May 31st
6:00-7:30pm Pathfinders & Rangers – Parish Hall
Sunday, June 2nd, The Sunday after Ascension Day
8:00am Holy Communion (followed by Men’s Club breakfast with Ladies invited)
10:30am Holy Communion
Seeing that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Rogation
Rogationtide brings us to the Ascension as the culmination or end of the Easter Season. It reminds us of two important themes that are quite radical in their extent. Rogation means asking, from the Latin, rogo, rogare. It appears in English in the word, interrogation. Rogation days are days of prayer, a kind of asking; an active acknowledgment or recognition that all and every good comes from God to us. Prayer places us and keeps us in the presence of God. This is the astounding truth and power of the Resurrection. Prayer and praise place us with God. Nothing stands in the way except our own hearts and wills.
The other theme that Rogation presents to us is the idea that redemption is cosmic in scope. The world is God’s world and participates in the redemptive love of God for the whole of his creation, including the natural world and world of human labour and endeavour.
The days of Rogation embrace the world in prayer. They remind us that wherever we are is a kind of holy land. How? By being the places in which we praise and honour God and pray to God.
To think on these things is the counter to our utilitarian exploitation of the natural world for our own immediate ends and the counter to our despair and anxiety about suffering and hardship. “In the world,” Jesus says, “you shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Wherever we are is to be a place of prayer and praise. Whatever we do is to be a work of prayer and praise.
Fr. David Curry