Audio file of 8:00am Holy Communion service, Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity
Click here to listen to an audio recording of the 8:00am service of Holy Communion at Christ Church on the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity.
Sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity
“That you, being rooted and grounded in love [may] know the love of Christ”
The powerful story of the raising of the only son of the widow of Nain is one of three stories where Jesus meets us as mourners and each time something happens that is transformative. “Be ye transformed in the renewing of your minds,” as Paul says. What we see and hear transforms our thinking and our doing. The operative word in the Gospel is the word, compassion. “When the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her.” It is the operative word and expression, too, in the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
That compassion is the love of Christ, the Son of God who became man for us and who engages us in our brokenness and hurt to heal and restore and to set us in motion towards one another. That compassion is the motivating force in the story of the one leper who “turned back, giving him thanks and he was a Samaritan,” which is also the traditional Thanksgiving Day Gospel as well as the Gospel for Trinity 14 which we didn’t hear this year because of the Feast of St. Matthew. All these things mark the recurring theme of our “being rooted and grounded in love,” as Paul puts in the Epistle and which is movingly illustrated in the Gospel story of the widow of Nain.
Compassion is deep love, the deep love of God in Jesus Christ which reaches out to our humanity, at once to the sorrow and loss of the widow, and to the death of her only son. We are meant to empathise with her loss and to feel its depth. She is utterly bereft – a widow who has lost her husband and now a mother who has lost her only son. We sense her desolation, the utter emptiness and forlornness of her life.
What happens? We see compassion at work. The active love of God which creates now recreates. Why is there anything at all? Why creation? The best and only answer is love, the love which manifests love, to paraphrase Jacob Boehme. And that love is so powerful, so great, that it extends to the restoration and redemption of all that is broken and dead, empty and bereft.
But it is wanted that we learn and know this love. The raising of the only son of the widow of Nain reveals the love of Christ “which passeth knowledge,” not unlike “the peace of God which passeth all understanding” in the liturgy. What does this mean? It is the love which goes beyond what we can know humanly speaking and beyond what we can do simply on our own. Something is being shown to us that belongs to the deeper truth of our humanity; a truth found in our engagement with God. Without the love of God, we are utterly incomplete, bereft, and empty.
What Paul seeks for us is what Christ provides for us, namely our being “rooted and grounded in love” and being able to comprehend, to know or understand something of the wondrous extent and nature of the divine love which goes beyond our own devices and desires. To be aware of this is to be awakened to an ethic of action rooted in compassion.
Month at a Glance, October 2025
Sunday, October 5th, Trinity 16
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
Sunday, October 12th, Harvest Thanksgiving/Trinity 17
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
Tuesday, October 14th
7:00pm Parish Council Meeting
Saturday, October 18th
Church clean-up! All Hands on deck
Sunday, October19th, Trinity 18
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
Tuesday, October 21st
7:00pm Christ Church Book Club: Peter Harrison’s Some New World: Myths of Supernatural Belief in a Secular Age (2024) & Carlo Rovelli’s Anaximander and the Birth of Science (2009/2011 Eng. trans.)
Saturday, October 25th
9:00am-3:00pm Quiet Day: Reflections on Classical Anglicanism
Sunday, October 26th, Trinity 19
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Communion
The Sixteenth Sunday After Trinity
The collect for today, the Sixteenth Sunday after Trinity, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):
O LORD, we beseech thee, let thy continual pity cleanse and defend thy Church; and, because it cannot continue in safety without thy succour, preserve it evermore by thy help and goodness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Epistle: Ephesians 3:13-21
The Gospel: St. Luke 7:11-17
Artwork: Hans von Aachen, Raising of the Widow’s Son at Nain, c. 1600. Oil on canvas, Seitenstetten Abbey, Austria.
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
Artwork: Bernardo Strozzi, St. Francis, c. 1610-15. Oil on canvas, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam.
Robert Crouse: “The Essence of Anglicanism”
The Essence of Anglicanism
A Transcription of a Lecture delivered October 3. 2002 at Regent College, Vancouver, by Dr. Robert Crouse (For a pdf version of this lecture, click here.)
It is a great honour to be the first lecturer in this proposed lecture series, and I thank the sponsors for the opportunity. And I cannot resist complimenting Regent College on the production of ordinands. It holds promise for a speedy reformation of the Anglican Church of Canada.
The Anglican Communion, the fellowship of Anglican Churches throughout the world, exists by virtue of a voluntary allegiance to a common tradition of Christian faith and worship. Faithfulness to that tradition, and that alone, constitutes the definition of Anglicanism, and that tradition is its principle of cohesion. It has, after all, no racial unity. People of Anglo Saxon origin who once dominated its membership are now a small proportion of it. It is not a linguistic unity. Its liturgies have been translated into many languages and most of the world’s Anglicans nowadays are not English speakers. It is not even really an organizational unity, not really. The Archbishop of Canterbury has a primacy of honour and the Lambeth Conferences bring together Bishops for consultation from all over the world. But no Primate, no Conference, no Council has any legislative authority over the Anglican Communion. So the Communion adheres only by faithfulness to a common tradition, and if that faithfulness falters it moves toward disintegration. No one can legislate for the Anglican Communion. Insofar as its member churches fail in their allegiance to the common tradition the communion disintegrates. And that, I think, is the nature of the current crisis in global Anglicanism.
Signs of disintegration are, as you well know, manifold. The Primates at their meeting in ler Portugal several years ago deplored the fact that repudiations of the resolutions of the Lambeth Conference have come, as they said, to threaten the unity of the Communion in a profound way. And they strongly urged those repudiating Lambeth “to weigh the effects of their actions and to listen to the expressions of pain, anger, and perplexity from other parts of the Communion.” Another sign of the times was, of course, the consecration of bishops to be missionaries to the Episcopal Church in the United States. And, of course, we have all become familiar with the phenomenon of separated or Continuing Anglican Churches in our own country and elsewhere and we have learned to live, somehow, with the condition of what is somewhat euphemistically called “impaired communion,” a condition brought about by unilateral decisions on the part of some Provinces of our Communion.
But these and other disquieting phenomena are merely symptoms of a malaise which threatens the continued existence of the Anglican way. The fundamental issue, I would insist, is faithfulness to a tradition of Christian faith and worship. But just what is that common tradition, and what precisely are its elements? What is the essence of Anglicanism?
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
Remigius was consecrated bishop of Reims, France, at age 22. The pagan Clovis I, who had married the Christian princess Clotilde, 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 “Clotilde’s God” for victory. His soldiers won the battle, and Clotilde 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: Daphné Du Barry, Baptism of Clovis, 1996. Bronze, Basilica of Saint-Remi, Reims, France.
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
One 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: Lionello Spada, St. Jerome, 1610s. Oil on canvas, Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica, Rome.
Saint Michael and All Angels
The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):
O EVERLASTING God, who hast ordained and constituted the services of Angels and men in a wonderful order: Mercifully grant, that as thy holy Angels alway do thee service in heaven, so by thy appointment they may succour and defend us on earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
The Lesson: Revelation 12:7-11
The Gospel: St. Matthew 18:1-10
The name Michael is a variation of Micah, and means in Hebrew “Who is like God?”
The archangel Michael first appears in the Book of Daniel, where he is described as “one of the chief princes” and as the special protector of Israel. In the New Testament epistle of Jude (v. 9), Michael, in a dispute with the devil over the body of Moses, says, “The Lord rebuke you“. Michael appears also in Revelation (12:7-9) as the leader of the angels in the great battle in Heaven that ended with Satan and the hosts of evil being thrown down to earth. There are many other references to the archangel Michael in Jewish and Christian traditions.
Following these scriptural passages, Christian tradition has given St. Michael four duties: (1) To continue to wage battle against Satan and the other fallen angels; (2) to save the souls of the faithful from the power of Satan especially at the hour of death; (3) to protect the People of God, both the Jews of the Old Covenant and the Christians of the New Covenant; and (4) finally to lead the souls of the departed from this life and present them to our Lord for judgment. For these reasons, Christian iconography depicts St. Michael as a knight-warrior, wearing battle armor, and wielding a sword or spear, while standing triumphantly on a serpent or other representation of Satan. Sometimes he is depicted holding the scales of justice or the Book of Life, both symbols of the last judgment.
Audio file of 8:00am Holy Communion service, Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity
Click here to listen to an audio recording of the 8:00am service of Holy Communion at Christ Church on the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity.