Sermons

Sermon for the Feast of St. Simon and St. Jude, 8:00am service

“He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance,
whatsoever I have said unto you.”

It is a powerful passage and one which takes us back to the Sundays of Easter leading to Pentecost, to the coming down of the Holy Spirit, hence the liturgical colour of red which connects the Holy Spirit with the Apostles who are sent in Jesus’ name. In other words, this powerful passage from the Gospel of St. John places us in the very heart of the Trinity; in short, in the communion of God who is the basis of our communion and fellowship with one another. We live only when we live with God.

That must seem a hard saying or at least a puzzling statement and yet it lies at the very heart of the Christian understanding of our life with God. Through the witness of the Scriptures, Jesus, who is the Word of God, has made known to us the things which God wants us to know and live. His word becomes the very basis of our life in his body, the Church. The Feast of St. Simon and St. Jude reminds us of the apostolic fellowship to which we belong precisely because of the power of the Holy Spirit “teach[ing us] all things and bring[ing] all things to [our] remembrance,” all the things which Jesus has said to us.

(more…)

Print this entry

Events, Month at a Glance

Week at a Glance, 29 October – 4 November

Monday, October 29th
4:45-5:15pm World Religions/Inquirer’s Class – Room 206, King’s-Edgehill School
6:00-7:00pm Brownies/Sparks – Parish Hall

Tuesday, October 30th
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place

Thursday, November 1st, All Saints
6:30-7:30pm Girl Guides – Parish Hall
7:00pm Holy Communion

Sunday, November 4th, Trinity XXII/In the Octave of All Saints
8:00am Holy Communion (followed by Men’s Club Breakfast)
10:30am Holy Baptism & Communion
4:00pm Evening Prayer – Christ Church
4:30pm Holy Communion – KES

Upcoming Events:

Sunday, November 11th, Remembrance Day
9:00am Holy Communion – Christ Church
10:00am Cenotaph Service – King’s-Edgehill School
11:00am Cenotaph Service – Windsor Cenotaph

Saturday, November 24th
4:30-6:30pm Annual Parish Ham Supper – Parish Hall

Sunday, December 2nd
Advent/Christmas Services of Carols and Lessons with King’s-Edgehill School
4:30pm Christ Church (Gr. 7-11)
7:00pm KES Chapel (Gr. 12)

Friday, December 21st
7:00pm Christ Church Concert Series: “With Kings To Bethlehem”, Capella Regalis, Men and Boys Choir, directed by Nick Halley

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

St. Simon and St. Jude the Apostles

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

Read more about Saint Simon and Saint Jude here.

Cametti, San SimoneMochi, San Taddeo

Artwork:
(left) Bernardino Cametti, Saint Simon the Apostle, 1722. Marble, Chiesa Sant’Agostino, Opera del Duomo di Orvieto.
(right) Francesco Mochi, Saint Thaddeus [Jude] the Apostle, 1631-34. Marble, Chiesa Sant’Agostino, Opera del Duomo di Orvieto.

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

The Twenty-First Sunday After Trinity

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

GRANT, we beseech thee, merciful Lord, to thy faithful people pardon and peace; that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve thee with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Ephesians 6:10-20
The Gospel: St. John 4:46-54

Maulbertsch, Christ and the Captain of Capernaum

Artwork: Franz Anton Maulbertsch, Christ and the Captain of Capernaum, c. 1765. Engraving, Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity, 10:30am service

“For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”

Where are our hearts? What do we want, really and truly? Do we want what is really and truly to be wanted? Do we know what that might be?

We do and we don’t. What is really and truly to be wanted is the “Father’s good pleasure” bestowed through the good virtue of the Mother: the good pleasure of our heavenly Father; the good virtue of Mother Church. But we are all caught, in one way or another, in the ambiguity of our desiring.

There is our wanting, first, this thing and, then, that thing, each with an absolute desire, only to discover that no one thing can really satisfy. “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee,” Augustine said long ago, or as Mick Jagger put it somewhat more recently, “I can’t get no satisfaction.” The double negative is simply part of the double-sidedness of our desiring. We don’t know what we want – is it this or is it that? – because we don’t know what is really and truly to be wanted. Jesus calls this condition of ours, “anxiety”– at least that is the modern English word, at least since the seventeenth century for the state of our distractedness. We are distracted because we are literally “divided in our minds.” How much more so in what Alan Jacobs has called “the age of distraction”?

It is a powerful image really. Our eyes flit quickly from one object to another unable to focus on any one thing. We are distracted and often beside ourselves; in short, divided in our souls. Against this, Jesus, in Luke’s account, would gently recall us to ourselves. He would recall us to what is really and truly to be wanted in which everything else must find its place. He gently but firmly reminds us of the Providence of God, of God’s providential care for us. God sees all things in his single-minded love for us.

(more…)

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity, 8:00am service

“Everything is ready”

“Everything is ready”, it seems, but are we?  What does it mean to be ready for the banquet, for the wedding feast? What, indeed, is the wedding-garment without which, it seems, we are not ready; without which, it seems, we are out even when we think we are in; without which, it seems, we shall be “cast into outer darkness”  where  “there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth”?

The times are never so bad that a good man cannot live in them, though, no doubt, that raises the larger question about the struggle for the good in our lives. But the point, surely, is that the quality of the times in which we live cannot be the measure of virtue and character. No. It is rather the setting in which virtue is shown and character is proved. The question for Christians “at all times and in all places” is whether we will be defined by circumstances or defined by grace.  By grace, we mean the highest perfection of human virtue which is God’s work in us, come what may in the world around us. “Wherefore,” St. Paul bids us, “be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.”

(more…)

Print this entry

Events, Month at a Glance

Week at a Glance, 22 – 28 October

Monday, October 22nd
4:45-5:15pm World Religions/Inquirer’s Class – Room 206, King’s-Edgehill School
6:00-7:00pm Brownies/Sparks – Parish Hall

Tuesday, October 23rd
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place

Thursday, October 25th
3:00 Service at Windsor Elms
6:30-7:30pm Girl Guides – Parish Hall

Sunday, October 28th, St. Simon & St. Jude/Trinity XXI
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Holy Baptism & Communion
2:00 AMD Service of the Deaf
4:00pm Evening Prayer – Christ Church
4:30pm Holy Communion – KES

Upcoming Events:

Sunday, November 11th, Remembrance Day
9:00am Holy Communion – Christ Church
10:00am Cenotaph Service – King’s-Edgehill School
11:00am Cenotaph Service – Windsor Cenotaph

Saturday, November 24th
4:30-6:30pm Annual Parish Ham Supper – Parish Hall

Sunday, December 2nd
Advent/Christmas Services of Carols and Lessons with King’s-Edgehill School
4:30pm Christ Church (Gr. 7-11)
7:00pm KES Chapel (Gr. 12)

Friday, December 21st
7:00pm Christ Church Concert Series: “With Kings To Bethlehem”, Capella Regalis, Men and Boys Choir, directed by Nick Halley

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

The Twentieth Sunday After Trinity

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

O ALMIGHTY and most merciful God, of thy bountiful goodness keep us, we beseech thee, from all things that may hurt us; that we, being ready both in body and soul, may cheerfully accomplish those things that thou wouldest have done; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: Ephesians 5:15-21
The Gospel: St. Matthew 22:1-14

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

St. Luke the Evangelist

Giambologna, St. LukeThe collect for today, the Feast of Saint Luke the Evangelist, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

ALMIGHTY God, who calledst Luke the Physician, whose praise is in the Gospel, to be an Evangelist, and Physician of the soul: May it please thee that, by the wholesome medicines of the doctrine delivered by him, all the diseases of our souls may be healed; through the merits of thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: 2 Timothy 4:5-13
The Gospel: St. Luke 24:44-52

Read more about Saint Luke here.

Artwork: Giambologna, St. Luke, 1601. Bronze, Orsanmichele, Florence. Photograph taken by admin, 18 May 2010.

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

Etheldreda, Queen and Abbess

The collect for today, the Feast of St. Etheldreda (d. 679), Queen, Foundress and Abbess of Ely (source):

St. EthelredaO eternal God,
who didst bestow such grace on thy servant Etheldreda
that she gave herself wholly to the life of prayer
and to the service of thy true religion:
grant that we may in like manner
seek thy kingdom in our earthly lives,
that by thy guidance
we may be united in the glorious fellowship of thy saints;
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 Epistle: Philippians 3:7-14
The Gospel: St. Luke 12:29-34

Artwork: St. Ethelreda, 1910, Embroidered Processional Banner, Ely Cathedral.

Print this entry