Prayers and liturgy

George Herbert

The collect for today, the commemoration of George Herbert (1593-1633), Priest, Poet (source):

King of glory, king of peace,
who didst call thy servant George Herbert
from the pursuit of worldly honours
to be a priest in the temple of his God and king:
grant us also the grace to offer ourselves
with singleness of heart in humble obedience to thy service;
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.
Amen.

The hymn, “Let all the world in ev’ry corner sing”, was originally a poem by George Herbert, published in The Temple.

George HerbertLet all the world in ev’ry corner sing,
My God and King.

The heavens are not too high,
His praise may thither fly:
The earth is not too low,
His praises there may grow.

Let all the world in ev’ry corner sing,
My God and King.

The church with psalms must shout,
No door can keep them out:
But above all, the heart
Must bear the longest part.

Let all the world in ev’ry corner sing,
My God and King.

George Herbert was born to a wealthy family in Montgomery, Wales. Educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, he appeared headed for a prominent public career, but the deaths of King James I and two patrons ended that possibility.

He chose to pursue holy orders in the Church of England and became rector at Bemerton, near Salisbury, in 1629, where he died four years later of tuberculosis. His preaching and service to church and parishioners contributed to his reputation as an exemplary pastor. He did not become known as a poet until shortly after he died, when his poetry collection The Temple was published.

He is buried in Saint Andrew Bemerton Churchyard.

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

Saint Matthias

The collect for today, the Feast of Saint Matthias the Apostle, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O ALMIGHTY God, who into the place of the traitor Judas didst choose thy faithful servant Matthias to be of the number of the twelve Apostles: Grant that thy Church, being alway preserved from false Apostles, may be ordered and guided by faithful and true pastors; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Lesson: Acts 1:15-26
The Gospel: St John 15:1-11

Riemenschneider, St MatthiasMatthias was chosen to replace Judas Iscariot after Judas had betrayed Jesus and committed suicide.

In the time between Christ’s Ascension and Pentecost, the small band of disciples, numbering about 120, gathered together. Peter spoke of the necessity of selecting a twelfth apostle to replace Judas and enunciated two criteria for the office of apostle: He must have been a follower of Jesus from the Baptism to the Ascension, and he must be a witness to the resurrected Lord. This meant that apostles had to be able to proclaim Jesus as Lord from first-hand personal experience. Two of the brothers were found to fulfill those qualifications: Matthias and Joseph called Barsabbas also called the Just. Matthias was chosen by lot. Neither of these two men is referred to by name in the four Gospels, although several early church witnesses, including Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea, report that Matthias was one of the seventy-two disciples.

Since he is not mentioned later in the New Testament, nothing else is known for certain about his activities. He is said to have preached in Judaea for some time and then traveled elsewhere. Various contradictory stories about his apostolate have existed since early in church history. The tradition held by the Greek Church is that he went to Cappadocia and the area near the Caspian Sea where he was crucified at Colchis. Some also say he went to Ethiopia before Cappadocia. Another tradition holds that he was stoned to death and then beheaded at Jerusalem.

The Empress St Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, is said to have brought St Matthias’s relics to Rome c 324, some of which were moved to the Benedictine Abbey of St Matthias, Trier, Germany, in the 11th century.

Artwork: Tilman Riemenschneider, Saint Matthias, c 1500-1505. Limewood, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Skulpturensammlung.  Photograph: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, www.metmuseum.org.

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for the First Sunday in Lent

“Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God,
And him only shalt thou serve”

For centuries upon centuries, the story of the temptations of Christ has been read on the First Sunday in Lent. But what are the temptations of Christ? They are our temptations brought to clarity in Jesus Christ. We are inclined, perhaps, to have a negative view of temptation. But in truth, there is something altogether positive about the fact of temptations. They are a necessary feature of our humanity. At issue is how we understand and respond to the temptations.

The temptations of Christ are about two things: the naming of the three forms of temptation which embrace every temptation; and the threefold overcoming of temptation. The critical lesson for us, in the Christian understanding, is that temptation is properly named and overcome only by Christ and by Christ in us; the grace that is given is not given in vain provided we act upon it.

In the Gospels, the account of the temptations of Christ follows the baptism of Christ. The baptism of Christ is an epiphany – a making known of his essential divine identity: “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” What immediately follows is that Christ is driven by the Spirit into the wilderness. Mark’s word ‘driven’ is more intense than the word ‘led’ used by Matthew and Luke; it, literally, is about being cast out or thrown into the wilderness and suggests the alienating and violent aspects of sin as well as the divine determination to achieve our reconciliation; after all, it is the Holy Spirit who drives or leads Jesus into the wilderness. The temptations belong to the intensity of the pageant of Christ’s passion.

The wilderness is the place of spiritual combat. It is also the place of spiritual refreshment and renewal. There is a struggle, a conflict, an agone that is more intense than the Olympics. The conflict is within. It is the conflict of wills within us. We are divided against ourselves in every temptation. It is a question about our fundamental identity. What really defines us?

(more…)

Print this entry

Events, Month at a Glance

Week at a Glance, 22-28 February

Monday, February 22nd
4:45-5:15 Confirmation Class – Rm. 204, KES

Tuesday, February 23rd, Eve of St Matthias
6:00pm ‘Prayers & Praises’ – Haliburton Place
6:30-7:30pm Brownies/Sparks – Parish Hall
7:30pm Holy Communion & Lenten Programme: The Creeds I

Thursday, February 25th
1:30-3:00pm Seniors’ Drop-In
6:30pm Christ Church “Cinema Paradiso” – Movie Night: “Wit”

Friday, February 26th
11:00am Holy Communion – Dykeland Lodge
3:30pm Holy Communion – Gladys Manning Home

Sunday, February 28th, Second Sunday in Lent
8:00am Holy Communion
10:30am Morning Prayer
2:00pm AMD Service of the Deaf
4:30pm Evening Prayer at KES

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

The First Sunday in Lent

The collect for today, the First Sunday in Lent, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

O LORD, who for our sake didst fast forty days and forty nights: Give us grace to use such abstinence, that, our flesh being subdued to the Spirit, we may ever obey thy godly motions in righteousness and true holiness, to thy honour and glory; who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Epistle: 2 Corinthians 6:1-10
The Gospel: St Matthew 4:1-11

Temptation of Jesus in the WildernessArtwork: Temptation of Jesus in the Wilderness, 1965. Stained glass, Cathedral of St John the Baptist, St John’s, Newfoundland. Photograph taken by admin, 7 September 2009.

Print this entry

Prayers and liturgy

Ash Wednesday

The collect for today, the First Day of Lent, commonly called Ash Wednesday, from The Book of Common Prayer (Canadian, 1962):

Colombe, Penance of DavidALMIGHTY and everlasting God, who hatest nothing that thou hast made, and dost forgive the sins of all them that are penitent: Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we worthily lamenting our sins, and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of thee, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Epistle: St James 4:6-11a
The Gospel: St Matthew 6:16-21

Artwork: Jean Colombe, “The Penance of David”, from Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 1485-89. Illumination, Musée Condé, Chantilly.

Jean Colombe’s miniature illustrates Lauds in the Office of the Dead, which begins with David’s psalm of repentance: “Miserere mei, Deus”: “Have mercy on me, O God”.

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for Quinquagesima, Choral Evensong

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God”

“If music be the food of love, play on” (Twelfth Night). And no doubt, we shall! “Dance me to the end of love.” Music, food, & dance, it seems, all come together tonight. But how? Through love. The question is not about what kind of music, whether Mozart or Villa-Lobos, not about what kind of food, whether Iberian or Brazilian, not about what kind of dance, whether minuet or samba, but about love. What kind of love?

What? Isn’t love, well, love? A little word pressed into the service of many and great things, I fear. Yet we cannot not think about love. It is the challenge of this day and a challenge for our culture. Nothing speaks more profoundly to our assumptions about love than the Scripture readings for this day and this season.

Our assumptions about love? Hey, isn’t it Valentine’s day? Isn’t love romantic and sensual, sexual and emotional? It is not something to think about. Feel the love! Yet:

In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes,
For they in thee a thousand errors note;
(not, perhaps, the best of opening lines for Romeos and Juliets!)
But ‘tis my heart that loves what they despise,
Who in despite of view is pleased to dote.
Nor are mine ears with thy tongue’s tune delighted,
(this is not getting any better, is it?)
Nor tender feelings to base touches prone,
Nor taste, nor smell, desire to be invited
To any sensual feast with thee alone.

There’s a challenge. Somehow love might be something more than the sensual and the physical, something more than just the erotic. Yes, but, note, neither less nor other than the sensual and the erotic, perhaps, and certainly not without romance.
(more…)

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for Quinquagesima, 10:30am service

“Set love in order in me”

It is a wonderful phrase from that great love-song of the Old Testament, the Song of Songs. It serves as a governing principle for the season of Lent. Today is Quinquagesima Sunday. We have already had occasion to talk about these curious names which adorn the three Sundays before Lent. Quinquagesima Sunday, is also commonly known as Love Sunday. It brings us to the very threshold of the season of Lent, to that concentration of the pilgrimage of our lives into the space of forty days. Lent, above all else, is the pilgrimage of love. Love’s journeying ways shape us in love and bring us to love’s end, to the peace and joy and blessedness of Jerusalem redeemed.

Quinquagesima is called Love Sunday principally because of today’s Epistle reading at Communion. It is St. Paul’s great love-song: “If I have not love I am nothing worth…and now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity”, love. The theme is captured wonderfully in the Collect, but its profounder meaning is presented in the Eucharistic Gospel in the words of Jesus to the disciples that “we go up to Jerusalem.”

This day illustrates the business of Lent; the business, if you will, of setting love in order in us, both individually and collectively. All the readings on this day illuminate the path of our Lenten journey. It is the pilgrimage of love.

(more…)

Print this entry

Sermons

Sermon for Quinquagesima, 8:00am service

“If I have not love, I am nothing”

Love is everything and without it we are nothing. Tough love, it seems. What is this love? Quite simply, it is the love of God, the divine love which seeks the perfection of our human loves.

But isn’t love, love? Love of what, in what way and for what end, we have to ask. Love is not static but dynamic. It is the desire or the eros of our souls, “the still more excellent way” that transcends and transforms our human attempts at justice and right.

Divine charity perfects human charity. In the divine fellowship, the true desire of our souls for the unity that unites all differences is accomplished and concluded. Such love cannot be an indifferent love, a love that is indifferent to the realities of our lives and the lives of others around us. Love indifferent is not love. The love that is sung in this Hymn of Love is the divine love which seeks our good, individually and collectively.

(more…)

Print this entry

Anglican issues

Motions passed at Annual Parish Meeting

Several motions were presented at today’s Annual Meeting of the Parish of Christ Church, Windsor, including two motions, posted below, that may be of interest to Anglicans beyond our Parish.  Both of these motions passed unanimously.

Motion # 4

Preamble:  Parishes have been asked to send to the Diocese [of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island] a parochial Mission Statement. The following expresses the intent and purpose for the continuing existence of the Parish, captures the intent and purpose of the Covenant in Ministry between the Rector and Parish, and establishes the principles that define an Anglican identity and witness.

Re: Mission Statement of the Parish of Christ Church:

To be a visible witness, in the community of Windsor and beyond, to the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ as faithful stewards of the mysteries of God in Christ and in his body, the Church, according to the principles of our Anglican spiritual identity expressed in the Book of Common Prayer, the Ordinal, the Thirty-nine Articles and the Solemn Declaration of 1893.

Motion # 5

Preamble: In the current distresses of the Anglican Communion and in the attempts to find a mechanism to hold the communion together, the Archbishop of Canterbury has sponsored an ‘Anglican Communion Covenant’.  The Covenant is attached in Appendix # 2 [and is posted online here].  The motion affirms the ‘Anglican Communion Covenant’ as consistent with the understanding of our identity, polity and life that the Parish has articulated from time-to-time as well as signaling our continued commitment tot eh Anglican Communion via the Archbishop of Canterbury regardless of the actions of local and national synods.

Re: Endorsement of the ‘Anglican Communion Covenant’

The Parish of Christ Church endorses the Archbishop of Canterbury’s ‘Anglican Communion Covenant’ as a mechanism for maintaining the unity of the Anglican Communion, in accord with the foundational principles of our Anglican identity expressed in the Book of Common Prayer, the Ordinal, and the Thirty-nine Articles and as consistent with the Solemn Declaration of 1893 in Canada.

Print this entry