a great week of saints

st. cedd, st. alfred the great, st. frumentius, st. neot and sts. simon and thaddeus all have come up this week. oddly enough, there are quite a lot of connexions between them.

cedd of course is the brother of my patron, chad, but he was also one of the most southern-traveling of the northumbrians, and worked in the territory of which alfred was king. (if alfred had not won at edington, you might be reading this in a language which, even if after 1066 and all that sounded much the same, would be called danish.) alfred was the patron of neot of glastonbury, a scholar and monk who was very influential on alfred. at a time when most kings were pretty bloody even if they were christian (think of my patronymic ancester, cadwaladr, who was a "christian" but who allied himself again and again with the pagan penda in wars against the christian kings of northumbria), alfred truly was a kinder and gentler sort of ruler.

neot shares his feast day with ss. simon and jude, who amongst other things were missionaries to persia. jude is also known as thaddeus, and in persia is called addai, the composer of the liturgy of sts. addai and mari, also used by the church in abbysinia, whose founder was st. frumentius.

the old testament reading for today's feast of simon and jude from isaiah (28:9-16) seems appropriate to all of these saints: "precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; . . . i lay in zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation; he that believeth shall not make haste."

and of course with all of them the collect for today is appropriate:

"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 the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

commemoration of st. frideswide

with the feast of luke the evangelist and iconographer and the new martyrs of russia available for consideration, why should i choose to mention the somewhat obscure 8th century mercian abbess frideswide? i chose to write about her because the history of the modern western church seems to be described by the history of her foundation. i can probably do no better than to quote her story from fr. beverly c. hughson o.h.c.'s athletes of god, pp. 335-336:

"this saint was a mercian abbess, the daughter of a prince who lived at oxford early in the eighth century. the old story is that algar, a neighboring prince, sought her hand in marriage. fearing lest her father would compel her to accept his addresses, she fled from oxford with two nuns in a boat, rowed by an angel in the likeness of a young man clothed in white, and took refuge in a wood near abingdon. many stories similar to this are told of this holy virgin. there is no question, however that she founded a convent at oxford and for many years devoted herself to the service of the poor and outcast. her convent was in later times given to the augustinian canons, and it was acquired by cardinal wolsey for his cardinal college, which afterwards became christ church. the chapel of this college, which was built in the twelfth century, is now the cathedral church of the oxford diocese. the bones of the saint were cast out of their tomb [see photo above] in the chapel in the reign of edward vi, and those of the wife of peter martyr, the reformer, enshrined in their stead. under queen mary the bones of the intruding lady were removed, and the relics of st. frideswide restored. when elizabeth came to the throne, she ordered the former to be returned to the shrine without disturbing those of the saint. so now it is said that they both rest in the same shrine, and those who go to venerate the relics of the saint have opportunity of contemplating the remains of her strange bedfellow."

monasticism in its early days was often an attempt to escape from the growing worldly politics in which the church was becoming engaged. frideswide's refusal of a political marriage and the privileges it would provide were well understood and appreciated in the early british church. consider the legend of the seven desert fathers who brought monastic christianity to wales and cornwall, and the popularity of the visit of st. anthony to st. paul as the bottom image on standing crosses.

but monasticism, too, came to be a source of power, rather than of seeking one thing: to know god. st. frideswide's abbey became an augustinian house. then the royally established episcopacy took over, and cardinal woolsey made it into a "college." at first colleges were legitimate institutions for christian learning, one may hope. but the despotic rule of henry, which the reformers thought they could turn to their advantage, made cardinal college a royal establishment instead, although cleverly named not king's (that would happen at the even more protestant cambridge) but christ college.

now even the bones of the monastic foundress were removed, and those of a foreign-born scholar replaced them. with the elizabethan settlement, all the bones were thrown in together, a somewhat macabre pre-curser of the claims of the history channel, for example, which claims that truth is to be found simply by considering everyone's "opinions." it is sad to consider that the pharisees have prevailed in so much of the modern church.

st. thais

i admit right up front that one of the reasons i decided to post on the commemoration of st. thais is to have a link to joshua bell's playing of the interlude in massenet's opera. but the real life of the penitent saint and the story as told by the romantic massenet are slightly different. paphnutius was not so distracted by her physical beauty as to be driven mad. rather he was given a vision of a throne awaiting some saint in heaven. he assumed it would be for s. anthony, but he was told instead that it awaited s. thais, the penitent, who reposed only fifteen days after entering the desert monastery.

praying the scriptures

a letter from a friend arrived yesterday with a very useful problem. ryan knight is a campus minister at a large state school. he is thinking of introducing praying the scripture to his students, but they are already having trouble understanding praying the psalms. so i thought about this as i walked out to the county's highest ridge, with a view of the kings river.

i had recently sent him one very practical book on the subject, which i did not yet know he had not read. oh well. but i thought, another book is probably not going to be much help anyway.

and it dawned on me that praying scripture is really very simple:
think about someone you love very much.
imagine that person in serious trouble.
think of yourself praying for that person.
think how you would want the holy one to listen to your prayer.
read scripture listening that way.

we are the ones whom god loves very much.
we are in serious trouble, and not for our sins only, but for the sin of the world.
the holy one speaks to us in scripture.
our listening is praying the scripture.

the next problem ryan came up with is that many of his students are still in denial that they are in serious trouble. but that is why so much of the scripture is stories. they catch us up in ways we aren't expecting. but that's perhaps the subject of another post.

eucharist & christology

the past few days i am thinking about the eucharist (ian t. ramsey, ed. london: s.c.m. press, 1972), particularly about the anglican eucharist in ecumenical perspective (edward p. echlin, s.j. new york: the seabury press, 1968), because i am starting a mission and the eucharistic rite we use is an ecumenical version of an anglican usage.

my thinking has led to several observations.

in times of great change in our understanding of epistemology and ontology, such as occured at the time of the reformation and is occuring now, in what we often call the post-modern era, the church is forced to rethink its understanding of the euchrarist in a very fundamental way if she is going to be able to make that understanding "understanded of the people." this seems obvious, but what may not be so obvious is how comprehensive eucharistic theology is. our understanding of the eucharist is interwoven with our understanding of the world.

as those understandings change, we look for authorities to support our new understandings. archbishop cramner looked to the continental reformers, especially martin bucer and peter martyr. the archbishops of york and canterbury in these days look to a "commission" drawn from the various academic "disciplines." the editors of "the liturgy of st. tikhon" looked to the russian church, which is seen, perhaps wrongly, as having preserved the tradition without the controversies of the reformation.

but seldom is eucharistic theology discussed in clearly christological terms. (welcome exceptions are the essays by j.l. houlder and h.e.w. turner in thinking about the euchraist.) it seems that much of the argument that accompanied the reformation and counter-reformation, as both the "catholic" and "protestant" parties of the western church tried to adjust their understanding of the eucharistic events to the new science, might have been helped by thinking of the bread and wine in terms of the definition chalcedon: the statements that are made about jesus christ as both man and god apply also to the bread and wine.

the "moment" of consecreation is not much discussed in the archbishops' book, but it has remained a point of contention for many who have written about the eucharistic event. father echlin, with fine jesuitical understanding, insists that oblation, anamnasis, and epiclesis are all necessary for the consecration. if we extrapolate from this to the acts of our lord, on maundy thursday, good friday, and either, in the johannine tradition, easter evening, or, in the lucan tradition, pentecost, then we have a parallel suggestion of events, actions, that are necessary for our salvation. then, of course, it may well be suggested that our salvation is the prelude and requirement for our sanctification.

so, i am led to another observation. one of the matters of contention during the reformation, brought up again in england during the oxford movement days, but now not getting much ink, was how the eucharist is a sacrifice, and if it is, is there an immolation. one of the reasons i am partial to the english rite is that it includes a self-oblation. it makes very clear that not only the bread and wine which are the body and blood of christ are made holy (which is the basic meaning of sacrifice), but the body of christ as the church gathered is made holy. our old selves are immolated, as we are sent out in the power of the spirit to be christ's body in the world.

the feast of the exaltation of the holy cross

today is one of my favourite holidays. when i first read the collect last night during the first vespers, i was at first a little disappointed. the old western collect is patterned after traditional jewish blessings: we thank god for giving us this celebration, and pray we may receive the benefits of it. but as i thought more about it, it seemed a wise way to approach such a complicated feast, with its look back to a wide range of old testament prophecies, and forward to a wide range of their fulfillments. in a way this feast is a recapitulation of all the old testament, not only a reminder that we're halfway to pasch, but also that we're halfway to the readings of the paschal vigil.

i found two of the posts at the blog, full of grace and truth to be particularly rich for this day. the first is for the day itself, and the second recognizes moses in the feast.

the first feast of the new year

on the eighth day of the first month of the year we celebrate the nativity of the blessed virgin mary, the theotokos.

the collect for this day is rich:

"we beseech thee, o lord, to bestow on us thy servants the gift of thy heavenly grace: that as the child-bearing of the blessed virgin was to us the beginning of salvation; so the devout observance of her nativity may avail for the increasing of our peace. through jesus christ thy son, our lord: who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the holy ghost, ever one god, world without end. amen.

of course it makes sense to pray for the gift of grace on a feast of the one who is full of grace. and the collect recognizes that the beginning of our salvation is the incarnation of our lord. but the next part has more references than we might immediately recognize. in part the petition for peace is an allusion the prophet ezekiel's description of the temple with the closed gate, which is a source of much of our imagery regarding the theotokos. but it is also a reminder of the role the blessed virgin plays in the whole church. she is, as the one who both hears and does the word, as the one who bears the christ, the model for the whole church. (think of her central place in the icon of pentecost.)

and so it is for the peace of the church that we pray in this final petition of the collect. what we do not have, we cannot share.

a footnote to this feast and the peace of the church is provided by the association for the promotion of the reunion of christendom, a short-lived organization which urged the church to pray for peace during the octave of the feast.

a new year begins

the orthodox church, following the calendar presented to moses, starts the new year this month. it is the month of the anniversary of creation (which actually comes at the 14th, on the lunar calendar, but it's the spirit that counts, or something--i personally start my year on holy cross day, the 14th, which is close to the lunar date.)

in honor of the new year, i thought this link to patriarch bartholomew's encyclical might be appropriate.

st. bartholomew's day: a wonder for nathaniel bar tholomew

"may the words of mouth always find favor,
and the whisperings of my heart,
in your presence, YHWH,
my rock, my redeemer." psalm 19:14, (jerusalem bible)

what, i wonder, were the words
whispering in nathaniel's hearts as
he sat under his fig tree.

i wonder if they could have been
jacob's dream of the ladder, well
before he became israel without guile.

(i wonder if even in john's gospel
jesus knew such things
as this. yes?)

i wonder how long nathaniel
would keep his ironic humor:
"rabbi, you are the son of god."

i wonder if it were jesus'
ironic humor,
"there is an israelite who deserves
the name, in capable of deceit,"
that drew nathaniel bartholomew
to follow.

i wonder, was it the search for the ladder
that would take this israelite to india,
carrying the gospel book in his native tongue.

i wonder, that spring day by the gallilean sea,
if nathaniel's heart murmered to wander
so far, even with the king of israel.

and, i wonder if it were only in albana,
by the caspian sea,
that he saw the ladder,
as his guileless skin
was pulled from his
faithful body.

call me historian, not christian

i read too much, and seldom do i listen.

lately i have been reading fredrick denison maurice's work. he is a rather unusual historian in that he is not so interested in learning the past that we might avoid the mistakes, but that we might enjoy the wisdom. and he is especially interested in christian unity, as i am, too. (see my posts from february, 2008.) but he still speaks in terms of the wisdom of quakers, and lutherans, and unitarians.

there is a little group that meets on friday nights for soup and bread, sometimes pie, and the gospel of mark. i am usually the historical arse, finishing people's statements with historical insights. history often is just the academic word for gossip. (think of footnotes: the most pedantic way of saying "he said 'she said'".)

last night, in that modest little group, i heard the word of the lord. it came, not surprisingly, gently, with no elaboration. the denominational backgrounds of the little group are varied, and therefore actually a help to each other. but, i the historian, have difficulty letting go of the past. so as we were casually ending the discussion, i referred to two very dear friends as "the lutherans."

marilyn quietly said, "we are not lutherans, dale, but christians." wow! the meaning in the depths of simple words has been been echoing in my hollow head all the hours since. i thought i needed to look for the unity of the church, and here it was, gathered around my little table, as we broke bread together.

there are none so deaf as i, who will not hear.

the dormition of the blessed virgin mary

there have of course been many thousands of pages written about the theotokos, and some of the earliest are accounts of her dormition, starting with evodius, the second bishop of antioch. i don't need to add much to the pages; a good review of many of the topics are clearly posted at a byzantine christian. i would direct you to the reading for celebrations of the blessed virgin on saturdays after trinity in the traditional benedictine missal:

"and it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked. but he said, yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of god, and keep it." (luke 11:27-28)

the first part of this gospel is the part picked up in discussions about mary that center, as most of them do and as lance discussed in his post, on the nature and person of her son. but the second part, the words spoken by jesus, point us to the nature and person of jesus herself. it is her hearing the word of god, and keeping it, which is at the heart of her singular role in our salvation. a few years ago there was a book by marina warner, alone of all her sex, which traced mary as, among other things, a model of feminism in western culture. it could however as easily been titled "alone of any sex," so singular is she.

i can't end without posting a link to my favourite hymn of this fest, "ave stella maris", here in a setting by monteverdi. it is the hymn in the benedictine second vespers for the feast.

musings on evangelism, 2

now for the good news: the spread of the kingdom doesn't require that my life is remarkable. it wouldn't hurt, but the good news is not that some of my friends are worried about their real estate investments, or not, nor that i, who live on social security, am worried about how many books my stipend will buy this month, or not.

rather, of first importance, the good news is that god was in christ, reconciling the world to himself. we are more accustomed to hearing that as god so loved the world that he gave his only son. indeed, that's on quite a few of the t-shirts walking round eureka springs on any given saturday.

god so loved the world: me, with all my books; my friends who find their real estate investments more enslaving than liberating; the earnest young man on the plaza clinging to his bible as he spoke; the lesbian couple who came to stand by me because, they said, i was peaceful.

what people need, what "saves us" (i.e., heals us, makes us whole), is to know the love of god, and to love in return. some of us remember when each sunday the anglican rite started with the words, "hear what our lord jesus christ saith. thou shalt love the lord thy god with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. this is the first and great commandment. and the second is like unto it; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

i said that if i were to preach at the park on a saturday morning, i would start with the eighth chapter of the gospel according to john. that's the story of the woman caught in the actual act of adultery. what jesus says to her, after all her accusers have gone, is remarkable: "neither do i condemn thee. now go and sin no more." as all gospel stories do, this one seems rather hard. likewise hard is the reading from the eighteenth chapter of st. luke in this morning's daily office. a certain ruler comes to jesus to find out what he needs to "do to inherit eternal life?" jesus tells him that he must "sell all tht thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shall have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me. and when [certain ruler] heard this, he was very sorrowful: for he was very rich."

we do not really know the responses of the woman caught in adultry or of the ruler. perhaps they followed jesus' command, even if the ruler were sorrowful at first. if indeed they did, their lives would probably have been as remarkable as anthony of the desert's. but we do know that jesus said about that the difficulty for those of us with richest to enter the kingdom of god, that "the things which are impossible with men are possible with god." and we do know that not all of us achieve sanctity immediately. remember that st. mark, whose gospel we have been reading on friday nights, was sent away by paul. but he went on to accompany peter in jerusalem, to write the gospel, and to become the first bishop of alexandria.

even if the life of christians are not always so remarkable as we might wish, the total life of the church neverless is. we are part of that great cloud of witness which includes the blessed virgin mary, apostles, martyrs, confessors, and those of us who worry about our mortgages and retirement funds. the holy one may have finished the work of creation, perhaps even the work of salvation (in the sense that if i were to tell someone the time and date of my salvation, i would probably say 3:00 p.m. 4 april a. d. 31, judean local time), but the work of sanctification continues, and the inclusion of more and more of the people the holy one loves into the body of those being sanctified continues.

there is, your see, nothing intrinsically wrong about t-shirts or houses or books, or love of another human being. but as we come to know and love the holy one, our love for all of these other things falls into perspective and is rightly ordered. that is good news indeed.

musings on evangelism

the topic of the past week has been evangelism. i had not invited it, at least not consciously, but i suppose my pretensions to starting a congregation has its own invitations. anyway, the topic first presented itself when i was the luncheon guest of the new episcopal vicar. we were talking about the attraction of eureka springs. i suggested that it has always been a place of healing, and that is still it's attraction, even for those who come on harley-davidson's, even though we have overlaid it with great numbers of greedy t-shirt stores and motels.

it was usual for desert monks to have a few books. st. athanasius' cell was remarkably free of books. when he was asked about that, he said that creation is an open book to those who have eyes to see. eureka springs seems like one of those places, and the opposition to its role as a revelation of the creator seems much like the same sort of opposition that occurs to other forms of the holy one's revelation, especially in scripture and in the incarnation of god the son.

friday night, as the little group that meets at my house for soup and the gospel of mark were discussing the fourth chapter of that gospel, one of the participants said, in real surprise, "why are we talking about evangelism?" for most of us evangelism has become a discomforting word, and we wondered why. it was, i suggested, because the word has been coopted by those whose take on evangelism is the question, "if you died tonight, where would you spend eternity?" the gospel of mark, the good news of our lord jesus christ according to mark, starts with jesus saying, "repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." there is no suggestion that the kingdom needs to wait until we die.

the little group also recognized, however, that the church often falls far short of actually living in the kingdom. we wondered whether there were any noticeable difference common to those of us who considered ourselves christians and those of our neighbors who do not consider themselves christians. it was certainly difficult to see much difference in morality.

one of the participants suggested that she had been taught as a young lutheran in catechism class that a christian is one who knows whom to thank. i added that for orthodox christians, it is also how to thank. we have again and again noticed in reading mark's gospel that people gathered in great numbers around jesus, who often was trying to escape for a while.

there was a fairly large gathering saturday morning in downtown eureka springs' basin park. it was one of the four annual "diversity weekends," and although i usually avoid downtown on weekends (for reasons alluded to above under the heading of greedy t-shirt shops), i thought it wouldn't hurt me to see more of the town in which i have come to live, and i was particularly curious about a group called "jericho riders" who have noticeably appeared on diversity weekends to perform "street preaching"--in other words, something that probably would be described by its practitioners as "evangelism." i listened to one of the earnest young men for a little while, went off to write a rather depressed letter to a friend, and came back to talk with the "preacher." i confess i find what he and the jericho riders were doing to be about as far from evangelism as i could imagine. to start with, they were "proclaiming" certain passages from paul's writings, mostly from his letters to the corinthian church, with no concern for how the passages they quoted worked within the structure of paul's letters and thought, nor with any appreciation that the audience in the park were mostly not church members. paul's letters were pointedly to church members. i thought that if i were going to preach to that crowd, i would probably start with the eighth chapter of john's gospel.

but evangelism i expect seldom occurs when some one decides that some group of "others" needs a good preaching. evangelism happened in the new testament, and it could happen still, when people who call themselves christians live lives that are remarkable enough to make people curious. jesus pointedly reminded us that where our treasure is, there we will find our hearts. for those of us whose main concern is the value of our real estate or retirement investments, or whose christianity consists of motor-cycle jackets with crosses decorating them, there's nothing to make anyone curious.

a prayer for the church

really, i am not picking on the episcopal church. it is merely a rather visible example of what one finds in so much of the protestant world today, in which one may receive the communion cup from an avowed hindu after not having recited the creed because it is no longer found relevant.

it is in this context which i offer the following prayer for the church, compiled in 1799 by the rev. dr. william smith for the diocese of connecticut as part of the service for the installation of a rector:

"ALMIGHTY God, who hast built thy Church upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone; Grant that, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, all Christians may be so joined together in unity of spirit, and in the bond of peace, that they may be an holy temple acceptable unto thee. And especially to this Congregation present, give the abundance of thy grace; that with one heart they may desire the prosperity of thy holy Apostolic Church, and with one mouth may profess the faith once delivered to the Saints. Defend them from the sins of heresy and schism; let not the foot of pride come nigh to hurt them, nor the hand of the ungodly to cast them down. And grant that the course of this world may be so peaceably ordered by thy governance, that thy Church may joyfully serve thee in all godly quietness; that so they may walk in the ways of truth and peace, and at last be numbered with thy Saints in glory everlasting; through the merits of the same thy blessed Son Jesus Christ, the gracious Bishop and Shepherd of our souls, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen."

Although written to be used in a particular congregation, it seems useful for the wider church as well.

thoughts towards independence day

in bellingham, on elm, waiting for a bus to take me to fairhaven. the view towards the north is a regular rhythm of porch piedments. the counter rhythm is runners making the most of this long day in a short summer.

the bus comes and transfers me to fairhaven: everyone is speaking the patois of the pacific northwest to a soundtrack of sufyan phillips. we are all heartbreakingly cool, spiraling around a core of nihilism. the headlines say we are more optimistic this week, but i feel as if i am at a new masque of the red death, where the little face-masques on bamboo elegant handles have been replaced by bmw's or saabs or mercedes-benzes. we handle them by power steering wheels, but they just let us feel we're in control. all the roads we follow so carefully lead to baghdad.

around the world this sunny morning, bombs are falling, dawn's early light still challenged by the rocket's red glare.

here in the cafe, we are safe. smoking is not allowed.

reading numbers after easter

in december last year i started using the 1943 american daily office lectionary because i wanted to go through the book of ezekiel again. these days we're reading the book of numbers each morning.

reading numbers these days after easter is a very wise choice. after the miracle of deliverance that is the passover ("the horse and rider he has thrown into the sea!") comes not the promised land but the desert, the wilderness. of course the people of god do our usual bitching and moaning. but as the readings this week remind us, the enemy never doubts the reality of what is happening. although the children of israel then just as we now complain about just about everything, doubting their and our salvation, balak and company never seem to doubt for a moment the necessity of stopping us and them.

i am disappointed that the wiser-than-the-writers-of-genesis editors of the lectionary decided to demythologize the story, leaving out balaam's ass. alas. we forget that the holy one loves not just us folks who smugly call ourselves, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, homo sapiens. we would do well to pay attention to what the rest of creation is revealing to us.

pentecost ember saturday

i was somewhat amazed when i did a google image search for priest to find an illustration for this post. i know that the christian priesthood is little regarded these days, but i didn't think it would take me to the fifth page to find a suitable image.

but that difficulty only points out more the appropriateness of this prayer written by father william doyle,s.j., m.c., on this pentecost ember saturday:

"o my god, pour out in abundance thy spirit of sacrifice upon thy priests.
it is both their glory and their duty to become victims,
to be burnt up for souls,
to live without ordinary joys,
to be often the objects of distrust, injustice, and persecution.

the words they say every day at the altar,
"'his is my body, this is my blood,'
grant them to apply to themselves:
'i am no longer myself, i am jesus, jesus crucified.
i am, like the bread and wine, a substance no longer itself,
but by consecration another."

o my god, i burn with desire for the sanctification of thy priests.
i wish all the priestly hands which touch thee were hands whose touch is gentle and pleasing to thee,
that all the mouths uttering such sublime words at the altar should never descend to speaking trivialities.

"let priests in all their person stay at the level of their lofty functions,
let every man find them simple and great, like the holy eucharist,
accessible to all yet above the rest of men.
o my god, grant them to carry with them from the mass of today,
a thirst for the mass of tomorrow,
and grant them, ladened themselves with gifts,
to share these abundantly with their fellow men. amen."

if this prayer were fulfilled, the it might more easily follow that the same "level of their lofty functions" might also be fulfilled in all the body of christ.

a new project

for the past two years or so i've been blessed to attend, when in eureka springs, a writers' group that meets at studio 62. besides enjoying the fascinating diversity of the group's writings, i've been disciplined to write something every week. part of the results have been the blog the ring of the lord.

having finished that series, i've decided to try to emulate john keble, whose series of poems, the christian year was very popular in the 19th century. i don't expect my work to become as popular as his, but i do think that the kind of thinking it will make me do will be very helpful in at least my own formation in the mind of christ. i hope that the blog will be helpful to others as well.

pentecost ember days

one of the reasons j. michael matkin and i became such good friends was discovering that we both read t.s. eliot's four quartets at the ember days. for a while we put on public readings of them in a coffee house in bellingham at the four seasons, within an evensong with readings. i was delighted therefore to find this string quartet by patrick handler based on east coker.

it makes me want to do the same thing in eureka springs. (by the way, michael's not-updated-frequently-enough blog is at aidan's ghost.

whit-week

and what, you might well wonder, is that picture. it is a sheep door. i am posting it because it illustrates today's (whit tuesday's) gospel. and i like that whitsunday, pentecost, lingers a bit, that it has an octave.

you see, for me the fifty days have passed rather too quickly. they have been great big ol' days, starting with a huge rain which, although it certainly could remind one of one's baptism and the need to be thankful, also moved the lighting of the new fire inside, where i was so excited about the eve of easter that i forgot the psalms in the vigil.

now, fifty-two days later, i find myself still on pivot rock road, where i had not expected to be able to stay, and where i celebrated the eve of pentecost amongst the green fire of beltane and said the kneeling prayers of pentecost vespers and still found that i wanted more of this amazing season.

so i am happy that the gelasian sacramentary and the apostolic constitutions gave us proper readings to celebrate monday and tuesday of this week. then pope gelasius reiterated the importance of the ember days this week, and a few hundred years later proper readings for thursday were added, making this a week for considering what happened, how were we changed during the great fifty days, and what lies ahead of us as ministers of the glory of the holy one. (the first octaves were in the west those of easter and pentecost, in the east that of the epiphany; pretty clearly days of recollection for the newly baptized.)

it is in this context that i found perhaps the most meaningful readings of these last few days amongst the texts for the first vespers of pentecost:

". . . thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondsman in egypt." (deuteronomy 16:12a)
and
". . . reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." (romans 8:18)

i am no longer in egypt; i may find myself in a desert, i may chose to be in a desert, but i am free. the revelation of the glory awaits.