Monthly Archives: July 2010

New Post at the Cafe

I have a new partial post up at the Episcopal Cafe. This one is on the Blessed Virgin and, specifically, the arguments around the word “virgin.” The way Jim divided the piece, today’s chunk focuses on the virgin birth of Jesus which means tomorrow or—more likely—Wednesday’s section will deal with the issue of the perpetual virginity of Mary, the arguments over whether Mary had more children after Jesus. If today’s seems a little skimpy, that’s because the heart of the discussion and the pay-off is located at the end of the next chunk.

AKMA on the Open Source Textbook

AKMA writes today on the Open Source Textbook. This is an idea whose time has definitely come.

I don’t know about you, but I sometimes find myself wondering strange thoughts like, “Hmm. You know, one of these days I should buy a Qur’an and maybe a decent scholarly introduction to it just to read through it for myself… I wonder what version and introduction scholars of religion use?” Occasionally these thoughts makes it all the way into a Google box which then tends to devolve in aimless search and eventual wish-list maintenance at Amazon.

I don’t believe in any of my wild-hare moments that I’ve seen a basic wiki from the American Academy of Religion that covers that topic—but wouldn’t that make sense?

Closer to home, I’ve written the occasional piece here, often in response to requests from folks like Tony or Brandon on a basic plan of study for the Apocrypha & Pseudepigrapha or Basic Homiletics for Medievalists. And those things are fine for the readership here, but if somebody googles in, they have no idea if I know what I’m talking about or if I’m just spouting off.

AKMA is absolutely right about the textbook, but here’s my suggestion. It takes a hell of a lot of work to get a textbook up and going as he notes (and I concur having survived a couple from the research assistant side!), so why not utilize a practical intermediary step? Begin with a wiki. Have a general plan for what kinds of things you’d like to see, then start gathering bits—pieces like mine above. Or a quickie intro to who Gregory the Great was, what he wrote and why he matters. Or an overview on arguments over Gospel Chronology. Host the site at an identifiable location with its own built-in credentials. Like the Disseminary. Gather together people to contribute material. Encourage Graduate faculty to have their students send in some of their seminar prep assignments which, if they’re like mine, often consisted of an overview of a classic work or studied a particular angle of a classic problem. Once the very specific articles come in, more general pieces can be written that link to them and give an order, framework, and context to these snapshots. From those contributors, start gathering an informal editorial board. Then, as the project (hopefully) picks up steam, look at what’s there, what’s getting accessed, what works and start constructing the textbook from these pieces.

A place positioned like the Disseminary has the advantage of being able to go in two key directions: it can speak to academics and the university/seminary setting but also can occupy an identifiably confessional theological position (confessional in the broad sense…). It can provide a trustworthy resource for clergy and interested laypeople who want an informed opinion coming from a known theological position. (Would this represent two different resources or two portals that draw from roughly the same material but with different points of entry? Who knows…)

So that’s my proposal. Definitely open source textbooks. But let’s start with wiki that can be used as a stepping stone.

More on the Trinity, Metaphors for God, and Devotion

The thread on M’s sermon has engaged some of the issues around the naming of God. If I may summarize what I read there, I think all participants are in agreement that “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” is the normative means for naming the Trinity in our public worship; the discussion turns then to whether this is the only metaphor or whether others are to be used, in what settings, and to what degree.

Frequently during discussions of this topic, I’m reminded of the Anthropomorphite controversy. This is one of the spin-offs of the long-standing Origenist controversy that rocked Alexandria for quite a while. The basic question seems to be whether Origen had taken allegory too far—what, in descriptions of God, were metaphor and what were literal? When the Scriptures speak of “God’s outstretched arm” is this purely a metaphor or is there a physical divine member in view here? In particular, this controversy caused some real difficulties in the first few generations of the monastic movement among the monks who were wise and holy—but not particularly learned. While you get sprinkles of this controversy in a variety of places in the literature, my thoughts this morning turn especially to John Cassian’s Conferences 10.1-5.

I think this section is worth citing in full so here it is from the venerable NPNF:

Introduction.

Among the sublime customs of the anchorites which by God’s help have been set forth although in plain and unadorned style, the course of our narration compels us to insert and find a place for something, which may seem so to speak to cause a blemish on a fair body: although I have no doubt that by it no small instruction on the image of Almighty God of which we read in Genesis will be conferred on some of the simpler sort, especially when the grounds are considered of a doctrine so important that men cannot be ignorant of it without terrible blasphemy and serious harm to the Catholic faith.

Chapter 2

Of the custom which is kept up in the Province of Egypt for signifying the time of Easter.

In the country of Egypt this custom is by ancient tradition observed that— when Epiphany is past, which the priests of that province regard as the time, both of our Lord’s baptism and also of His birth in the flesh, and so celebrate the commemoration of either mystery not separately as in the Western provinces but on the single festival of this day, — letters are sent from the Bishop of Alexandria through all the Churches of Egypt, by which the beginning of Lent, and the day of Easter are pointed out not only in all the cities but also in all the monasteries. In accordance then with this custom, a very few days after the previous conference had been held with Abbot Isaac, there arrived the festal letters of Theophilus the Bishop of the aforesaid city, in which together with the announcement of Easter he considered as well the foolish heresy of the Anthropomorphites at great length, and abundantly refuted it. And this was received by almost all the body of monks residing in the whole province of Egypt with such bitterness owing to their simplicity and error, that the greater part of the Elders decreed that on the contrary the aforesaid Bishop ought to be abhorred by the whole body of the brethren as tainted with heresy of the worst kind, because he seemed to impugn the teaching of holy Scripture by the denial that Almighty God was formed in the fashion of a human figure, though Scripture teaches with perfect clearness that Adam was created in His image. Lastly this letter was rejected also by those who were living in the desert of Scete and who excelled all who were in the monasteries of Egypt, in perfection and in knowledge, so that except Abbot Paphnutius the presbyter of our congregation, not one of the other presbyters, who presided over the other three churches in the same desert, would suffer it to be even read or repeated at all in their meetings.

Chapter 3

Of Abbot Sarapion and the heresy of the Anthropomorphites into which he fell in the error of simplicity.

Among those then who were caught by this mistaken notion was one named Sarapion, a man of long-standing strictness of life, and one who was altogether perfect in actual discipline, whose ignorance with regard to the view of the doctrine first mentioned was so far a stumbling block to all who held the true faith, as he himself outstripped almost all the monks both in the merits of his life and in the length of time (he had been there). And when this man could not be brought back to the way of the right faith by many exhortations of the holy presbyter Paphnutius, because this view seemed to him a novelty, and one that was not ever known to or handed down by his predecessors, it chanced that a certain deacon, a man of very great learning, named Photinus, arrived from the region of Cappadocia with the desire of visiting the brethren living in the same desert: whom the blessed Paphnutius received with the warmest welcome, and in order to confirm the faith which had been stated in the letters of the aforesaid Bishop, placed him in the midst and asked him before all the brethren how the Catholic Churches throughout the East interpreted the passage in Genesis where it says, “Let us make man after our image and likeness” Genesis 1:26 And when he explained that the image and likeness of God was taken by all the leaders of the churches not according to the base sound of the letters, but spiritually, and supported this very fully and by many passages of Scripture, and showed that nothing of this sort could happen to that infinite and incomprehensible and invisible glory, so that it could be comprised in a human form and likeness, since its nature is incorporeal and uncompounded and simple, and what can neither be apprehended by the eyes nor conceived by the mind, at length the old man was shaken by the numerous and very weighty assertions of this most learned man, and was drawn to the faith of the Catholic tradition. And when both Abbot Paphnutius and all of us were filled with intense delight at his adhesion, for this reason; viz., that the Lord had not permitted a man of such age and crowned with such virtues, and one who erred only from ignorance and rustic simplicity, to wander from the path of the right faith up to the very last, and when we arose to give thanks, and were all together offering up our prayers to the Lord, the old man was so bewildered in mind during his prayer because he felt that the Anthropomorphic image of the Godhead which he used to set before himself in prayer, was banished from his heart, that on a sudden he burst into a flood of bitter tears and continual sobs, and cast himself down on the ground and exclaimed with strong groanings: “Alas! Wretched man that I am! They have taken away my God from me, and I have now none to lay hold of; and whom to worship and address I know not.” By which scene we were terribly disturbed, and moreover with the effect of the former Conference still remaining in our hearts, we returned to Abbot Isaac, whom when we saw close at hand, we addressed with these words.

Chapter 4

Of our return to Abbot Isaac and question concerning the error into which the aforesaid old man had fallen.

Although even besides the fresh matter which has lately arisen, our delight in the former conference which was held on the character of prayer would summon us to postpone everything else and return to your holiness, yet this grievous error of Abbot Sarapion, conceived, as we fancy, by the craft of most vile demons, adds somewhat to this desire of ours. For it is no small despair by which we are cast down when we consider that through the fault of this ignorance he has not only utterly lost all those labours which he has performed in so praiseworthy a manner for fifty years in this desert, but has also incurred the risk of eternal death. And so we want first to know why and wherefore so grievous an error has crept into him. And next we should like to be taught how we can arrive at that condition in prayer, of which you discoursed some time back not only fully but splendidly. For that admirable Conference has had this effect upon us, that it has only dazzled our minds and has not shown us how to perform or secure it.

Chapter 5

The answer on the heresy described above.

Isaac: We need not be surprised that a really simple man who had never received any instruction on the substance and nature of the Godhead could still be entangled and deceived by an error of simplicity and the habit of a longstanding mistake, and (to speak more truly) continue in the original error which is brought about, not as you suppose by a new illusion of the demons, but by the ignorance of the ancient heathen world, while in accordance with the custom of that erroneous notion, by which they used to worship devils formed in the figure of men, they even now think that the incomprehensible and ineffable glory of the true Deity should be worshipped under the limitations of some figure, as they believe that they can grasp and hold nothing if they have not some image set before them, which they can continually address while they are at their devotions, and which they can carry about in their mind and have always fixed before their eyes. And against this mistake of theirs this text may be used: “And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of corruptible man.” Romans 1:23 Jeremiah also says: “My people have changed their glory for an idol.” Jeremiah 2:11 Which error although by this its origin, of which we have spoken, it is engrained in the notions of some, yet none the less is it contracted in the hearts also of those who have never been stained with the superstition of the heathen world, under the colour of this passage where it is said “Let us make man after our image and our likeness,” Genesis 1:26 ignorance and simplicity being its authors, so that actually there has arisen owing to this hateful interpretation a heresy called that of the Anthropomorphites, which maintains with obstinate perverseness that the infinite and simple substance of the Godhead is fashioned in our lineaments and human configuration. Which however any one who has been taught the Catholic doctrine will abhor as heathenish blasphemy, and so will arrive at that perfectly pure condition in prayer which will not only not connect with its prayers any figure of the Godhead or bodily lineaments (which it is a sin even to speak of), but will not even allow in itself even the memory of a name, or the appearance of an action, or an outline of any character.”

I’m struck by the narrative qualities of this passage—by how Cassian chooses to tell this story.Clearly, he considers himself to be orthodox and champions the position which was deemed orthodox. Yet he paints a very sympathetic picture of Abba Sarapion but, unlike many stories of this ilk, he decides to close the story in a rather ambiguous fashion. Instead of relating that henceforth Abba Sarapion lived in quietude and orthodox faith, our final glimpse of the anchorite is a burst of grief and a spiritual dilemma: “Alas! Wretched man that I am! They have taken away my God from me, and I have now none to lay hold of; and whom to worship and address I know not.”

Cassian does this deliberately and skillfully for he sets up his topic perfectly. Those who mine writings like these solely for their history of theological arguments miss quite a lot if they do not consider the context. The discussion of the controversy is not accidental; this whole conference is on prayer and, specifically, what images we should form in our mind as we pray. That is, as we pray, how do we conceive of the One with whom we communicate?

Cassian uses this episode to hammer home the ascetic implications of bad doctrine. The wise and holy ascetic risks losing his years of spiritual labor because he has thought wrongly and grounded his spirituality in a theologically deficient framework.

Abba Isaac goes on in the Conference to portray a spirituality grounded in the incomprehensible God who, nevertheless, reveals himself to those who seek him with diligence and earnestness. It seems to me—and I speak with less than perfect knowledge here—that what is described in this Conference dovetails nicely with what we find in On the Divine Names by Pseudo-Dionysius where he presents a brilliant introduction to God’s self-revelation that carefully balances the cataphatic and apophatic approaches to God.

So—bottom line—this theology stuff matters because of the way that our spiritual lives are shaped by it. We do well to not fall into the Anthropomorphite error and to take sufficient safeguards against it. God as beyond materiality is beyond gender. God is not “he”. I use “he” when I speak about God, and, no doubt, there are some seminaries where I would get into trouble for doing so. (Far too often the various ways around the male pronoun turn our language about God into a stilted mess rather than something beautiful, prayable, and singable. I have severe reactions against the seminary phrase “God God-self” for its horrible infelicities as an English expression.) I am no Anthropomorphite, and have no plans of becoming one—and yet casual use  becomes habitual formation. I don’t think that God is a dude. And yet, with frequent enough repetition and no checks in other directions, concepts of God-ness and dude-ness will become linked whether I’m intending it or not. And herein lies the danger, and therefore the need to remember and to utilize, when appropriate, alternate language for and about God.

This is another area of theology and public liturgical speech which has been negatively impacted by the incessant culture wars which swirl around and through the church. The rejection of masculine language has become a cause celebre for certain liberal types. This has prompted a backlash from certain conservative types who will then insist on nothing but masculine and sometime deliberately,  antagonistically patriarchal language for God. Both of these groups are distorting our theology to score political points. (And I kindly request them to stop now. There. We’ll see how far that gets me…)

I’d like to point back to Cassian and to Pseudo-Dionysius as both an appeal for a reason why a return to a more civilized discussion is needed. We cannot now God as God is. We only know God as God has been revealed in Scripture through metaphor and we then use these metaphors as keys to understanding our personal experiences of God and our glimpses of the divine life. One of the foremost ways God has chosen to reveal himself and his triune nature is as “Father, Son, and, Holy Ghost” and, as such, this is what our forebearers have enshrined in our liturgies. We do well to follow them.

But we must also be firmly reminded that in no way do these epithets exhaust both the potential and the edifying metaphors and names for God. No, Cassian and Pseudo-Dionysius are not collaborators in some devious feminist plot (despite what some choose to think…).  I don’t think that conscious Anthropomorphism is a danger in today’s world; subconscious Anthropomorphism is alive and well—and perhaps even promulgated by those who can only start prayer with “Father God…” In our teaching then and perhaps in our private prayers other names and metaphors should be cultivated and remembered not to displace other formulations, but to fill out a more robust understanding of the One of whom Dionysius says, “Mind beyond mind, word beyond speech, it is gathered up by no discourse, by no intuition, by no name. It is and it is as no other being is. Cause of all existence, and therefore transcending existence, it alone could give an authoritative account of what it really is.” (DN 588B 1).

Sermon on Colossians 1: A Word to the Fashionable Modalists

M gave me permission to post this up; it’s what she preached this past Sunday. I wondered if it might rustle some feathers in the congregation but apparently she got quite a lot of feedback—all of it overwhelmingly positive. So, without further ado:


When my elder daughter, G., was about three or four she came home one day from pre-school and in her usual manner told me all about her day. She began to tell this vivid story of her new friend Vava. I thought his name was a little unusual, but then she told me that he was Hindu and I realized that this was a name from India that I had never heard before. Day after day I heard all about Vava and one day she informed me that Vava was coming over to visit before he moved. Sure, I told her. I’ll get his phone number tomorrow when I drop you off at school. “No, Mom” she said. “You can’t do that.” Puzzled I asked her why? She said in all seriousness, “Mom, Vava isn’t real—you can’t see him.”

As it turned out, Vava was one of G.’s imaginary friends. For several years we heard quite a lot about Vava and his female companion Doodoo, who they were visiting and what they were up to. Our younger daughter, H., made friends with them as well, and kept them company once G. went off to kindergarten.

What we eventually figured out, though, is that Vava was only partly an imaginary friend. Indeed, it might be more accurate to say that Vava was actually an invisible friend. Bit by bit, my husband and I began to realize that Vava was modeled quite closely after one of G.’s real-life friends, and Indian boy named R.. Many of the characteristics and hobbies that we thought G. had made up Vava were entirely real about R.. When we actually met the real boy R. at a birthday party, I felt like I already knew him because I’d lived so long with Vava. The real boy taught us about the imaginary friend, and, in turn, the invisible friend taught us about the real boy.

Paul’s language in Colossians this morning reminded me of Vava, and I couldn’t help thinking about him and about R. this week. Paul says in particular that Jesus is the very image of the invisible God. And that interplay between Vava and R. came to mind hearing Paul discuss the interplay between who Jesus is and who God is, and about what we learn about God by looking at Jesus.

This passage from Colossians is one of the most beautiful pieces of poetry in the New Testament. Indeed, this passage is often referred to as one of the earliest Christian hymns. Now, we don’t know if anyone actually sang it or if it was used in early church gatherings outside of where we find it in this letter, but its language is rich and evocative and beautiful. Sometimes with language this beautiful, I give in to the temptation to just let it wash over me and to enjoy the experience of hearing it without trying to fully understand it. And yet—this is worth the trouble to understand.

It’s not uncommon these days in the Episcopal Church to hear people using the phrase “Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer” when they are talking about the Trinity or even to hear some clergy start services or sermons with an invocation “in the name of the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer.” I don’t do that and I won’t do that because I think it’s confusing and, without quite a lot of clarification, it gives people a set of wrong ideas about God.

In one sense, the basic formula is absolutely right: The Trinity does act together as the world’s creator, redeemer, and sustainer. But—that’s rarely how the formula comes across. Instead, too many of the people I know use it as a kind of shorthand or substitute. They have become very sensitive to the use of too much male language and so they don’t want to use too much. As a result, they get the sense that instead of saying “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” that it’s perfectly ok to say “Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer.” And it’s not.

The problem isn’t so much the formula, rather it’s how they use it and how we hear it. It’s really easy to hear this phrase and to think “oh—I see: Creator = Father, Redeemer = Jesus, and Sustainer = the Holy Spirit.” And that’s not right. And one of the reasons that’s not right is what the poetry from Colossians tells us this morning. Jesus is the very image of the invisible God. In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. Or, as John’s Gospel records Jesus saying, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father.

The real problem with the formula is the way that it limits our understanding of who God is and how God acts. One of Paul’s key points today is how Jesus is the great linch-pin of Creation: “All things have been created in him and for him.” Paul is reminding us—hey, Jesus is “Creator” too! But then he goes right on to say, “in him all things hold together.” Paul is reminding us—hey, Jesus is “Sustainer” too! And let me tell you today that all of this is Good News. Why? Because what Paul is telling us here is that Jesus is the very image of the invisible God—we learn about the invisible God from the God who took flesh. We learn about the God whom we cannot see who blows around us at this moment from the one whom, as 1 John starts out: we have seen with our own eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our own hands, concerning the Word of Life. Paul reminds us in this beautiful New Testament hymn that Jesus himself is simultaneously the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sustainer. And indeed, he shows us what is revealed elsewhere: God the Father is the Creator, yes, but as the God who freed Israel from Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm is a redeemer and as he fed the Children of Israel with quail and manna in the desert was Sustainer as well. The Holy Spirit who sustains us is the same Spirit who laid the foundation stones of Creation and who redeems us in water and Spirit when we are washed in the holy waters of baptism.

So here’s Paul’s point—and it ends up having a really practical purpose: Jesus is the very image of the invisible God. If we want to learn about God, the first and best way to do it is to look at Jesus. It is to consider Christ. And now we’ll use just two points to make this practical.

First, when we look at Jesus, when we look at what he said and what he did, we see love, the reconciling love of God who calls us back to the riches of the glory of the mystery of God. The love of God revealed in Christ is so deep that God is willing to go to the cross for us. The love of God revealed in Christ is so powerful that not even the cross can end it, for God’s love breaks the bonds of death.

Second—our second point takes us back to invisible friends. Sometimes those whom we cannot see teach us about those whom we can. And, vice-versa, sometimes those whom we can see teach us about those whom we cannot. We cannot see God the Father or God the Spirit with our eyes of flesh. And, even though the apostles could, we can no longer see Jesus with our eyes either. So how do we learn about those whom we cannot see? Well—we look at the parts that we can see. In our liturgy we proclaim that each of us is baptized into the Body of Christ. We become part of his body. When we gather together at the altar for Eucharist, we feed on the Body of Christ. The Body becomes a literal, physical part of us. Now, in these latter days, we cannot see Jesus. Unless, of course, we stop and look around the room…

One of the great monastic teachers, John Cassian, wrote over fifteen centuries ago about how his monks were supposed to learn about virtue. They were to look to the elder monks and find those whose lives were worthy of being imitated. But no one person has all of the virtues. Instead, Cassian counsels that we look for the good, we look for the virtues, in each person around us. In one we will find wisdom, in another humility, in another righteous action, in yet another compassion. These virtues, Cassian tells us, are nothing less than Christ distributed amongst his people. It is only when we come together in unity and in faith that we bring together the whole Christ of whom we are members.

How do we know the invisible God? Well—by looking at who we are when we are at our best together. This church can be a true model of who God is. We can ourselves be an image of the invisible God when we, as a whole, show forth the love that Christ commands of us. Furthermore—Christ is the linch-pin. He is what holds us all together.

The world that we live in is so broken and fragmented, but this Colossians passage gives us hope. We are told, “and in him all things hold together.” If we look through the eyes of faith, though, we see that it is Christ’s love that is holding everything together. It ought to encourage us rather than depress us, inspire us instead of making us do nothing—so I leave you with one task this coming week. See if you can figure out how Christ’s arms embrace the world today in your own life and in the life of the church—and how we, in our actions, can continue to extend his arms in love.

On the Hill of Circumcision

Those who used the breviary early this morning may have gotten a glitch at the First Reading. I currently have the entire contents of the KJV and WEB Bibles in the database. As a result, the file pulls a Scripture reference and passes it to a parsing function which looks at it for colons, dashes, and commas. The short reason why there was an error this morning is because today’s first reference: Joshua 4:19-5:1, 15:10-15 overwhelmed the parser with the sheer volume of its punctuation. The longer answer is that I didn’t fully program the parser to handle this kind of Scripture reference because of a fundamental disquietude concerning our current Daily Office lectionary.

I know—the rule is common prayer. And I abide by it (99% of the time…). As a result, the Daily Office lectionary from the BCP is what is in there and what will remain in there.

But on occasion I have to register my objections, and this is one of them.

Whenever I look at a reference that causes my parser to break a sweat, I always have the same question: why? Why is there a gap here that we have to deal with? What is it about the intervening verses that the BCP Daily Office lectionary doesn’t include them. Did the compilers feel that they were too boring? Too strange? Too uncomfortable? Too raunchy? And how does the absence of these texts from our day-to-day biblical experience skew our understanding and apprehension of the Bible?

Here are the verses that we were instructed to—er—cut out today…:

At that time the LORD said unto Joshua, Make thee sharp knives, and circumcise again the children of Israel the second time. And Joshua made him sharp knives, and circumcised the children of Israel at the hill of the foreskins. And this is the cause why Joshua did circumcise: All the people that came out of Egypt, that were males, even all the men of war, died in the wilderness by the way, after they came out of Egypt. Now all the people that came out were circumcised: but all the people that were born in the wilderness by the way as they came forth out of Egypt, them they had not circumcised. For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, till all the people that were men of war, which came out of Egypt, were consumed, because they obeyed not the voice of the LORD: unto whom the LORD sware that he would not show them the land, which the LORD sware unto their fathers that he would give us, a land that floweth with milk and honey. And their children, whom he raised up in their stead, them Joshua circumcised: for they were uncircumcised, because they had not circumcised them by the way. And it came to pass, when they had done circumcising all the people, that they abode in their places in the camp, till they were whole. And the LORD said unto Joshua, This day have I rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off you. Wherefore the name of the place is called Gilgal unto this day.

What about this was deemed unnecessary? Who got to decide that we shouldn’t encounter this, and what were their reasons for doing so? In a time when we are arguing over identity and covenants (recalling both the Anglican Covenant and the whole Communion without Baptism controversy) aren’t these verses worth hearing?

One enterprising reader compiled and sent to me a reverse Daily Office Lectionary which identifies which passages are, and therefore are not, included within the Lectionary. It makes for enlightening reading. He gave me permission to put it into a database with a web front-end but my current massive busyness has prevented me from accomplishing this yet. Soon, however…

I think it’s time to start revisiting the lectionary. I have no problem with a Mass lectionary with gaps. After all, that’s not the purpose of a Mass lectionary. But the function of the Daily Office lectionary is to move us through the entire Scriptures each year. Ours doesn’t—and that’s worth a serious discussion.

The Church as the Interpreter of Scripture

I commend to all Fr. Haller’s thoughtful reflection on Scripture and its interpretation.

I have quite a lot to say on this topic that I cannot write now. Thus, let me leave you with just a few teaser thoughts:

  • The point of the Christian faith as I understand it is to participate within the community of those invited into the interior life of the Triune God. As a result, one of the key factors here is relationships. We as individuals are in a relationship with God and are also in a relationship with a community. The Scriptures are one record of one part of that relationship and the community as a whole has privileged them as an essential and sufficient record. A record is not a relationship, however.
  • At the root of the faith is the relationship between God and “his people”–variously identified as those God has called into relationship with himself. As a result, history itself is a key factor. However, we have no access to the history. We have a written record which means that what is normative amongst us is a document which describes, among other things, history which reveals the on-going character of the relationship between God and his people. A document, while it may be historical, is not a direct window into history.
  • I think it’s important to constantly remind ourselves what Scripture says about itself in one of its most beleaguered and put-upon sets of verses: 2 Timothy 3:14-17  “But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it  15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  16 All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,  17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” Hmmm. From this one might suspect that the purpose of the Scriptures is to reveal the character of the relationship between God and humanity and from there to direct what character a Christian ought to be forming.  And that seems to me to be both quite a bit more and quite a bit less than what others often use these verses to claim.

American Company of Servers?

I’ve started any number of times to write a post on this topic and they keep self-destructing after having gone on for far too long about far too little. So—I’ll get right to the point, then.

In the UK, the Society of Catholic Priests is twinned with a lay group—the Company of Servers.

The point of this group is that it teaches the laity who serve at altars and in chancels the practicalities, theology, and spirituality of service in the sanctuary.

In brief, I’m very much for it in the same way and for the same reasons that I’m for the Society of Catholic Priests. In brief:

  • Anglo-Catholicism has always had an issue with idiosyncrasy. Area-wide groups where people come together to learn can help smooth out parish level idiosyncrasies by means of a common practice.
  • Too many times, rectors jerk parishes around especially on the liturgical level. Just because the rector is having a particular spiritual journey doesn’t necessarily mean that the congregation wants to go along. I keep insisting that liturgy in any given place is the theology of the gathered community made kinetic. That doesn’t mean it’s something a rector gets to impose. Instead, a wise priest will determine the operative theologies in a parish and respond to those. A group like this helps laity articulate together what their theology is and, as a result, what sort of worship should result.
  • Sometimes, for a wide variety of reasons, Anglo-Catholics or other forms of “high” Anglicans get stuck in broad to low parishes. Wouldn’t it be nice if a local chapter of the Company of Servers could meet for the BCP-appointed Holy Days and offer a full-on reverent Mass (with the assistance of a like-minded priest) in order to retain the practice and spirituality even if stuck in a parish without it?
  • It’s rooted primarily in practice—what we do together—which seems to me a far more productive ground and purpose than meeting around theology which can get quite fraught especially when we start up the games of “More Catholic Than Thou.”

What do you think—can/could this model get transplanted here? What kind of organizational tweaks might be necessary to deal with the North American situation?

New Breviary Upgrade is Here

The latest version of the St Bede’s Breviary is now up. This new release includes a number of features that people have been requesting:

  • cookie support—if you go to the “Preferences” page, you can now save your Office-praying options and they will stay set whenever you return to the site.
  • additional sanctoral kalendars—In addition to the kalendars as printed in the ’79 BCP and the extended Holy Women Holy Men, it also includes the Church of England’s Exciting Holiness, the current Roman Catholic kalendar, the ordines of the Order of the Holy Cross and the Order of Julian of Norwich, and the kalendars from the Anglican and English Missals.
  • improved aesthetics—including a layout which functions for handheld devices; I’ve been praying the Offices via Blackberry with it
  • additional information on the sources of the material
  • some brief catechetical material included in the preferences page.

Quite a lot has also changed under the hood in the way that it calculates dates, but—hopefully—no one but me will know that…

It’s still in beta, so I’m not promising that it’s bug-free, but this does represent a big step forward towards the goal I’m trying to fully realize here.

As always, it’s your breviary as much as it is mine, please feel free to send in thoughts, questions, comments, and new feature requests. As to the latter, I’ll let you know that the NRSV readings are in the works as is a build-out to include the Prayers and Thanksgivings on BCP pp. 810-841.

On Picking Prelates

The slate of candidates for the next Bishop of Springfield has been announced and what a large field it is—14 nominees in all. With a field that large it’s no surprise that there are some familiar names; one is even a commenter here.

I clicked into the responses for several of them; I appreciated that the one of the questions that nominees had to answer queried them about their personal Rule of Life. Bishops are, in theory, at the spiritual center of the dioceses. Yes, I imagine you’d want a capable administrator, but I’d very much want a person of prayer as well, especially one grounded in our Anglican tradition. I saw one commonality in their responses, that I’d like to lift up.

I had no idea that so many senior clergy have such a steadfast devotion to the Daily Office.

Because, in all honesty, I fail to see signs of it in our church at large.

Indeed, I’d think that if such a large sampling of senior clergy showed so many so devoted to it, there would be more evidence of it in the parishes and in the dioceses where they serve now. But there’s not.

With such a wonderful opportunity, though, to inquire of regular users of it, if I were at the walk-abouts, I’d have one question for each of the nominees: “So, in light of your Rule of Life, I was wondering if you could tell us what canticles you like to use on Wednesday mornings, and why?”

Come to think of it, it’s a question I wouldn’t mind putting to the whole House of Bishops…