Christmas Eve with the Hackney Phalanx: "the dawnings of that day"

From A Course of Sermons, for the Lord's Day throughout the Year, Volume I (1817) by Joseph Holden Pott - associated with the Hackney Phalanx - a sermon for Christmas Day, words to prepare us for the joy of celebrating the Lord's Nativity:

We are now met, according to the solemn purport of this day, to celebrate the benefits which are derived to us from our Redeemer's coming to open and fulfil the great treaty of salvation, for the succour and recovery of a fallen race. We are assembled now in order to take nearer views, and to encourage larger recollections, of the several circumstances which accompanied our Lord's Nativity, and which marked the first period of the happy season of redemption ...

To us, then, it belongs to raise many a pious meditation on those lines of the sacred narrative, to draw many a lesson from each memorable sentence of those hallowed pages, which have the seal of the divine authority impressed upon them in such living characters, and which were written so expressly "for our learning". To us it belongs to consider with delight and veneration the wonders of our merciful Redeemer's welcome birth ...

To us, also, it belongs, to view with joy and gratitude, with humble trust and ceaseless admiration, the fruits of that event, which angels saw with wonder, and which they who hope to share with angels in their happiness, must celebrate with their perpetual praises. Cold indeed must be that heart which does not glow when such subjects form the proper and peculiar themes of recollection and rejoicing; when we are invited to look back to the dawnings of that day, in the brightness of which we walk to this hour; that day which knows no failure or declension; that sun which shall never hasten to go down.

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Why I support the ordination of women: a High Church reflection

A number of commenters on this blog have asked about my occasional expressions of support for the ordination of women to all three orders. With some hesitation, I have decided to post a summary of my own views on this matter. The hesitation is because I have sought on this blog to focus on issues and themes which can unify those who identify with or have respect (grudging or otherwise!) for what we might term 'classical' Anglicanism (the Anglicanism of the Formularies and - yes - of the Old High Church tradition). Some oppose the ordination of women (and I have friends and colleagues who do so, Anglo-Catholic, High Church, and Reformed Evangelical). Some of us support it (again, friends and colleagues covering a wide range of theological traditions). Below, I have organised my thinking around 5 points (needless to say, no reference to Dort is implied). 1. The Declaration for Subscription required of clergy in the Church of Ireland states: (6) I promise to submit ...

How the Old High tradition continued

Charles Gore's 1914 letter to the clergy of his diocese, ' The Basis of Anglican Fellowship ', can be regarded as a classical expression of the Prayer Book Catholic tradition. A key part of the letter - entitled 'Romanizing in the Church of England' - addressed the "Catholic movement", questioning beliefs and practices within it which tended to "a position which makes it very difficult for its extremer representatives to give an intelligible reason why they are not Roman Catholics". Gore provides the outlines of an alternative account and experience of catholicity within Anglicanism, defined by three characteristics. What is particularly interesting about these characteristics is their continuity with the older High Church tradition. Indeed, the central characteristic as set out by Gore was integral to High Church claims over centuries: To accept the Anglican position as valid, in any sense, is to appeal behind the Pope and the authority of t...

Pride, progressive sectarianism, and TEC on Facebook

Let me begin this post with an assumption that will be rejected by some readers of laudable Practice , but affirmed by other readers. Observing Pride is an understandable aspect of the public ministry of TEC. On previous occasions , I have rather robustly called for TEC to be much more aware and respectful of the social conservatism of the Red states and regions in which it ministers. A failure to do so risks TEC declining yet further into the irrelevance of progressive sectarianism. At the same time, TEC also obviously ministers in deep Blue states and metropolitan areas - and is the only Mainline Protestant tradition in which a majority of its members vote Democrat .* With Pride now an established civic commemoration, particularly in such contexts, there is a case for TEC affirming those aspects of Pride - the dignity of gay men and lesbian women, their contribution to civic life, and their place in the church's life - which cohere with a Christian moral vision. (I will n...

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