laudable Practice

Lord God our Father,  through our Saviour Jesus Christ you have assured your children of eternal life and in baptism have made us one with him. Deliver us from the death of sin and raise us to new life in your love, in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. For some it might be surprising that the post-Communion prayer from the Church of Ireland BCP 2004 - shared with the CofE's Common Worship - for the 'Second Sunday of Easter' (i.e. Low Sunday) can bring us to think about the sacramental theology of Calvin. The issue came to mind when this prayer was said on Sunday past, as I am aware that for a certain strain of contemporary evangelicalism in the CofI this reference to Baptism is, to put it charitably, problematic. (We will leave aside, for the moment, the fact that the subscription required of all clergy in the CofI declares that "the doctrine of the Church of Ireland" as set forth in the Book of Common Prayer is ...

But this emphasis [in Restoration Episcopalian accounts] on martyrdom, ejection and exile has obscured the extent to which prominent episcopalian conformists were subsequently prepared to defend their Interregnum careers, presenting their ministries in these years as evidence of steadfast commitment to both the Church of England and the king. By staying within the Church, ministers had acted as a bulwark against heresy and error, the last bastions of ‘true Protestantism’, and thereby worked to protect and to ‘undeceive’ the distracted laity - (re)shaping attitudes towards liturgy, episcopacy and even monarchy. William White, in ' Remembering Episcopalian Conformity in Restoration England ', thus reminds us that alongside the narrative of persecution and martyrdom promoted by formerly non-conformist Episcopalians at the Restoration, there was another narrative to be told, that of the Episcopalian Conformists in the Cromwellian Church. As we saw last week , George Bull was amongs...

There are also obvious reasons why a Christian should never attend a gay wedding. Many wedding liturgies, including that of the Book of Common Prayer, require the officiant to ask early in the service if anyone present knows any reason why the couple should not be joined together in matrimony. A Christian is at that point obliged to speak up ... Of course, that applies beyond the issue of gay marriage. A marriage involving somebody who has not divorced a previous spouse for biblical reasons involves that person entering into an adulterous relationship. No Christian should knowingly attend such a ceremony either. Thus did Carl Trueman recently declare in First Things . It is rather odd that a conservative Presbyterian should invoke the Book of Common Prayer, rejected by the Presbyterian tradition when its representatives embraced schism rather than conformity in 1662. This, however, might explain why Trueman badly misinterprets the robustly Anglican 1662 rite.   To begin w...

I am not sure of the origin of the illustration which was circulated on Anglican Twitter some weeks ago (apologies to the person who designed it), but I did enjoy considering its options.  Such things are not, of course, to be taken too seriously.  Thinking about my instinctive answers, however, I realized that they provided a rather good expression of why I value the Old High tradition.  Today's post offers some extended thoughts on these choices. Archbishops of Canterbury - D, William Howley, 1828-48. This might be regarded as my most surprising choice.  Why not Laud? I do, of course, admire Laud for his defence of the ecclesia Anglicana against the gathering storm inspired by Puritan agitation. What gives me pause, however, is perhaps best summarised by Hume's judgement that he did not act "with the enlarged sentiments and cool reflection of a legislator". While rejecting the deeply inaccurate portrayals of Laud which still dominate historical accounts (Sharpe...

Where ever Mary is venerated, and devotion to her takes place, there the Church of Christ does not exist. This quote from Barth's Church Dogmatics received some attention recently on Twitter . It is, at best, a foolish statement, profoundly uncharitable to very many in the Body of Christ. Upon first encountering the statement, my thoughts turned immediately to a local Roman Catholic Benedictine community, the brothers ending Compline each night with an anthem to the Blessed Virgin, before her icon.  To say that this prayerful, grace-filled community is not the Church of Christ - constituted by Word and Sacrament - is, frankly, blasphemous.  In historical terms, the statement is similarly deeply foolish. It excludes from the Body of Christ vast numbers of the baptised in East and West over centuries. To suppose that the grace of God in Christ, proclaimed in the Scriptures and ministered in the Sacraments, could not justify and sanctify because of exaggerated, or even erroneous...

A reflection on praying with the Book of Common Prayer during the time of national mourning and the King's accession. O Lord, save the King. For the last time in my life, I prayed the petition 'O Lord, save the Queen' at Evensong on 8th September. Before Mattins on 9th September, following the example of Anglican clergy in these Islands over centuries at the beginning of a new reign, I carefully wrote into this petition 'the King', and changed the name of the Sovereign in the state prayers.   I was very aware that any Anglican and Episcopalian in the United Kingdom, and praying the daily offices according to the Book of Common Prayer, was doing the same thing.  The new reign was beginning with our prayer for the King across "all the whole realm", a prayer that would be offered each day, morning and evening.   O Lord, save the King. The word has multiple meanings.  Save the King in this time of grief, upholding and sustaining him.  Save the King amidst...

Now follows a remarkable and interesting song of the holy virgin, which plainly shows how eminent were her attainments in the grace of the Spirit ... She announces that this kindness of God will be kept in remembrance throughout all generations. But if it is so remarkable, that it ought to be proclaimed everywhere by the lips of all men, silence regarding it would have been highly improper in Mary, on whom it was bestowed ... Let Papists now go, and hold us out as doing injury to the mother of Christ, because we reject the falsehoods of men, and extol in her nothing more than the kindness of God. Nay, what is most of all honourable to her we grant ... We cheerfully acknowledge her as our teacher, and obey her instruction and commands - from Calvin's Commentary on Luke 1 , on the Magnificat. Twelve: that is the number of times Calvin uses the term "holy virgin" in his commentary on Luke 1.  In Luke 2, he uses the term on four occasions. It is testimony to Calvin's rev...

Yesterday, 1st August, was Lammas Day, commemorated as a Black Letter Day in the 1662 Calendar.  That, of course, means that 1662 provides no liturgical provision for the day.  Despite this, however, there is much in the ordinary form of Mattins and Evensong to mark the day. The opening exhortation reminds us that it is right in public prayer "to ask those things which are requisite and necessary, as well for the body as the soul": petition for a good harvest is, therefore, right and meet.  At Mattins, the Venite's praise for the God in whose "hands are all the corners of the earth ... and his hands prepared the dry land", roots our praise on Lammas in the truth which also affirm in the Apostles' Creed: "Maker of heaven and earth". Lammas being the first day of August, the Psalter begins again.  Psalm 1 evokes rich natural imagery, indicating the spiritual significance of harvest (after the example of the Lord's teaching, for "the kingdom ...

Two Tweets on a subject of beloved of laudable Practice - Sunday Mattins - caught my attention recently.  The first was by Church of England priest and theologian Angela Tilby : The second was from Eric Parker , a priest and theologian in the Reformed Episcopal Church in the United States: What is particularly striking about these comments is the recognition of the - to use a word employed by the latter - wisdom  of Sunday Mattins.  This wisdom is seen in various ways.  Firstly, there is the prudence of Sunday Mattins.  Angela Tilby's mention of it being a more inclusive liturgy than the Parish Communion is certainly suggested by the contemporary appeal of Choral Evensong in the Church of England context.  If there is an ambition to see Anglicanism evangelise and grow in North Atlantic societies, we might ask ourselves if the Parish Communion is really the appropriate principal liturgy on every Sunday when non-Eucharistic services (Choral Evensong, Remembr...