laudable Practice

Having considered the Exhortation which 1662 directed to be read to "the Communicants ... conveniently placed for the receiving of the holy Sacrament", John Shepherd - in his A Critical and Practical Elucidation of the Book of Common Prayer, Volume II (1801) - turns to what he terms the "immediate Invitation": This Invitation consists of three parts; the qualifications required in those that are invited; the Invitation itself; and a direction to make their confession to Almighty God. In many ways, of course, this "immediate Invitation" summarises the teaching and call of the longer Exhortations. Shepherd, however, sees it as something greater than merely a summary. He roots it in the invitations to the Sacrament seen in the great liturgies of the East: Invitations similar to this are mentioned in the writings of the Fathers, and found in ancient Liturgies. Pseudo-Dionysius, describing the manner in which this sacred rite was administered, informs us, that...

From Bishop Bull's sermon ' The Middle State of Happiness or Misery ', an extract illustrating how Wisdom 3:1 was understood as summarising the Scriptural hope for the post-mortem state, over and against the teaching of purgatory: even in the Old Testament, we have a full testimony given to this truth, that the soul subsists after the death of the body, by Solomon, where, describing man's death and dissolution, he saith, "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it."  Whereas man consists of two parts, body and soul, the condition of these two, when a man dies, will be very different: for the body being at first taken out of the dust of the earth, and so of a corruptible constitution, shall go back into the earth again, and moulder into dust; but the soul, as it is of another and more excellent original, (as being at first inspired immediately by God Himself into the body,) shall not perish with the body,...

Remembrancetide. It falls in mid-November, with the leaves fallen and the trees bare, the days shorter, another year reaching its end. A fitting season to remember.  Far from the garish, loud days of Summer, these November days encourage a sombre quietness as we recollect loss, death, grief, sacrifice. The last days of Autumn, as the dark days before Christmas draw near, encourage the modesty and restraint of our remembrance. We do not gather to celebrate victory or give expression to patriotic fervour.  The symbol of Remembrancetide is not the national flag but a little poppy - a memory of Flanders fields - pinned to our lapels. The parson, standing close to the local war memorial, is in surplice, hood, bands, tippet: fitting ecclesiastical attire, echoing the modesty and restraint which hold and still us before the sombre quiet of Remembrance.  A crowd gathers, each with the little poppy in their lapels. Quiet nods of greeting. Little, if any, talking. There is an inher...

Jeremy Taylor's Holy Dying is a text for November days, the month of the departed. The final section of the work is "A peroration concerning the contingencies, and treatings of our departed friends after death, in order to their buriall, &c.". Addressing our duties to the departed, it sets forth what we might term a Prayer Book piety with regards to mourning. This is immediately seen in the exhortation against ostentatious ceremonies for the departed - which would, of course, be the very opposite of the sparse, reserved nature of the Prayer Book Burial of the Dead : When we have received the last breath of our friend and closed his eyes, and composed his body for the grave, then seasonable is the counsell of the son of Sirach: Weep bitterly and make great moan, and use lamentation as he is worthy, and that a day or two, lest thou be evil spoken of; and then comfort thy self for thy heavinesse. But take no grief to heart; for there is no turning again, thou shalt not ...

Dearly beloved in the Lord, ye that mind to come to the holy Communion of the Body and Blood of our Saviour Christ ... The now unfortunately rarely used Exhortation "At the time of the Celebration of the Communion" is a rich text which calls us both to meaningful self-examination as we approach the holy Sacrament and to receive with thanksgiving. In his A Critical and Practical Elucidation of the Book of Common Prayer, Volume II (1801), Shepherd roots this Exhortation in the practice of the ancient Eastern churches: Chrysostom informs us, that in the Greek Church, when the communicants were conveniently placed, "the Priest standing in a conspicuous station, and stretching forth his hand, and lifting up his voice in the midst of profound silence, invited some (that is, those that were worthy), and forbad others (the unworthy) to approach." By showing how the Exhortation follows patristic practice and the liturgies of the East, Shepherd reminds us how much of the rhe...

From Bishop Bull's sermon ' The Middle State of Happiness or Misery ', an extract rejecting both the doctrine of purgatory and speculative theories about the post-mortem state, resting instead in a conventionally Reformed understanding of "the plain doctrine of the Holy Scriptures", with no need to go beyond the "modesty of the apostolic Doctors". Bull here echoes how the Prayer Book Burial of Dead - a graveside prayer of which is quoted in this extract - rests in the promises of Scripture and eschews fanciful speculations: I have shewn you, that the Apostolic writers were wont to express the different place and state of good and bad men presently after death, by this and the like phrases, that they went to their "own proper, due," or "appointed places": that is, to places agreeable to their respective qualities, the good to a place of happiness, the wicked to a place and state of misery ... I have now said all that I can think necess...

On this Gunpowder Plot Day, words from a 5th November 1691 sermon by John Sharp, Archbishop of York, on the text of Romans 10:2, "For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge". In our own age of bitter culture wars and heightened partisanship in Church and State (and mindful that today, of course, is the presidential election in the United States), Sharp points us to the Gunpowder Treason as an unfortunately resonant example of zeal "not according to knowledge", destructive of "true Religion" and "Publick peace". Against this, we are to be marked by a right and true zeal "agreeable to the Spirit and Temper of our great Lord and Master Christ": I wish this mark of right Zeal, that it ought to be according to knowledge, were more considered. For it seems not often to be thought on by those that are most zealous in their way, of what perswasion soever they be. This same business of Knowledge, is a th...