Scottish Episcopal Church shows a way forward The Scottish Episcopal Church has opened marriage to committed same-sex couples. It has done so through changing its Canon 31 of marriage, removing that it is ” one man and one woman…and lifelong” and highlighting: In the light of the fact that there are differing understandings of the… Continue Reading
From Holy Women, Holy Men In the New Testament, the word “saints” is used to describe the entire membership of the Christian community, and in the Collect for All Saints’ Day the word “elect” is used in a similar sense. From very early times, however, the word “saint” came to be applied primarily to persons… Continue Reading
There are different ways to be a community, a Christian community [or any religious community]. You could focus around a leader. You could find unity by all signing up to the same list of beliefs. You could find unity by a common mission drive. You could focus on knowing each other and being like a… Continue Reading
Pray Tell Blog I am honoured that this Liturgy site receives a special introduction at Pray Tell Blog. a Roman Catholic liturgy blog published by the Liturgical Press, St. John’s University, and St. John’s Abbey, Collegeville, MN. A lot of the books on my shelves, of course, are published by Liturgical Press. The office I… Continue Reading
A ‘perfect storm’ results from a combination of adverse factors. I keep tripping over such factors: I read of the relentless decline of The US Episcopal Church continuing. It is regularly contrasted with a (yet-to-be-verified-and-I-suspect-oversimplified) meme that “conservative churches are growing” (in fact cathedral worship is bucking the trend). The fragmenting tendency of Bible-alone protestantism… Continue Reading
In the mongrel/platypus phenomenon that is Anglicanism, the via media is not half-way between catholic and protestant – it is both catholic and protestant; protestant software running on catholic hardware. It is unsurprising, then, that a catholic celebration such as The Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of our Lord has some, possibly hidden,… Continue Reading
A friend sent me Rachel Held Evans’ opinion piece, Want millennials back in the pews? Stop trying to make church ‘cool.’ Rachel is a well-known author (Searching for Sunday, A Year of Biblical Womanhood, Faith Unraveled). She provides pretty standard statistics of decline:”…no religious affiliation at all,…significantly more disconnected from faith…” I hadn’t heard of… Continue Reading
