gcoffice – Page 31 – Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music

August 29: John Bunyan, Writer, 1688

August 28, 2010gcoffice8 Comments

Welcome to the Holy Women, Holy Men blog! We invite you to read about this commemoration, use the collect and lessons in prayer, whether individually or in corporate worship, then tell us what you think. For more information about this project, click here.

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About this commemoration

John Bunyan was born in 1628 at Elstow in Bedfordshire England. Little is known about his early life. His parents were poor; his father was a brazier, a trade that Bunyan also followed for a time. Bunyan had little to no formal education, and he may have learned to read English from reading the Bible. He served as a soldier in the Parliamentary army during the English Civil War, after which he married. His wife introduced him to Arthur Dent’s Plain Man’s Pathway to Heaven and Bishop Lewis Bayly’s Practice of Piety, devotional books that set him on the religious path.

In 1653 he was baptized into the Bedford Baptist (Independent) Church, and was soon thereafter recognized as a preacher, a vocation at which he excelled. He claimed to have had visions similar to those of Teresa of Avila. After the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Bunyan was targeted and slandered by the new royalist government along with many others who had supported the revolutionary cause during the Civil War. Under the laws of the restored Stuart regime, congregational meeting houses were closed and citizens were required to attend their Anglican parishes. It was punishable by law for anyone, except those who had been ordained according to Episcopal orders, to conduct services or preach. Bunyan was arrested while preaching in 1660 and spent most of the next twelve years imprisoned in Bedford.

While imprisoned, Bunyan wrote the first part of his most famous work, The Pilgrim’s Progress, an allegorical story that was completed in 1684. The Pilgrim’s Progress tells the story of Christian, a lonely pilgrim who must cross such treacherous terrain as the Slough of Despond and the River of Death before finally reaching the Land of Beulah. Along with John Milton’s Paradise Lost, it was one of the most influential works of the seventeenth century, and retained its influence for several centuries thereafter.

Collect of the Day

God of peace, you called John Bunyan to be valiant for truth: Grant that as strangers and pilgrims we may at the last rejoice with all the faithful in your heavenly city; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Lessons

Job 33:14–19,26–28

Hebrews 4:12–15

Matthew 7:12–14

Psalm 49:4–15

Preface of All Saints

We invite your reflections about this commemoration and its suitability for the official calendar and worship of The Episcopal Church. How did this person’s life witness to the Gospel? How does this person inspire us in Christian life today?

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August 28: Moses the Black, Desert Father and Martyr, c. 400

August 28, 2010gcoffice12 Comments

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About this commemoration

Moses of Ethiopia (d. c. 405), sometimes called Moses the Black, was a fifth century monk who lived in one of several isolated desert monasteries near Scete in Lower Egypt. He was described as being tall, strong, “black of body,” and in his early life, the hot-blooded leader of a marauding robber band.

Little is known of his actual life, but an imaginative collection of religious legends has accumulated about him. Such tales point to the deep struggles of a Christian soul seeking salvation in difficult settings. Moses was portrayed as a person of deep excesses, a slave who was both a thief and a murderer, a perennial fornicator who, after he became a monk, still struggled for several years with sexual fantasies. To rid himself of sexual temptation he reportedly stood all night in his cell with his eyes open. This endured for seven years, after which the temptations went away.

He led an ascetic life, lived in a simple cell, and ate only ten ounces of dry bread each day. Once when the monks gathered to judge a member who had sinned, Brother Moses arrived carrying a leaky basket filled with sand on his back. He explained that what he was holding behind him represented his own many sins, now hidden from his own view. “And now I have come to judge my brother for a small fault,” he remarked. The other monks then each personally forgave their erring brother and returned to their cells.

Moses was not ordained until late in life; also in his later years he founded his own monastery. At about age 75 he was warned that an armed band of raiders was approaching to slay him. “They who live by the sword shall die by the sword,” (Matthew 26:52) the former robber-murderer calmly replied. He and six other brothers waited patiently, and were slain, after which a monastic account, St. Moses the Ethiopian recounts, seven crowns descended from heaven over the place where they were martyred.

Collect of the Day

God of transforming power and transfiguring mercy: Listen to the prayers of all who, like Abba Moses, cry to you: “O God whom we do not know, let us know you!” Draw them and all of us from unbelief to faith and from violence into your peace, through the cross of Jesus our Savior; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

2 Chronicles 28:8–15

Acts 22:6–21

Luke 23:39–43

Psalm 86:1–13

Preface of God the Son

August 27: Thomas Gallaudet, 1902, with Henry Winter Syle, 1890

August 27, 2010gcoffice16 Comments

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About this commemoration

Thomas Hopkins Hallaudet, by George F Wright, 1851

Ministry to the deaf in the Episcopal Church begins with Thomas Gallaudet. Without his genius and zeal for the spiritual well-being of deaf persons, it is improbable that a history of ministry to the deaf in the Episcopal Church could be written. He has been called “The Apostle to the Deaf.”

Gallaudet was born June 3, 1822, in Hartford, the eldest son of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, founder of the West Hartford School for the Deaf, whose wife, Sophia, was a deaf-mute.

After graduating from Trinity College, Hartford, Thomas announced his intention of being confirmed and becoming a priest in the Episcopal Church. His father prevailed upon him to postpone a final decision, and to accept a teaching position in the New York Institution for Deaf-Mutes. There he met and married Elizabeth Budd, a deaf-mute. Gallaudet was ordained deacon in 1850 and served his diaconate at St. Stephen’s Church, where he established a Bible class for deaf persons.

Ordained a priest in 1851, Gallaudet became Assistant at St. Ann’s Church, where he conceived a plan for establishing a church that would be a spiritual home for deaf people. This became a reality the following year, with the founding of St. Ann’s Church for Deaf-Mutes. The congregation was able to purchase a church building in 1859, and it became a center for missionary work to the deaf. As a result of this ministry, mission congregations were established in many cities. Gallaudet died on August 27, 1902.

One fruit of Gallaudet’s ministry was Henry Winter Syle, who had lost his hearing as the result of scarlet fever. Educated at Trinity; St. John’s, Cambridge; and Yale (B.A. and M.A.); Syle was a brilliant student, who persisted in his determination to obtain an education, despite his handicap and fragile health. He was encouraged by Gallaudet to seek Holy Orders, and, having moved to Philadelphia, was supported by Bishop Stevens, against the opposition of many who believed that the impairment of one of the senses was an impediment to ordination. Syle was ordained in 1876, the first deaf person to receive Holy Orders in this Church. In 1888, he built the first Episcopal church constructed especially for deaf persons. He died on January 6, 1890.

Collect of the Day

O Loving God, whose will it is that everyone should come to you and be saved: We bless your holy Name for your servants Thomas Gallaudet and Henry Winter Syle, whose labors with and for those who are deaf we commemorate today, and we pray that you will continually move your Church to respond in love to the needs of all people; through Jesus Christ, who opened the ears of the deaf, and who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

Isaiah 35:3–6a

2 Thessalonians 1:3–4

Mark 7:32–37

Psalm 25:7–14

Preface of Pentecost

August 25: Louis, King of France, 1270

August 25, 2010gcoffice11 Comments

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About this commemoration

Louis IX of France was canonized by the Church in 1297. A man of unusual purity of life and manners, he was sincerely committed to his faith and to its moral demands. Courageous and fearless in battle, patient and uncomplaining in adversity, he was an impartial, just, and compassionate sovereign. The one word that summarizes his character is integrity.

Louis’ crusading adventures in the Middle East and in North Africa were of little historical consequence. Such ventures were part of the piety of his time. Throughout his life he was diligent in attending divine worship, and constant in his charities, both open and secret. Unusually free of the bigotry of his age, Louis had an intelligent interest in the theological issues of his day. But his primary concern was to put Christian ethics into practice in both his personal and his public life.

Louis was born at Poissy, April 25, 1214, and was crowned King at Rheims on November 29, 1226. His early religious exercises of devotion and asceticism were inspired by his mother, Blanche of Castile. He died August 25, 1270, while on crusade at Tunis, and was buried with his royal peers in the basilica of St. Denis near Paris.

After his canonization, his relics were transferred to the Sainte Chapelle, the lovely Gothic chapel in Paris which he built as a shrine for relics of our Lord’s passion. The building is itself a fitting monument to his genuine piety and beautiful character.

Because of his determined effort to live a personal life of Franciscan poverty and self-denial in the midst of worldly power and splendor— he wore a hair shirt under his royal dress—Louis is honored as patron saint of the Third Order of St. Francis.

Collect of the Day

O God, you called your servant Louis of France to an earthly throne that he might advance your heavenly kingdom, and gave him zeal for your Church and love for your people: Mercifully grant that we who commemorate him this day may be fruitful in good works, and attain to the glorious crown of your saints; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Lessons

Wisdom 3:1–9

Colossians 2:6–10

Luke 12:22–31

Psalm 21:1–7

Preface of Baptism

The Vision and Mission of the Church

August 23, 2010gcoffice4 Comments

The 2009 General Convention of the Episcopal Church directed the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music to collect and develop theological and liturgical resources for blessing same-sex relationships (Resolution C056). The Commission is eager to engage the wider church in theological conversation as one among many sources that will inform our work.

The reflection below was submitted by the Rev. Jay Emerson Johnson, Ph.D., chair of the task group preparing theological resources.

August 23: Martin de Porres, 1639, Rosa de Lima, 1617, and Toribio de Mogrovejo, 1606, Witnesses to the Faith in South America

August 23, 2010gcoffice27 Comments

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About this commemoration

Martin de Porres was born in Lima, Peru, on December 9, 1579, the illegitimate son of a Spanish nobleman and a young black former slave. Because Martin inherited the dark skin of his mother, his father abandoned the family.

Martin apprenticed to a barber-surgeon and after learning the trade, he applied to the Dominicans to be a “lay helper.” Placed in charge of the infirmary, he was known for his tender care of the sick and for his spectacular cures. His faithfulness led the community to request his religious profession. The stipulation that “no black person may be received to the holy habit or profession of our Order,” was dropped, and Martin took vows as a Dominican brother in 1603.

Martin was a good friend of Rosa de Lima, who shared his passion for the sick and the poor. Rosa was exceedingly beautiful and, because of her family’s fading fortunes, she feared being married off to a wealthy man in exchange for her dowry. Not wanting this to happen, Rosa disfigured herself. In order to contribute to her family’s upkeep, Rosa took in sewing and served as a gardener.

Her passion for the poor, however, eventually led her to the Third Order of St. Dominic where she became a recluse. Out of her prayer grew a strong desire to do works of mercy for the poorest of the poor, particularly for Indians, slaves, and others on the margins of society.

Toribio de Mogrovejo was born in Spain in 1538 and became a brilliant student of law and theology. In 1580, the Archdiocese of Lima, Peru, needed a new leader and Toribio was chosen. He objected because he was a layman, but was overruled, ordained priest and bishop, and arrived in Peru in 1581 as archbishop.

Confronted with the worst of colonialism, Toribio fought injustice in both the church and the civil order. He baptized and confirmed nearly a million souls. Among his flock were Rosa de Lima and Martin de Porres. He founded many churches, religious houses, and hospitals, and, in 1591, founded the seminary at Lima.

Collect of the Day

Merciful God, you sent your Gospel to the people of Peru through Martin de Porres, who brought its comfort even to slaves; through Rosa de Lima, who worked among the poorest of the poor; and through Toribio de Mogrovejo, who founded the first seminary in the Americas and baptized many: Help us to follow their example in bringing fearlessly the comfort of your grace to all downtrodden and outcast people, that your Church may be renewed with songs of salvation and praise; through Jesus Christ, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 7:32–36

James 2:1–8,14–17

Mark 10:23–30

Psalm 9:9–14

Preface of Baptism

August 20: Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, 1153

August 20, 2010gcoffice9 Comments

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About this commemoration

Bernard, fiery defender of the Church in the twelfth century, was famed for the ardor with which he preached love for God “without measure.” He was completely absorbed, even to the neglect of his own health, in support of the purity, doctrine, and prerogatives of the Church. He fulfilled his own definition of a holy man: “seen to be good and charitable, holding back nothing for himself, but using his every gift for the common good.”

Bernard was the son of a knight and landowner who lived near Dijon, France. He was born in 1090 and given a secular education, but in 1113 he entered the Benedictine Abbey of Citeaux. His family was not pleased with his choice of a monastic life, but he nevertheless persuaded four of his brothers and about twenty-six of his friends to join him in establishing a monastery at Clairvaux in 1115.

During the following ten years, Bernard denied himself sleep that he might have time to write letters and sermons. He preached so persuasively that sixty new Cistercian abbeys were founded, all affiliated with Clairvaux. By 1140, his writings had made him one of the most influential figures in Christendom. He participated actively in every controversy that threatened the Church. He was an ardent critic of Peter Abelard’s attempt to reconcile inconsistencies of doctrine by reason, because he felt that such an approach was a downgrading of the mysteries.

When a former monk of Clairvaux was elected Pope, as Eugenius III, Bernard became his troubleshooter. He preached the Crusade against the Albigensians, and the Second Crusade to liberate Jerusalem, winning much support for the latter in France and Germany. When that Crusade ended in disaster, Bernard was roundly attacked for having supported it. He died soon after in 1153. He was canonized in 1174.

Among Bernard’s writings are treatises on papal duty, on love, on the veneration of Mary, and a commentary on the Song of Songs. Among well known hymns, he is credited with having written “O sacred head sore wounded,” “Jesus, the very thought of thee,” and “Jesus, thou joy of loving hearts.”

Collect of the Day

O God, by whose grace your servant Bernard of Clairvaux, kindled with the flame of your love, became a burning and a shining light in your Church: Grant that we also may be aflame with the spirit of love and discipline, and walk before you as children of light; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 39:1–10

Jude 1–3

John 15:7–11

Psalm 19:7–11(12–14)

Preface of a Saint (1)

August 18: William Porcher DuBose, Priest, 1918

August 18, 2010gcoffice17 Comments

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About this commemoration

William Porcher DuBose, probably the most original and creative thinker the American Episcopal Church has ever produced, spent most of his life as a professor at the University of the South, in Sewanee, Tennessee. He was not widely traveled, and not widely known, until, at the age of 56, he published the first of several books on theology that made him respected, not only in his own country, but also in England and France.

DuBose was born in 1836 in South Carolina, into a wealthy and cultured Huguenot family. At the University of Virginia, he acquired a fluent knowledge of Greek and other languages, which helped him lay the foundation for a profound understanding of the New Testament. His theological studies were begun at the Episcopal seminary in Camden, South Carolina. He was ordained in 1861, and became an officer and chaplain in the Confederate Army.

Doctrine and life were always in close relationship for DuBose. In a series of books he probed the inner meaning of the Gospels, the Epistles of Paul, and the Epistle to the Hebrews. He treated life and doctrine as a dramatic dialogue, fusing the best of contemporary thought and criticism with his own strong inner faith. The result was both a personal and scriptural catholic theology. He reflected, as he acknowledged, the great religious movements of the nineteenth century: the Tractarianism of Oxford; the liberalism of F.D. Maurice; the scholarship of the Germans; and the evangelical spirit that was so pervasive at the time.

The richness and complexity of DuBose’s thought are not easily captured in a few words, but the following passage, written shortly before his death in 1918, is a characteristic sample of his theology: “God has placed forever before our eyes, not the image but the Very Person of the Spiritual Man. We have not to ascend into Heaven to bring Him down, nor to descend into the abyss to bring Him up, for He is with us, and near us, and in us. We have only to confess with our mouths that He is Lord, and believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead—and raised us in Him—and we shall live.”

Collect of the Day

Almighty God, you gave to your servant William Porcher DuBose special gifts of grace to understand the Scriptures and to teach the truth as it is in Christ Jesus: Grant that by this teaching we may know you, the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

Deuteronomy 30:11–14

2 Timothy 1:11–14

Luke 24:25–32

Psalm 37:3–6,32–33

Preface of the Epiphany

August 17: Samuel Johnson, 1772, Timothy Cutler, 1765, and Thomas Bradbury Chandler, 1790, Priests

August 17, 2010gcoffice16 Comments

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About this commemoration

Born in Connecticut in 1696, and ordained a Congregational minister in 1719, Samuel Johnson as a young man had already developed serious doubts about the Congregationalist way of life. He had come to believe that the true connection to the faith of the primitive church was found in episcopal orders and in apostolic succession. He viewed the ordered liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer and Anglican polity as the proper alternative to the rampant dissent and local power struggles of the Congregationalist culture in which he lived and worked.

It was shortly after his ordination that he and others sympathetic to his cause began to meet and discuss the Anglican alternative. Among those gathered with Johnson was Harvard graduate Timothy Cutler, who was rector of Yale College. In September of 1722, the “Yale Apostates” confronted the trustees of Yale College and announced their intention to shift their allegiance to the Church of England.

In December of that year, Johnson, Cutler, and their friend Daniel Browne reached England, and in March they were ordained to the Anglican priesthood by the Bishop of Norwich.

Returning to New England as a missionary for the Society of the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG), Johnson became the rector of the first Episcopal congregation in the colonies, in Stratford, Connecticut, where he served until he became the first President of Columbia University (then King’s College) in New York. Cutler, after doctoral studies at Oxford and Cambridge, served as rector of Christ Church, Boston, where he tirelessly advocated for the appointment of an Anglican Bishop in the colonies.

Johnson’s pupil, Thomas Bradbury Chandler, also an ardent advocate for both the Anglican way and for the presence of bishops in the colonies, continued the work. Chandler, the father-in-law of Bishop John Henry Hobart, served for 43 years as the rector of St. John’s, Elizabethtown (now Elizabeth), New Jersey, and was himself appointed the first bishop in the Americas, in Nova Scotia, but was unable to accept the appointment due to illness.

Collect of the Day

God of your pilgrim people, you called Samuel Johnson, Timothy Cutler, and Thomas Chandler to leave their spiritual home and embrace the Anglican way: We give you thanks for their devoted service in building up your Church and shepherding your flock in colonial times; and we pray that, like them, we may follow where your Spirit leads and be ever eager to feed the hearts and minds of those entrusted to our care, in the Name of Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Lessons

Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 24:1–8

1 Peter 2:1–10

Matthew 16:13–20

Psalm 32:8–12

Preface of Advent

August 14: Jonathan Myrick Daniels, Seminarian and Martyr, 1965

August 14, 2010gcoffice19 Comments

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About this commemoration

Jonathan Myrick Daniels was born in Keene, New Hampshire, in 1939. He was shot and killed by an unemployed highway worker in Hayneville, Alabama, August 14, 1965.

From high school in Keene to graduate school at Harvard, Jonathan wrestled with the meaning of life and death and vocation. Attracted to medicine, the ordained ministry, law and writing, he found himself close to a loss of faith when his search was resolved by a profound conversion on Easter Day 1962 at the Church of the Advent in Boston. Jonathan then entered the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In March 1965, the televised appeal of Martin Luther King, Jr. to come to Selma to secure for all citizens the right to vote drew Jonathan to a time and place where the nation’s racism and the Episcopal Church’s share in that inheritance were exposed.

He returned to seminary and asked leave to work in Selma where he would be sponsored by the Episcopal Society for Cultural and Racial Unity. Conviction of his calling was deepened at Evening Prayer during the singing of the Magnificat: “ ‘He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted the humble and meek. He hath filled the hungry with good things.’ I knew that I must go to Selma. The Virgin’s song was to grow more and more dear to me in the weeks ahead.”

Jailed on August 14 for joining a picket line, Jonathan and his companions were unexpectedly released. Aware that they were in danger, four of them walked to a small store. As sixteen-year-old Ruby Sales reached the top step of the entrance, a man with a gun appeared, cursing her. Jonathan pulled her to one side to shield her from the unexpected threats. As a result, he was killed by a blast from the 12-gauge gun.

The letters and papers Jonathan left bear eloquent witness to the profound effect Selma had upon him. He writes, “The doctrine of the creeds, the enacted faith of the sacraments, were the essential preconditions of the experience itself. The faith with which I went to Selma has not changed: it has grown … I began to know in my bones and sinews that I had been truly baptized into the Lord’s death and resurrection … with them, the black men and white men, with all life, in him whose Name is above all the names that the races and nations shout … We are indelibly and unspeakably one.”

Collect of the Day

O God of justice and compassion, you put down the proud and mighty from their place, and lift up the poor and the afflicted: We give you thanks for your faithful witness Jonathan Myrick Daniels, who, in the midst of injustice and violence, risked and gave his life for another; and we pray that we, following his example, may make no peace with oppression; through Jesus Christ the just one, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Lessons

Proverbs 4:20–27

Galatians 3:22–28

Luke 1:46–55

Psalm 85:7–13

Preface of a Saint (2)