Distinguishing the imaginative/affective conversation from the functional/equipping process allows for diverse ideas and interpretations as well as for careful organization.
Perrin argued that it was Jesus’ enactment of Isaiah’s feast for all people’s, the divine banquet where God welcomed all, including the unworthy, the unprepared, the unfit, in sum all the ‘wrong’ people prompted some Jewish religious leaders and local Roman authority (for different reasons and different understanding of the threat Jesus posed) to work together in a conspiracy to stop and eventually kill him.
The word “tradition” gets thrown around a lot, especially among folks who hang out at church. Sometimes people like to talk about “traditional” versus “contemporary” worship, or “traditional” versus “emergent” or “creative” worship. The words can function as helpful shorthand, but they also create dichotomies.
“A seemingly simple phrase like, ‘The peace of the Lord be with you,’ turns into a major debate. We end up having to go back to the original texts, some of which are in Hebrew, to try to decipher exactly what the person writing that meant.”
I think that the onus of paying attention is not on the liturgist but rather on the disciples participating in the service. The service is simply a mirror upon which we can see reflected the Face of Christ. To put it more bluntly, if you find the service boring whose reflection are you seeing in the mirror?
We want to meet this guy where he is. And, in truth, he’s already taken the first step towards greater Christian maturity—that’s the one that got him over the threshold. Meeting him where he is means thanking him for that step and encouraging and engaging him. The next step means presenting a non-coercive vision and expectation of weekly attendance.
The 1979 Book of Common Prayer consistently highlights the place of Baptism within the Christian life. Baptism is restored to equality with Eucharist as the two great sacraments given to us by Christ in the Gospels, the two Dominical Sacraments. Given this focus, I’m mystified why we’ve never chosen to incorporate the Rite of Sprinkling at the beginning of a festal Eucharist.
It is in the liturgy that we are able to enter into another consciousness, probe a deeper reality, strive for a sense of transcendence which lifts us above the mundane, and in the words of psalmist, sets us on a rock that is higher than ourselves.
A desire for inclusive language ought to have some higher view of the importance of the female side of things than just being married to a patriarch. Why are we not including some of the women of the Hebrew Covenant who made a difference in their own right? Wouldn’t it be more sensible to include, say, Deborah, Ruth, and Esther.
“If the conscience of the ordained minister allows, private liturgies of blessing and support and public services of the Eucharist in thanksgiving for the covenanted, lifelong, monogamous realities of these committed relationships can be held in the churches of our diocese.” ~~ +Gulick