Letters
from 20 to 26 November 2006
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Preparation
for Advent
Last
week (and in previous years at this time) you have commented on
the need for a season to "prepare for Advent". I wonder how widespread
is the observation of "Kingdom Season", which is celebrated by
friends of mine who are Anglican Franciscan brothers in another
part of Australia. We don't mark this season in our parish nor
is it mentioned in the Australian Lectionary. However, a quick
web search revealed at least a couple of churches in the United
Kingdom where the season is recognised.
I know
very little of the details, but Kingdom Season begins on the eve
of All Saints (or nearest Sunday) and ends just before Advent Sunday.
Quite a few of our lectionary readings during this period relate
to the time of the coming of the Kingdom, or the coming of the
Son of Man, as a kind of precursor to Advent, and Kingdom Season
also includes the Feast of Christ the King, on the Sunday before
Advent.
My favourite
reading from this season is from the Gospel of Luke, where Christ
answers a question about the timing of the coming of the Kingdom
of God with, 'The coming of the Kingdom of God does not admit of
observation and there will be no-one to say, "Look, it is here!
Look, it is there! For look, the Kingdom of God is among you." It
certainly starts us thinking about the coming season of Advent.
Julianne
Stewart
St Luke's Anglican Church, Toowoomba
Toowoomba, Queensland, AUSTRALIA
20 November 2006
The time
is right
to rediscover Maurice
Is
anyone out there reading
Frederick Denison Maurice? He's right up there with
Richard Hooker, explaining why we Anglicans are full
participants in the Kingdom of Christ, without assuming
that that Kingdom is defined by the Church of England.
You
could call him the Anglican Kierkegaard, if you take into consideration
that he considered himself part of the Church, rather than some
sort of beautiful Lutheran individual, for whom the Church was
just some creepy version of "christendom."
I think
FDM is very interesting, and possibly useful for us desperate Anglicans,
once you get around his early Victorian mode of expression. Rather
like Hooker in substance, but with a lot more 1840s fluff and Romophobia.
Rob
Moody
[Still looking for a home parish]
Kingston, Ontario, CANADA
red_guelf@yahoo.ca
24 November 2006
'Rafter-rattling
heart-beating hand-raising smile-giving'
Here
are some observations I
made when watching the investiture of the new presiding
bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Most Reverend Katharine
Jefferts Schori, on my tiny laptop computer screen:
Color. Above all I noted color. Color in vestments. Color
in people. Color in windows. Color in clothes. Wild, wonderful
color. Colors melting into each other like wet watercolor
paint. Bird egg blue, sea green, stripped sparrow browns,
bright canary and oriole yellows and oranges, red of wine,
the rainbow flowing off the reflection of every person there.
The colors danced with the faces, danced with the music,
danced with the dancers. One camera caught hands, just hands,
no faces, hands reaching, reaching for the Eucharist, from
left and right, now a hand, now another, brown, white, old,
young — making their own rhythms and rhythm together.
Sound. Organ blaring, drums of all sizes, saxophone wailing,
violins stretching, feet tapping, body swaying and languages
mingling — Spanish, African, Chinese, Navajo, English, a
cacophony of praise.
Circles. There could not be a much more hierarchical occasion than
the investiture of a presiding bishop yet there was not a hint of
that. Everything circled. Everyone circled. Equality oozed and mingled.
It was so different from the Roman Catholic formal clergy weighted
ceremonies witnessed on TV. No sense of power or control. Just us.
All of us. Each and every one of us.
One of the most beautiful moments in the liturgy was the renewal
of our Baptismal Covenant. Dancers in flowing white gowns carried
huge stone teal colored jars filled with water and gently, softly,
one dancer held aloft, they swayed around the large bronze font,
and at last with the sound of a flowing stream emptied the huge jars
of water into the font. I was reminded of Jesus turning the water
into wine and was not quite sure what color would pour forth.
The sermon was a challenge. A call to Shalom. A call to unity.
A call to peace. A call to courage to let go of our fears
enough to love, our insensitivities enough to hear each other's
pain. It was a call to Come Home together... a homecoming
for all humanity.
There was great love, great glory, great joy in this celebration
of the Body of Christ. It was a rafter-rattling heart-beating
hand-raising smile-giving celebration of life and God's love.
I even was able to catch a glimpse of our own bishop with
a big smile on his face as he helped distribute Eucharist.
I was filled with great pride as I partook long-distant in this glorious
liturgy, proud of who we are as a people in both proclamation and
living human flesh. It was truly a witness of God's Glory incarnated
in all humanity.
The
Reverend Sister Judith Schenck
Hermitage of the Transfiguration
Kalispell, Montana, USA
21 November 2006
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