FROM FATHER SMITH: THE CHURCH PREPARES FOR GENERAL CONVENTION

We have been looking inward rather a lot here at Saint Mary’s in recent days and understandably so. We’ve been dealing with the challenges presented by COVID-19, and we’ve now entered a time of transition following the retirement of our rector, Father Gerth. But it is never a good idea to ignore the needs and demands of the wider world altogether.

On Monday, January 31, 2022, 5:30 to 6:30 PM, the General Convention Deputation of the Diocese of New York will host an online webinar to which all the clergy and people of the diocese have been invited. Father Matthew Mead, a former curate here at Saint Mary’s, and Ms. Diane Pollard, will discuss the upcoming General Convention of the Episcopal Church, what it is, how it works, and the Convention’s likely agenda. One can register for the webinar via this link. Both Father Mead and Ms. Pollard have a lot of experience in the wider church, and this should be an efficient and informative way to learn about how our church works.

In preparation for Monday’s webinar, I’m providing here some basic facts and figures and some bullet points concerning the Convention’s agenda. Much, though not all, of this material has been taken from the church’s online sources and was not written by me. Much, though not all, of the material in the numbered bullet points were written by me after extensive consultation with others who know more about these things than do I:

https://www.episcopalchurch.org/who-we-are/church-governance/

https://houseofdeputies.org/

https://www.episcopalchurch.org/who-we-are/church-governance/house-of-bishops/

https://www.generalconvention.org/announcements

https://www.lambethconference.org/

The General Convention is the governing body of The Episcopal Church. The Convention is a bicameral legislature that includes the House of Deputies, which has some 900 members (including alternates), both clergy and lay people, and the House of Bishops, which is comprised of nearly 300 active and retired bishops. The Convention meets every three years and has the authority to amend the Constitution and Canons of The Episcopal Church; adopt the budget for the church for the next three years; authorize liturgical texts, and amend the Book of Common Prayer; adopt communions and covenants with other churches; set qualifications for orders of ministry and office-holders; elect officers of the General Convention, the Executive Council, and members of boards; and delegate responsibilities to the interim bodies of The Episcopal Church.

The other arm of government of the Episcopal Church is the Executive Council, which is an elected body representing the whole church. In the three years between General Conventions, the Executive Council meets quarterly. The Executive Council has the duty to carry out programs and policies adopted by General Convention and to oversee the ministry and mission of The Episcopal Church. The Executive Council is comprised of twenty members elected by General Convention (four bishops, four priests or deacons, and twelve lay leaders) and eighteen members elected by Episcopal provinces.

The 79th General Convention met in July 2018 in Austin, Texas. The 80th Convention was scheduled to meet in July 2021 in Baltimore, Maryland, but Executive Council postponed the convention due to COVID-19. It will now meet in Baltimore, July 7–14, 2022. (This postponement is not unprecedented. The 6th General Convention of 1798 was postponed a year because of yellow fever. Influenza in 1918 almost derailed the 46th General Convention, which ended up meeting as scheduled in 1919.)

Each diocese of The Episcopal Church appoints up to four clergy and four lay leaders as deputies to attend the General Convention.

These are some of the matters that General Convention will consider in July: 

1.      The Election of the President and Vice President of the House of Deputies. (They must be in different orders, that is, one must be ordained and the other must be a lay person.) The office of President of the House of Deputies is now a paid position and has become an increasingly important position in the church. In addition to presiding over the House of Deputies when it is in session, the President of the House of Deputies serves as vice-chair of the Executive Council . . . appoints clergy and lay members to standing committees and commissions and other churchwide bodies, and serves as an ambassador and advocate for work that carries out the resolutions of General Convention.

2.      Not surprisingly, money and budgets will be a big issue. Decisions about the endowment and cash reserves must be made. Decreases in income are expected in coming years and must be planned for. Some savings are expected due to less travel and more online meetings. Money to pay for the increased need for translation of documents and simultaneous translation during meetings must be allocated. In addition, Convention will almost surely want to set aside money for church planting and racial reconciliation projects, among other pressing tasks of the moment.

3.      The church has for some time now used task forces as a way of studying and developing policy with respect to a host of issues both within the church and in the society at large. Such task forces have focused, for instance, on such issues as marriage, racial justice, mission, investment, safe church, and many others. It is likely that such task forces will continue to be part of the church’s response to such issues as mental health, the opioid crisis, climate change, among other things. In anticipation of General Convention, the existing task forces will deliver their reports in the so-called Blue Book, which is predicted to be over 1000 pages long this year, the longest in the church’s history. It will be important, of course, for the delegates to Convention to propose ways to implement the task forces’ suggestions. It is an ancient and enduring problem: how to put words into action.

4.      The Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music will continue to work, as it has done for some years, on the issue of Prayer Book reform. This is an ongoing, complicated, and sometimes contentious issue. There will be proposals for changes to the church calendar. Changes to the Book of Occasional Services presented in 2018 have been revised and those changes will be considered again at Convention this summer. The Book of Occasional Services is a companion volume to The Book of Common Prayer and contains liturgical resources related to occasions which do not occur with sufficient frequency to warrant their inclusion in The Book of Common Prayer. These rites may be secondary, but they are often useful and have to do with preparation for baptism, the blessing of homes, and sacramental reservation on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. Some expansions to the Book are designed to respond to the need for greater cultural sensitivity and inclusiveness.

5.      Normally, this Convention would choose Members of the Joint Standing Committee for the Election of a Presiding Bishop, since Presiding Bishop Michael Curry’s nine-year term ends in 2024. However, the members were elected last summer since it was decided the work of the committee could not be delayed.

6.      Because of the postponement of Convention due to COVID, the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops will begin two weeks after the conclusion of General Convention. It will be a busy summer for Episcopal bishops. It is likely that preparations for Lambeth will take place at Convention, either formally or informally.

YOUR PRAYERS ARE ASKED FOR Dennis, who is gravely ill, and for Stephanie, John, Tatiana, Ricardo, Philip, Sylvia, Pat, Karen, Shalim, Brian, Carmen, Greta, Liduvina, Marilouise, Quincy, Florette, Peter, George, Abraham, Dennis, Emil, Ethelyn, Gypsy, Hardy, Margaret, and Robert; for the Brothers of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist; for Lind, deacon; for Sammy, Randall and Louis, priests; for Andrew, bishop; for all victims of natural disaster; all who suffer from COVID-19; all refugees; all who work for the common good; all the friends and members of this parish; and for the repose of the souls of Wilbert Mora and Jason Rivera . . .  GRANT THEM PEACE . . . January 30: 1887 Betsy Maria DeWolfe Hoyt; 1902 Marie Louise Asbury; 1923 Peter H. Morris; 1943 Olive Eugene Morgan; 1955 Mary A. Scott.

OF WILLS AND ESTATES . . . Your parish clergy are often surprised to discover that there are members of the parish who have not taken the time to make a will. Procrastination in such matters is ill advised and, among other things, creates problems for one’s survivors. Our church has addressed this matter quite explicitly in the Book of Common Prayer, “The Minister of the Congregation is directed to instruct the people, from time to time, about the duty of Christian parents to make prudent provision for the well-being of their families, and of all persons to make wills, while they are in health, arranging for the disposal of their temporal goods, not neglecting, if they are able, to leave bequests for religious and charitable uses.” (The Book of Common Prayer, page 445).

This is good advice, and we are not ashamed to ask all of our readers to consider the final words of that injunction. Please do leave bequests for religious uses, including to and for the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, your parish community, where you come to be nurtured by Word and Sacrament. This church’s ministry in Times Square absolutely depends upon the gifts of its people. We exist today because our forebears made provision for Saint Mary’s in their last wills and testaments. — JRS

THIS WEEK AT SAINT MARY’S . . . The Holy Eucharist and the Daily Office: The Angelus is recited Monday through Saturday at 12:00 PM and 5:00 PM. The Holy Eucharist is celebrated Monday through Saturday at 12:10 PM. Evening Prayer is normally said in the church Monday through Saturday at 5:00 PM, except on Federal holidays and certain holy days. Solemn Mass is celebrated at 11:00 AM on Sunday morning and Evening Prayer is said at 5:00 PM in the church on Sunday afternoons. On Sunday, January 30, The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, the Adult Education class will meet from 9:30 AM to 10:30 AM in the Arch Room, on the Second Floor of the Mission House. Access is via 133 West 46th Street or via the sextons’ lodge off the Narthex of the church . . . Tuesday, February 1, Racism Discussion Group Meeting, 7:00 PM via Zoom. For more information about this ongoing weekly meeting, please call the parish office . . . Wednesday, February 2, The Presentation of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple, Mass 12:10 PM; Organ Recital at 5:30 PM by Jason Roberts, director of music ministries, Church of the Blessed Sacrament, New York City; Blessing of Candles, Procession, and Solemn Mass 6:00 PM, Sermon by the Rev. Alison Turner.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 2, CANDLEMAS . . . In one sense, the Christmas season comes to an end forty days after Christmas Day on the feast of the Presentation of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple, a feast day also known as Candlemas. It is a beautiful and much-loved feast, and we look forward to celebrating it this coming week. We invite you to join us at one of the Masses.

A Said Mass will be celebrated at 12:10 PM on that day. At 5:30 PM, Mr. Jason Roberts, director of music ministries at the Church of the Blessed Sacrament on the Upper West Side, will play an organ recital. We are very pleased to welcome Jason to Saint Mary’s, especially since he was unable to play the recital as planned on January 6.

Solemn Mass is at 6:00 PM. The Entrance Rite at the Solemn Mass includes the Blessing of Candles and a Procession. This is a lovely ritual, especially at a Mass celebrated after sunset. As the procession wends its way around the church, the nave is filled with soft light as the congregation holds its lit hand candles in remembrance of Jesus Christ, the light of the world.

We are pleased to be able to welcome Mother Alison Turner as our guest preacher at the Solemn Mass on Candlemas. Mother Turner is one of our assisting priests, and we see too little of her these days since she now serves full time at Saint Thomas Fifth Avenue. It will be good to have her with us on Wednesday. We look forward to hearing her sermon.

AROUND THE PARISH . . . Our interim rector, Father Sammy Wood, will say goodbye to his parish in Tennessee on Sunday, February 6. He will fly to New York with his son Patrick on Thursday, February 10. Father Wood plans to be with us for the Solemn Mass on Sunday, February 13. His wife Renée and his daughter Flannery will travel to New York on February 18. Moving trucks will arrive at the rectory on February 19. Please keep the Wood family in your prayers during this exciting, but no doubt stressful, time . . . Parishioner Dennis Smith has been unable to travel to Saint Mary’s from his home in New Jersey for sometime now. We learned this week that Dennis is now in hospice care. We give thanks for Dennis’s ministry, presence, and friendship over a period of many years. We have missed him and we invite you to keep him in your prayers. Please pray also for Susanna Lam, Dennis’s goddaughter and caregiver . . . Many of the members and friends of the parish remember parishioner Dick Leitsch, who died in June 2018, with foundness, but also with gratitude and respect. Dick played an important role in the early movement for LGBTQ rights. A photograph of him and others not being served alcohol at a bar in Greenwhich Village because they were “avowed homosexuals” is now in the collection of the Smithsonian. A copy of that photograph, printed on durable metal, is now attached to the fence of the Stonewall National Monument in Sheridan Square.

HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY . . . This past week people around the world marked Holocaust Remembrance Day. The United Nations General Assembly has designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of the death camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau—as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this annual day of commemoration, the United Nations urges every member state to honor the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust and millions of other victims of Nazism and to develop educational programs to help prevent future genocides.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has links to the following short films on the Remembrance Day section of its website: The Holocaust Encyclopedia: Provides an overview of the Holocaust using text, photographs, maps, artifacts, and personal histories; The Path to Nazi Genocide. This 38-minute film examines the Nazis’ rise and consolidation of power in Germany; International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Learn more about how the day was established and its designated purpose.

ADULT EDUCATION . . . The Adult Forum will meet this coming Sunday, January 30, at 9:30 AM in the Arch Room on the second floor of the Mission House. Father Jay Smith will lead the class in a discussion of Luke 4:21–32, the gospel passage appointed for the day. Father Victor Conrado will preach on that text at the Solemn Mass later that morning. On Sunday, February 6, Father Matthew Jacobson will lead the class in a discussion of Luke 5:1–11.

ABOUT THE MUSIC . . . Holy Apostles Mass, Sunday’s Mass setting, was composed by David Hurd, organist and music director at Saint Mary’s, while he was director of music at the Church of the Holy Apostles, Chelsea, Manhattan. It was first sung at Holy Apostles Church on All Saints’ Day 2003. Commissioned by parishioners Mary Anne and John Grammer, Holy Apostles Mass is a setting of the Rite II Eucharistic texts. It was originally scored for congregation, choir, organ, strings, flute, oboe, and horn, and was intended to be the setting for the Christmas Midnight Mass. From the time of its introduction at the parish, Holy Apostles Mass was sung in rotation with several other settings by the congregation and choir, sometimes with full or partial orchestration, or with organ alone. The original choral parts were later expanded in fulfillment of the original plan for the Mass, and the revised version was premiered by the choirs of All Saints’ Episcopal Church, Austin, Texas, in April 2018. Today at Saint Mary’s this revised edition of the Gloria, Sanctus-Benedictus, and Agnus Dei will be sung by the choir with organ accompaniment.

The motet sung during Communion on Sunday is a setting of Holy Sonnet XV, Wilt thou love God, by John Donne (1572–1631). This choral setting by David Hurd was commissioned by Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Austin, Texas, and premiered there on October 31, 2021. Today’s performance by the choir of Saint Mary’s will be the second performance and New York premiere of this music. John Donne is considered the leading English poet of the metaphysical school and the greatest love poet in the English language. He is also noted for his religious verse, his treatises, and for his sermons which rank among the most noted of his time. He was dean of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London, from 1621 until 1631. Wilt thou love God is the fifteenth of his nineteen numbered sonnets under the general heading of “Divine Meditations.” David Hurd’s motet exploits choral textures ranging from unison trebles at its outset to full eight-part mixed voices at its conclusion in setting Donne’s rich meditation.

Fantasia on Wondrous Love, played as the organ prelude at the Solemn Mass on Sunday, was composed by David Hurd in the spring of 2016 for an anthology of organ pieces published in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Association of Anglican Musicians. It is based on a melody from Southern Harmony (1835), which was compiled by William Walker (1809–1875). The Fantasia is in three sections, each one devoted to a stanza of the hymn: “What wondrous love is this,” “To God and to the Lamb,” and “And when from death I’m free” (The Hymnal 1982, 439). A final coda revisits the music of the title stanza. The postlude will be the fourth of David Hurd’s Four Spiritual Preludes and was composed in 2000. The set, which is dedicated to Dr. Mickey Thomas Terry of Washington, DC, is a suite of four short organ pieces modeled on the examples of the Baroque masters’ chorale preludes. Each piece presents a well-known spiritual melody in an expressive texture and fresh harmonic context. In Deep River, which concludes the set, the melody of its chorus is largely supported by augmented triads and thirds in triplet figures. In the verse, the melody and alto voice are heard over repeated chords in triplet patterns. A reprise of the chorus ends the piece. — David Hurd

NEIGHBORS IN NEED . . On Friday, January 21, the Neighbors in Need Volunteers served around 40 guests, providing clothing and hygiene items. We mourned the recent and sudden death of fellow volunteer, John Heffernan. We welcomed a new volunteer, Gretchen Floyd.

This month we were able to purchase a large number of heavy, hooded sweatshirts in several colors for distribution. They were a popular item in this cold weather. We were able to purchase them because of the generosity of our donors. We thank you.

Our next Drop-by Day is scheduled for Friday, February 18. Volunteers work from 1:30 PM until 3:30 PM. Our guests are invited into the church at 2:00 PM, and we close our doors at 3:00 PM. We need six (6) volunteers for each Drop-by. If you would like to volunteer, please contact Marie Rosseels, MaryJane Boland, or Father Jay Smith. You may reach them by calling the Parish Office at 212-869-5830. The March Drop-by will take place on Friday, March 18.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO MAKE A DONATION FOR ALTAR FLOWERS? . . . Many dates for donating flowers are available, including the following Sundays: February 13, 20, and 27; and Sunday, March 27, The Fourth Sunday in Lent (Laetare Sunday). A number of Sundays in Eastertide are also available. The suggested donation is $250.00 which provides flowers on the high altar; shrines of Christ the King, Blessed Virgin Mary, and Sacred Heart; and/or other locations depending on the calendar. The donation amount can be divided between more than one donor. Please contact Chris Howatt and Father Smith to donate the altar flowers. For questions about flowers and the Flower Guild, please speak with Brendon Hunter.

This edition of the Angelus was written and edited by Father Jay Smith. Father Matt Jacobson is responsible for helping to edit and proofread the newsletter and for posting it on the parish website and distributing it via mail and e-mail, with the assistance of Christopher Howatt, parish administrator, and parish volunteer, Clint Best.