From the Curate:  Speaking The Truth In Love

Wednesday, April 25 is the Feast of Saint Mark the Evangelist.  Wednesday also happens to be the day we regularly hold Christian Formation classes.  Having just celebrated the Feast of a saint and an evangelist whose Gospel begins by proclaiming “The Good News of Jesus Christ, the Son of God,” it was all the more poignant for me to enter into our new series, In Dialogue with Judaism.  Often in

Easter at Saint Mary’s

There are always things to celebrate after Holy Week.  I want to give thanks for the spirit of joy that was so evident in all areas of our common life from the beginning of the week to the end.  It was easy for so many to work so hard and to give so much of themselves when every time one looked in any direction, someone had joy on his or her face.  I’m not making this up.  This isn’t fluff.  This is the character of this Christian community.

Easter Letter

Dear Friends,

I write to you on the morning of Maundy Thursday.  We have already celebrated the last service of Lent, Morning Prayer for today.  The altar of repose is being prepared.  The great silver sanctuary lamp is being polished.  MCs will begin to arrive shortly.  The church staff is making final preparations for the Triduum.  The music of a hauntingly beautiful Tenebrae still seems to hang in the air, especially the lovely treble voice of the Allegri Miserere mei.

Reconciliation

There are many surprising graces to a first confession.  At least there were for me and I still feel the power of that first confession twenty-five years later.  Having grown up in a community of faith where this sacrament was not formally celebrated, it was for me at age twenty-two an act which helped define who I was going to be as an adult: I was going to put my trust in God and in the institutional Church. 

Laetare: Rejoice

This Sunday is the Lenten "refreshment" Sunday.  Its name "Laetare" comes from the first word in Latin of the traditional entrance song for the day.  The text is beautiful in Latin and in English:

Laetare Ierusalem: et conventum facite omnes qui diligitis eam: gaudete cum laetitia, qui in tristitia fuistis: ut exsultetis, et satiemini ab uberibus consolationis vestrae.  Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sung mihi: in domum Domini ibimus.

Music Search Report

Next week five persons will be at Saint Mary's to audition and to be interviewed by me and the Music Search Committee for the position of organist and music director.  The five come to us from the search process that was initiated to find the best possible candidate in North America and Britain.  I am looking forward to meeting the candidates.

Welcome and Service

From time to time I see clear signs that this parish community has entered a new phase of its common life.  Every generation of a community like ours has its own focus and mission.  It is the mission of our generation at Saint Mary's to share what we have, to extend the love of Christ and to grow the size of the parish.  On Ash Wednesday it was clear to me that the ministry of welcome, one of the most significant ways we begin to invite others into our community, is being shared broadly by members of the parish community.  I like it a lot.

Liturgy in Lent

Some things about Lent are simple.  There are no flowers on the altar except on two occasions, the Fourth Sunday and the Feast of the Annunciation.  Other than Saint Joseph's Day and the Annunciation no other commemorations interrupt the cycle of Lenten Weekdays.  The weekday Mass propers for Lent are especially well done.  And here at Saint Mary's, as in other liturgical parishes, a sense of preparation and restraint are reflected in all areas of our common life.

Lent

In the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd young children are introduced to the liturgical year through the use of color.  Three year-olds like special words like "Pentecost" and "Epiphany."  They aren't too interested in the meaning of the word at this point in their development; yet the words help them begin to develop a vocabulary they will use to express their wonder at the gift of life and the history of salvation.

Fruit in Due Season

On February 13 the Episcopal Church commemorates the life of Absalom Jones (1746-1818), first African-American priest in the Episcopal Church.  This year the Daily Office Lectionary provided for the second reading at Evening Prayer to be Mark's account of the Cursing of the Fig Tree:

From the Curate:  Why do we do what we do?

Liturgy is important in the Episcopal Church.  Instead of the 300-page catechism or Biblical fundamentalism we have the Book of Common Prayer and the liturgy contained in it to keep us bound together and well behaved.  Not much can be tinkered with in the 18-page catechism or with the Bible.  So for Episcopalians, especially the clergy, liturgy becomes the venue for their creative expression.   

About the Mass: The Liturgy of the Word (Part I)

Early Christians gathered to listen to the story of salvation, to pray and to break the Bread.  This is still what we do.  Today we call it the Mass.  Things haven't changed essentially from the days when the Apostles gathered with each other in amazement at the presence of the Lord.

About the Annual Meeting

In the Episcopal Church an annual meeting of the congregation is held every year.  It is the occasion for the members of the congregation to receive reports from the rector and vestry on the temporal affairs of the community and to hold parish elections.  It is also a time when the parish leadership reports to the community about its work in the past year and plans for the new year.

About the Liturgy: Entrance Rite

I get questions from time to time about the shape of the Entrance Rite in the Mass.  This is the first part of the Eucharistic celebration, from the opening chant through the collect of the day.  In the Prayer Book tradition this part of the service is not really separated from what is usually called "the Liturgy of the Word" - the first Lesson through the Peace.  Yet the Entrance Rite evolves as a separate and later element to what we might call the original shape of the Eucharist.

Wanted: Evangelists

Members of the parish community have heard me since my arrival as your rector speaking, preaching, writing and teaching about the need for us to be a community where people who have no community of faith can become Christians.  One expression I use is to say that I hope we will be worthy enough so that God will send us the unbaptized.  Perhaps instead of waiting for God to act, we ought to be asking ourselves if we have the capacity to learn how to bring people to faith.

Friends

As rector of Saint Mary's I am very aware of the unusual importance of our local parish community for members of the wider Episcopal Church.  I regularly receive letters that comment on our common life from people who either read parish publications or who occasionally attend worship here.  Sometimes these are letters of thanks; sometimes these are letters of judgment. 

Merry Christmas

One of my good friends always says of the Christmas Eve service, "It goes so fast."  She's right.  More than any other liturgy of the church year, it seems to me that the Midnight Mass goes so very quickly.  Perhaps it isn't entirely our fondness for and familiarity with this liturgy that makes it seem short to me.  We have been living for months in a world surrounded by shoppers and entertainments, a world in which we all participate to some degree.  When we

Of the Father's Love

The earliest of our Christmas hymns in The Hymnal 1982 is "Of the Father's love begotten."  It is ascribed to Marcus Aurelius Clemens Prudentius (348-410?).  In early Christian hymns there is a theological directness and simplicity that is helpful and spiritually powerful.  Think of, for example, the Good Friday hymns "Sing, my tongue,

Grace Lacurto, 1899 - 2000

Grace LaCurto, the oldest member of Saint Mary's, died on Tuesday, December 5, in Greenwich, Connecticut.  She was born on January 16, 1899.  She was confirmed at Saint Mary's on December 18, 1947 and had been an active member of the parish until she could no longer manage the commute from Connecticut every Sunday.  Older members and friends of the parish will remember that for years she presided over the pouring of coffee after the Solemn Mass on Sundays. 

Unique

Our community life at Saint Mary's is full of wonderful events and celebrations that sustain us and keep us in our journey in faith.  As a Christian community most of these events tend to be centered in worship and the fellowship that surrounds worship.  We are people gathered at the Table and we feel at home at the Table as at no other place.