Ordinary life discloses to us, in the experience of loving, this dimension of glory—discloses the transcendence of loving over everything else that a human being can do. The Gospel of John suggests to us that the divine glory, in that ultimate dimension in which it appears in the handing over of Jesus, is of this same shape, though on a vaster scale. There is in it something whose shape we know and can recognize—the shape of the glory of loving. There is in the God Who is disclosed in Jesus first the glory of signs and mighty works—the glory of free and unfettered activity and achievement; but when Jesus destines himself, by His own will and initiative, to wait at the end of exposure and helplessness, there is disclosed, as the ultimate dimension of the divine glory, that same glory which we dimly perceive in our own experience when, because we love, we destine ourselves to wait and to be exposed and to receive. The glory of that waiting figure in Gethsemane is not wholly strange and unfamiliar to us—not so strange that we could mistake it for misfortune and regard the figure with pity or sheer incomprehension. The glory of God which finally appears in the waiting figure in the Garden is the glory of that not wholly unfamiliar activity which always, in the end, destines itself to waiting—the activity of loving.

From The Stature of Waiting by W. H. Vanstone. © 1982, 2006. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com.

The real tragedy of Good Friday was the death of Judas. This death was truly tragic, meaningless, violent and desperate. Much of my ministry has been spent with people who have died tragic deaths. Others have lived lives which have been devoid of hope. I think particularly of the experience of many heroin addicts as they moved towards despair. Unless we can identify in some way with this loss of hope, we have not begun to understand the Good Friday experience. In fact only those who know something of the meaning of despair can come to experience victory. Only the dead can appreciate resurrection, and all Christians must confront and experience the darkness as they move along the way to death. One of the worst aspects of the darkness which we face is the painful fear that some of the darkness we encounter may not be redeemable, that it may be the darkness of original sin. Yet this too must be faced in trust and confidence.

This entry into the darkness is the very heart of faith and of hope. To be a Christian at all is to enter this dark night: the night in which we do not know the way but in which God becomes luminously present. This dark night is a paradigm of the paschal transformation by which we are integrated into the life of God.

From We Preach Christ Crucified by Kenneth Leech. Tenth anniversary edition. Copyright © 1994, 2005. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

The third procession is that of the Easter Vigil ceremony which is held on the night before Easter Day and once again it is possible to come into this central moment of the Christian year, the celebration of the completion of salvation, by the simplest of ways, by walking, bowing, standing, breathing, being. On Easter night we are on even more fundamental ground in the simplicities of this procession, which is shaped by the basic elements of earth, of air, of fire, and of water. There is silence at the basis of it: when all lights in the church are extinguished, we stand with Adam in darkness, at the moment of creation, in earth and air only, until new light is struck out of the rock. The Scripture readings of the Vigil will later emphasize this beginning, by using Genesis, with the creation of all things, of which humankind is the crown, the complete image of God. This is the time of new beginning, a new creation, and therefore especially it is the time of the catechumens; this is, those who are preparing for baptism, and for those already baptized who are with them as they go towards baptism, the unifying basis of Christian life. There is in this moment of darkness a sense of alienation, of exile, of not being at home, created in the image of God but still far off, helpless of ourselves to change. From the rock of the tomb a new light is struck from flint and shines into darkness. A candle is lit and from it small candles take their light, so that behind each small candle-flame there is the face of a human person newly made in Christ whose only identity in the darkness is that of this new light. We are taken into a new dimension of life which is pure gift. We are with the reconciled, with the baptized, with the risen Lord, who is the new Adam. It is the first and timeless day of a new creation.

From In the Company of Christ: A Pilgrimage Through Holy Week by Benedicta Ward. Copyright © 2005. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org.

Here and now in this new dawn there is someone who weeps, broken-hearted, in a garden and hears her name. The young man is risen, death is taken into victory, but it is still a time of tears, both of sorrow and of longing and of wonder for amazing love. It is overwhelming: as Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) wrote, meditating on the meeting of this new Eve in this new garden with the new Adam:

The Lord called her ‘Mary’,
the name he had so often called her by as if to say,
‘I know who you are, and what you want;
behold me; do not weep, I am he whom you are seeking.’
At once her tears were changed;
I do not believe they stopped at once,
but where once they were wrung from a heart
broken and self-tormenting,
they flow now from a heart exulting.

From In the Company of Christ: A Pilgrimage Through Holy Week by Benedicta Ward. Copyright © 2005. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org.

April 9

I found a loose thread in the sleeve of my jacket the other day and hesitated to pull it off in case it unraveled the entire seam. I did it anyway and of course the whole lining came apart. This made me think of certain questions we are reluctant to ask ourselves. We think twice about dealing with them in case we make a worse rip in the fabric of the story we tell about ourselves. Just now, as we approach the celebration of Easter, I am not sure that I want to ask: “How real will my Easter joy be this year?” Questions about the authenticity of our feelings scare us. Where might it lead if I start wondering whether my religious experience is fake?

So what is authentic Easter joy? Well, I do know it isn’t relief at the return of spring, however welcome that is. Easter joy has to be something that I would experience just as much in the southern hemisphere, where Easter heralds the onset of winter cold. Easter joy is not a seasonal mood of uplift.
Neither is Easter joy to be confused with a sense that Jesus’ resurrection is a reassuring illustration of the adage “All’s well that ends well.” A penetrating remark made by the fearless Anglican philosopher Donald McKinnon has always haunted me. He claimed that a lot of conventional talk about the resurrection misrepresented it as “a descent from the cross given greater dramatic effect by a thirty-six-hour postponement.” The counterfeit version of Easter joy depends on the make-believe that God pulls a surprise “happy ending” on us after the ghastly setback of Jesus’ crucifixion. Jesus is presented as a Houdini figure who, it seems, could not possibly have gotten out of the ultimate trap of crucifixion and burial in a sealed tomb. But no! To our relief—our so-called Easter joy—out he comes! All is well and our hero is victorious, the One they couldn’t keep down! Happy Easter! Let’s congratulate ourselves for being on the winning side!

From “The Real Thing” in Compass and Stars by Martin L. Smith. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

April 10

Many of those who are skeptical about the story of the empty tomb and take the stories of Jesus’ appearances as legends opt for an interpretation that is similarly reassuring. They assume the early disciples created the stories to express in a vivid but imaginary way their inner conviction that Jesus’ soul had passed triumphantly and inevitably into heaven. But this is impossible to square with the evidence that the apostles regarded the resurrection as a shocking anomaly. Something utterly unprecedented had happened to transform the dead Jesus, and this transformation involved the passing of his body into an entirely new state. The visible trace of this transformation was an empty grave.

From “The Real Thing” in Compass and Stars by Martin L. Smith. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

April 11

Easter joy focuses then on why God would do this unique thing to Jesus, something that by definition only he could do. If someone is raised while history is allowed to go on, this is God’s only way of showing us what he is actually like. The resurrection is God’s way of showing that it is the crucified Jesus who is the ultimate manifestation of his identity and character. In the resurrection, it is Jesus-on-the-cross who is confirmed as the “last word” about the nature of divine love and creativity—and divine vulnerability.

From “The Real Thing” in Compass and Stars by Martin L. Smith. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

April 12

This is where it gets scary. The resurrection only makes sense as God’s “showing his hand” about the meaning of the cross. So I can’t have Easter joy if I don’t find joy in Jesus-on-the-cross. In fact, I can’t even believe in the resurrection, unless I want to believe in a God who would be so crazy as to identify himself with the crucified Jesus. God identifies with Jesus’ choice to risk being crucified, his refusal to make the compromises that could have saved him from it. Paul speaks of the foolishness and weakness of God shown on the cross. The resurrection, far from supporting the notion of a triumphalistic deity of power, mysteriously confirms how deeply hidden and baffling the Creator truly is, as he reveals that he is at one with the man who so willingly exposed himself with an open heart to the fate devised by political power and religious expediency to crush him.

Authentic Easter joy—the genuine pearl of great price—is unfeigned delight in my heart of hearts that a hidden God turns out to be so different from all the stuff, aggressive or sentimental, that gets fabricated about him. Centuries ago, a custom grew up of beginning Easter sermons with a joke, known as the risus paschalis. The subtlety of Easter joy is like getting a joke. It is impossible to explain the resurrection to someone who doesn’t get the foolishness of the cross. You either get it or you don’t. The real God has authenticated himself in an event only the poor in spirit can appreciate. Easter faith comes with a desire to be in on the secret, to get the joke.

From “The Real Thing” in Compass and Stars by Martin L. Smith. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

April 13

Wendell Berry, the great environmentalist poet-theologian, has written a piece about somebody he calls a “mad farmer” who goes around shouting, “Practice resurrection!” “Practice resurrection.” That’s not bad advice. It’s certainly what Thomas does—and maybe, just maybe, the other disciples are rehearsing the story and replaying the experience, too. Most of us don’t “get it” the very first time. Most of us spend our lives learning what the reality of resurrection looks like, feels like, and tastes like—because it keeps on happening in new ways every day of our lives.

How do we practice resurrection?

Maybe the most important skill is learning to live in the now, looking toward the future, rather than living in the past. That doesn’t mean we forget about what’s come before, though we are meant to honor what’s good about it, and grieve what is gone if we need to. It also means that we live in hope for the new thing God is doing.

Resurrection means that creation isn’t over and done with. And if we’re made in the image of God, then we’ve got creation work to do. What’s coming may not look exactly like what we knew before, but God promises that it will be abundant and life-giving.

From “Practicing Resurrection” in A Wing and a Prayer by Katharine Jefferts Schori. © 2007. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

April 14

Practicing resurrection means living in openness. It’s a vulnerable attitude. Jesus invites Thomas to examine his wounds—come and see the ugliest thing you can imagine. God has made it a source of beauty and healing. It means that our fears, our inadequacies, the wretched parts of ourselves, can be the vehicle for new and more abundant life—if we’re willing to confront them honestly and openly. In the baptismal covenant, it’s the second promise we make—to repent and return to the Lord. But it’s not just our wrongdoing—the weak and untried parts of ourselves can be the stuff of new life, too. That’s what exercise is all about—stressing, trying the weak parts of our bodies so that they become stronger. Our psyches and souls can find new strength too if we’re willing to journey within and confront some of that darkness or fear or mystery.

Practice resurrection. Live in open expectation of the new thing God is doing at all times and in all places. It means opening ourselves to that new thing, recognizing that the change it brings will cause some distress. But there is always more abundant life on the other side of the pain and grief that comes with change and growth.

From “Practicing Resurrection” in A Wing and a Prayer by Katharine Jefferts Schori. © 2007. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

April 16

I am very sure that so long as we are caught in time, we will never be able to see heaven, which I believe is entirely and absolutely seeable. But having arrived at that statement (which, alas, I have discovered is the only definitive one I can actually make at this juncture), I immediately run up against the very core of the problem for me: namely, that I have had what is now euphemistically referred to as a near-death experience. In 1955 when I was having it, there were no easy terms for such, no almost jocular NDE abbreviations to lessen the outréness of the experience.

The whole thing was fairly straightforward, really. I was threatening to miscarry our first child; and the drug I was given, while hardly experimental, was nonetheless new and, as it turns out, highly toxic to some women. Six or seven of us died, in fact. I didn’t . . . Correction: I did, but I came back.

The second most vivid memory of my life is that of sitting, hunched up like a gargoyle, in the upper corner of my hospital room, watching Sam and the nurse beat on my body, trying to restart my heart. The most vivid memory is when the corner opened up and let me out of the room into a tunnel, pleasantly grassed even on its curved surfaces. Walking through it, I could see the light coming from the other end and I could know myself drawn without effort toward That Which Waited There.

I never left the tunnel, though I stood at the edging place where it ceased and the translucent goldenness began. We talked there, just on the brink of the entering, I saying I needed to go back, that there were children I wanted to have before I came . . . and the What Is saying, “Go,” and my soul breaking within me that I was leaving a greater love for a lesser one, but knowing that I must go . . . and knowing as well that I would return and that the What Is and I were, and would be, when I do return.

So it is—and for over fifty years has been—that I cannot, in any discussion of heaven, get beyond the verge where the end of the tunnel met the That Which Waits There. Neither my mind nor my necessity are ever sufficient to push beyond that place.

From “Sweet Reluctance” by Phyllis Tickle, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

April 17

I do not know—none of us does—what it must have been like to have a dead man materialize through the wall of a meeting room and lay out for public viewing the holes in his hands where his executioners had nailed him to a cross or the rip in his belly where they stabbed him open to hasten his demise. Whatever they felt or experienced, those witnesses to the unspeakable, they knew. They knew what they had seen, and it was enough to persuade them at all costs of the actuality of the thing . . . which is by way of saying that I, too, know what I saw and am persuaded, at all costs, by the actuality of the thing.

I know no more to say or write; but the exercise of having tried has not been entirely wasted. At least I can admit now that I shall never be able to speak of the what-I-don’t-know that lies beyond the what-I-do-know. There is relief in that, as well as comfort and a certain inexpressible pleasure in realizing that someday soon I shall be about the business of greeting again that which I once left with such sweet reluctance.

From “Sweet Reluctance” by Phyllis Tickle, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

In the garden Christ gently but deliberately says to Mary Magdalene, “Noli me tangere.” “Do not touch” is a misleading translation that deprives us of the significance of what is happening here. “Do not cling” is a more accurate rendering of the Greek, for surely we do need to touch, to touch the hem of the garment, to touch the wounds and feel them. But we must not cling, for that carries the danger of becoming dependent, of clutching or holding on in the wrong way. I love the statue of the Walking Madonna by Elisabeth Frink in the cathedral close at Salisbury. Here is this young woman who strides out boldly into the future, her one hand strong and determined, while the other is vulnerable. She knows that she has seen the Lord, the risen Christ; she has heard the resurrection message and now she is ready to cross the threshold and engage whatever lies before her. What gives her the strength to move forward with today: such assurance, calling out that loving welcome, that Deo Gratias, to a future that is unsure, unknown?

From To Pause at the Threshold: Reflections on Living on the Border by Esther de Waal. © 2001. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

The cross is the abyss of wonders, the centre of desires, the school of virtues, the house of wisdom, the throne of love, the theatre of joys, and the place of sorrows; it is the root of happiness, and the gate of heaven.

Of all things in heaven and earth it is the most peculiar. It is the most exalted of all objects. It is an ensign lifted up for all nations, to it shall the gentiles seek. His rest shall be glorious: the dispersed of Judah shall be gathered together to it, from the four corners of the earth. If love be the weight of the soul, and its object the centre, all eyes and hearts may convert and turn unto this object, cleave unto this centre, and by it enter into rest. There we may see God’s goodness, wisdom and power: yea his mercy and anger displayed. There we may see man’s sin and infinite value, his hope and fear, his misery and happiness. There we might see the Rock of Ages, and the joys of heaven. There we may see a man loving all the world, and a God dying for mankind.

From Centuries by Thomas Traherne (Faith Press, 1960).

By Greg Jones

Episcopalians are people of a common book. Whether we worship in the Churches of England, South Africa, Sudan or the Episcopal Church – all Anglicans share a common book of prayer, worship and wisdom. It predates the American Revolution, the Enlightenment, and, yes, even the Bard himself. Our common text of life in Christ was finished before Henry VIII got married the first time – and before Thomas Cranmer said the Eucharist in English. Yes, our truly common book is the Bible. Quite by itself, the Bible is the inspired text of our Church. The Bible constitutes the sacred vocabulary of the Body of Christ, through which the living and active Word of God continues to breathe its transformational power. The Bible describes our common life in Christ, the incarnate Word of God, and it informs our every song, story, and prayer.

The Book of Common Prayer and Hymnal which form our twin expressions of Episcopal doctrine are themselves as good as they are because they are the fruit of deep engagement with Scripture. As the Prayer Book says, "Lord Jesus ... kindle our hearts, and awaken hope, that we may know you as you are revealed in Scripture." Indeed, our liturgical life is a lived engagement with the Word of God in the Bible – and not much more. Thus, in our spiritual and worshipful encounter with the Word of God in the Bible, Christ is made manifest in us, to us, and through us – who by baptism have become members of Christ's body. The way I see it, the Bible is the utterance of the Body of Christ to the Body of Christ.

In her prophetic work The Dream of God, the late Verna Dozier offers a reflection on the following collect from the Book of Common Prayer:

"Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning; Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life; which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ."
Dozier says that it is "exciting beyond telling" that God caused the Scriptures to be written, not just to inspire us, or comfort us, but to teach us.

She writes:

"[The Scriptures] are written for our learning (sic). There is something we need to learn, and the only place we can find the subject matter for that learning is in the Bible. We need to know the story, the story the Bible – and only the Bible – tells. The climax of the story is Jesus Christ...[and] you will never understand the answer to the question of who Jesus is unless you know the story the Bible tells."

In a nutshell, we believe that the Word of God in the Bible was uttered, edited and published in and by the Body of Christ at the instigation of the Holy Spirit – for the purpose of delivering to hope, assurance and learning. And not just a general hope, assurance or learning – but the kind which only comes from life in Christ Jesus.

Just as Christ has caused the Church to be His body, the Church believes God has caused the Bible to be, and that in our engagement with it, God will grant us the gift of hearing his Word – not only with our ears but with our minds and hearts. And the aim of all this is transformation into Christ. The purpose of all this is that we might 'put on Christ,' and live into fuller, deeper, truer lives.

We believe that in our reading of the Word of God in the Bible, the Holy Spirit will write this Word in our hearts, that in our active "marking and learning," in our searching the Scriptures, we will incorporate this Word into the very makeup of our selves, souls and bodies – just as food disintegrates and then becomes the body which consumes it. We believe that Christ wants this for us.

Dr. Ellen T. Charry is professor of systematic and historical theology at Princeton Theological Seminary, and an active Episcopal laywoman. Charry believes the first priority of Christians is to seek a living and active relationship with the God who transforms lives. She says this enterprise of inquiring after God, listening to God, and heeding God's call to transformation, is what the Bible is all about – and is how the Bible came to be in the first place. The Bible is the story about a people's journey into God which has itself become a journey into God. Charry writes, "The biblical documents were written to disclose to readers the God they discuss." She says, "the purpose of reading [the Bible] is to be enlarged, not simply informed."

The Rev. Greg Jones, rector of St. Michael's Church in Raliegh, North Carolina, blogs at fatherjones.com

I can explain why heaven makes no sense, why the most logical response to the human condition is despair, why the future that lies ahead of us is only chaotic and dark, why we—as individuals, as a species, as a planet—in fact have no future at all. I can explain why belief in heaven as afterlife or belief in heaven on earth is equally impossible, equally absurd. But eventually, and often when I least expect it, something in me rises up and declares: Nevertheless. Is it the Risen Christ? That’s what I would say. For when it comes, so does heaven—a glimpse of it, anyway, a chink in the wall, an echo in the ear. And hope becomes possible again, a hope as lovely and startling as the sight of Earth rising above the barren landscape of the moon.

From “When Heaven Happens” by Margaret Bullitt-Jonas, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

See, Christian soul, here is the strength of your salvation, here is the cause of your freedom, here is the price of your redemption. You were a bond-slave and by this man you are free. By him you are brought back from exile, lost, you are restored, dead, you are raised. Chew this, bite it, suck it, let your heart swallow it, when your mouth receives the body and blood of your redeemer. Make it in this life your daily bread, your food, your way-bread, for through this and not otherwise than through this will you remain in Christ and Christ in you, and your joy will be full.

Consider, O my soul, and hear, all that is within me, how much my whole being owes to him! Lord, because you have made me, I owe you the whole of my love; because you have redeemed me, I owe you the whole of myself; because you have promised so much, I owe you all my being.

From “Meditation on Human Redemption” by Anselm of Canterbury, in The Prayers and Meditations of St. Anselm, translated by Benedicta Ward (Penguin, 1973).

By Missy Morain

I tried to skip Lent this year. It wasn’t entirely intentional. There wasn’t any conscious thought to it. I went to the Ash Wednesday service, got my ashes, and even led the Litany of Penitence from the center aisle of the National Cathedral. Yet my head was never really in it and I let other aspects of my life take over. I never came up with something to give up or to add into my day. Somehow living 1,000 miles away from my brother using my teenage standby of “I will get along with my brother” didn’t seem heartfelt or appropriate. Little did I know that Lent would catch up with me.

On the Saturday before Palm Sunday I awoke to phone call from my father telling me that my grandfather had gone into a coma. Around dinner time my mother called to tell me that my grandfather had died. I wasn’t surprised by either phone call. My grandfather was 94 years old and nothing at that age is really unexpected. Unlike the death of Jesus, Papa’s was relatively painless and peaceful, surrounded by people who loved him.

Quickly the mechanics of gathering a large family from across the country began. Life took over again. The details of arranging plane tickets, delayed flights, planning work coverage, getting on a plane, seeing my brother and sisters all took over the space which I could have created to begin grieving, to begin feeling. Allowing me to put aside what my mind and body were telling me to pay attention to.

I arrived in Iowa and went through the motions, attending the visitation and the funeral, even reading part of the family written obituary. Hearing those around me crying yet unwilling to break that barrier myself until I returned to Washington, DC the day after the funeral. Something broke inside me and I finally began to cry. For me Lent had finally begun.

Easter Sunday came only four days after my grandfather’s funeral. I had every intention of going to Easter service but couldn’t walk in the door when the time came. I wasn’t ready for the resurrection. I wasn’t ready to celebrate and say “alleluia, Christ has risen”.

Funny thing about the resurrection is that much like Lent it comes regardless of whether I am ready for it or not. Life works in cycles much like that of the liturgical year. Birth and death and renewal occur whether I am paying attention to them or not. The liturgical calendar of the church helps me to remember this and to remember that there is a point where I will feel ready to celebrate the resurrection again. I might not be there quite yet, and that is just fine, but it gives me hope to know that I will be ready eventually. Ready to say “Good Papa Fred” and hello to the new life, to the resurrection that surrounds me.

Missy Morain is program coordinator at the Cathedral College at Washington National Cathedral. She blogs at Episcopal Princess.

By Jennifer McKenzie

“Open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold Him in all his redeeming work…” –Book of Common Prayer, pg. 224, Collect for “Third Sunday of Easter.”

Close your eyes. Just for a minute. What is it like to sit in that darkness? When I do this it’s not exactly total darkness that I experience. Sometimes there are these weird little flashes of light or color. I can usually sense contrast in my environment –where light is coming from, where the shadows are. But I can’t really see. I can only imagine what’s in front of me. I have to trust my intuition and my memory of my environment. I have to make decisions in my mind’s eye about where obstacles are and how to navigate to where I’m trying to go.

We’ve all had that experience, one way or another. You get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, curtains drawn and you leave the lights off so as not to disturb your partner. It’s a challenge, but not too much of one. After all, the terrain map is safely stored in your memory. You’ve inadvertently trained yourself by walking this way so many times before in the light. So what, it’s dark now. Big deal. You just use your hands to guide you – palms out, fingers pulled back slightly, shuffling slowly around trying not to bump into the doorframe…it’s an odd feeling of determined confidence under-girded by modest fear.

But there’s another version of this experience that we’ve probably all had, too. The one where you’re going along fine at first, only to discover that you are ever-so-slightly off course. You thought you were poised to walk right through the center of the open doorway when in fact your foot catches the nightstand and you realized in that instant of yelping expletives with your lips clamped tight that you were about a foot off course. Ouch! The problem with walking in the dark is that we can usually go along fine for a while – sometimes a good while – dependent on our own instincts and the path we’ve carved in our minds. So we deceive ourselves about how accurately we’re navigating our way, and suddenly we’re caught up short – we miss the mark.

The New Testament Book of Acts, Chapter 9 recounts the conversion of Saul, whom God renames Paul. St. Paul. Paul thinks he knows the way. He has that determined confidence that he is doing what is right in God’s sight. But ironically he is walking in spiritual darkness. And he’s been going down the wrong path long enough that he gets blinded by the light. God covers his eyes with scaly-somethings so that he must be still for three days in physical darkness. And there he sits in the “house of Judas” on the “road called Straight.” And while he has no vision, he has A Vision. A Vision of sight regained. A Vision of regained sight.

This Saul, who had been “breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord…who belonged to The Way” is a zealous lover of God and of God’s law. The problem was that he was blind to the fact that God could be doing a new thing. That just didn’t fit in with his religious worldview. But this Saul is the very one who founded new churches – communities of faith called ekklesia – all over the Mediterranean world, and risked his own life, several times over to do it. This Saul had his sight restored and a new vision grafted into his heart. This Saul, God said, “is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel.” It’s a wonderful thing, isn’t it, that while clearly God doesn’t always call the qualified, God is always able to qualify the called…and to open the eyes of our faith, so that we can see our lives anew.

The Rev. Jennifer McKenzie, assistant rector at St. David’s, in Washington, D. C., recently accepted a call to be associate rector for Evangelism, Mission/Outreach, and Adult Discipleship at Christ Church, Alexandria. She blogs at The Reverend Mother.

In the common way of looking at things heaven is a place you go after you die (if you’ve been good). And I suppose that overall this shorthand is true: when the physical body has dissolved, there is less to obscure what had really been there all along anyway.

But it is possible to encounter heaven earlier, while still in physical flesh, and to live in it—and from it—here and now. In fact, more than a few people think that’s exactly what Jesus meant by his term the kingdom of heaven: it’s this world seen through the eyes and heart of divine love. Or perhaps better, it’s the flood of transfiguring energy set loose in this world once the eyes of heaven have awakened.

So why not go for it now? For sure, this question stumped Jesus; you could even say it comprised the tragic miscalculation of his life. Why, when this angelically tinged “other” is as simple as opening the eyes of the heart here and now, why wouldn’t people immediately open their eyes and give thanks? Why does the good news tend to receive a rain check?
But the fact is, this other way of seeing requires a high level of spiritual attunement—to use the current buzzword, presence—far more so than is accustomed or perhaps comfortable in this life. “Those who are given liberty by Him to act freely are nailed on the earth; and those who are free to act as they choose on the earth will be nailed in the heavens,” an old Sufi proverb goes. One becomes a fastidious servant of the Now, not of daydreams and future options, and certainly not of one’s personal preferences and agendas. It’s a strange, Himalayan environment of the heart that seems out of tempo with most of what we usually call “getting the most out of life.” And so heaven can wait, as the old saying goes. It’s easier to get caught up in the enchantments and diversions of this existence. Drink it in for all it’s worth, then allow heaven to be “next,” once the veil has melted on its own.

From “Hobbling (Walking, Flapping) North” by Cynthia Bourgeault, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Image (detail) "I Will be What I Will Be" by Margaret McGee

What I have said so far suggests a provisional definition of the primary stage in preaching the resurrection as an invitation to recognize one’s victim as one’s hope. The crucified is God’s chosen: it is with the victim, the condemned, that God identifies, and it is in the company of the victim, so to speak, that God is to be found, and nowhere else. And this is not simply to say, in the fashionable phrase, that God makes his own the cause of the poor and despised. We are not talking of ‘the’ poor and despised, ‘the’ victim in the abstract. The preaching of the resurrection is not addressed to an abstract audience: the victim involved is the victim of the hearers. We are, insistently and relentlessly, in Jerusalem, confronted therefore with a victim who is our victim. When we make victims, when we embark on condemnation, exclusion, violence, the diminution or oppression of anyone, when we set ourselves up as judges, we are exposed to judgment, and we turn away from salvation. To hear the good news of salvation, to be converted, is to turn back to the condemned and rejected, acknowledging that there is hope nowhere else.

From Resurrection by Rowan Williams (Darton, Longman & Todd, 1982).

By Heidi Shott

Maybe most long-term relationships develop similar weirdnesses, I don’t know. But I do know that every few years my husband Scott latches onto a phase that he repeats several times a day for no discernable reason. In the late 1980s, when we first moved to Maine, he started waking me up by saying, “These are the things we’ve come to expect from you. These are the sorts of things.”

Throughout the middle years of the last decade, whenever he entered a room, I’d hear, “You don’t care. You don’t care. I know you don’t care.”

“You got that right, bud,” I’d say without looking up from my book.

A few months ago he invented a new line that I find entertaining.

Out of the blue he’ll catch my eye and say, “I know the truth about you.”

Now this is someone I met when I was a 17 year-old college freshman. He knows a lot about me, but despite all we’ve shared – twin sons, several house renovations, his middle-aged scooter obsession, those few bad months when he was senior warden and the person renting the rectory was keeping a secret flock of chickens, all this day-to-day life for more than two decades – he can’t begin to know the truth about me and he knows it. That’s why it’s funny. That and because we both know that the truth about me, known and unknown, is not outrageously exciting.

Last June at the Episcopal Church’s General Convention I found myself alone in a hotel elevator with Martyn Minns, the newest Virginia-based bishop in the Anglican Church of Nigeria. I could have asked him anything in this intimate space, (I am, after all, supposed to be a church journalist,) but what I heard my idiot-self say was, “I have a son named Martin.” Now this is indeed true, but who the hell cares? After a second, I caught myself and added wryly, “but we spell it the traditional way.”

So for a few moments before the elevator stopped for more passengers, we spoke about the return to old-fashioned names. He told me his children were naming his grandchildren names like, (let’s say, for example, because it’s slipped my mind,) Celia and Walter. He seemed bemused and slightly perplexed at this return to the old ways. Here was a man I’d read a lot about over the past few years standing right before me, but it occurred to me that there was no truth about him that I knew with any certainty. Nor did he know anything about me. The video piece I’d done the night before for the General Convention Nightly News about the newest split in the Episcopal Church – those who like jello dishes at potluck suppers and those who don’t – didn’t tell a fraction of the truth about my history or my life or my faith or what is dear to me. It merely suggested that one opinion I hold is that we Episcopalians take ourselves way too seriously.

I know the truth about you. When you come face-to-face with someone, when you look him in the eye, it is impossible to say with any certainty “I know you.” When we examine our burgeoning on-line culture of chatter with its easy, facile insta-response, we kid ourselves by assuming we can know anyone simply by what he or she writes on a given day in a given mood.

The saddest and most horrific example of this unknowability was made manifest on the Virginia Tech campus this week. Mental illness and a deep detachment may have made knowing the truth about Cho Seung-Hui impossible, but those who knew him as “the question mark kid” didn’t know him at all. And in my deepest heart, though I so wish it were different, I suspect I would have looked over him as well. When people are unappealing or difficult or somehow different, isn’t brushing past them the easiest way?

There is so much to know in this remarkable age. As I sit at my desk each day, my head reels at all the pieces I don’t have time to read thoroughly. Things I want to know as well as topics and ideas that pique the edges of my interest. How quickly my opinions are formed by the fleeting glance of this person’s response on this particular blog. How much I assume I know about people I know virtually nothing about.

As Christians this business of being deeply known and loved by God is at the core of our faith. Being completely known and loved anyway is what allows us to reach to those who may not be loveable or agreeable or fathomable in any way. The truth, Jesus assures us, will set us free. In the swirl of that kind of knowing and love we are free to be vulnerable, free to ask questions, free to place our lives in the hands of people we don’t entirely know…and will never fully know. That kind of vulnerability and self-revelation is hard enough to do with those we draw deeply into our daily lives. How much harder to know and be known by the people at our margins.

“I know the truth about you,” my husband says to me this morning as he knots his tie at the foot of our bed. “You are a slug.” It’s true. It’s school vacation week. I’ll get to work when I get to work. But because he has nailed me, I resent him. From the middle of the bed I grab the big body pillow he sleeps with to keep his shoulder from becoming stiff – the pillow he’s named Evangeline after the actress who plays Kate on the TV show Lost – and chuck her onto the floor.

“Ha,” I say.

He looks aghast, but recovers quickly. “These are the things we’ve come to expect. These are the sorts of things.”

Heidi Shott, press officer for the Diocese of Maine, is communications director of the Genesis Community Loan Fund. She keeps the blog Heidoville.

Evangelion (that we call the gospel) is a Greek word, and signifieth good, merry, glad and joyful tidings, that maketh a man’s heart glad, and maketh him sing, dance and leap for joy. This Evangelion or gospel (that is to say, such joyful tidings) is called the New Testament; because that as a man, when he shall die, appointeth his goods to be dealt and distributed after his death among them which he nameth to be his heirs; even so Christ before his death commanded and appointed that such Evangelion, gospel, or tidings should be declared throughout all the world, and therewith to give unto all that repent, and believe, all his goods: that is to say, his life, wherewith he swallowed and devoured up death; his righteousness, wherewith he banished sin; his salvation, wherewith he overcame eternal damnation. Now can the wretched man hear no more joyous a thing, than such glad and comfortable tidings of Christ; so that he cannot but be glad, and laugh from the low bottom of his heart, if he believe that the tidings are true.

From “A Pathway into Holy Scripture” by William Tyndale, in The Work of William Tyndale, edited by G. E. Duffield (Sutton Courtenay Press, 1964).

By Derek Olsen

The Daily Office, the Liturgy of the Hours, Morning and Evening Prayer—call them what you may, but these liturgies to me are at the heart of the Anglican way. I’ve watched commentators wrangle for months and years now on what a real Anglican is. I’ve seen arguments based on doctrine, arguments based on polity, arguments based on breadth. I have no idea who has the right of it—but I do know that I don’t trust any definition that does not make its way through these liturgies, the liturgies that have been the daily bread of Anglicans since Thomas Cranmer’s first Book of Common Prayer in 1549.

In a pattern both catholic and evangelical, the reforming archbishop produced two services of liturgical prayer that were, basically—unoriginal. And that was and is their genius. Cranmer’s work is not his own intellectual labor but, rather, the product of centuries of Christian prayer and reflection, formulated by a sixth century Italian monastic here, explicated by an eight-century English deacon there, simplified by a fifteenth century Spanish cardinal, and—finally—translated by a sixteenth century archbishop. But the story doesn’t consist only of these, of course. For through all of these moments sound the countless tongues of countless saints who have murmured, sung, and wept these words. No, the story of these liturgies encompasses all of us who have prayed, who have felt, who have been shaped by their words, their concepts, their cadences.

The soul of the Daily Office is repetition, of living a pattern. It’s a pattern written upon a year, Christ’s year, that draws us into his journey from cradle to crowds to cross that leads us beyond a span of years in Galilee to encompass the all, from creation to new creation. In this repetition and rhythm, two elements circumscribe the center: the songs of Scripture—the psalms and canticles. The psalms wheel around us in cycles of months—following Cranmer’s 30 day calendar still found in our Psalter today—or in the seven or so weeks of our current daily lectionary. But what mark our days, what come without fail as the sun meets each horizon are the canticles. These are the words that shape us; these are the words that form us into their ways. These are the words without which, cries of “true Anglican” ring hollow—to my ears, at least.

The canticles that cleave close to the heart of the Hours are four: the Benedictus, the Magnificat, the Nunc Dimittis, and the Te Deum. The first three are directly from the words of Scripture, from the opening pages of Luke’s gospel; the fourth, a creedal hymn of the early church. The first three function like overtures to Luke’s gospel—they introduce the themes that will be spun out in the two-volume story of Jesus and the spread of faith in his name across the known world. In common they recall the past history of saving deeds that God performed for the Children of Israel. They focus on the promise of redemption that God has reiterated time and again through the covenants and prophets. And, ultimately, they point to the fulfillment of these saving acts, of the promised redemption, in the person of Jesus—the babe of the manger, Mary’s boy, the true God in our own flesh. As we read and sing these canticles they draw us into their act of praise: we recall the doings of God that are wondrous in our sight, we experience the pregnant pause as we await the final fulfillment of God’s promises while we yet rejoice in the power of the Spirit.

While the songs from Luke hold these themes in common, each one speaks a powerful word of challenge, reflecting variously on the manifold meanings of what God in Christ is doing for us—and to us. The Benedictus, the Song of Zechariah, sung by the rejoicing hierarch of Israel underscores the priestly role of all of God’s people. The aim of God’s promise here is safety that the people may—with heart, mind, soul, and strength—worship God in holiness and righteousness. In the words sung to his new-born son we overhear the call to proclaim the redemptive message of Christ to all who sit in darkness, to all who inhabit the shadow of death. In the Magnificat or Song of Mary, the expectant mother consciously recalls the Old Testament Song of Hannah—the words of an earlier mother whose son would hear and obey the words of God, a promise of the Child who was to come. The expectant Mary exults in the radical reversals of God and the words of her song foreshadow and frame the opening words of Christ’s own great sermon in Luke, the Sermon on the Plain. With the Blessed Virgin we contemplate the chaos of God’s expectant order, paradoxes achieved preeminently by He who conquers glorious in a shameful death upon a cross. The Nunc Dimittis, the Song of Simeon, finds the aged friend of God holding in his hands the Light of the Ages, embracing his mortal end confident that he goes not into darkness and shade—for he has beheld the new dawn within the child in his arms. With him we consider our own mortality and the mystery of life in Christ, the promised rest for a pilgrim people.

Truly, if these don’t challenge you, if these don’t push you—you just ain’t paying attention…

Alongside these, the Te Deum renders the creeds in song, calling us to join with the whole host of heaven, the whole company of faithful people, the whole created order in a life ringing—and ringed—with praise. The ancient mysteries of faith: Christ incarnate; Christ crucified; Christ risen and ascended; He before whom all the trees of the wood will clap their hands, all the rivers roar, when he comes again to judge with truth and equity; these are recounted and hymned, both proclaimed for our edification and praised for the glory of God. The canticle dances with Scripture, now lighting on Isaiah, now touching on Paul, the Psalter sounding in our ears all the while, until—at the last—it culminates in a plea. We know the promises. We have sung the promises. Now—by the mercy of Christ—may we claim the promises and share in a life hid in God.

These are the words that circumscribe the Anglican heart. These are the promises that bound and ground our hope and faith. Words of Scripture, words of song, these are the words that lead us into the mind of Christ.

Derek Olsen is a database programmer and adjunct professor at Emory University's Candler School of Theology. He keeps the blog Haligweorc.

For audio visual meditations on the Magnificat and Nunc Dimitis, visit the meditations page and click on Canticle 15: The Song of Mary and Candlemas, respectively.

We spent the afternoon like that, the three of us. Vincent and I changed places at [my mother’s] bedside. We sponged her mouth. I watched her eyes. I held her hand. Her face was smooth. Her eyes were like the eyes of a child or a delicate bird. A creature. Curious, delighted. She was, we were, there is no other word for it, changed.

How is it that things fall away? The hours of that afternoon were like a wave set off by a stone dropping into a pool of water; the ripples reverberated backward through her life. The past is not what we think it is. It is not written in stone after all, but can be washed over and through by the present’s events.

I felt I understood a part of the resurrection. Jesus rode a wave backward into time and human history and redeemed events, that is, stole them back from chaos and destruction. He walked among the dead and woke them up with the power of the same thing that stood with us that afternoon. In the mind of God, there is no past or present and nothing ever dies.

That afternoon, whatever we had done together in our lives, or failed to do, the fragments of love in all three of us were gathered up so that they coalesced to the point of profound connection. We crossed over, my mother leading the way. It was as if a door had opened into heaven, allowing heaven in. In my Father’s house are many mansions. It matters that it was only a fraction of a long life, a few hours at the end of eighty-eight years, but it was, for then, and for now, enough.

From “Her Last Hours” by Nora Gallagher, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Of course the Church is conservative for it has so much to conserve. But let it conserve a vision of the world’s destiny and not the structures of the world’s past. Let the Church in remembering Christ remember that it is conserving the most uprooting, the most revolutionary force in all human history. For it was Christ who crossed every boundary, broke down every barrier. He crossed the boundaries of class by eating with the outcasts. He crossed the boundary of nations by pointing to a Samaritan as the agent of God’s will. He transgressed religious boundaries by claiming that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. Everywhere he manifested his freedom and called others to theirs, calling them forth from family, national, and religious loyalty to the world at large. If ever there was a man who trusted his origins and had the courage to emerge from them, it was Christ.

From Credo by William Sloane Coffin (Westminster-John Knox Press, 2004).

Love for God cannot be separated from love of neighbor. Jesus calls us to love God through our neighbor—by visiting prisoners, by hospitality to strangers, by actions that ostensibly give us no reward at the end of a long day’s work. Jesus seems idealistic at best. When we look around and see others prospering through violence or greed, most of us pay little attention to God’s love. How can we? After all, we live in a “real” world in which survival is paramount. Work with prisoners or those on death row may be typical of God’s kind of love, which gravitates toward generosity and gift, but not for our kind of love that is seeking to survive in a violent world. Jesus knows our dilemma, but he does not let us off the hook. He still requires us to channel God’s infinite generosity. Just as we cannot love God without loving our neighbor, we cannot worship in a church building without also ministering in a jail, hospital, or school.

God’s love always points toward the capacity to love outside of self-interest. When it came to heaven, Jesus was no realist—if by realism we mean self-interest. This was his genius. Perhaps the greatest lesson in this for us is to learn that we must prepare to love as God loves—through random acts of kindness. We prepare through our daily prayers. We prepare through the butterflies in our stomach when we make our first volunteer visit in a jail. This kind of preparation hones our skills of navigation as we make our way toward heaven—toward the real heaven, not just our own narcissistic version of heaven. We must practice heaven. In so doing, we catch glimpses of God’s idea of what’s real because we are increasing our attention span to see beyond the ordinary.

From “A Strange Route to Heaven” by Michael Battle, in Heaven, edited by Roger Ferlo. A Seabury Book from Church Publishing. Copyright © 2007. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

By John B. Chilton

The second use of this catechism is to provide a brief summary of the Church's teaching for an inquiring stranger who picks up a Prayer Book.

-Book of Common Prayer, page 845

The Episcopal Church today is racked by divisions over sexual morality and the true interpretation of the Scriptures. Anyone who follows the news could not be blamed for concluding we are more about internal power and politics than outward mission and ministry. The Episcopal Church welcomes you, but who would want to visit?

And yet should an inquiring stranger drop in for a visit and pick up a Prayer Book they may stumble on the place to begin to appreciate us, our catechism. It is a remarkably clear-eyed and cogent outline of our faith, and sustains my trust that, with God’s help, Episcopalians are capable of discovering and teaching truth.

What does the catechism have to do with homosexuality or interpretation of scripture? Bluntly, what does it say about sin? It is not by chance that the catechism opens with the topic of our human nature:

Q. What are we by nature?
A. We are part of God's creation, made in the image of God.
Q. What does it mean to be created in the image of God?
A. It means that we are free to make choices: to love, to create, to reason, and to live in harmony with creation and with God.
Q. Why then do we live apart from God and out of harmony with creation?
A. From the beginning, human beings have misused their freedom and made wrong choices.
Q. Why do we not use our freedom as we should?
A. Because we rebel against God, and we put ourselves in the place of God.

We are endowed with freedom of choice; our actions cannot be excused as being predetermined by our nurture or nature. The question is what choices are wrong and separate us from God.

Several pages on, we arrive at the first explicit mention of sin:

Q. What is the purpose of the Ten Commandments?
A. The Ten Commandments were given to define our relationship with God and our neighbors.
Q. Since we do not fully obey them, are they useful at all?
A. Since we do not fully obey them, we see more clearly our sin and our need for redemption.
Q. What is sin?
A. Sin is the seeking of our own will instead of the will of God, thus distorting our relationship with God, with other people, and with all creation.

Being human we like to see rules and regulations listed – the more easily to find the loopholes, beat the system, and yet come out righteous. In the gospels the Pharisees serve as foils for Jesus. The Pharisees seek to catch him out on technicalities in the law. He responds with the offer of a relationship with God. We are offered not the security of a checklist of dos and don’ts to get right with God, but the challenge to believe, to stake our life, on a relationship with God.

Q. What is the New Covenant?
A. The New Covenant is the new relationship with God given by Jesus Christ, the Messiah, to the apostles; and, through them, to all who believe in him.
Q. What did the Messiah promise in the New Covenant?
A. Christ promised to bring us into the kingdom of God and give life in all its fullness.
Q. What response did Christ require?
A. Christ commanded us to believe in him and to keep his commandments.
Q. What are the commandments taught by Christ?
A. Christ taught us the Summary of the Law and gave us the New Commandment.
Q. What is the Summary of the Law?
A. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Q. What is the New Commandment?
A. The New Commandment is that we love one another as Christ loved us.

Regarding scripture the catechism says in part:

Q. Why do we call the Holy Scriptures the Word of God?
A. We call them the Word of God because God inspired their human authors and because God still speaks to us through the Bible.
Q. How do we understand the meaning of the Bible?
A. We understand the meaning of the Bible by the help of the Holy Spirit, who guides the Church in the true interpretation of the Scriptures.

Indeed. God does not stop speaking to the Church through scripture. The only question is, are we listening, and, with the help of the Holy Spirit, seeking true interpretation of the Scriptures.

In a recent interview, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori expressed the belief that it is our vocation “to keep questions of human sexuality in conversation, and before not just the rest of our own church, but the rest of the world.” Can it be that in God’s grace we are ready to come to a new teaching on homosexuality? To be unafraid to entertain doubts about existing doctrine? To ask the question, is there anything about homosexuality that is per se a misuse of freedom and a wrong choice? To ask the question, are our beliefs about homosexuality driven by unfounded fears, and a failure to live in love and charity with our neighbors?

To inquiring strangers and cradle Episcopalians, I ask you not to concentrate on my words, but to go and savor the inspired words of the Episcopal Catechism. The full text is available at a pew near you. See also the online sources of the Book of Common Prayer provided here.

Dr. John B. Chilton is an economist at the American University of Sharjah (United Arab Emirates) specializing in applied game theory. He keeps the blog New Virginia Church Man.

Daily Reading, April 30

It is essential to remember that for a Christian “the word of the Cross” is nothing theoretical, but a stark and existential union with Christ in his death in order to share in his resurrection. To fully “hear” and “receive” the word of the Cross means much more than simple assent to the dogmatic propositions that Christ died for our sins. It means to be “nailed to the Cross with Christ,” so that the ego-self is no longer the principle of our deepest actions, which now proceed from Christ living in us: “I live, now not I, but Christ lives in me” (Gal. 2:19-20). To receive the word of the Cross means the acceptance of a complete self-emptying, a kenosis, in union with the self-emptying of Christ “obedient unto death” (Phil. 2:5-11). It is essential to true Christianity that this experience of the Cross and of self-emptying be central in the life of the Christian so that he may fully receive the Holy Spirit and know (again by experience) all the riches of God in and through Christ.

From Zen and the Birds of Appetite by Thomas Merton, quoted in Wisdom of the Cloister, edited by John Skinner (Image Books, 1999).

By Micah Jackson

There’s a new show on VH1. It’s called Acceptable.TV. Have you seen it? If not, the premise is this—each week the show presents five allegedly comedic sketches. When the show is over, fans go to the website and vote for their favorites. The top two “pilots” are “renewed” for the next week and receive new episodes. The others are “cancelled” by the host and “producer,” Jack Black, and are replaced with new contenders. Professional staff writers develop some of the new sketches, and fans contribute others. Either way, it had better work for the audience, or it’ll never see another week.

It’s a very common gimmick for television these days. Survivor and American Idol all use a similar method of slowly eliminating competitors until the winner is revealed. The rise of YouTube and its ilk are giving ordinary creative people a way to reach an audience much larger than the crowd at the corner bar. The truth is that whereas “user generated content” and “fan voting” seem new, they are not. In reality, this is the way that our church has developed its liturgy since the beginning. Episcopal liturgy is truly leitourgia, the work of the people.

The 1789 Book of Common Prayer came about in response to the pastoral needs of Anglicans in the brand-new United States of America. Prayers for the King needed to go, that was obvious. “But since we’re revising the book anyway,” they must have thought, “let’s find out what else isn’t working for us?” When they were done, the Preface of the BCP put it this way, “It is a most invaluable part of that blessed ‘liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free,’ that in his worship different forms and usages may without offence be allowed, provided the substance of the Faith be kept entire.”

Ever since then, the users of the BCP have controlled its content. Changing the rites is not an easy or quick process, to be sure. After all, our worship shouldn’t be blown around by every wind of popularity. But it is true that when it becomes clear that old rites are no longer working, or that new rites are needed to express our intercessions and thanksgivings, we can revise or create them. In this way we fulfill Christ’s instruction, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.” (Matthew 13:52)

For example, as a pastoral response to the influenza epidemics of the early 20th Century, and the dramatic rise in childhood death that accompanied them, the 1928 BCP introduced special rites to be followed “At the Burial of a Child.” These concerns were not so pressing during revisions for the 1979 BCP, and the special rites for children’s funerals were left out. However, many people felt that the issues surrounding the death of a child required a particular response from the Church, different than that for someone who had lived a long and full life. Enriching Our Worship 2 re-introduced this rite in response to this pastoral need. Looking forward, the Standing Committee on Liturgy and Music has again responded to a sad contemporary reality by proposing special prayers “For a Child who Dies by Violence.” Our Church has always, and must always, be aware of the pastoral needs of its members and respond to them by authorizing rites and prayers which can carry our joys and concerns to our God.

In its concluding words, the Preface to the 1789 BCP says, “And now, this important work being brought to a conclusion, it is hoped the whole will be received and examined by every true member of our Church, and every sincere Christian, with a meek, candid, and charitable frame of mind; without prejudice and prepossessions; seriously considering what Christianity is, and what the truths of the Gospel are; and earnestly beseeching Almighty God to accompany with his blessing every endeavour for promulgating them to mankind in the clearest, plainest, most affecting and majestic manner, for the sake of Jesus Christ, our blessed Lord and Savior.”

More than 200 years before reality television, the revisers of the first American BCP set out the rules for evaluating new liturgies. Since then, we’ve used this method to evaluate liturgies and prayers written by professional liturgists and other Episcopalians. How can we do any less in these days?

The Rev. Micah Jackson is doctoral student in Homiletics at the Graduate Theological Union. His personal blog is St. Jerome's Library