This month at Journey with Jesus

At Journey with Jesus, Daniel B. Clendenin publishes "The Journey Without, The Journey Within: Ignorance, Inclusion, and Impotence," a commentary on the lectionary readings for Sunday June 8, 2008. Take a look at the essay; it explores one of the most salient texts in the Bible, Genesis 12 and the call of Abraham.

At Journey with Jesus this week Dave Werther considers "The Swell Season," featuring Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova from the Irish film Once. And Clendenin reviews "For the Bible Tells Me So," a documentary about five Christian families whose children came out as gay. See what you think. He also takes a look at The Elephant and the Dragon (2007), a book about the rise of India and China. His series of poems by Wendell Berry continues with "Sabbath Poem VII."

For the Sundays in June, Clendenin announces the following essay titles:

June 15: Sarah: God Gave Me Laughter

June 22: The Crisis in Burma, by physicist Brad Keister

June 29: A Father Sacrifices His Son; A God Tests His Disciple (Genesis 22)

Image: Paradise with Christ in the lap of Abraham,13th century Germany.

Back from Iona

Although the six of us--Carol and Bob Rogow, Claudia and Harry Smiley, and June and I--got back to the States on Thursday, it's only now that I've really had the open time to let you know that God blessed our trip to Iona so that it's memory now lies deep within us with thanksgiving. As we get to see most of you personally sometime this summer, we'll share our stories, especially about the people of Ireland and Scotland, and notably about Iona itself. I will be taking a bus back to Richmond, Kentucky, on Wednesday while June stays in Georgia. When I'm back in my study and can work comfortably with a better computer, I'll post a few of my favorite photos and tell you more about the trip. While Ireland and Scotland are beautiful in many places, it's truly good to be back home again.

See you in two weeks!

As soon as we return from Ireland and Scotland, I'll post a few pictures, especially those I hope to take while on the Isle of Iona. In the meantime, for your lectio, some words for Henri Nouwen:

Are you in love with Jesus? Do you know the incarnate God? In our world of loneliness and despair, there is an enormous need for men and women who know the heart of God, a heart that forgives, that cares, that reaches out and wants to heal.

On Pilgrimage in Ireland and Scotland

June and I will be in pilgrimage in Ireland and Scotland from May 11 until May 23. We're going with two other couples: Claudia and Harry Smiley, Carol and Robert Rogow. After flying to Dublin, we're driving up the east coast, bed and breakfasting along the way, for a few days so that eventually we can cross the Irish Sea by ferry and head up to and through Glasgow, Scotland. The high and outer-most point of our journey will be the Isle of Iona, the ancient "thin place" of Celtic Christianity, where we'll stay for two nights. A good bit of our time will be spent in and around the Abbey where we'll have opportunities to pray and participate in the Sunday liturgy. Please remember us in your prayers, asking that we have a safe and Spirit-filled pilgrimage. When we return, I'll do my best to share all that the Lord will have given to us during our journey.

Image: Inside the Abbey Church by Roger Wilco

May 8: Dame Julian of Norwich, Contemplative

This morning June and I attended the Eucharist at The Church of the Good Shepherd in Covington, Georgia. As we entered the sanctuary, Fr. Tim Graham handed us this information about Dame Julian of Norwich, whose commemoration is May 8 (and was transferred to our mid-Week Holy Communion, as is often the practice among many parishes). For more information about this remarkable woman, visit The Order of Julian of Norwich.

Lord God, who in your compassion granted to the Lady Julian many revelations of your nurturing and sustaining love: Move our hearts, like hers, to seek you above all things, for in giving us yourself you give us all; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Image Source

May 19 June 16: Lectio Divina: An Online Retreat and Practice Group

Yesterday I received the following announcement from Jan Carter, who provides leadership for a weekly Centering Prayer meeting in Lexington:

The ancient practice of praying the Scriptures is being rediscovered and renewed in our time. Known as Lectio Divina (Divine Reading), it is one of the great treasures of the Christian tradition of prayer. Contemplative Outreach is
pleased to partner with Spirituality & Practice to make this teaching more accessible through an online retreat format.

Lectio Divina flows out of the Hebrew method of studying the Scriptures which is called haggadah, learning by the heart. Haggadah was an interactive interpretation of the Scriptures by means of the free use of the text to explore its inner meaning. This online retreat will present the Christian version of this spiritual practice working with passages from the Bible. However, the method of divine reading can be used with any sacred text, so people of all traditions are invited to join us.

Lectio Divina online retreat and Practice Group will run from May 19 - June 16, 2008. This course is based on the Contemplative Outreach Lectio Divina introductory workshop. P articipants will receive a weekly email with step-by-step instructions in the Lectio Divina method. Two other weekly emails will provide answers to your questions and links to audio programs with commentary on this classic practice.

Replicating what you might experience during a face-to-face retreat, you will have access to a private Practice Circle at SpiritualityandPractice.com where mentors from Contemplative Outreach will provide further guidance and support. Here you'll have an opportunity to report on your experiences with this practice and learn from others working with it. The Practice Circle will be available for an additional month for further sharing as you incorporate Lectio Divina into your daily life.

The fee for participation in this online retreat and Practice Group is $39.95. To sign up, go to Spirituality and Practice: E-courses.

If you have any questions, please email Spirituality and Practice: E-courses.

If you in the least bit interested, I urge you to participate in this e-course.

Photograph: courtesy of W.T. Bryant

Bringing to Your Attention a New Blog

In our daily prayers we all pause, perhaps spending considerable time, to remember the needs of others and making intercessory prayer on behalf of those who have asked us to pray for them and/or who need our prayers. For the past several weeks some friends and I have been talking about the possibility of creating a small ecumenical group of Christians who might wish to learn more about non-violent Christianity, how we might both pray for and promote justice (so prominent a prayer in the Psalms), and how we might concretely help to feed the hungry and poor (again, so prominent in the Psalms). Right now we are in the early stages of thinking how we might gather together interested Christians. We're reading and studying; we're praying for the Holy Spirit's guidance and for discernment. As a "background" resource, I've created a blog which may interest you: Peaceful Christians, Promoting Justice, Providing Food, Protecting Environments. Might you take a look at it. Perhaps it may be something of a series of prayer concerns that you and I will want to incorporate into our daily prayers on a regular basis. And perhaps we may find some linkages that might connect the two groups. Think about; pray about it. I'll put a link on our blog here to the new blog: Peaceful Christians, Promoting Justice, Providing Food.

Making Intercessions for Sandy and Toby

This afternoon I receive an email from a friend who has written to a number of Christian friends in Richmond, asking for prayers on behalf of her friends. Here is a lightly edited copy of the email I received:

My husband is at the UK hospital right now, sitting with a friend whose wife was flown in last night, suffering from a brain aneurysm. She is in surgery right now, they give her a 50/50 chance of survival, with lots of terrible possibilities in the event she does survive (paralysis, brain damage, etc.) We all know people like Toby and Sandy . . . and they are very dear to us and especially to my husband. Any
prayers you wish to raise for Sandy, Toby, their family and the doctors, and
in particular for patience, understanding and acceptance would, I know, be most appreciated. Thanks.

In your daily prayers please offer intercessions for Sandy, Toby, their family, and the doctors. I will circumspectly keep you informed about those for whom we are praying.

Preparing for the Feast of Pentecost (May 11)

This evening I received this message from Daniel B. Clendinen:

May 11 is Pentecost, the perfect week to announce that we've just added translation of our webzine into four new languages---Dutch, Greek, Hindi, and simplified Chinese. We now offer Journey with Jesus in 14 languages; check out the country flags on our navigation bar.

For Pentecost we've posted the poem "O Comforting Fire of Spirit" by Hildegard of Bingen (1098–1179). David Werther has a new music review. Richie Furay's "The Heartbeat of Love" (2007) will take you straight back to Buffalo Springfield and Poco.

I review Ron Sider's new book The Scandal of Evangelical Politics (2008), and the powerful film There Will Bloood. My essay for May 11 is called "From the inspiration of the Spirit to the Institution of the Church." Pentecost grace, peace, and joy to each and every reader.

Take a look at Clendinen's thoughtful essay as you prepare yourself for this coming Sunday's worship. And enjoy the beautiful icons he includes as the sacred images accompanying the essay.

Image Source

This Week and Clendinen's Journey with Jesus

I was unaware, as perhaps you are, that at the beginning of May the world is commemorating the genocide of six million Jews in the Holocaust by observing Yom Hashoah — Holocaust Remembrance Day. For this reason, in his commemtary for this coming Sunday's worship and prayer Daniel B. Clendenin writes not so much on the lectionary readings as on how we might remember the Holocaust and with Amartya Sen commit ourselves to three ways by which we oppose violence "caused by the illusion of identity."

May 2: Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, Theologian, Doctor

On May 2 we remember one of the giants in the Faith: St. Athanasius. According to Lesser Feasts and Fasts, "rarely in the history of the Church has the course of its development been more significantly determined by one person than it was by Athanasius in the fourth century" (248). Whenever we say the Nicene Creed and confess that "we believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father," we owe, in large measure, that orthodox articulation of our Faith to St. Athanasius.

In the fourth century, Athanasius, often as a minority spokesman, spoke out vigorously against the heretical views of Arius. Yes, it's true, as Sam Portaro notes, "Arius was partially right; most heretics are. Jesus was a man, a mere mortal" (Brightest and Best: A Companion to the Lesser Feasts and Fasts, 83). Indeed, our Lord was fully human; he spent nine months in the womb of Mary, he went to school to learn how to read, he ate passover meals and drank passover wine, he wept, slept, worked in a carpenter shop, took boat rides, read Scriptures, spoke out against hypocrisy and misdirected piety, upset temple tables, lived a life of celibacy and poverty, announced the arrival of the Reign of God, and eventually died as a common criminal. But at the same time, without denying any of his manliness and humanity, Jesus was fully divine. As the eternal Word of God, Jesus created and still creates the world, loved Abraham, journeyed with the people of Israel, stilled a wild sea storm, turned water into wine, miraculously multiplied food, brought the dead back to life, healed lepers, and absolutely forgave and forgives sin. As Robert Capon in The Fingerprints of God rightly tells us, "His Godhead was 100 percent God, without a scrap of humanity in it; and his humanity was 100 percent human, without a scrap of Deity in it. Each was utterly true to its own nature, completely itself and none other; and yet each was perfectly one with the other in the Person of the Word of God" (106). We owe a great debt of theological gratitude to Athanasius for helping the Church preserve and live by that Mystery, the Incarnation. Like C. S. Lewis, you may enjoy (as several of us have during the past month) one of Athanasius most popular writings, On the Incarnation.

Uphold your Church, O God of truth, as you upheld your servant Athanasius, to maintain and proclaim boldly the catholic faith against all opposition, trusting solely in the grace of your eternal Word, who took upon himself our humanity that we might share his divinity; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

May 1: The Feast of the Ascension

Since my May parish newsletter did not arrive in the mail this week, this afternoon I stopped by my church in Lexington to ask if there might be an service tomorrow evening on Ascension Day, May 1. The parish secretary told me (with some sadness in her voice), "No, we used to have one, but not many people showed up, and we no longer have a service of worship on Ascension Day." Although I was disappointed to hear that not-so-good news, I was not surprised. The Feast of the Ascension is a celebration which, always falling on a Thursday, is slowly disappearing from the worship life of many congregations. We keep saying in the Creed that "He ascended into heaven," but we no longer regard that great event as important as the Incarnation, the Passion of Our Lord, and His Resurrection.

That doesn't mean, however, that in our daily prayers we too may forget that forty days after His Resurrection, Our Lord Jesus returned to His Father eternally so that he might live fully everywhere in His Church. To celebrate His return, this evening and tomorrow many Christians turn their thoughts to our Lord’s ascension and what it means to the Church, to the world, and to one personally. In his Letters and Papers from Prison, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “Today is Ascension Day, and that means that it is a day of great joy for all who can believe that Christ rules the world and our lives.”


Several years ago M. Basil Pennington, a Cistercian monk and one-time abbot visited me in Massachusetts and gave me, after a nearly day-long talk on the porch, a strong five-minute blessing with his big hands solidly on my head. His journals from trips to the Holy Land have just been published. After visiting the spot on Mount Olivet where Jesus is said to have ascended, Basil wrote:

It is good that Jesus ascended. His mission was complete. He gave us all. He deserves to sit on the right hand of the Father in glory. The reality of his Ascension gives us the courage to transcend ourselves and open us to divine contemplation. In Christ’s going ahead, we are assured that there is heaven for all of us humans, there is intimacy and at-homeness with the divine.

Basil’s right. Any desire for Jesus to live in a certain place with a single address is much like that desire of Peter, James, and John to domesticate the Transfiguration. But Jesus would have none of that so that "we can transcend ourselves."

The Ascension tells us that Jesus presents himself to us all at once in a multitude of ways: when we read and hear the Gospel, when we table with Him in our homes and churches, when we meet children, when we visit prisoners, when we put diapers on babies, dresses on women, and coats on men, when we stand for justice, when we work for peace, when we serve the poor, when we reach out to our enemies, when two or three of us come together and name Him. In other words: when we love one another.

And then there's this which Mark Harris announces: "The ascension proposes that Jesus Christ has taken a place above all the principalities and powers in the world. He has become that to which we turn in order to find meaning and fulfillment in living." In this sense the ascension is a key doctrine in these latter days. It is not one that super-patriots of any stripe, those who place their loyalties to nation about that of Christ, will like very much. If we turn to Paul, we see that he speaks of the "spirit of wisdom" by which to discern these things. If we use that spirit, we'll be led to proclaim Christ's absolute rule--not as king, but as one who feeds and sustains. Giving all other powers their due and their respect, in the final analysis we Christians cannot totally and without reservations embrace the flag, support the government, or pledge allegiance to the country for which they stand. Rather we end up having to say with Paul that Christ Jesus is "far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come." Perhaps the visual notion of the ascension is the movement of the Christ to the place at the head of the table as our great high priest, the head of the true state that is the Church, the Body of Christ of which Christians are all parts.

Image source: Ascension

April 29: Catherine of Siena, Teacher, 1380

On Tuesday, we remember and give thanks to God for the life and witness of St. Catherine of Siena, a remarkable woman. Pope Pius II canonized Catherine in 1461. Her feast day is April 29 in the new Roman calendar and April 30 in the traditional Roman calendar. This date is observed by various Christians including Anglicans and Lutherans. Pope Paul VI bestowed on her in 1970 the title of Doctor of the Church - making her the first woman, along with Saint Teresa of Ávila, ever to receive this honor. In 1999 Pope John Paul II made her one of Europe's patron saints. Saint Catherine is also the patroness of the historically Catholic American sorority, Theta Phi Alpha.

Everlasting God, who so kindled the flame of holy love in the Heart of blessed Catherine of Siena, as she meditated on the passion of your Son our Savior, that she devoted her life to the poor and the sick, and to the peace and unity of the Church: Grant that we also may share in the mystery of Christ's death, and rejoice in the revelation of His Glory, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Rogation Days

The calendar in my prayerbook tells me that April 28, 29, and 30 (that is, today, tomorrow, and Wednesday) are Rogation Days. And here's what the note on the backside of the calendar's April page tells me about Rogation Days:

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday before thie festival of the Ascension of Our Lord have long been observed as days of prayer for the fruits of the earth and have been more recently expanded to include prayer for human labor and for peace. Congregations may observe the Rogation Days on these days or, preferably, on days days closer to seed time in their areas. The traditional observance consists of Holy Communion preceded by an outdoor procession. This procession may take place at the fields and other locations where labor is perfomed or out of doors on teh church grounds. At various stoppoing point or "stations,"
appropriate Scripture lessons and prayers may be read. Hymns may be sung during the procession. The Litany is begun as the procession enters the church. Petitions concerning the care and fruitfulness of the earth may be inserted into the Litany following the final set of petitions with the response "We implore you to hear us, good Lord." After the Kyries which conclude the Litany, a prayer for the Stewardship of Creation is said as the Prayer/Collect of the Day.

Now, to be quite honest, I have never participated in a Rogation Day Eucharist with Litany, but I'd surely like to, especially with a bunch of farmers, field laborers, gardeners, nursery workers, and anyone who likes to get his or hands soiled up from planting seeds and flowers. From what I know, it's still done in and around country parishes, especially in the mid-West. If anyone knows of a parish observing a Rogation Day in the area, let me know. For now, however, June and I will most likely go out by the garden one evening early this week and say evening prayers with special thanksgiving for God's gift of plants and trees around the house.

Here's a particularly fitting prayer for your Rogation Day; I found it at the conclusion of an exceptionally fine homily, "An Earth Day Sermon," by Steven Whitney, an Anglican professional environmentalist:

Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to reflect on your creation, your covenant with all living things, and our obligation to be good stewards of the gifts you have provided. Help us to understand that each of us has an important role in Caring for Creation, by the choices we make and by the actions we take. Give us the wisdom to choose thoughtfully, and to act with care, in accordance with your will, and your love of this good Earth, our island home.

It's Still Eastertide!

Running my fingers across the calendar days of Eastertide (fifty in all, until we come to the Vigil of Pentecost on May 10th), I calculate that we're now thirty-five days into the Season of the Resurrection, still singing our Alleluias "for the Lord is risen indeed!" Lest anyone tend to disremember, here are two memorable celebrations of the Resurrection joy that I found on YouTube. The first is the Vigil celebrated at St. Gregory of Nyssa, Episcopal Church, San Francisco. The second, a tad less ecumenical, is recommended by Ben Witherington, who says, "Get on up with your Good Self, Kanye and Eminem ain't got nothin' on you." Take a gander, ye geese in the flock of the Risen Lord. Enjoy!

Easter Vigil
Nazbo Rap II

Image Source

Getting Ready for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, April 27, 2008

Again, I urge you to visit Journey with Jesus, a weekly essay on the Biblical lectionary by Daniel B. Clendenin. This commentary for this coming Sunday is titled "From Synagogues and Sanctuaries to Bars and Boardrooms: The Apostle Paul at the Areopagus." In addition to his lectionary essays, be sure also to visit the Book Reviews, Film Reviews, Poetry, and Music Reviews .

Today: Saint Mark the Evangelist

Almighty God, who by the hand of Mark the evangelist have given to your Church the Gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God: We thank you for this witness, and pray that we may be firmly grounded in its truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

To learn more about the "first Gospel," written by the one whom have come to call Mark, visit L. Michael White's The Gospel of Mark: A Story of Secrecy and Misunderstanding in The Story of the Storytellers. Image Source.

Andy attends the consecration of a new sanctuary

Last Sunday Andy, along with his Gerogia neighbors Gayle and Michael Folkerts, went to nearby Covington to be among friends at the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd as their Bishop of the Atlanta Diocese consecrated their beautful new sanctuary, baptismal font, lecturn, pulpit, and altar. June, alas, didn't have the opportunity to attend because she and her daughter Becky were on their way home from Florida, having disembarked from their cruise ship earlier in the morning. Since spending more time in Georgia in the past two years, June and Andy have come to appreciate the parish priest, Fr. Tim Graham and many in the congregation. To show our appreciation, Andy commissioned the two icons that have been installed in the narthex. If you come to visit June and Andy in Georgia and are with them on a Wednesday or Sunday (when the Eucharist is offered), you'll be invited to come and see the church. To see more of the consecration, visit the slideshow!

Getting Ready for the Fifth Sunday of Easter, April 20, 2008

Be sure to visit Daniel B. Clendinen's Journey with Jesus as you prepare for this coming Sunday's lectionary readings. His commentary on the Sunday Gospel is especially helpful. It begins with this paragraph:

In our politically-correct culture, few opinions generate more hostility than ones like the words of Jesus from this week's readings: "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John
14:6). Or consider Peter's words: "There is no other name [than Jesus] under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). Truly, Jesus is a stone that causes us to stumble and a rock of offense (1 Peter 2:8).

Interested? Read the rest of his essay!

Image source: //www.crosswoodsgallery.com/sc_images/products/389_large_image.jpghttp://www.crosswoodsgallery.com/sc_images/products/389_large_image.jpg

Praying and Working for the Conservation of Creation

This morning I was privileged to meet Rusty Pritchard, editor of Creation Care: A Christian Environmental Quarterly (visit Your Family Blog for details). I've placed a link to this fine publication and urge you to subscribe. An article by Greg Pitchford, "The Restoration of All Things," is especially fine reading, a superior piece of work; when it becomes available online, I'll alert you to it.

My prayerbook sets aside every Tuesday as a day wherein we might pray for Creation and Providence; it includes this collect for the conservation of natural resources:

Almighty God, in giving us dominion over things on earth, you make us workers with you in your creation: Give us wisdom and reverence so to use the resources of nature, that no one may suffer from our abuse of them, and that generations yet to come may continue to praise you for your bounty; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Our Parishes: Six New Links

This afternoon I thought it might be a good to add six links to our list of places to visit. Five of these links are to local churches to which friends in our daily-prayer group are communicants: First Presbyterian Church, First United Methodist Church, The Episcopal Church of Our Saviour, St. Thomas Lutheran Church, and Faith Lutheran Church in Lexington. In hopes that some friends from St. Mark Roman Catholic Church may soon take an interest in our community of daily pray-ers, I’m also placing the parish on our list. You may wish to look around. If you know of another parish we should include in our Praying Daily list of churches, let me know.

April 13: The Fourth Sunday of Easter

By way of a prefatory personal note, our trip to Haiti, scheduled from April 10-17, was canceled because there is considerable civil unrest in Port au Prince and elsewhere on the island. Our friends at Hospice St. Joseph and in Ranquitte, Haiti, strongly recommended on Wednesday, the night before our Thursday flight, that the risk of violence to visitors is too great to ignore. All of us--Pastors Ron Luckey and Barry Neece, along with Dr. Greg McMorrow--are saddened that we are not able to go at this time. We will try to visit Haiti sometime in July or August. Please pray for the people of Haiti that in spite of their poverty, they may receive food to nourish their bodies and the Bread of Life to give them hope and heal their spirits.

I also encourage you to visit Journey with Jesus; Daniel B. Clendinen's commentary on the lectionary readings for this coming Sunday are especially trenchant and on the mark, especially as you become aware of the poverty in Haiti.

Finally this "afterward": my wife June, thinking that I'd be away for the week, had months ago arranged to go on a cruise with her daughter Becky, a mother-daughter outing which I hope will be a wonderfully memorable time for them. Their cruise means, however, that I will be in Georgia by myself for the week. During this time I've decided to enter into a quiet retreat, cultivating and wrapping myself in a good bit on longed-for silence, self-reflection, and prayer. I'm asking therefore that you include me in your intercessions, asking God to bless me with a strong sense of His presence and love so that I may discern what kind of a future God has in store for me as a disciple of the Lord Jesus.

April 9: Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Today is the anniversary of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's death.

On this day in 1945, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was taken by his Nazi captors from his cell where he had been imprisoned for treason, and was hanged. Bonhoeffer was a remarkable man -- a brilliant theologian and extraordinary pastor. From the first days of the Nazi accession to power in 1933, Bonhoeffer was involved in protests against the regime, and especially its policies of anti-Semitism.

He was a leading spokesman for the Confessing Church -- the center of Protestant resistance to the Nazis -- and worked tirelessly for a peaceful end to the Second World War. After an attempt on Hitler's life failed, documents were discovered which revealed that Bonhoeffer had played a minor role in the assassination conspiracy. He was duly arrested, and spent the remainder of his life in various prison camps, including the infamous Buchenwald.

While imprisoned, he continued to write, to teach, to minister to other inmates, and even to preach and administer the sacraments, as he was allowed. As he was taken to the scaffold on April 9, 1945, he turned to one of his fellow prisoners and said: "This is the end. For me, the beginning of life."


For more information about this life and writings, visit The International Dietrich Bonhoeffer Society.

Prayer

Gracious Lord, in every age you have sent men and women who have given their lives for the message of your love. Inspire us with the memory of those martyrs
for the Gospel like your servant Dietrich, whose faithfulness led them in the way of the cross, and give us courage to bear full witness with our lives to your son's victory over sin and death; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Source: Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church, Linglestown, Pennsylvania, USA

April 4: Commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Although the Church, with our nation, remembers Martin Luther King, Jr. on January 15, the date of his birth in 1929, this year many churches also commemorate the fortieth anniversary of his death on April 4, 1968. In your remembrance of Dr. King as Martyr and Renewer of Society, you may wish to pray this prayer:

Almighty God, who created us in your own image: Grant us grace fearlessly to contend against evil and to make no peace with oppression; and that we may reverently use our freedom, help us, like your servant Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to employ it in the maintenance of justice in our communities and among the nations, to the glory of your name; through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Make a Weekly Pilgrimage to Journey for Jesus

Every week on Monday, Daniel B. Clendinen provides commentary at Journey for Jesus on matters of faith and life, often writing about the lectionary readings appointed for the coming Sunday.

Those of you who make the psalms the centerpiece of your prayer life will appreciate this week's offerng, a solid reflection on what happens in the Psalms.

One of the great "extras" that Daniel B. Clendinen continually provides is his top-of-the-page "Think about it," a quotation often so good that I copy it into my chapbook. Here's one that I found this morning:

Those who once delighted in fornication now embrace chastity alone...we who once took most pleasure in accumulating wealth and property now...share with everyone in need; we who hated and killed one another and would not associate with men of different tribes because of their different customs now, since the coming of Christ, live familiarly with them and pray for our enemies. — Justin Martyr

Hildegard of Bingen's Hymn, "About the Blessed Virgin Mary"

During our Evening Prayers last night as we began our commemoration of the Annunciation of our Lord, my wife June read this beautiful hymn, written by Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179); it so wonderfully announces what happened at the Annunciation (and, of course, the Incarnation) that we thought you might like to sing it (however, you might):

Greetings, noble, glorious and chaste beloved.

You image of purity,

You ground of sanctity,

Pleasing to God.

Certainly a heavenly infusion

Pour into you,

Because the highest Word

In you took on flesh.

You are the radiant white lily

Whom God perceived

Prior to all creation.

You the most beautiful and loveliest;

God so delighted in you that he pressed within you

The passionate embrace of his own heat,

So that his own son was suckled by you.

Truly has your body contained joy,

Since without you every heavenly harmony sounded,

Because, Virgin, you carried the son of God,

When your own purity became illuminated in God.

Your womb contained joy

Just as the grass was infused with

Greenness, when the dew sank into it;

Therefore Mother everything joyful has been

Created through you.

Now let the whole Church, dawning rose-red, break the day in joy

And sound in harmony because of the loveliest Virgin

And most praiseworthy Mary, Mother of God. Amen.

Our prayerbook cites Medieval Women's Visionary Literature by E. A. Petroff (Oxford UP, 1986) as the source.

Image source: Heather Williams Durka, Icons and Sacred Images.

April 1: The Annunciation of Our Lord (transferred)

Because the traditional day for the Annunciation, March 25 (nine months before Christmas Day), came this year within the first week of Eastertide, many churches (my Lutheran included) have transferred the celebration of the Annunciation to April 1. If the calendar of your prayerbook provides pages for this day, please join those of us who remember and honor the Blessed Virgin as she says "Yes" to the overshadowing Spirit and so conceives the Word of God as flesh of her flesh. Those who need lectionary readings, special psalms, and prayers for this day may visit Textweek for assistance.

James E. Kiefer is his Biographical Sketches of Memorable Christians of the Past articulates the Church's understanding of this day with the following commentary:

In the first chapter of Luke we read how the angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she had been chosen to be the mother of the Christ, and how Mary answered, "Here I am, the handmaid of the Lord. Let it be to me as you have said." It is reasonable to suppose that Our Lord was conceived immediately after this. Accordingly, since we celebrate His birth on 25 December, we celebrate the Annunciation nine months earlier, on 25 March.

For many centuries most European countries took 25 March, not 1 January, as the day when the number of the year changed, so that 24 March 1201 was followed by 25 March 1202. If you had asked a Christian of that time why the calendar year changed so awkwardly partway through a month, he would have answered: "Today we begin a new year of the Christian era, the era which began X years ago today when God was made man, when He took upon Himself a fleshly body and human nature in the womb of the Virgin."

The following paragraph is from Chapter 14 of the book Miracles, by C S Lewis.

...ONE of those features of the Christian story which is Repulsive to the modern mind. To be quite frank, we do not at all like the idea of a "chosen people". Democrats by birth and education, we should prefer to think that all nations and individuals start level in the search for God, or even that all religions are equally true. It must be admitted at once that Christianity makes no concessions to this point of view. It does not tell of a human search for God at all, but of something done by God for, to, and about Man. And the way in which it is done is selective, undemocratic, to the highest degree. After the knowledge of God had been universally lost or obscured, one man from the whole earth (Abraham) is picked out. He is separated (miserably enough, we may suppose) from his natural surroundings, sent into a strange country, and made the ancestor of a nation who are to carry the knowledge of the true God. Within this nation there is further selection: some die in the desert, some remain behind in Babylon. There is further selection still. The process grows narrower and narrower, sharpens at last into one small bright point like the head of a spear. It is a Jewish girl at her prayers. All humanity (so far as concerns its redemption) has narrowed to that.

The following quotation is from Martin Luther's sermon "On the Magnificat" (the Song of Mary, Luke 1:46-55).

"For He that is mighty hath done great things for me, and Holy is His Name." (Luke 1:49)
The "great things" are nothing less than that she became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed upon her as pass man's understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among whom she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in Heaven, and such a child.
She herself is unable to find a name for this work, it is Too exceedingly great; all she can do is break out in the fervent cry: "They are great things," impossible to describe or define. Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God.

No one can say anything greater of her or to her, though He had as many tongues as there are leaves on the trees, or grass in the fields, or stars in the sky, or sand by the sea. It needs to be pondered in the heart, what it means to be the Mother of God.

Luther's Works, Vol. 21, p. 326, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan, Concordia Publishing House, 1956.

PRAYER (traditional language)

We beseech thee, O Lord, pour thy grace into our hearts; that We who have known the incarnation of thy Son Jesus Christ, announced by an angel to the Virgin Mary, may by his cross and passion be brought unto the glory of his resurrection; who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
Almighty God, who hast poured upon us the new light of thine Incarnate Word: Grant that the same light enkindled in our hearts may shine forth in our lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

PRAYER (contemporary language)

Pour your grace into our hearts, O Lord; that we who have known The incarnation of your Son Jesus Christ, announced by an angel to the Virgin Mary, may by his cross and passion be brought unto the glory of his resurrection; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Almighty God, whose love has poured upon us the new light of Your Incarnate Word: Grant that this light enkindled in our hearts may shine forth in our lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Eastertide

On Easter Sunday we gather as a community of faith to celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus. Our worship is filled with festive alleluias, and songs of praise and thanksgiving. Even nature seems to join in the celebration as signs of new life surround us. There are the first flowers of Spring pushing their heads above ground, the smell of new leaves on the trees, the song of birds filling the air, the warm breezes signaling the coming of bright days and pleasant nights. Drawn into the joy of Easter and the beauty of new life, we tend to forget what has gone before. Our memories of the gray winter days and long cold nights fade as we see signs of new life and know again the hope of Jesus' resurrection. Yet Easter is a celebration of life coming out of death, of hope arising in the face of suffering and struggle. The joy of Easter is having come through the darkness of Good Friday and emptiness of Holy Saturday.

It is believing that from suffering and death can come new life. This interplay of death and life is a mystery that we all experience in our daily lives. We are all familiar with times of darkness as well as times of light. We have experienced both the death of a loved one and birth of a child. We have felt the fear around the impending surgery of a family member and the joy of knowing that someone is recovering from a serous illness. We know the anguish when a loved one has been injured in an accident and the gratitude that wells up in us when someone who struggles with an addiction can celebrate a year of sobriety. Times of depression, experienced like a dark cloud hanging over us, weigh heavily upon us and times of hope and expectation fill us with energy and new dreams and hopes.

Maria Tasto, OSB. Easter: The Interplay of Life and Death.

Image: Resurrection by Solomon RAJ, India
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The Resurrection of Our Lord

The Prayer for Easter Evening

Almighty God, you give us the joy of celebrating our Lord's resurrection. Give us also the joys of life in your service, and bring us at last to the full joy of life eternal; through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.


Image source: Empty Tomb, by He Qi, China.

Tonight's Easter Vigil

The Easter Vigil, held tonight at 7:30, is one of my favorite services of the church year. At my home church, we gather outside for the lighting the New Fire, bless a new Paschal Candle, and slowly proceed--led by cantors singing "Light of Christ" with candles in our hands--into the still darkened sanctuary . As we go through the doors into the sanctuary, we are greeted with the smell of lilies. We pause at the back of the sanctuary to hear readings from the Old Testament and join the cantors in singing of more psalms. As we listen, we know that all is ready: the bread and wine, soon to be for us the Body and Blood of Christ, wait our arrival. Again in procession we move further into the sanctuary to offer prayers for those who will be baptized throughout Christendom, hear the story of the Resurrection, and begin the ancient Eucharistic Liturgy. As the most intensely beautiful liturgy in the Church's year, having prepared ourselves during Lent for this Day's celebration, we are eager to this year's first announcement that "Christ is risen!"

During the liturgy June and I will be in prayer for all of you who are trusting in the faithfulness of the Father who loves us in Christ. We will ask the Holy Spirit to bless you. And, if you have asked us to pray for you, we will offer our intercessions for you by name. We will especially remember those of you who have been praying with us, mornings and evenings, throughout the year.

Christ is risen! He is risen indeed.!

Holy Saturday: The Great Sabbath

I'm writing just a few minutes before three o'clock on Good Friday, and according to the Gospel accounts, it was at this time that Jesus, "God of God, very God of very God" (as the Nicene Creed says) died on the cross. Perhaps like me, on this Good Friday you have envisioned God in our flesh, Jesus, being taken down from the cross and carried on a bier to the tomb where hastily his friends are placing him on a stone slab before the Friday sun sets and the sabbath begins. In an hour or so, the tomb will be shut and sealed.

In my prayerbook, I'm asked to remember--with Christians everywhere--that this evening is Holy Saturday because tonight begins the day that Christ "rested" physically in the tomb. Anciently, it is also believed that it was on this day Our Lord performed in spirit the Harrowing of Hell and raised up to Paradise those held captive there.

Beginning this evening and nearly all of tomorrow's Saturday/Sabbath, I will be resting a good bit, simply waiting (sitting quietly outside if the weather is good, perhaps reading) for the day to pass so that on Saturday evening, June and I will, along with our daughter Chelsea, can drive up to Lexington for the 7:30 p.m. Easter Vigil, the first stirrings of Easter, the Day of the Resurrection of Our Lord. As I wait, I plan to listen to Henri Nouwen's wonderfully insightful talk on “The Spirituality of Waiting,” which you can read online, or hear via a recording of Nouwen himself. I owe this listening opportunity to Ben Witherington's comments in which he says,
During a difficult season in my Christian life, Henri Nouwen provided me with manna from heaven, water in a weary and dry place and guidance on spiritual formation that I still live out of. I would say he is certainly one of the greatest spiritual formation writers of any age. The picture on the left is from one of his books which deals both with slowing down and listening to God, and also being honest with God and waiting upon the Lord.

After thanking James Howell for the initial link to Nouwen, Witherington continues:

It will be worth your time [reading Nouwen]. "For those who wait in the Lord will renew their strength,They will mount up like eagles with wings of great length. They will run and not get weary, they will walk and not faint. Giving strength to the weary, and power to his saints."

Dona nobis pacem

I plan to to read Nouwen tomorrow. Perhaps you'd like to join me. In addition to praying the Daily Offices, I will also visit Daniel B. Clendinen's Journey with Jesus to read as my lectio divina Clendinen's commentary on the lectionary readings for the Feast of the Resurrection. Perhaps you too would like to visit Clendinen; that also will be well worth your time, your waiting time.

Entering Holy Week

Yesterday we received our palms. It's a tradition in many churches, my Lutheran parish among them, for those who waved their newly blessed palms in the procession to and through the church doors to take their palms home and place them behind icons, pictures, and crosses so that throughout the year, they may remember that on Passion Sunday, our Lord entered Jerusalem with the enthusiasm of his followers. Palm waving for Jesus, all of us discover, is fairly easy. Going with Jesus to the cross, however, is much more difficult, often dangerous. During the year, as the leaves on the palm branches dry up and sometimes turn brownish-green, we are reminded that beyond the enthusiasm, Jesus walked the Hard Road, the road He invites us to take with him. As we walk our way through this Holy Week, remembering day by day how Jesus shows us the Way, may our eyes be rivited on His commitment as He walks in front of us. May we look hard and long at the Way he chooses for Himself--and asks us to journey with him.

Our Lenten Psalmody Studies

Hats off to our Lenten psalter studies! Beginning last January 24, we met seven out of eight Lenten Thursdays so we might know how to sing the Psalter. While studying our way through six chapters of Cynthia Bourgeault’s Chanting the Psalms, we taught ourselves psalm tones and practiced chanting the Psalter in Evening Prayer. At last evening’s gathering, we took a good look at the Psalter for the Christian People and decided that we’d encourage ourselves to purchase copies so that when we come together as a group, we’ll have a common Psalter with which to sing to God. Based on “inclusive-language revision of the Psalter of The Book of Common Prayer 1979, this Psalter is very inexpensive (about $6.00 when purchased as “nearly new” from Amazon's new and used booksellers. Using this ecumenical psalter means that anyone from any Christian tradition, both at home and in our gatherings, can join us in our psalm-singing prayer life.

Special appreciations go out to all who came to our Thursday evening meetings at First Presbyterian Church, and especially all of you who traveled considerable distance on dark and often chilly nights to encourage one another! As we go forward into Holy Week, the Vigil of Easter, Eastertide, Pentecost, and the days afterward, may all of us remember one another in our prayers, especially in the evenings when we make intercessions for one another in the Church. For each one who came, shared, studied, learned, and prayed, our group is grateful to God for your presence and your prayers.

From Andy's Chapbook: Merton on humility

To the truly humble man the ordinary ways and customs and habits of men are not a matter for conflict. The saints do not get excited about the things that people eat and drink, wear on their bodies, or hang on the walls of their houses. To make conformity or non-conformity with others in these accidents a matter of life and death is to fill your interior life withconfusion and noise. Ignoring all this as indifferent, the humble man takes whatever there is in the world that helps him to find God and leaves the rest aside. He is able to see quite clearly that what is useful to him maybe useless for somebody else, and what helps others to be saints might ruin him. That is why humility brings with it a deep refinement of spirit, a peacefulness, a tact and a common sense without which there is no sane morality.

Merton, Thomas. New Seeds of Contemplation. (New Directions, 1961) 84-85.

Good news about Sister Judy!

Sister Judy's Benedictine sisters just sent this email update:

Just a quick note to let you know that Sr. Judy's surgery on her thyroid went well this morning. They only needed to take the right lobe and it looks benign. If things go as planned she will be home tomorrow. Thanks for your prayers!

That's wonderful news. Now we can all thank God that all went well!

March 13: our final Lenten Thursday evening meeting

On Thursday evening, 7:00, our little community of Daily Office pray-ers will meet at First Presbyterian Church. Stephen Locke will lead us in Evening Prayer. Before Evening Prayer, we will discuss what's new in our thinking about a Psalter to meet our needs. And we will practice singing the appointed psalms for the evening with this double tone that is beautiful and easy to sing. And--O yes!--this: on Monday evening Andy spoke with Wayne, one of the cantors who leads congregational psalm-singing during Sunday Eucharists at Faith Lutheran Church, and Wayne has agreed to come and visit us at the end of May when we'll have our annual picnic together at June and Andy's home. You'll really like Wayne! That's he in the center of the photograph.

Pray for Sister Judy

Sr. Judy (that's she, the second from the left) , for some of us our Oblate Director at The Monastery on Mt. Tabor, will be in Central Baptist Hospital on Wednesday and Thursday of this week for thyroid-related surgery. Please remember her in your prayers, perhaps by offering this intercession:

Lord Jesus Christ, by your patience in suffering you hallowed earthly pain and gave us the example of obedience to your Father's will. Please be with Sister Judy in her time of weakness and pain; sustain her by your grace, that her strength and courage may not fail; heal her according to your will; and help her always to live within your faithfulness to us. Be with all who love her, especially all her Benedictine sisters and most especially those at her monastery. In your love protect all of us us as we seek to do your will, sharing your divine hospitality with all whom we meet. Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayers.

A Pope whom many Christians remember with gratitude

On Wednesday, March 12, numerous Christian churches, notably the Roman Catholic, but also including many in the Protestant tradition (especially Lutherans and Episcopalians), will remember and give thanks to God for the life of Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome, who died in 604 a.m. Remembering that he labored during an extraordiany dark time in the history of the Europe (and long before there were any serious divisions of the Church), do take time to read this short biography of his life and thank God for his tremendous witness to Christ.

As James E. Kiefer reminds us in his short biography of Gregory the Great,

English-speaking Christians will remember Gregory for sending a party of missionaries headed by Augustine of Canterbury (not to be confused with the more famous Augustine of Hippo) to preach the Gospel to the pagan Anglo-Saxon tribes that had invaded England and largely conquered or displaced the Celtic Christians previously living there. Gregory had originally hoped to go to England as a missionary himself, but was pressed into service elsewhere, first as apocrisiarius [a delegate or deputy; especially, the pope's nuncio or legate at Constantinople] and then as bishop of Rome. He accordingly sent others, but took an active interest in their work, writing numerous letters both to Augustine and his monks and to their English converts.

Gregory served the Christian church well, although he was not perfect, (who among us is?).

As an aside: in my chapbook, I've placed this quotation, attributed to Gregory by Aquinas in his Catena Aurea: "The highest, the only proof of love, is to love our adversary."

After you read about him, you may wish to offer this prayer to God:

Almighty and merciful God, who raised up Gregory of Rome to Be a servant of the servants of God, and inspired him to send missionaries to preach the Gospel to the English people: Preserve in your Church the catholic and apostolic faith they taught, that your people, being fruitful in every good work, may receive the crown of glory that never fades away; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

More from Andy's Chapbook: Lewis on Temptation

I know all about the despair of overcoming chronic temptations. It is not serious provided self-offended petulance, annoyance at breaking records, impatience, etc. doesn’t get the upper hand. No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be v. muddy and tattered children by the time we reach home. But the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, & the clean clothes are in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one’s temper and give it up. It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present to us: it is the v. sign of His presence.

C.S. Lewis, letter to Mary Neylan, The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Vol. II, ed. Water Hooper (San Francisco: Harper, 2004), 507.

From Andy's Chapbook

I'm always on the lookout for quotations that I want to copy into my chapbook. I find them in journals and magazines, newspapers, books and commentaries, roadside graffiti, brochures, advertisements, comic strips, the lives of the saints, Internet postings, postcards--in short, from anything written (and sometimes spoken). When I find something that I want to chew on, I scribble it into a little leather chapbook, usually with an old-fashioned fountain pen; and then--now and then--I turn back on the pages and read what I thought was good and worth preserving for a rainy spiritual day. So tonight I thought I might start to share some of them with you periodically. Here's one:

Truth rises from the silence of being to the quiet tremendous presence of the Word. Then, sinking again into silence, the truth of words bears us down into the silence of God. Or rather God rises up out of the sea like a treasure in the waves, and when language recedes His brightness remains on the shores of our own being.

From Thomas Merton, Thoughts In Solitude (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1956) 86.

Preparing for Next Sunday, Palm Sunday or Passion Sunday

Here are the lectionary readings for Palm Sunday, March 16:

Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm 31:9–16
Philippians 2:5–11
Matthew 26:14–27:66 or Matthew 27:11–54

Spend some time with them. And again, as ususal, here is Daniel B. Clendenin's commentary, well worth a good reading

Image Source: Corinne Vonaesch, 2001. L'entrée de Jésus a Jérusalem,

Leslie doing fine!

Yesterday Leslie wrote to say that the surgery on the back of her neck went well. The procedure, she says, was "just at two hours"; the surgeon worked on four nerves so that in the future they won't produce nearly as much pain. But for now, Leslie says that she's "rather sore and brused, and will feel worse before [she] gets better . . . . With luck, [she] should be back at work on Wednesday. Right now it's ice packs, warm compresses, tea and toast, percet and asprin. " In closing, she sends her "love to all." And we send ours to you, Leslie!

Pray without Ceasing

Have you ever wondered what St. Paul means when he encourages us to "Pray without ceasing" (I Thess. 5.17)? Consider this understanding of that imperative by an Orthdox writer:

Usually in the Holy Scriptures, the word always is used in the sense of "often." For instance, "The priests went always into the first tabernacle at certain fixed hours, not that they went there unceasingly by day and by night; they went often, but not uninterruptedly." Even if the priests were all the time in church, keeping alight the fire which came from heaven, and adding fuel to it so that it should not go out, they were not doing this all at the same time, but by turns, as we see from St. Zacharias: "He executed the priest's office before God in the order of his course' (Luke 1. 8). One should think in the same way about prayer, which the Apostle ordains to bedone unceasingly, for it is impossible for man to remain in prayer day and night without interruption. After all, time is also needed for other things, for necessary cares in the administration of one's house; we need time for working, time for talking, time for eating and drinking, time for rest and sleep. How is it possible to pray unceasingly except by praying often? But oft-repeated prayer may be considered unceasing prayer.

Source: The Art of Prayer: An Orthodox Anthology. Compiled by Igumen Chariton of Valamo. Edited by Timothy Ware. (Chatham, Kent: Machays PLC, 1997), 49.

Praying for Haiti

As some of you may know, I have a special love for the people of Haiti, especially those living in and around the village of Ranquitte, located back in the mountains of upper north-eastern Haiti.

In April four of us from central Kentucky (Dr. Robert McMorrow, along with two Lutheran pastors, Ron Luckey and Barry Neece, and I) will be making a trip (April 10-17) to build a home for "the poorest of the poor," in our hemisphere. If you'd like to look at some photographs of our last trip, made in October, 2007, visit Faith Lutheran Church as follow the links. If you'd like to join us, let me know,

Praying Daily meets again on Thursday, March 6

Our community of Daily Office people will meet again this Thursday, March 6, 7:00 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church in the Parlor Room. Inasmuch as we concluded our discussion last Thursday with considerable talk about a common Psalter for us, Leslie Ferris sends the following list of Psalters for our consideration:

1. A New Metrical Psalter by Christopher Webber (Lectionary Psalms)
2. Hymntune Psalter by Daw & Hackett Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 (Lectionary Psalms)
3. Anglican Chant Psalter Alec Wyton - (all 150 Psalms)
4. Plainsong Psalter - James Litton - (all 150 Psalms)

If you have a Psalter you'd like for us to look over, please bring it to our "show and tell." By way of support for our discussion, we'll use Chapter 6, "Psaltersand Sourcebooks," in Cynthia Bourgeault's Chanting the Psalms, as our text for study. We'll begin Evening Prayer at 8:00 p.m. After our March 6 meeting, we have one more Lenten gathering on March 13.

Image Source: http://www.artfund.org/images/artwork/2004108_1.jpg

The Lectionary Readings for Next Sunday, March 7, The Fifth in Lent, 2008

As promised, here is where to go on your Journey with Jesus as you prepare to listen to, contemplate, and live by the Word in next Sunday's lectionary readings: Ezekiel 37:1–14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:6–11; the Holy Gospel to be read for next Sunday is the story of the raising of Lazarus from death. You will appreciate reading Daniel B. Clendenin's commentary.

Image Source: http://kids.christiansunite.com/images/Bible_Stories/143.jpg

The Collect for the Fourth Sunday in Lent

Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that we, who for our evil deeds deserve to be punished, by the comfort of your grace may mercifully be set free; through your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Source: The Gregorian Sacramentary (Rome, 8th cent. mss.); qtd. The Daily Prayer of the Church, 984.

Two Icons to Share

On Friday I received a large wooden crate containing two icons that June and I had commissioned as gifts to The Church of the Good Shepherd (Episcopal) in Covington, GA. On Saturday morning I photographed them so that you might enjoy looking at them. And tomorrow I will re-crate them and send them on to Fr. Tim Graham, the rector of The Church of the Good Shepherd.

The icon on the left is called "Theotokos and Child"; the icon on the right is "The Good Shepherd." The icons will be installed in the narthex of a new church sanctuary and will be blessed at the consecration of the building by the Bishop of Atlanta on April 20.


Both icons were "written" by Mel Ahlborn, about whom you may wish to learn more. You may also wish to listen to an interview with Mel Ahlborn in a RealAudio slide presentation.

The Marvel of the Psalter

Among all the books, the Psalter has certainly a very special grace, a choiceness of quality well worthy to be pondered; for, besides the characteristics which it shares with others, it has this peculiar marvel of its own, that within it are represented and portrayed in all their great variety the movements of the human soul. It is like a picture, in which you see yourself portrayed and, seeing, may understand and consequently form yourself upon the pattern given. Elsewhere in the Bible you read only that the Law commands this or that to be done, you listen to the Prophets to learn about the Saviour's coming or you turn to the historical books to learn the doings of the kings and holy men; but in the Psalter, besides these things, you learn about yourself. You find depicted in it all the movements of your soul, all its changes, its ups and down, its failures and recoveries.

From St. Athansius, Letter to Marcellinus (included in an edition of On the Incarnation, St. Vladimir's Press, 1998); qtd. Lutheran Forum, 37:2 (March 2008).