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In December 2022, I wrote about the UK’s 2021 census that revealed we haven’t had such a high number of non-Christians since the Dark Ages.
My post included this tweet:
Since then, the news in Britain seems to be worsening by the day.
Scotland has realised it has a behavioural problem in the classroom. The Times‘s ‘End of school punishments blamed for pupil disorder’ reveals that all hell is breaking loose (emphases mine):
Teachers and parents have become increasingly alarmed by a decline in classroom behaviour since the end of the pandemic — and a method imported from the justice system is being blamed.
Restorative practice, involving “constructive conversations” with unruly youngsters in an attempt to make them understand what they have done wrong, is taking the place of more traditional sanctions such as detentions or withdrawal from activities.
But members of the Scottish Secondary Teachers’ Association (SSTA) have unanimously backed a motion that warns the approach is time-consuming and if mishandled can result in “severe damage to teachers’ classroom authority”.
Apparently, teachers are not properly trained in class discipline and even less in ‘restorative practice’. It is amazing that detentions are out of fashion. The article continues:
Seamus Searson, general secretary of the SSTA, said restorative practice seemed to be “flavour of the month” when it came to managing challenging behaviour in schools …
He warned pupils were taken out of class supposedly to have restorative conversations but would then be returned to lessons without the discussion genuinely taking place …
“The youngsters in class, they see things black and white, it is either right or it is wrong. There is no half-way. They expect that if a child misbehaves something happens. If they think for one second that so-and-so can get away with that, [then they think] why can’t I do it?”
This is an issue upon which all political parties north of the border agree: something must be done.
These are a few of the things going on.
First, the school bully:
One parent recalled how her six-year-old boy had come home from school and told her: “You will not believe what they have done. The teachers have taken the nastiest, most horrible boy in the class and have put him in charge of looking after the new pupil who started today.”
The manoeuvre had somewhat backfired when the young delinquent began teaching his classmate how to hurl items at other kids.
Teachers thought that by shepherding the new boy, the bully would learn empathy, but the article said that no discussion about that took place.
Secondly, the reward for bad behaviour:
Other parents have described unruly children being rewarded with trips to a local café. A deputy head said one pupil with extreme problems “came into school with fast food”.
The senior teacher explained: “He had been taken out for the day. He went in and rubbed it in the face of every single child around him. It alienated him from other people in the school, it alienated the child from his peers. His teacher was saying: ‘What is going on?’”
I’m not sure what ‘it’ in the second sentence of the previous paragraph means. On first reading, I thought ‘it’ might mean the fast food from the local café. It would not surprise me.
Thirdly, the threat at home:
[A mother, Ms] Green describes her son being involved in a playground tussle started by another boy. They were called inside for a restorative conversation and her son was asked to understand why the boy was having a bad day. “No one asked why my son was upset,” she said.
Two days after the “restorative chat”, she says the aggressor appeared at her house and said to her son “when you are not in school I am going to jump you and kill you”.
The article says that restorative practices are being rolled out in other British nations, which is a pathetic development:
They have crossed to education from the justice system after projects found it could reduce the chance of reoffending if criminals were put in touch with their victims.
Violent incidents are rising in primary (!) schools:
Figures uncovered by the Scottish Liberal Democrats earlier this month show 10,852 incidents of violence were recorded in primary schools in 2021-22 compared with 10,772 in 2018-19. For the secondary sector they have increased from 2951 from 2728.
Good grief. That wouldn’t have happened in my day.
This is another thing that wouldn’t have happened when I was at school:
Refusal to work, mobile phone misuse, disrespect and wandering around are the most common issues reported. Three quarters said they had experienced verbal aggression.
We never thought of ‘wandering around’.
Not surprisingly, students often give the following excuse as the reason for misbehaving:
“because I can!”
Also:
“That child will not be short on telling people: ‘nothing happened to me, I have just been put in another room’.”
Furthermore, children will band together to confront a teacher:
Stuart Hunter, president of the SSTA, said he had seen restorative conversations carried out badly. In one situation, he said, two pupils raised a complaint about work they had been set. When the teacher was called into an office for the restorative discussion, she found the girls had friends with them for support. The implication, he says, was the teacher was in the wrong.
Nothing much happens to wrongdoers at all. I didn’t bookmark it, but I recently read that the UK is a criminal’s paradise because the police are so soft.
In fact, whether real or staged, misbehaviour is rewarded. Take the case of Bacari-Bronze O’Garro, 18 and father of one, better known as Mizzy. Within the matter of a month, the Londoner has even been on television being interviewed about his exploits, which, in some cases, were criminal:
In May 2022, O’Garro was given a community protection notice prohibiting him from trespassing on private property.[9] On 24 May 2023, he was fined £200 plus costs and surcharge (£365 in all) after admitting breaching that community protection order on 15 May and was issued with a two-year criminal behaviour order (CBO).[5][10] The next day, O’Garro was interviewed by journalist Piers Morgan on Piers Morgan Uncensored[11] who called him “an idiot” … Former politician and journalist Patrick O’Flynn praised O’Garro’s entrepreneurial spirit, noting his ability to grab the media spotlight and convert it into social media fans.[13]
Remind me not to cite any further articles by Patrick O’Flynn.
At least his TikTok and YouTube accounts, on which his exploits appeared, have been terminated. Social media companies go where police and the justice system fear to tread.
What has Mizzy learned? That criminal acts have propelled him to fame:
Our political class is no better. They would rather ruin the UK than make the necessary effort to restore it to its former greatness. Pictured below are two Labour MPs Sir Lindsay Hoyle (Speaker of the House) and Keir Starmer (Labour leader) with the Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak:
https://twitter.com/Lampada76/status/1663592524068339714
The Telegraph‘s Sherelle Jacobs tells us:
There is no delicate way of putting it: the British governing class has completely lost the plot. It would rather risk some kind of economic collapse or populist backlash than actually deal with any of the country’s problems. Bereft of values and captured by institutional pessimism, our politicians are incapable of decisive action. Numbed by groupthink, and poisoned by ever-expanding managerial surveillance and ministerial turf wars, the Civil Service has been rendered inoperable. The British governing machine is broken; we are heading for total systems failure …
How did Britain end up like this? Blairite Third Way politics, devoid of principle beyond “capturing the centre ground”, has a lot to answer for. It is hard to imagine a Tory party with a confident philosophy on free markets contemplating price caps; nor a Labour Party committed to a high-wage economy proving so bashful about the country’s addiction to mass migration. Institutionalised back-covering, and a total breakdown in trust between ministers and officials, meanwhile, mean that any policy that is difficult or controversial is increasingly impossible to deliver.
A Ground Zero moment of implosion may now be unavoidable. At that point, we can only hope that at least one of the two major parties rediscovers its core beliefs, and regains the stomach to fight for them. Big messy wars will need to be fought – starting with a breakup of the Treasury, bringing an end to its reign of terror.
For now, though, things look pretty bleak. In complex systems theory, a system becomes pathological when it gets to the point where measures being taken to maintain equilibrium are actually destroying the system. A system is also classed as fatally neurotic when it deems the psychological cost of detaching from the status quo to be too great, even if failure to adapt threatens its own destruction. There is little doubt that the British ruling class strongly exhibits both of these symptoms. And things will get a lot worse before they get better.
Sherelle Jacobs is not wrong.
But — and it’s a big BUT — two glimmers of hope have emerged.
In September 2022, two months before Britain’s post-Christian census figures appeared, The Guardian published ‘”God gives me reason to hope”: why young Britons are turning to prayer’.
Six of the paper’s readers gave their reasons for praying in response to a survey which found:
More young people in the UK are turning to prayer compared with 20 years ago, with one in three 18- to 36-year-olds saying they had prayed within the past month.
… spirituality in its many forms are thought to be behind the increase.
Three of the responses are from Christians. Two of them follow.
A 32-year-old midwife says:
Since getting pregnant, I’ve come back to prayer. I was raised Christian and have come back to it from time to time. But this time things feel different. With the world crumbling, God has given me a reason to hope and see beyond the hopelessness of our current political and financial landscape. It’s quite a scary time to be bringing a baby into the world with all the uncertainty – the financial situation and working out what kind of world he’s going to be born into is quite scary. Prayer has really helped me to take myself out of those world problems and see things in a broader context.
An 18-year-old student explains:
I used to go to church with the Scouts when I was six or seven but it was never regular – I didn’t really understand what was happening when I was that young. I wasn’t brought up in a religious family and I didn’t have a relationship with faith until recently, when I started seeing videos by priests on TikTok. After I saw that and became interested, I could understand it a bit more. I wanted to connect with faith because I wasn’t happy with the way my life was going, and I wanted to be better to other people. Developing my spiritual health has made me feel happier. I pray because it’s a way I can speak to God and give him my worries or concerns. I’m not involved with a particular church – I’m just trying to find my place at the moment.
Even more surprising is that nearly one-third of Britons under the age of 40 believe in the afterlife and hell, compared with 18 per cent between the ages of 60 and 77.
On May 23, 2023, The Guardian reported on these findings from the World Values Study, conducted by King’s College London:
You may think the idea of hellfire belongs to an age when people’s lives were shaped by the threat of eternal damnation.
Wrong, it seems: generation Z and millennials in the UK are significantly more likely to believe in hell than baby boomers, according to a new study by the Policy Institute at King’s College London.
Younger people are also more likely to believe in life after death than older generations, despite being less religious generally.
The findings are part of the World Values Study, one of the largest academic social surveys in the world, which has been running for more than 40 years.
According to its data, just under half (49%) of Britons said they believed in God, down from 75% in 1981. Only five countries – Norway, South Korea, Japan, Sweden and China – are less likely to believe in God than the UK. The Philippines topped the league table [in religious belief], scoring 100%.
Good for the Philippines!
Here are the stats on heaven, hell and the afterlife:
Belief in heaven among the UK public has also fallen, from 57% in 1981 to 41% last year. But belief in hell and in life after death has remained largely consistent, at 26% and 46% respectively.
When broken down by age, 32% of those under the age of about 40 said they believed in hell, compared with 18% of those aged between 59 and 77. Belief in life after death was 51-53% for younger generations, compared with 35-39% for older people.
“Our cultural attachment to organised religion has continued to decline in the UK – but our belief that there is something beyond this life is holding strong, including among the youngest generations,” said Bobby Duffy, director of the Policy Institute.
“While the youngest generations continue to have lower attachment to formal religion, many of them have similar or even greater need to believe that there is ‘more than this’.”
The article has international graphs to explore, which are fascinating.
Also of interest is that Britons have a newly increased confidence in religious institutions:
Another unexpected finding is that confidence in religious institutions had rebounded. Between 1981 and 2018, Britons’ confidence in churches and religious organisations fell from 49% to 31%, but by 2022 had risen again to 42%.
A possible explanation is the provision by churches and other religious institutions of essential social services such as food banks, social hubs, warm spots and debt counselling as the cost of living crisis has escalated.
Duffy said religious belief in the UK was unlikely to disappear, but would keep eroding. “It looks like a slow but inevitable decline, unless organised religions can engage with that broader sense of wanting something else beyond this life,” he said.
One week after this article appeared, the rector of St Bartholomew’s in London, the Revd Marcus Walker, posted a series of adverts from the Episcopal Church in the United States, which seem to come from the 1980s. I don’t remember these at all. I would have, too, had I seen them, as I had become an Episcopalian during that decade.
These are really powerful, especially the one about Holy Communion:
As Jesus said (John 6:47-48):
47 Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life.
Everyone responding to Marcus Walker was surprised:
Someone from the Church of England should ask for permission to repurpose these. In Scotland, they could use the text as it is, because the denomination is known as The Episcopal Church there and it’s not doing well.
If not, something similar can be done throughout the UK.
Let’s go, clergy. What are we waiting for? Carpe diem!
Just before the Second Sunday in Lent — March 8, 2020 — a number of county and diocesan directives went out in the United States over public gatherings.
Not surprisingly, one of these was church attendance. Another, at diocesan or local level, was coffee hour after Sunday service.
Today’s post features the Revd Scott A Gunn, the executive director of Forward Movement in the Episcopal Church, a co-author of Faithful Questions: Exploring the Way with Jesus and a religious editorial writer for Fox News.
When I last wrote about Mr Gunn, he was cutting short his visit to Asia.
This was his experience in the latter days of his stay with regard to coronavirus:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1235363124783525891
On his way home:
How true. That also happened to me. Message to anyone who doesn’t want to become a Calvinist: don’t go into consulting!
Once at home, Gunn contemplated Psalm 24:3-5. He received an equally good response about the nature of sin:
I fully agree with him on keeping churches open (even though Christ Church Episcopal in Georgetown was closed for the first time since 1800). Historically, that is what was done:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1235616416650399744
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1235616982709526528
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1235617442778537984
ABSOLUTELY!
Those who feel that they should not attend because of health reasons should stay at home. Keep churches open for those who want to attend.
The subject of baptismal fonts has also arisen. These are supposed to be drained for Lent, as there are to be no baptisms until Easter:
https://twitter.com/RevAdamYates/status/1236972105285144576
On a secular level, Scott was not best pleased with the public panic surrounding the coronavirus last weekend:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1236399852856041472
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1236402585394909185
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1236411327746277378
Pizza also proved problematic:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1236458429440577536
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1236460801889898498
Coffee hour was a new issue last Sunday. In some places it was banned. In others it came under restrictions:
https://twitter.com/PadreJZorro/status/1235781171075788801
Why do we always forget about flu season, which occurs every year and is responsible for tens of thousands of deaths in each Western country?
Absolutely.
Now is a good time for churches to make a hygienic plan for coffee hour then stick to it even when the coronavirus threat disappears. There will always be health panics. And, I hope, there will always be coffee hour.
I was not planning on featuring two of these posts back to back, however, much of the world is in a panic over the coronavirus.
In some cases, it’s warranted:
https://twitter.com/HilorSharma/status/1234463628432216066
Agree on Namaste. No touching, just bowing to someone with your hands pressed together upwards, as if in prayer. I might even start doing the Peace again at church if it caught on.
There were others who liked the shoe-touch, though:
https://twitter.com/wonderbarn/status/1234540668095287297
Yet, that can be problematic, depending on where one’s feet have trodden.
On a lighter note, I have to admit that, I, too, thought of the Knack’s 1970s hit, My Sharona in this context at the weekend:
On a serious note, though, in some countries, e.g. the United States, people have to be prepared to pay big bucks to get tested for coronavirus:
https://twitter.com/PurlLeslie/status/1234142364769247233
In churches around the world, the subject of how one takes Holy Communion during the coronavirus outbreak is a hot one.
That is equally true in the Episcopal Church and the rest of the Anglican Communion.
The Anglo-Catholic priest, FrKeithV, featured before in my Episcopal priests series, thinks the hysteria is over the top:
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1233932668171096064
Agree.
Back in the summer of 2009, when there was a global swine flu outbreak, I wrote three posts about Anglicans and Holy Communion.
My first, from July that year, quoted a Telegraph article saying that the Church of England was reviving the 1547 Sacrament Act for the crisis, which says that providing the Cup can be suspended in times of necessity.
My second, written in August 2009, discussed my personal experience with intinction as our vicar at the time practised it. He wanted us to take the intincted host from his fingers and place it in our mouths. I asked him afterwards whether we could dispense with intinction and just receive the host. He said that we absolutely had to have the Cup. My post explains that the Church of England frowns on intinction full stop because it does not prevent bacterial transmission.
My third post on the swine flu scare that year appeared in September 2009. I quoted various Anglican priests giving their views on intinction. Most were against it. Some dispensed with the Cup. Others continued the Cup, encouraging congregants to sip from it in the usual way. That post also mentioned advice from health experts in the Midlands who said that it didn’t matter whether people drank from the Cup, because they were just as likely to get the flu from people sitting around them in church.
Then the swine flu panic died down.
Now, nearly 11 years later, we have a coronavirus panic.
Returning to FrKeithV, he thinks that intinction is ‘theologically questionable’:
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1234226548808585216
An interesting exchange followed:
https://twitter.com/JaredTT1230/status/1234253242139389953
A Lutheran responded:
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1234226946604720129
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1234227457886167040
The Revd Kara N. Slade, Canon Theologian at Princeton Theological Seminary, explained why the Cup can be temporarily suspended — the Doctrine of Concomitance:
https://twitter.com/KaraNSlade/status/1234480771592851458
https://twitter.com/onsikamel/status/1234490511341346819
The point about Martin Luther is also good.
I wish I had known all of that when I debated unsuccessfully with my then-vicar 11 years ago. In an unrelated outcome, he retired shortly after that and moved away.
A Pentecostalist from Northern Ireland tweeted about an Episcopal priest’s scientific views on taking Communion during the coronavirus panic:
The Revd David Sibley, an Anglo-Catholic, is the rector of St Paul’s Episcopal Church in Walla Walla, Washington. He recently posted a letter to his congregation, ‘From the Rector: Coronavirus (COVID-19) and the Common Cup’.
I would strongly advise anyone worried about taking Holy Communion to bookmark it. He includes footnotes.
Excerpts follow, emphases in purple mine.
Invariably, the first question asked of the church in moments like this is:
What about the common cup at the Eucharist?
The simple answer is this – peer reviewed studies and Centers for Disease Control guidance since the 1980s have consistently shown that “no documented transmission of any infectious disease has ever been traced to the use of a common communion cup” and “the risk for infectious disease transmission by a common communion cup is very low, and appropriate safeguards–that is, wiping the interior and exterior rim between communicants, use of care to rotate the cloth during use, and use of a clean cloth for each service – would further diminish this risk.” American Journal of Infection Control (Vol. 26, No. 5, 1998).
We do all these things at St. Paul’s! Our Eucharistic Ministers are trained to wipe the rim of the chalice between each communicant, to rotate the purificator (the cloth), and the Altar Guild ensures a clean cloth is used for each liturgy.
He then explains why intinction is not a good idea:
Is it more sanitary to intinct the host into the cup than drink from it?
In short – absolutely not! As any experienced Eucharistic Minister or clergy person will tell you, it is a common occurrence when people intinct the host for their fingers to touch either the consecrated wine or the side of the chalice. This is in fact less sanitary then drinking in the first place – we can make sure our Eucharistic Ministers and clergy wash their hands, but we can’t do the same for the whole of the congregation!
For those still concerned about how to take Communion at this time, he provides three options. Note that the third refers to the aforementioned Doctrine of Concomitance:
As your priest, I can recommend three options to you:
-
- When in doubt, drink from the common cup – it is the most sanitary way for you to receive the consecrated wine at the Eucharist. Christians have been doing so for centuries, and still manage to die at the same rate and pace as the general population!
- If you don’t want to drink from the cup, don’t intinct for yourself. Instead, leave the host on your hand, and allow the Eucharistic Minister to intinct it for you, and place the host on your tongue. This ensures that only people with washed hands are handling the hosts, and it eliminates the unsanitary conditions that are caused by intinction.
- Finally, if you don’t want to receive the cup at all, it’s ok not to. The church believes that all of the grace of the sacrament of the Eucharist is conferred wholly in each element – both consecrated bread and wine. To receive only the host is not to have a “half blessing” or to receive “half communion.” Instead, receiving in one kind is to fully partake in the Eucharistic feast.
- When in doubt, drink from the common cup – it is the most sanitary way for you to receive the consecrated wine at the Eucharist. Christians have been doing so for centuries, and still manage to die at the same rate and pace as the general population!
Finally, let your consideration for others carry the way you would through any other sickness: if you have a fever, stay home; if you have a cold, don’t shake hands at the peace; and always, always, always wash your hands with soap and water for 15 seconds or longer.
Good man.
He holds a Bachelors and a Masters degree in Chemistry. He was ordained in 2011. That means he has finished leftover Communion wine quite a lot. This is what he says:
I’ve consumed what’s left in the chalice after Holy Communion, quite literally drinking behind thousands of people over my ordained vocation. And I promise – I get sick at the same rate the rest of us do!
Brilliant observation.
Let us not panic over coronavirus and Communion. If we truly believe that the priest is the conduit in transforming bread and wine into a Holy Mystery and the Real Presence, then, the thought of contamination should not occur to us.
In closing, what follows was my experience at Sunday morning Communion service on March 1. Our priest made no mention of coronavirus. I did notice, however, that there was a dispenser of sanitiser gel on the side altar table. He cleaned his hands with that before proceeding with the prayer of consecration.
As this was a 1662 service, there was no Peace ritual.
Today’s post features the Revd Scott A Gunn, an Anglo-Catholic serving in a Midwestern city. He is also the executive director of Forward Movement in the Episcopal Church, a co-author of Faithful Questions: Exploring the Way with Jesus and a religious editorial writer for Fox News.
Last month, I posted his thoughts on respecting the Church calendar.
Scott Gunn loves Lent. What follows are his impressions of Ash Wednesday and the season as a whole.
Before delving further, unrelated to Mr Gunn, this was the street scene in Houston, Texas, last Wednesday. These Episcopal priests are associated with the city’s Christ Church Cathedral. Excellent:
Ash Wednesday
Last week, Scott Gunn was in Tokyo for Ash Wednesday:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1232605996997996546
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1232620462393319424
He wrote an editorial about Ash Wednesday for Fox News, which was well received:
https://twitter.com/MarkLBennett/status/1232674300597096450
Excerpts follow from ‘Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent — here’s why it’s important’ (emphases mine):
The name Ash Wednesday comes from the tradition of marking people’s foreheads with ashes in the shape of a cross. The ashes are a sign of our mortality, and they are given with the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
At first, it might seem depressing to contemplate our inevitable death. But Ash Wednesday is just the opposite. Today reminds us that our earthly life is very short, but it is a gift from God. We are meant to use this gift well. In that way, Ash Wednesday is hopeful, encouraging, and inviting.
Ash Wednesday, and the whole season of Lent, invites us to turn away from what doesn’t matter and turn toward what does matter. As Christians, that means we recommit to following Jesus and to sharing his love with the world.
For some, that will be a new way of contemplating Ash Wednesday.
He then discusses the spiritual disciplines that characterise Lent:
Lent begins with an invitation. In the Episcopal Church, the invitation tells us how to observe a holy Lent. We do this “by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy Word.”
Self-examination and repentance are counter-cultural. It’s much easier to go through life blaming everyone else and talking about how wrong they are for whatever they did. But Lent invites me to think about the ways I have fallen short, to say I’m sorry. Lent invites me to try again.
I am happy to see that he encourages fasting, accompanied by prayer:
Lent is a time for prayer and fasting. Prayer is pretty common, and most of us know what it is, and we have at least a vague idea of how to go about talking to God this way.
But fasting is much less common. Again, fasting is counter-cultural. In a culture that tells us our worth comes from what we have, we are always urged to acquire and to consume more and more. Fasting means we cut back on the most vital of activities, eating. We might avoid food altogether, or we might severely limit the kinds of foods we eat.
Fasting creates a void of sorts in us. Our hunger reminds us of what we are missing. The awareness of what is missing reminds us that we survive only by God’s steady provision for us. And in this fasting, we are also reminded of suffering — of Christ’s suffering for us and of those who suffer daily due to poverty. Fasting reminds us that the world isn’t about us. Amidst the glitter of this age, fasting teaches us we all need the basic stuff of life, and we all need God.
I was even happier to read that he encourages reading the Bible. There was a time when Episcopalians knew the Bible very well. That’s no longer true.
Therefore, Lent is the perfect opportunity to get reacquainted with the Good Book:
And, finally, we get to my favorite part of the Lenten invitation. We are invited to read and meditate on God’s holy word. Reading the Bible reminds us of God’s vast love for us. From the moment of creation until the end of time, the Bible tells the story of how God desires our redemption.
When we read and meditate on God’s word, we are reminded of where we fit into this love story. In a world that values short-term thinking, the scriptures remind us to think eternally. In a world that tells us to give up when it gets tough, the scriptures remind us that God never gives up on us and we shouldn’t give up on God. In a world that magnifies fear, the scriptures tell us to be fearless. In a world that tells us to look after ourselves, the scriptures remind us to look after others as we seek God.
Ultimately:
Two thousand years ago, Jesus showed us perfect love, in his life, in his death, and in his resurrection. This Lent I want to try to see that perfect love anew, so that I might share it with a world in need of hope, mercy, and grace.
Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Remember God’s grace, and by grace alone do we all live. Remember.
Lent
On March 1, the First Sunday in Lent, Scott Gunn was in Yangon (Rangoon, in days of yore):
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1233935570440605697
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1233976619846393856
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1233984686667399168
Unfortunately, he had to cut short his stay:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1234097382347833344
He encouraged the faithful to begin Lenten disciplines, if they hadn’t already done so:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1234131268540891138
Excerpts follow from his brilliant explanation for Fox News: ‘What is Lent and why does it matter?’
Mr Gunn explains that, as far as he is concerned, Lent is the best season in the Church year for self-examination and self-improvement:
Before I try to convince you that Lent is the best season, let’s review where it came from.
From ancient times, one of the ways Christians prepared for Easter was by providing a time to repent of grievous sins. While that sounds severe, look at it the other way. The church gave people a second (and a third, and a fourth) chance. You could mess up badly and still have an opportunity to make it right.
Lent was also a time for people to prepare for baptism. Those to be baptized had to be taught and prepared. They had to learn the important things about the Christian faith.
Lent has always been about renewal, about second chances, about new life in Jesus through the waters of baptism. Lent has always been about the important things.
Over the centuries, Lent evolved into the season we now keep. Beginning on Ash Wednesday and lasting until the week before Easter Sunday, the Lenten season is forty days (excluding Sundays). This echoes the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry.
Indeed, Jesus’s time in the wilderness was the Gospel reading on March 1.
Here is something I did not know:
The word “Lent” comes from an Old English word that means “spring season.”
Spring is a good time to clean not only our houses but also our souls:
Many of us do a spring cleaning of our homes, and I like to think of Lent as a spring cleaning for our souls. You don’t have to be Catholic or to be part of Christian church that observes Lent to make your own journey through the season. Lent can be for everyone. It is, quite simply, a time to remember and to practice the most important things.
There is something to be said for self-denial:
No one should give up something for Lent for the sake of misery itself. Misery is not God’s desire! Instead, we might give things up that take us away from Jesus to make more room for those things that bring us closer to Jesus …
… In so doing, I am reminded that I depend on God, not on things. In other words, giving things up can help me notice that it’s not all about me.
Some people like to add a new religious activity to their lives during Lent:
Lately, it has become more common to take things on for the season of Lent. People might decide to read the Bible or pray more. But we might also decide to focus on something like forgiveness. How can we practice forgiving others? Who do we need to forgive?
Best of all, Scott Gunn indirectly referred to Jesus’s words to the Pharisee about the greatest Commandment (Matthew 22:37-40) …
37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
… and Hebrews 13:15-16:
15 Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. 16 Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.
He wrote of Lenten sacrifices of love:
We have all that we need in God’s grace. We aren’t meant to look after ourselves alone, but rather to offer sacrificial love to our neighbors. We don’t need to fear anything.
Loving God and loving our neighbors are the most important things. And Lent is a wonderful way to remember that life is about love, not about our own desires. Lent is the best season, because it’s all about the best things.
That’s a splendid, positive way of thinking about Lent.
February 23, 2020 was Transfiguration Sunday.
However, some traditionalist Episcopalian clergy dispute that, pointing to the Feast of the Transfiguration on August 6:
https://twitter.com/freverett/status/1229172979436748800
That’s all well and good, but most observant Christians are more likely to be in church on Sunday than on a weekday.
These were among the replies that the Revd Everett Lees received:
Agree fully.
A Canadian wrote in:
Easy mistake to make, when in our Canadian Book of Alternative Services we have Transfiguration readings that day, and we’re directed to use the Collect for the Transfiguration. Personally, I don’t think God will lose too much sleep if someone calls it Transfiguration Sunday.
So did a Lutheran:
I guess my Lutheran Book of Worship: Manual on the Liturgy is wrong.
And what about denominations that do not observe feast days, e.g. the Presbyterians?
The aforementioned Rev. Green Man did a bit more research on the scheduling of Transfiguration Sunday:
https://twitter.com/jdotclarkson/status/1229222791527923717
https://twitter.com/jdotclarkson/status/1229224400710443009
https://twitter.com/lindsaymonihen/status/1229490273454944257
Yes, that is helpful. I had not thought about the transition in Jesus’s ministry from Galilee to Jerusalem.
It should be noted that the Vanderbilt Divinity lectionary page has no list of readings for August 6.
From this we see that Transfiguration Sunday has its rightful place at the end of the season of Epiphany.
Where do Democrats stand in defending the rights of the unborn? Sadly, nowhere.
Yet, it has taken several years for this truth to dawn on lifetime Democrat voters.
It is unfortunate that Pete ‘Mayor Pete’ Buttigieg (pron. ‘Budd-uh-judge’) of South Bend, Indiana, is an Episcopalian. He puts the denomination to shame in his support of late-term abortion. Yet, many other Episcopalians — also Democrats — do, too:
On Tuesday, February 11, 2020, at least one Catholic Democrat saw the light, as Mayor Pete defended abortion until the bitter end. Interestingly, Mayor Pete’s dad was a left-wing professor at the University of Notre Dame who was a co-founder and past president of the International Gramsci Society. Who can make sense out of that? But I digress.
LifeSite News reported that the professor who termed Mayor Pete’s views as ‘the straw that broke this camel’s back’ is:
Charles Camosy, an associate professor of Theology at Fordham University, has also resigned from the board of Democrats for Life.
Camosy, who specializes in biomedical ethics, explained his reasons for his decision in an op ed he wrote for Thursday’s New York Post: the Democrats’ complete disregard for the unborn child.
Also (emphases mine):
… it was same-sex married Pete Buttigieg’s attitude to late-term abortion, aired last week on The View, that convinced Camosy that pro-life Democrats are “fighting a losing battle” in convincing their party to respect their position. Buttigieg had indicated that he didn’t think the government should have any say regarding late-term abortion or post-birth infanticide.
“The straw that broke this camel’s back was Pete Buttigieg’s extremism,” Camosy wrote.
“Here was a mainstream Democratic candidate suggesting, at one point, that abortion is OK up to the point the baby draws her first breath.”
He concluded that if the party was “willing to go all-in on the most volatile issue of our time with a position held by only 13 percent of the population, it was time to take no for an answer.”
Camosy also predicted that, thanks to its pro-abortion “extremism,” the Democratic Party will lose the next election.
We can but hope. If they win, they will have cheated; of that, I’m sure.
Dr Camosy does not think he will be able to vote Republican, though:
“My broader values mean I can’t vote Republican, however, and this makes me one of many millions of Americans for whom our political duopoly doesn’t work,” he wrote.
That’s too bad. Opening up other minor yet established parties does not work, either. The British proved that in their December 12, 2019 election.
LifeSite News has more of what Camosy wrote for the New York Post, all of it worthwhile reading. It also quotes Mayor Pete’s views for The View.
In closing, this is what Camosy had to say in his op-ed about the Democrats’ stance on late-term abortion:
Camosy asked them to participate in a thought experiment in which they suppose that “hundreds of thousands of children are being killed each year in horrific ways,” either because they have Down syndrome, or because their grandparents think their parents are too young, or because an abusive partner demands it.
“And then suppose a political party claimed this killing was a social good. Just another kind of health care. Something to shout about with pride,” the ethicist asked.
“This party, it should go without saying, would be unsupportable,” he concluded.
Just so.
Sounds a lot like eugenics, doesn’t it?
More will follow on the Democrats’ views on abortion.
Continuing my series what’s on Episcopal priests’ minds, the Anglo-Catholic FrKeithV posted a succinct tweet on inclusion in the Church:
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1227995308124229633
I couldn’t agree more. We should be transforming our lives through the gift of faith and God’s infinite grace: becoming more Christlike and rejecting the bondage of sin.
It is unclear whether his next tweet is related to inclusion, but one of the reasons people find inclusion upsetting is that a handful of those who wish to be included do tend to demand it, rather than approach the Church in humility and goodwill.
One remedy for this is to rely on Scripture rather than one’s personal feelings — emotions:
https://twitter.com/FrKeithV1/status/1227983944265719813
It is hard being a Christian. Sometimes we love our personal baggage, which often keeps us in a sinful cycle. Satan can readily supply us with any number of excuses not to grow spiritually, to remain in his snare.
Our emotional resistance — wilful disobedience — to God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit is one of the devil’s best tricks. Don’t fall for it.
My latest instalment on what Episcopal priests are thinking about involves respecting the Church calendar.
The following tweets come from the Revd Scott Gunn, an Anglo-Catholic serving in a Midwestern city. He is also the executive director of Forward Movement in the Episcopal Church, a co-author of Faithful Questions: Exploring the Way with Jesus and a religious editorial writer for Fox News.
Epiphany
We are in the last few Sundays of the season of Epiphany, so let’s make the most of them. We should be grateful for the Lord God sending His only begotten Son who died for our sins:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1223076745647206400
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1223078404116840448
And, while we are at it, let’s forget this abominable modern concept of ‘Ordinary Time’ in the Church calendar, as promulgated by Roman Catholics. Sadly, it has spread to some liturgical Protestant churches. How can Sunday worship or the Church calendar ever involve something ‘ordinary’?
Someone replying suggested developing an Episcopal Church of Twitter. Count me in. It’s a darn sight more traditional and meaningful than many Episcopal Church witterings. That goes for the Church of England, too.
Septuagesima Sunday
In my post with the readings for the Fifth Sunday after Epiphany — Year A, I later updated it to say that February 9, 2020, was Septuagesima Sunday, the seventh Sunday before Easter. Next Sunday will be Sexagesima Sunday and the one after that Quinquagesima Sunday.
Until Vatican II modernised the Catholic Church, that was the Sunday that signalled the beginning of Lent for traditionalists. In old money, Lent would have started on Monday, February 10. Now Lent begins on Ash Wednesday for nearly everyone. You can read more about the Sundays before Easter below, including the season of Shrovetide in my post below:
The Sundays before Lent — an explanation (the Sundays that define Shrovetide)
The readings for the latter Sundays in the season of Epiphany begin to move towards a call to repentance, and this was evident in the first reading from Isaiah as well as the Gospel reading for February 9.
Scott Gunn reminded us of our traditions, which some of his readers had also noticed:
Other Episcopal priests also remembered it was Septuagesima Sunday:
There was a bit more about the importance of the Gesimas in terms of our souls:
https://twitter.com/scottagunn/status/1225252415064215552
Holy Week
Then we discover that Holy Week is a separate season from Lent. This I did not know. I was not alone:
Either way, penitence, prayer and fasting still apply to the final days before Easter.
Corpus Christi
Mr Gunn also reminded us of the feast of Corpus Christi, which is the Thursday or the Sunday following Trinity Sunday. (Corpus Christi is Latin for Body of Christ.) It is still commemorated in the Church of England on the first Thursday after Trinity:
https://twitter.com/ianlasch/status/1226666799128883201
This is the modern version of the Collect from that liturgy:
Lord Jesus Christ,
we thank you that in this wonderful sacrament
you have given us the memorial of your passion:
grant us so to reverence the sacred mysteries
of your body and blood
that we may know within ourselves
and show forth in our lives
the fruits of your redemption;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
An Episcopal priest replying to him was in a lather, tweeting in all caps. It culminated in this exchange, which clarified that the priest was angry about Maundy Thursday as the institution of Holy Communion at the Last Supper:
https://twitter.com/ianlasch/status/1226673103603933184
https://twitter.com/ianlasch/status/1226674462193520640
Oh, dear. I connect both with Holy Communion.
In closing, it is good to see that so many clergy — and laity — still place importance on the traditional Sundays of the Church calendar. Long may it last.
I hope more follow their example.
In my new series ‘What’s on Episcopal priests’ minds’, here’s a good tweet on eschatology: the theological view of the end of the world, or, in Christian parlance, Christ’s Second Coming.
This comes from the Revd J Wesley Evans, OPA, an Anglo-Catholic based in Texas who belongs to the Anglican Order of Preachers. The Order of Preachers — O.P. — is better known as the Dominicans.
Two weeks ago, he lamented that the Episcopal Church does not preach enough about eschatology. I wholeheartedly agree, for all the reasons he states:
https://twitter.com/FrWesleyEvans/status/1217521585164357632
Sadly, a reply he received displays all the wrong thinking of the Episcopal Church and, in many respects, the Anglican Communion in Western countries. Contrary to what the Revd Hill says, eschatology should not be restricted to the season of Advent alone:
https://twitter.com/FrWesleyEvans/status/1217525051949449218
So, how does one preach about eschatology?
Here is one useful and rather timely example, given that the Super Bowl took place on February 2, 2020. This comes from a young deacon who is preparing to be ordained to the priesthood (i.e. ‘transitional’). The Revd AD Armond works for the Episcopal Diocese of Western Lousiana as a school chaplain:
https://twitter.com/AD_Armond/status/1223692915748282369
If one wanted to preach on eschatology more often, however, how would one do it?
Fr Evans offers his thoughts on preaching in general. There is a fine line to be struck between giving congregants a sense of complacency on the one hand and, on the other, despair.
There’s another important message in the first tweet. God makes no promises regarding our health (N.B.) or wealth:
https://twitter.com/FrWesleyEvans/status/1223678129203556354
https://twitter.com/FrWesleyEvans/status/1223678131141259264
That last tweet says it all concerning ‘the virtue of Faith’.
One wonders how many other clergy are that concerned about their Sunday sermons. Would that they all were that intent on preaching about our spiritual health — and faith.
Last week I started a new series, ‘What’s on Episcopal priests’ minds‘.
This week’s instalment presents a defence of Christian beliefs. The tweets are from the Revd Everett Lees, SCP, vicar of Christ Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
BCP below is the Book of Common Prayer:
https://twitter.com/freverett/status/1221505443484327936
https://twitter.com/freverett/status/1221505445703102464
I could not agree more.
For too long, spiritually corrupted Protestant clergy have portrayed Jesus in a vague, butler-in-the-sky manner or as a socio-political activist.
Episcopalians — and other Anglicans — must recapture the doctrine and beliefs of their denomination. This holds doubly true for clergy. We must teach those tenets and the life of Christ to newcomers and the next generation. I am happy to see that the Revd Mr Lees does just that:
May God continue to bless him and his ministry team.
Churchmouse Campanologist 