Thursday, Bloody Thursday
I've been having some health issues lately and needed some blood taken yesterday. Anyone who knows me in real life knows this is going to be fun. I have fainted a few times after blood was taken (even pinpricks) and I even fainted in a college history of science class on Harvey's Circulation of the Blood . Well, I told my doctor and nurse this, so they had me lie down and then the nurse suggested I breathe and recite some sort of mantra to myself as the blood was being taken. Thanks to *Christopher's endorsement, I went for the Jesus Prayer. No fainting. Yes!
According to Hatchett (may be a several part series)
According to Hatchett, the Prayer of St. John Chrysostom may not be of John Chrysostom, being found in later manuscripts of his eponymous Divine Liturgy but not earlier ones. I've always thought it ended abruptly and I was right. The traditional close would translate in Prayer Book language (it's used in a Eucharistic Prayer) to: "For you are gracious, O Lover of souls and to you, we give glory, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit."
Friday, July 27, 2007
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
the Pope and One Big Book
On the Pope's Latest Works
I'm quite glad that the 1962 Missal will have freer use in the future. The replacement of the Missale Romanum and the early insanity associated with the Novus Ordo somewhat alienated one of my grandfathers from the Roman Catholic Church. I'm can't exactly justify his reasons, which I suspect had something to do with his own affection for the Latin tongue and a profound hatred for the folk mass, but I think many of my Roman Catholic friends will appreciate the opportunity to arrange a regular Tridentine mass wherever they can find a priest to say it. The especial benefit lies in a rich hymnody and an integrated seasonal rhythm within the old rite that is simply lacking in the new. The problems mainly lie in worries about anti-Semitism, cultural elitism, and fears of division in the faithful of the Roman rite. I've heard complaints about how this motu proprio is just going to embolden the fundamentalist RCs. I think there's a much wider set of Roman Catholics who would appreciate the old Mass than such a statement would imply.
On the latter document released by the Pope, I echo the common sentiment of lack of surprise. My reply would have to be, "If our Orders were invalid, so would yours be." Not only do I feel supremely confident in this statement on independent grounds, I am merely paraphrasing Saepius Officio .
Indeed, I was thinking of this little phrase especially, "Finally, we would have our revered brother in Christ beware lest in expressing this judgment he do injustice not only to us but to other Christians also, and among them to his own predecessors, who surely enjoyed in an equal measure with himself the gift of the Holy Spirit."
Saepius officio also contains a lovely little summary of Anglican eucharistic theology, though I'm sure it would not go down well with certain Zwinglians in our midst.
One Big Book
That's what I have to say about M.J. Hatchett's, Commentary on the American Prayer Book , which is nearly as large as my Bible and came today. It is helpfully organized to be a companion text to the 1979 BCP. Everything is in order. Indeed, there's even commentary on the Certificate. I may read a few pages before bed each night.
I'm quite glad that the 1962 Missal will have freer use in the future. The replacement of the Missale Romanum and the early insanity associated with the Novus Ordo somewhat alienated one of my grandfathers from the Roman Catholic Church. I'm can't exactly justify his reasons, which I suspect had something to do with his own affection for the Latin tongue and a profound hatred for the folk mass, but I think many of my Roman Catholic friends will appreciate the opportunity to arrange a regular Tridentine mass wherever they can find a priest to say it. The especial benefit lies in a rich hymnody and an integrated seasonal rhythm within the old rite that is simply lacking in the new. The problems mainly lie in worries about anti-Semitism, cultural elitism, and fears of division in the faithful of the Roman rite. I've heard complaints about how this motu proprio is just going to embolden the fundamentalist RCs. I think there's a much wider set of Roman Catholics who would appreciate the old Mass than such a statement would imply.
On the latter document released by the Pope, I echo the common sentiment of lack of surprise. My reply would have to be, "If our Orders were invalid, so would yours be." Not only do I feel supremely confident in this statement on independent grounds, I am merely paraphrasing Saepius Officio .
Indeed, I was thinking of this little phrase especially, "Finally, we would have our revered brother in Christ beware lest in expressing this judgment he do injustice not only to us but to other Christians also, and among them to his own predecessors, who surely enjoyed in an equal measure with himself the gift of the Holy Spirit."
Saepius officio also contains a lovely little summary of Anglican eucharistic theology, though I'm sure it would not go down well with certain Zwinglians in our midst.
One Big Book
That's what I have to say about M.J. Hatchett's, Commentary on the American Prayer Book , which is nearly as large as my Bible and came today. It is helpfully organized to be a companion text to the 1979 BCP. Everything is in order. Indeed, there's even commentary on the Certificate. I may read a few pages before bed each night.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Conference Madness
Many academics read this blog, so let's ask a few rhetorical questions:
Does one day of your conference wrap up with a discussion of advising the government about how to execute a multibillion dollar project? Note that the government is legally obligated to listen to your advice and yet present government officials believe that it is illegal for them to consider the advice as the primary influence on decisionmaking (and keep hinting at that at every conceivable opportunity).
Do presentations involve standing in the hot sun for two and a half hours, wondering why you didn't bring sunscreen or water?
Do you find vocabulary from your ecclesial life appearing occasionally in presentations but meaning completely different things?
Yes, so that's my life at present.
Today, I also made my first operational weather forecast for another planet. On that note.
Collect for Astronomy
O Lord, who is adorned with light and whose glory the heavens declare, prevent us in all our humble inquiries into Thy works. But we especially beseech Thee to favor our probings into the waters of the Deep and to give us a clear vision of thy sublime creature [ target name ]. May the instrument be tuned to its proper settings, the target be tracked precisely, and the computers read, write, and analyze without pause or error. Bless, keep, and prosper the handiwork especially of the operator, for if we be incompetents, Lord, thou and she alone may preserve our observations unto utility. This we ask, Father, through the Word and Wisdom of all the worlds, Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.
Does one day of your conference wrap up with a discussion of advising the government about how to execute a multibillion dollar project? Note that the government is legally obligated to listen to your advice and yet present government officials believe that it is illegal for them to consider the advice as the primary influence on decisionmaking (and keep hinting at that at every conceivable opportunity).
Do presentations involve standing in the hot sun for two and a half hours, wondering why you didn't bring sunscreen or water?
Do you find vocabulary from your ecclesial life appearing occasionally in presentations but meaning completely different things?
Yes, so that's my life at present.
Today, I also made my first operational weather forecast for another planet. On that note.
Collect for Astronomy
O Lord, who is adorned with light and whose glory the heavens declare, prevent us in all our humble inquiries into Thy works. But we especially beseech Thee to favor our probings into the waters of the Deep and to give us a clear vision of thy sublime creature [ target name ]. May the instrument be tuned to its proper settings, the target be tracked precisely, and the computers read, write, and analyze without pause or error. Bless, keep, and prosper the handiwork especially of the operator, for if we be incompetents, Lord, thou and she alone may preserve our observations unto utility. This we ask, Father, through the Word and Wisdom of all the worlds, Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Reconciliation And Free Stuff
Free Stuff
Today, I was notified that I had won $100 of Amazon.com credit out of a random drawing from a group of Cambridge University lab monkeys. Future purchases likely will include Hatchett's commentary on the Book of Common Prayer, Modern Talking's magisterial eighth album, America , and the last Harry Potter book. Sadly, this made my day. It was a very boring day of making posters for a conference next week, documenting new model features, and monitoring terrestrial and martian weather. I really can't wait for the conference next week.
Reconciliation
Lately, the local courts have been ruling that the property of certain parishes who have forcibly sought alternative episcopal oversight actually belong to the Diocese of Los Angeles. For some in this neck of the woods (such as everyone's favorite former Orange County soccer mom, Rev. Ms. Susan Russell), this turn of events has led to a bit of gloating. Observers in the wider church wonder what the consequences of these decisions shall be in the vicinity in Fresno, though these issues will require settlement in the Supreme Court of Ionia, I mean, California.
Our bishop, Jon Bruno, Anglo-Jesuit former police officer and football player, is on record as saying that he wants to reconcile with the four parishes who are squatting on diocesan property. Kristy Harding today asks a fair question: "Yes, because a lawsuit is just the way to make them want to rejoin TEC. Is this real?" Kristy doesn't doubt +Bruno's desire to reconcile. She wonders whether it will work.
It's a good point, because reconciliation usually requires at least one side (and preferably both sides) to admit their sin against the other. I really don't see this happening in these four cases.
Lately, I've been reading the harsher parts of the Rule in which St. Benedict faces the reality of living in community, not just a godly community but one with an understanding of authority and the rule in law in the midst of disordering civilization and organizing barbarism. He has to distinguish between the venially vicious, those who because of human frailty breach the requirements of the community's life and those who actually intend harm to the community's life, to the community's being. For the former, Benedict seems inclined to the Wisdom literature and depends on deprivation and corporal punishment. For the latter, the New Testament church discipline is more of an inspiration. Warning, reproof, chastisement, and finally cautery.
It's hard to extend this model. The tyranny of bishops is something that repulses the American mind, and tyranny soon becomes anything that we consider intolerable. When does the teaching authority of a bishop rise to the level of disrespect to a parish that theologically begs to differ? No one can answer this. No Episcopal bishop therefore is an abbot. No one allows a bishop the formation privileges of an abbot, for fear they will some day seriously disagree with their bishop. O Lord, bless and keep the bishop...far away from us .
I remember the example of the aftermath of the Council of Whitby in which Saint Colman resigned the see of Lindisfarne and founded a new monastery in the west of Ireland. But I think this was Colman's admission that the Celtic party no longer could minister effectively within the Province of York. And this is the generality at the root of these situations. If the Diocese of Los Angeles takes over these properties, will they be genuine centers of life and mission or will they be bulldozed and sold (as Stand Firm commenters claim)? The ball, as far as I am concerned, is in Bishop Bruno's court.
I know what I'd do. I'd go myself quietly or send trusted friends to visit the church a few times, walk about the neighborhood, read the annual reports, and think and pray carefully about whether the Kingdom of God as a whole would be better served by this parish or a new Episcopal congregation built in the ashes of this one. If the former, I would remember that those who gave in the past gave for the work and spread of the Kingdom of God. I would go to the Rector and Vestry of the parish and draw up an agreement in which the parish admitted they had no right to do what they did and the Bishop admitted that the trust of former generations was upheld in the work of the parish. The latter case would be harder but necessary. I would give the parish a year from legal finality to vacate the property, a year for both parties to plan to start again.
It's a tricky balance between avoiding handing our disputes outside the circle of those who will judge angels and dulling the effect of the temporal sword that restrains evildoers. The balance comes when we let the courts settle the issues of civil righteousness ( meum et tuum ) but let God's concerns direct how matters will play out in the end.
Today, I was notified that I had won $100 of Amazon.com credit out of a random drawing from a group of Cambridge University lab monkeys. Future purchases likely will include Hatchett's commentary on the Book of Common Prayer, Modern Talking's magisterial eighth album, America , and the last Harry Potter book. Sadly, this made my day. It was a very boring day of making posters for a conference next week, documenting new model features, and monitoring terrestrial and martian weather. I really can't wait for the conference next week.
Reconciliation
Lately, the local courts have been ruling that the property of certain parishes who have forcibly sought alternative episcopal oversight actually belong to the Diocese of Los Angeles. For some in this neck of the woods (such as everyone's favorite former Orange County soccer mom, Rev. Ms. Susan Russell), this turn of events has led to a bit of gloating. Observers in the wider church wonder what the consequences of these decisions shall be in the vicinity in Fresno, though these issues will require settlement in the Supreme Court of Ionia, I mean, California.
Our bishop, Jon Bruno, Anglo-Jesuit former police officer and football player, is on record as saying that he wants to reconcile with the four parishes who are squatting on diocesan property. Kristy Harding today asks a fair question: "Yes, because a lawsuit is just the way to make them want to rejoin TEC. Is this real?" Kristy doesn't doubt +Bruno's desire to reconcile. She wonders whether it will work.
It's a good point, because reconciliation usually requires at least one side (and preferably both sides) to admit their sin against the other. I really don't see this happening in these four cases.
Lately, I've been reading the harsher parts of the Rule in which St. Benedict faces the reality of living in community, not just a godly community but one with an understanding of authority and the rule in law in the midst of disordering civilization and organizing barbarism. He has to distinguish between the venially vicious, those who because of human frailty breach the requirements of the community's life and those who actually intend harm to the community's life, to the community's being. For the former, Benedict seems inclined to the Wisdom literature and depends on deprivation and corporal punishment. For the latter, the New Testament church discipline is more of an inspiration. Warning, reproof, chastisement, and finally cautery.
It's hard to extend this model. The tyranny of bishops is something that repulses the American mind, and tyranny soon becomes anything that we consider intolerable. When does the teaching authority of a bishop rise to the level of disrespect to a parish that theologically begs to differ? No one can answer this. No Episcopal bishop therefore is an abbot. No one allows a bishop the formation privileges of an abbot, for fear they will some day seriously disagree with their bishop. O Lord, bless and keep the bishop...far away from us .
I remember the example of the aftermath of the Council of Whitby in which Saint Colman resigned the see of Lindisfarne and founded a new monastery in the west of Ireland. But I think this was Colman's admission that the Celtic party no longer could minister effectively within the Province of York. And this is the generality at the root of these situations. If the Diocese of Los Angeles takes over these properties, will they be genuine centers of life and mission or will they be bulldozed and sold (as Stand Firm commenters claim)? The ball, as far as I am concerned, is in Bishop Bruno's court.
I know what I'd do. I'd go myself quietly or send trusted friends to visit the church a few times, walk about the neighborhood, read the annual reports, and think and pray carefully about whether the Kingdom of God as a whole would be better served by this parish or a new Episcopal congregation built in the ashes of this one. If the former, I would remember that those who gave in the past gave for the work and spread of the Kingdom of God. I would go to the Rector and Vestry of the parish and draw up an agreement in which the parish admitted they had no right to do what they did and the Bishop admitted that the trust of former generations was upheld in the work of the parish. The latter case would be harder but necessary. I would give the parish a year from legal finality to vacate the property, a year for both parties to plan to start again.
It's a tricky balance between avoiding handing our disputes outside the circle of those who will judge angels and dulling the effect of the temporal sword that restrains evildoers. The balance comes when we let the courts settle the issues of civil righteousness ( meum et tuum ) but let God's concerns direct how matters will play out in the end.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)