Good day!
Once again, here is a reminder of the upcoming annual Lay Readers/Church Leaders conference. It is offered via Zoom and is free of charge. You can register simply by emailing your info to Dr. Carol Knox: carolknox3@gmail.com (Please provide Carol with your name, email address, parish, deanery, and role in the Church). You can get more info here: https://www.dioceseofalgoma.com/2023/07/11/2023-lay-readers-church-leaders-conference-information-now-available/
If there are any other upcoming events that I can advertise for you please let me know.
A Liturgical Note For You:
The ‘Season of Creation’ begins on Friday, September 1 and runs through October 4. This is absolutely not a liturgical season in our church (like Advent or Easter). This is a time when Christians are invited to pay particular attention, through prayer and reflection, to God’s creation that nourishes and sustains us. Hymns and prayers during worship services, congregational activities and prayer outside of worship services, and even special worship services in addition to the main Sunday service, are ways in which we can acknowledge this time of attention to the stewardship of our environment.
The ‘Season of Creation’ is not the greenlight for messing with the established lectionary readings. God – who is Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer, and Ruler of all things – is found within our lectionary readings every single week. The current cycle of readings is a crucial piece in our ongoing transformation “from glory to glory.” Here is what Becoming the Story We Tell (p.3) says about this:
The Church Year now takes us through four acts in [the drama at the heart of our Salvation Story]: the coming of Christ as the herald of God’s kingdom (from Advent through the Sundays after Epiphany); the growing resistance to his offer of reconciliation and peace (Lent); the Passover crisis (Holy Week and the Great Three Days); and the revelation of a New Humanity in the risen Christ (Easter Day through to Pentecost). This is the same dramatic journey you must make if you are going to become a disciple of Jesus. It is not enough to be impressed by Jesus’ wonderful example; we need to deal with our resistance to the way of Jesus — a resistance we have been formed in by our culture. Above all, we need to recognize what it means that our world rejected Jesus. Only then will we be prepared to welcome the risen Christ who gives us his peace, and summons us to be his witnesses. This is the kind of conversion that leads to real discipleship. If the church is going to be a company of disciples and a sign of God’s coming kingdom, we will need to provide the kind of formation for newcomers that enables them to be converted in that way. Our hospitality will need to be much more than making newcomers feel welcome and comfortable. By the way, Becoming the Story We Tell has fabulous resources – personal and liturgical – and is a wealth of knowledge regarding why we do what we do. Here is the link: https://www.angli.ca/bst/Becoming+the+Story+we+Tell+2023v2.pdf
For Your Devotions:
Monday, August 28th is the memorial of Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, Teacher of the Faith. Augustine was born in 354 in North Africa. He took a very round-about way to Christianity but was extremely influential once he got there. Many of his writings and sermons have survived and offer up his sometimes controversial theological perspectives. He was the Bishop of Hippo from 396 until his death in 430. If you’d like to read more, check this out: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Augustine
Tuesday, August 29th is the Holy Day of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist. If you’d like to refresh your memory on the details of this event and learn some interesting, non-scriptural legends, check out the website that follows. For example, after Herod had ordered John’s beheading, the prophet even in death was unrelenting in voicing his condemnation of Herod’s wrong-doing. Far from being whimsical or superstitious, these legends offer commentary on the vital roles of the people in this Gospel story. https://oca.org/saints/lives/2007/08/29/102419-the-beheading-of-the-holy-glorious-prophet-forerunner-and-baptis
Wednesday, August 30th is the commemoration of Robert McDonald, Priest in the Western Arctic. Robert was born in 1829, the second of 10 children, in a place which later became known as Winnipeg. For over 40 years, he worked as a missionary among the Gwich’in people in the Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Alaska – baptizing, establishing schools, and translating the Bible, Book of Common Prayer and many hymns using the alphabet he had created for the Gwich’in language. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_McDonald_(missionary)
Thursday, August 31st is the commemoration of Aidan, Bishop of Lindisfarne who died in 651. Aidan was born in Ireland but was a monk on the Island of Iona when he was chosen to become a bishop and evangelize northern England. His career was relatively brief but his legacy has been long-lasting. He founded churches and monasteries and trained other ministers to follow in his footsteps. For more information: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Aidan
Saturday, September 2nd is the memorial of the Martyrs of New Guinea, 1942. Anglican missionaries reached New Guinea in 1891. In 1898 the Anglican Diocese of Papua New Guinea was established and remained a missionary diocese of the Church of England in Australia until 1977, when an autonomous Anglican province, the Church of the Province of Papua New Guinea, was established. During World War II Christian missionaries and the natives of New Guinea suffered greatly from the Japanese invaders. On this day we remember the eight missionaries and two lay persons who, despite knowing the risk, stayed to continue their mission work and ended up losing their lives. If you’d like more detail, check this out: http://anglicanhistory.org/aus/png/rowland_faithful1964.html
In the joy of the risen Christ,
Susan
Deanery of Algoma 