Vital Posts / Worship

Browse


Related

  • Re-enter Dancing
    I somehow think that other rectors did not spend their last days of sabbatical crawling clubs in Chicago or dancing in front of the stage at Buddy Guy’s. But that is how my time away ended and I loved every minute of it. As I spend my first d…
  • Do the Right Thing!
    Churches often fail to observe copyright laws, or even the basics of courtesy. We have this unfortunate habit of thinking that just because it is "for the church" it is OK if I make a few copies of this or that. So, Sunday School teachers photocopy…
  • Love in the Midst of Suffering
    I had a blog post almost ready to post before I went to church on Sunday evening. Perhaps that’s what a sacrament should do: engage and disrupt. At St. Lydia’s on Sunday evenings we prepare a meal together and participate in a simple and ancien…
  • Public Liturgy
    I spent Holy Week in the Diocese of Chicago trailing my good friend Dent Davidson, Missioner for Arts and Liturgy. Most of the week we participated with the people of All Saints, Chicago, in the unfolding mysteries of the walk to the cross and the …
  • Flowering the Cross
    One of the delights in being new is experiencing a church’s long-held tradition for the first time. On Easter Sunday, a day full of tradition and pomp, I was moved by our new church’s custom of “flowering the cross.” As the hand…
  • “Love One Another”
    Taking off your socks in a strange place is never particularly comfortable. What if the floor isn’t clean? What if your feet smell? We’d rather sit in our pews and stick to the rituals we know. Still, on Maundy Thursday Episcopalians around the…
  • Ritual and Creativity
  • The Fifth [Meatless] Friday of Lent
    Give them such fulfillment of their mutual affection that they may reach out in love and concern for others. Amen.  -The Blessing of a Marriage, the Book of Common Prayer I grew up thinking only nuns could be married to God. Now I think t…
  • Taize
    I have just completed a one-week retreat at the Taize monastery in south east France. I leave here rested, centered, and hopeful. My church hosts a Taize service each Sunday evening at 6 pm and as part of my sabbatical travels I wanted to come …
  • Creating and Communicating Silence
    I have a good friend who occasionally likes to stare at me silently, just to see what I’ll say. The silence makes me slightly uncomfortable, so I’ll say something and then I’ll keep speaking, trying to talk through whatever is causing her to gi…
  • Leaving Uganda
    My sabbatical experience is planned to divide neatly into three separate experience bases – Africa, Europe, and Chicago. Leaving Uganda, I have now completed the first half of the first leg and if each experience is as rich as this one has been t…
  • Walking Away for a While
    Today I walked out of my office and won’t return until May 1. I am leaving on my first sabbatical in 31 years of priesthood. It will be an opportunity to travel to Africa and Europe and to spend a month in Chicago all pursuing music as an importa…
  • Offering Hope and Healing: Stephen Ministry
    On November 19, 2011 a service of Hope and Healing was held at The Church of the Transfiguration in Dallas Texas.This holiday prayer service provided a place of meaning and comfort for those experiencing the loss of a loved one.The parish’s Steph…
  • St. Nicholas Day Resources
    Editor's Note: Today's guest blogger Jim Rosenthal, who frequently represents St. Nicholas as part of his ministry with the St. Nicholas Society, shares resources related to this well known saint. The origin of the Saint Nicholas tradition: fro…
  • A New Normal 2: Communion
    For me, church was always done a certain way: Until I began going to a new church. For the first 40+ years of my life, taking communion meant walking to the front of the church – when prompted by the usher – and kneeling at the altar rail. …
  • Postcard from Memphis
    I’ve been traveling this past week. From New York to Memphis to San Antonio, I am visiting friends and family after a lengthy time away. In the process, however, I’ve also had the opportunity to check out a few innovative ministries taking plac…
  • How Wired Do You Want to Be?
    I’ve discovered a great new blog from the Diocese of Olympia: Putting the “I-T” in Spirit. Written by Kerry Allman, internet strategist at Episcopal Diocese of Olympia, this blog serves as a resource and as a forum for people using web and so…
  • Ecstasy
    I have taken the exact same vacation for the past 17 years. I return to Ohio for the Community Festival (Comfest), and then my wife, El, joins me and a bunch of friends at a cabin in Ohio’s Hocking Hills. Then we head to Pelee Island in Lake Eri…
  • Outdoor Church
    When the weather's nice, do you move worship outside? Sunday morning in Marblehead: Slept late, breakfasted on oatmeal raisin bread purchased at the Farmers’ Market, then headed to the Fort at the mouth of the harbor to watch the boats ready …
  • America!?
    How many of you will sing Hymn 719 this coming weekend? Or something else from the back of Hymnal 1982? Will anyone be doing a number from the final pages of Lift Every Voice and Sing II? Yesterday as I finalized my plans for the 4th of July ho…
  • Space invaders
    The air conditioner died, not with a bang but a whimper. Because of problems getting the parts, it would be a month before the company could install a new unit. With early June temperatures in the 90s – and the priest already prone to sweat…
  • Summer as its own Liturgical Season
    This week we enter one of my favorite seasons of the church year. I don’t mean the Season of Pentecost. I mean the Season of Summer. While not strictly its own color-coded calendar section, the liturgical Season of Summer probably represen…
  • Diocesan Ministry Fairs
    Worship in the Diocese of Chicago last Saturday was fantastic. Why worship on Saturday? The opening of the annual diocesan Leadership and Ministry Fair. Bishop Jeffrey Lee, Vicki Garvey (canon for Christian Formation), and Dent Davidson (Missio…
  • Sing a New Song
    I just got back from the post office where I sent off my grant application to the Lilly Foundation for my first sabbatical in 30 years of ministry. Whether we get the funding or not, we are pushing ahead with a shared renewal experience for me and …
  • What was THAT All About?
    The rector who was my first supervisor as a young priest used to tell the story of a fellow rector who checked in to a mental hospital for Easter Week nearly every year. I, myself, share openly that when Jesus emerges from the tomb on Easter mornin…
  • Tenebrae
    I’m looking forward to going to church tonight. For the second time, I’ll be joining my friend Barb at the Tenebrae service at Old North (United Church of Christ). Last year, I had no idea what a Tenebrae service was. It’s part of Holy Wee…
  • Who's Blooming?
    How did the rose ever open its heart and give to this world all its beauty? It felt the encouragement of light against its being – otherwise, we all remain too frightened. (Hafiz) This beautiful phrase anchors tonight’s meditation during Ve…
  • Holy Weak
    I have always joked that when Jesus comes out of the tomb on Easter I crawl in. This run between now and Easter Monday is a marathon of liturgical gymnastics that will leave all competent clergy absolutely spent. Here is what we are doing at St.…
  • Morning Prayer Solitaire
    As part of our Lenten series on spirituality and social justice, Will, a new parishioner, taught one class on the use of daily Morning Prayer. He came to us from the Roman Catholic Church and has absolutely fallen maddeningly in love with the Book …
  • The Music Scene
    What will the future Episcopal Church sound like?  Two noteworthy events have taken place in the past few weeks regarding music in the Episcopal Church. First, the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music (SCLM) has extended the deadlin…
  • Episode II, Undercover Rector: LOL
    I saw a post on Facebook the other day about a friend’s father who had taken a turn for the worse. Another friend posted, “Prayers heading your way. LOL.” Wait a minute. I thought LOL meant laughing out loud. I’m guessing (hoping) thi…
  • Blessing (and welcoming) the bikes
    What would you do if a bunch of bicyclists rolled their wheels up to the front of your sanctuary? Would you bless them? For the past 13 years, St. John the Divine Cathedral in New York City has welcomed bicyclists for an annual Bless…
  • We Gather Together: Conversations on Same-Gender Blessings 2
    This is the second of two blogs I am sharing from Katrina Hamilton who represented the Diocese of Olympia at the church-wide consultation on Same-Sex Blessings in Atlanta. Katrina is the 25-year-old head of our deputation to next year’s General C…
  • We Gather Together: Conversations on Same-Gender Blessings
  • Super Bowl Sunday
    It’s not in the lectionary or listed in Holy Women, Holy Men but Super Bowl Sunday is certainly high among the cultural holidays celebrated in this country. I have a certain amnesia about the game itself. I watch it every year and for the life of…
  • A New Program Goes Old-School
    My church is going old-school with a new visitation program. Like many Episcopal congregations, we have a growing number of elderly people and shut-ins who can no longer attend worship services. These are folks who have been faithful members …
  • A Mega-Church Plant
    Traffic started about a mile from the entrance of the church.    Police and volunteers guided vehicles through the parking lot maze. At every door, greeters with genuine smiles welcomed us. They held eye contact and sometimes put a reassuring h…
  • Chalk marks the Way
    A good friend of mine once gave me an Epiphany gift – a beautiful box with the spices of frankincense and myrrh. Because we’re such good friends, I joked, “Where’s the gold?” Because she’s such a good friend, she answered back, “T…
  • Las Posadas
    Though I didn't realize it at the time, I grew up celebrating a Reader's Digest version of Las Posadas. In Mexico and Guatemala, Las Posadas celebrations involve an elaborate pilgrimage, complete with statues of Mary and Joseph, wherein townfolk we…
  • A Thanksgiving Feast - The Religious Kind
    Episcopalians corner the market on Thanksgiving. Sure, everyone across the United States celebrates Thanksgiving in some way, from cranberries and turkey dinners to lazy afternoons watching football and parades to studious planning of Black F…
  • It’s Beginning to Look a Lot like Christmas . . .
    I remember the day I was flying home from the east coast on Halloween and as I was getting off the plane I heard on the muzak the first Christmas carol of the season. Living with a retailer (my wife runs the Cathedral Shop at St. Mark’s Cathed…
  • Who Presides When the Bishop Comes? We do.
    When Bishop Greg Rickel makes his first official visitation to St. Andrew’s this Sunday, he’ll join a priest, a deacon, and a lay presider at the altar for a celebration of the Eucharist that stretches the rubrics but models the theology of our…
  • Sharing Liturgical Resources
    At the 2009 General Convention, resolution C056, "Liturgies for Blessings" directed the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music to collect and develop theological and liturgical resources, and report to the 77th General Convention. The Rev. Dr. Ru…