The Rose Maniple

Ordo: Advent to Lent

2011-12-24T02:44:00.002-05:00

November
27 - FIRST SUNDAY IN ADVENT (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 268, Grad 1010
28 – Advent Feria – BAS p. 452, Grad 1012
29 – Advent Feria – BAS p. 452, Grad 1013
30 – St Andrew the Apostle (red), BAS p. 430, FAS p. 359, Grad 2002

December
1 – Advent Feria BAS p. 452 Grad 1015
2 – Advent Feria - BAS p. 452,Grad 1016
3 – St Francis Xavier (white) - BAS p. 452, FAS p. 361, Grad 3121
4 – ADVENT II (violet or dark blue) comm. Nicholas Ferrar BAS p. 269, Grad 1020 FAS p. 363
5 – St Clement of Alexandria (white), BAS p. 452, FAS p. 365, Grad 2010
6 – St Nicholas (white) BAS p. 453, FAS p. 367, Grad 2012 Year’s Mind of the Montreal Massacre
7 – St Ambrose (white) BAS p. 453, FAS p. 369, Grad 2014
8 – Conception BVM (white and blue) – FAS p. 371, Grad 2016
9 – Prophets of the Old Covenant (white) BAS p. 453, FAS p. 373, Grad 2565
10 – Of the Octave (white and blue) BAS p. 453, Grad 2016
11 – ADVENT III “Gaudete” (rose-pink) Independence Day in the Dominion of Canada BAS p. 270, Grad 1030.
2nd celebration: BAS p. 412, Grad 5220
12 - Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 453, Grad 1031
13 – Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 453, Grad 1032
14 – Simon Gibbons (Ember Wed) (white) BAS p. 453, FAS p. 375, Grad 1041
15 – Octave Day of the Conception (white and blue) BAS p. 454, collects FAS p. 371, Grad 2016
16 – Ember Friday (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 454 Grad 1042 Sapientiatide begins
17 – Ember Saturday (violet or dark blue) Grad 1043
18 – ADVENT IV “Rorate” (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 271, Grad 1040
19 – Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 454, Grad 1046
20 – Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 454, Grad 1047
21 – St Thomas the Apostle, BAS p. 413, FAS p. 213, Grad 2022
22 – Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 454, Grad 1051
23 – Advent Feria (violet or dark blue) BAS p. 454, Grad 1052
24 – Vigil of the Nativity (violet) Grad 1053

25 – NATIVITY OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST ACCORDING TO THE FLESH (white or gold)
Midnight: BAS p. 273, Grad 1103
Dawn: BAS p. 274, Grad 1104
Day: BAS p. 275, Grad 1105

26 – St Stephen the Protomartyr (red), BAS p. 417, Grad 1106
27 – St John the Evangelist (white), BAS p. 406, Grad 1107
28 – Holy Innocents (Childermas) (red), BAS p. 398, Grad 1108
29 – St Thomas Becket (red) FAS p. 383, FAS , Grad 2028
30 – Christmas Feria (white) BAS p. 455, Grad 1111
31 – John West (white), BAS p. 455, FAS p. 385, Grad 3121

January
1 – OCTAVE DAY OF THE NATIVITY: NAMING & CIRCUMCISION OF JESUS (white or gold)
BAS p. 277, Grad 1112/1113
2 – St Basil the Great & St Gregory of Nazianzus (white), BAS p. 456, FAS p. 41, Grad 2259/2366
3 – Weekday in Christmas (white), BAS p. 456, Grad 1114
4 – Weekday in Christmas (white), BAS p. 456, Grad 1115
5 – Weekday in Christmas (white), BAS p. 457, Grad 1117
6 – Epiphany (gold or white) BAS p. 279, Grad 1202
7 – Weekday in the Octave (white), BAS p. 457, Grad 1203
8 – SUNDAY IN THE OCTAVE OF EPIPHANY: BAPTISM OF THE LORD (white) BAS p. 348, Grad 1204/1205
9 – In the Octave (white), BAS p. 468, Grad 1302
10 – William Laud (red), BAS p. 468, FAS p. 45, Grad 2032
11 – In the Octave (white), BAS p. 468, Grad 1302
12 – Marguerite Bourgeoys (white), BAS p. 468, FAS p. 49, Grad 3412
13 – St Hilary of Poitiers (white), BAS p. 468, FAS p. 53, Grad 2036
14 – John Horden (white), BAS p. 469, FAS p. 51, Grad 3111
15 – SECOND SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (Proper 2: green) BAS p. 349, Grad 1303
16 – Richard Benson (from Sunday) (white) BAS p. 469, FAS p. 55, Grad 3411
17 – St Antony of Egypt, BAS p. 469, FAS p. 57, Grad 2042
18 – Confession of St Peter the Apostle (white) Octave of Christian Unity begins BAS p. 399, Grad 2044
19 – Requiem (black) BAS p. 469, Grad 4730
20 – Requiem (black) BAS p. 469, Grad 4730
21 – St Agnes of Rome (red), BAS p. 469, FAS p. 61, Grad 2050
22 – THIRD SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (proper 3: green) BAS p. 350, Grad 1304
23 – St Vincent the Deacon (from Sunday) BAS p. 470, FAS p. 63, Grad 2052
24 – St Francis de Sales (white), BAS p. 470, FAS p. 65, Grad 3211
25 – Conversion of St Paul the Apostle (white) BAS p. 400, Grad 2056
26 – SS Timothy & Titus (white), BAS p. 470, FAS p. 69, Grad 2060
27 – St John Chrysostom (white), BAS p. 470, FAS p. 71, Grad 2062
28 – St Thomas Aquinas (white), BAS p. 470, FAS p. 73, Grad 2064
29 – FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (proper 4: green) BAS p. 352, Grad 1305
30 – St Charles Stuart (red) BAS p. 470, FAS p. 75, Grad 2066
31 – Requiem (black) BAS p. 470, Grad 4730

February
1- Requiem (black) BAS p. 470, Grad 4730
2- Presentation of Christ & Purification BVM (Candlemas) BAS p. 401, Grad 2070
3 – St Anskar (white) Blessing of Throats BAS p. 471, FAS p. 79, Grad 2072
4 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 471, Grad 4730
5 – FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (proper 5: green) BAS p. 353, Grad 1306
6 – ACCESSION DAY: THE DIAMOND JUBILEE OF THE REIGN OF HM ELIZABETH II, QUEEN OF CANADA (white)
BAS p. 412, Grad 1306
7 – Martyrs of Japan (from Sunday) (red), BAS p. 471, FAS p. 81, Grad 2076
8 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 471, Grad 4730
9 – Hannah Grier Coome, BAS p. 471, FAS p. 83, Grad 3412
10 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 471, Grad 4730
11 – BVM (white and blue), BAS p. 471, Grad 5574
12 –SIXTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (proper 6: green) BAS p. 354, Grad 1307
13 – Requiem (black) BAS p. 472, Grad 4730
14 – SS Cyril & Methodius (white), BAS p. 472, FAS p. 85, Grad 2084
15 – Thomas Bray (white), BAS p. 472, FAS p. 87, Grad 2086
16 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 472, Grad 4730
17 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 472, Grad 4730
18 – BVM (white and blue), BAS p. 472, Grad 5574
19 – SEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (proper 7: green) BAS p. 356, Grad 1308
20 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 473, Grad 4730
21 – Requiem (black), BAS p. 473, Grad 4730
22 – Ash Wednesday (violet) BAS p. 281, Grad 1403

Preface to the Ordo

2011-12-24T02:43:00.003-05:00

Editorial principles

•Range
The choices made in the ordo are designed to expose the faithful to the broadest possible range of liturgical material in our repertoire. Every effort is made both to accommodate the widest possible selection of sanctoral commemorations and to maintain Archbishop Cranmer’s ideal of an orderly course of Scripture reading. This has sometimes entailed the choice of options at variance with what is envisioned by McCausland’s or the BAS itself. I have not, for example, followed the modern bias against clutter in the liturgy, as seen in the disparaging of octaves and commemorations. The latter I have suggested when a saint’s day falls on a Sunday and has no proximate candidate for transference, as an alternative to omission. The former I have retained in a modified way while preserving the integrity of the daily lectionary. For some occasions occurring on a Sunday (for example, diocesan services or civic occasions), a secondary afternoon or evening celebration may be appropriate in addition to the Parish Communion of the weekly proper.

•Readings
References are given to the BAS Daily Office Lectionary. The Weekday Eucharistic lectionary may be used instead if the Office lectionary is in use at the Office, but the BCP’s lectionary is more suitable for the latter purpose. On Sundays, the single BAS page reference yields the lections and major propers printed together. On saints’ days, the major propers are taken from For All the Saints. I have, however, preferred to interrupt lectio continua as conservatively as possible, and so I do not recommend the readings of the day on saints’ days save those given in the BAS, as on feasts of Scripture. (An exception is feasts of Our Lady, which are all treated as holy days, notwithstanding the inexplicable distinction of the Conception and Nativity in the BAS). Minor propers are taken from the Anglican Gradual and Sacramentary. The same minor propers may be repeated during traditional octaves, while the lectionary continues in course.

•Colour
I have been somewhat flexible in colour: while my normative baseline is the Use of Christminster Abbey, I have also taken account of Full Homely Divinity’s advice on local adaptation of the traditional ‘Western’ scheme. I have not made the distinction suggested by the BAS between “memorials” (which use the colour and readings of the saint) and “commemorations” (which use the ferial colour and readings, with a nod to the saint in the major propers). Rather, I have split the difference, recommending throughout the sanctoral colour (as on memorials) and the readings of the day (as an commemorations). This adjustment avoids the strange sight of saints’ days in green and endless repetitions of the Great Commission on the feasts of each and every missionary.

•Calendar
The Ordo is intended to conform to the authorized Canadian Calendar of Holy Persons. On feasts distinctive to this kalendar, since the Gradual is American in origin, an appropriate common has been suggested for the minor propers. Major historic anniversaries and some traditional ecclesiastical dates not listed in the calendar itself are noted as possible votives where appropriate and permitted by pontifical authority. On “free” days in green time, while continuing the course of the lectionary, I have suggested Daily Mass for the Dead instead of a recapitulation of the Sunday Mass. Likewise, traditional Incarnational votive Masses of Our Lady on Saturday have been referenced to the Gradual. Pastoral judgment will dictate the extent to which these options are used and the manner in which they are offered.

Roundup

2011-11-04T04:15:00.002-04:00

Formal theological education hasn't afforded the same kind of luxury of blogging, yet the world continues without me. Expect some restructuring. In the meantime, though, what briefly has been up since last I posted?

The implementation of Anglicanorum coetibus continues. In Canada it appears the erection of the ordinariate is close at hand. Both the Anglican Catholic Church of Canada and the Toronto and Calgary groups have gone quiet, though in this last case not before announcing a reception date of Rorate Sunday. The convent of the All Saints Sisters of the Poor outside Baltimore has been formally reorganized in the Archdiocese of Baltimore. Correspondents in England were surprised to hear of their submission to the Roman obedience two years ago since the English congregation apparently does not share the reputation of its erstwhile American sister and indeed includes female hieronuns.

Controversy has bubbled over the movement that has begun to grow out of Occupy Wall Street in New York. My thoughts on this deserve their own post, but suffice it to say that I'm wary of what appear to be neoliberal economic opinions couched in the language of Christian misgivings. The notion that the current state of runaway capitalism is within the realm of Christian freedom of political conscience strikes as me as specious. And the anabaptist in me thinks the contrast in Church response between London and Toronto is illustrative of the perils of establishment.

The few remaining Reformed Episcopal Church of Canada have fractured three ways, being absorbed into either the Anglican Church in North America or the Independent Anglican Church Canada Synod. A third congregation in Toronto may or may not exist outwith the internet as a separate entity with some kind of informal relation with the others).The congregation going into the IACCS (under a new "Reformed Diocese of Ontario") is led by the former Reformed Episcopal bishop of Central & Eastern Canada, who cited the cross-partisan nature of the ACNA (tainted by a few Anglo-Catholics in the Missionary Diocese of All Saints and some former Episcopal dioceses), which is odd since the IACCS has itself a Tractarian heritage.

The Prime Ministers of the Dominions of the Commonwealth have agreed to the introduction of lineal primogeniture in the succession to the crowns, in place of the current male-preference system. Such a change would mean that the first child of Prince and Princess William of Wales would become heir to the throne regardless of gender. Also to be discarded is the restriction against marriage to Roman Catholics.

The County Orange Lodge of Toronto held its 191st parade, the longest-running in the city. Hard to believe, right?

Finally, trendwatching in the blogosphere and the Anglican Journal suggests that unbaptized is becoming the new gay. Stay tuned.

Breaking - all the sacraments for all the baptized

2011-07-16T19:17:00.003-04:00

The National Convention of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada has approved two motions abolishing gender restrictions on marriage and consequently barriers to ordination for candidates in same-gender marriages, effectively granting gay and lesbian Anglicans in Canada access to marriage under the Waterloo Declaration, which recognizes Anglican and Lutheran presbyters as "priests in the church of God" and encouraged them to make use of one another's liturgical rites. The ELCiC's new Social Statement on Human Sexuality, adopted last night, is viewable in pdf.

Waterloo, ten years on: communio in sacris and learning from dissent

2011-05-14T12:55:00.008-04:00

Apologies for my relative apophasis this year. I didn't anticipate the extent to which the transition to seminary life would swallow up all non-essential (defined more broadly than I would prefer) matters in its vortex. The Easter Ordo will be up soon: I hope you are all faking it adequately with McCausland's in the meantime! The good news is that summer will allow me to develop en banc some posts that have been brewing and aging over the past few months.

This month the Anglican/Episcopal and Evangelical-Lutheran churches in North America celebrated a decade of full communion. I myself had never set foot in an Anglican church at the time (that landmark would not come until Accession Day the following year, the Golden Jubilee, and any serious interest in Anglicanism considerably later). However, when I was received the accord was still new enough in its reception among the consensus fidelium that I recall mixed feelings about it, both from myself and others, particularly in the prayer-book, Anglo-Catholic circles I travelled in.

I've been reminded of this now that the story has been covered by the Anglican Journal, attended by the usual snarky comments from presumably former members of the ACoC who still harbour a bit of a crush after their breakup and feel the need to traverse the web disparaging their former church home. What I'm interested in here is the degree to which mistrust of the agreement was shared on both sides. Anglican and Lutheran reservations about full communion have significant differences as well as significant overlap.

Since the vagaries of either tradition's internal politics are likely arcane each to the other, they bear some comment, particularly since as I say they converge in many respects. In the first place, while the language of "churchmanship" is not indigeneous to Lutheranism, both traditions have schools of thought emphasising Catholic (Anglo-Catholic or Evangelical-Catholic), latitudinaran, and Protestant (Evangelical or Pietist) strands of thought. In Lutheranism, the Evangelical-Catholic and Pietist edges of the spectrum are both often found in congregations of German descent, since the Prussian Union forcibly yoked Lutheran churches to Calvinist influence, while galvanizing opposition to the union (many of whom settled in the US as what would become the Missouri Synod - and Australia). Thus Zion Detroit, the "S. Clement's of Lutheranism" is an LCMS parish. St Luke's Chicago, perhaps the highest ELCA parish, comes from the Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches, the youngest of the ELCA predecessor bodies, formed by theological moderates purged from the LCMS during its "right turn" in the 70s.

The LCMS itself bears some further comment. Anglican pewfolk may be dimly aware that there are Lutherans other than "ours" but the alphabet soup can be a bit daunting. Further confusion comes from the differing use of "synod": the Missouri Synod is not simply the ELCA's Missouri diocese but a distinct denomination. It has been said that Anglicans will endure any amount of heresy to avoid schism while Lutherans will put up with endless schism for the avoidance of heresy. While flippant, this remark points to a significant difference in the ecclesiology underlying the discourse on full communion in both traditions. (It's worth noting as well the geographical difference. In Canada, the ELCiC is considerably smaller the Anglican Church, which is dwarfed only by the Roman Catholic and United churches. The Lutheran synod in which the Diocese of Toronto lies covers virtually everything east of Manitoba. Both the ELCA and the LCMS on the other hand are larger than the Episcopal Church. The LCMS' Canadian districts formed the autonomous "Lutheran Church - Canada" in the 80s).

The reason this observation about the two traditions' respective priorities is interesting is that it illustrates two hot potatoes in the communion negotiations, namely the Eucharist and the episcopate. Traditionalists in both camps viewed the other as being weak on one of these. As the aphorism suggests, Lutherans have a tradition of considering the organization of church polity a secondary matter. Indeed, everything is really secondary to the proclamation of the Gospel: the correct polity is the one which best lends itself to that goal. Thus, faced with a lack of episcopal support for Lutheran congregations, Luther had no qualms about turning to the prince to provide episcopal succession. This is not in keeping with a strict RC or Anglo-Catholic understanding of apostolic succession, but as the article on the Coronation Mass in "Liturgy and Worship" reminds us, the attribution of quasi-pontifical status to the sovereign is not a new idea and has traces even in our own tradition.

Conversely, the Book of Concord is unambiguously emphatic about the real presence of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament. While philosophical explanations are avoided, there is no wiggle room from Christ's promise that the bread and wine are his body and blood. Anglicans, on the other hand, have traditionally "comprehended" a wide variety of interpretations about the Eucharist, while keeping the episcopate as our defining feature, and indeed in many countries our namesake.

Hence the stereotype of the ragtag Anglican popular front with its hangups about polity and vague doctrine (the Queen, as the cunning deputy minister Sir Humphrey Appleby reminds us in Yes, Prime Minister, is essential to the Church of England; God, an optional extra). Likewise the proliferation of Lutheran conventicles, each in search of a purer form of confessional subscription. (Thus the Wisconsin synod in turn looks rather askance at Missouri's female congregational suffrage and openness to praying with outsiders).

The Anglo-Catholic and the "confessional" Lutheran dissident thus actually have a robust eucharistic theology in common: the Anglo-Catholic is sceptical of the concordats because he imagines Lutherans to be "Protestants" (a term which Lutherans freely own but which can scare the horses in certain Anglican quarters) while the conservative Lutheran sceptic also does not trust the eucharistic theology of the mainline bodies - but sees this not as a result of Lutheranism but of deviation from Lutheranism. But then it is unfathomable to him why the Anglo-Catholic would remain in fellowship with Christians (i.e., other Anglicans) whose theology is likewise suspect to begin with.

On the other hand, to take on board the necessity of episcopal ordination and the discontinuation of lay presidency under special circumstances is, to a certain variety of Lutheran observer, to elevate a matter of form to the status reserved for the Gospel. The works suspicion of Lutheranism lends itself to an aversion to trying to micromanage the sacraments: they are more concerned with the reverent execution of the sacraments than they are about who does it.

Like Anglicans, Lutherans are a polyphonic bunch, though not perhaps quite so diverse. (Apart from the ordinariate-bound Anglo-Lutheran Catholic Church, which uses the Roman Rite and disavows all Reformation teaching at variance with Rome and is hard to pin down as Lutheran in any meaningful sense, there is no equivalent to Anglo-Papalism). So their Pietist outliers should not alarm the Anglo-Catholic anymore than our own. Concerns about the episcopate are likewise time-limited: in the near future, cross-consecration will render the issue of pedigree moot as in India.

Lutherans meanwhile can take comfort that the understanding of lifetime episcopal ordination does not entail a monarchical understanding of pontifical authority: retired bishops remain bishops and can licitly function as such with the permission of the ordinary, but they do not themselves exercise ordinary jurisdiction. The convergence of the traditions provide us with the opportunity to reconcile Anglican praxis around the catholic threefold ministry with Lutheran democratic polity. The impending extension of full communion to the Moravians bodes especially well for this project, as bishops in the Unitas Fratrum serve as pastors-to-the-pastors and are the ministers of ordination but lack a juridical role. These new frontiers in intercommunion are not an assault on the "faith once delivered" but an exciting expansion of the same.

TRM Lent 2011

2011-03-14T14:05:00.005-04:00

March

10 - Robert Machray (white, BAS p. 458, FAtS p.109, Gradual 3241)
11 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 458, Gradual 1405)
12 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 458, Gradual 1406)
13 - FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT (Quadragesima) Litany in Procession (violet, BAS p. 286 [2nd collect 281], Gradual 1407 [Evening 1408]))
14 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 458, Gradual 1409)
15 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 459, Gradual 1410)
16 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 459, Gradual 1411)
17 - St Patrick (red or white, BAS p. 459, FAtS p. 111, Gradual 2135)
18 - St Cyril of Jerusalem (white, BAS p. 459, FAtS p. 113, Gradual 2138)
19 - St Joseph, Foster Father of the Lord and Patron of the Universal Church (white, BAS p. 459, FAS p. 115, Gradual 2141)
20 - THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT (violet, BAS p. 288, Gradual 1415)
21 - Thomas Cranmer (red, BAS p. 459, FAtS p. 119, Gradual 2141)
22 - Thomas Ken (white, BAS p. 459, FAS p. 121, FAS p. 121, Gradual 2147)
23 - St Gregory the Illuminator (white, BAS p. 459, FAS p. 123 Gradual 2156)
24 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 459, Gradual 1419); I Evensong of the Annunciation
25 - The Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary (white, BAS p. 403, Gradual 2159)
26 - of the Annunciation (readings of the feria BAS p. 460)
27 - THE THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT (violet, BAS p. 289, Gradual 1422)
28 - Charles Henry Brent (white, BAS p. 460, FAS p. 127, Gradual 3251)
29 - John Keble (white, BAS p. 460, FAS p. 129, Gradual 2165)
30 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 460, Gradual 1425)
31 - John Donne (white, BAS p. 460, FAS p. 131, Gradual 2168)

April

1 - Frederick Denison Maurice (white, BAS p. 460, FAS p. 133, Gradual 2175)
2 - Henry Budd (white, BAS p. 460, FAS p. 135, Gradual 3551)
3- THE FOURTH SUNDAY IN LENT (Laetare) (rose, BAS p. 291, Gradual 1429)
4- Reginald Heber (white, BAS p. 461, FAS p. 139, Gradual 3241)
5 - Emily Ayckbowm (white, BAS p. 461, FAS p. 787, Gradual 3452)
6 - St Richard of Chichester (from Sunday: white, BAS p. 461, FAS p. 137, Gradual 2181)
7 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 461, Gradual 1433)
8 - Feria (violet, BAS p. 461, Gradual 1434)
9 - William Law (white, BAS p. 461, FAS p. 141, Gradual 2190)
10 - THE FIFTH SUNDAY IN LENT (Passion Sunday) (crimson, BAS p. 293, Grad 1436)
11 - George Augustus Selwyn (white, BAS p. 461, FAS p. 143, Gradual 2193)
12 - Feria (crimson, BAS p. 461, Gradual 1438)
13 - Feria (crimson, BAS p. 461, Gradual 1439)
14 - Feria (crimson, BAS p. 462, Gradual 1440)
15 - Feria (crimson, BAS p. 462, Gradual 1441); Compassion of the BVM Grad 1442
16 - Mollie Brant (white, BAS p. 462, FAS p. 145, Gradual 3552)
17 - THE SECOND SUNDAY IN PASSIONTIDE (Palm Sunday) (crimson, BAS p. 297, Grad 1502 [Evening 1503])
18 - Monday in Holy Week (crimson, BAS p. 301, Grad 1404)
19 - Tuesday in Holy Week (crimson, BAS p. 302, Grad 1405)
20 - Wednesday in Holy Week (crimson, BAS p. 303, Grad 1406)
21 - Maundy Thursday (violet and white, BAS p. 304, Grad 1510)
22 - Good Friday Mass of the Presanctified (black, BAS p. 308, Grad 1512)
23 - Easter Even (violet and gold or white, BAS p. 321, Grad 1602)
24 - THE EASTER DAY, OR PASCH: the Resurrection of Our Saviour Jesus Christ according to the flesh (gold or white, BAS p. 335) Gradual:

1604 - Mass of the Dawn
1605 - Mass of the Day
1606 - Mass of the Evening
1607 - Great Paschal Vespers (0451 Benediction)

Good news from the Sisterhood of St John the Divine

2011-02-22T22:42:00.004-05:00

From the Epiphany 2011 Eagle comes the announcement of an ordained postulant's admission to the community. Since the ordination of the Revd Canon Sr Constance Joanna "C.J." Gefvert SSJD, St John's Convent has had one religious priest in residence. Now there is to be another: on 4 January, the Revd Debra Johnston, a Lutheran presbyter and thus a "priest in the Church of God" under the terms of the Waterloo Declaration, was admitted as a postulant. She will provide an ecumenical and sacerdotal witness to the community. Please remember Pastor Debra and the Sisters of St John in prayer.

The First Book of Common Prayer of Edward VI

2011-02-13T19:05:00.007-05:00

Litany & High Mass of the Purification of St Mary the Virgin: second in a series at St Thomas's, Huron Street, Toronto. See archives under February 2010 for posts of last year's Sarum Candlemass.

Just for fun: a diversion

2011-01-28T15:59:00.003-05:00

Lorne Michaels Presents Chalet 2000, the Kids in the Hall's 1992 Christmas special. Despite the jibes of fans that Scott Thompson must have won a bet, I actually think this is their magnum opus. The take-off a the format of an 80s variety show live Christmas special is too much.

On the ordinariates

2011-01-14T23:53:00.002-05:00

Every once in a while a story emanates from the church that attracts major attention from the secular press, which is vexing for those of us who are familiar with the general level of ecclesiastical savvy among non-specialist journalists. The Cunning Man famously opens with the narrator's attempts to recount in an interview the death of the celebrant of the Mass of the Pre-Sanctified at a church broadly sketched on St Mary Mag as Davies knew it while at UCC. (Curiously, in Robertson Davies: A Portrait in Mosaic, Canon Nahabedian accuses Davies of a technical bluff for depicting a "celebration of the Eucharist" on Good Friday, [Ross 2008:345] though he can hardly be unaware of the distinction obtaining having presided as rector of SMM for more than 25 years).

But in these last days it has been the promulgation of Anglicanorum coetibus that has caught so much attention. And a great deal of discussion and even rancour has been generated, much of which I think is, frankly, overblown.

First, let's talk about why people become Roman Catholics. There's really only one reason to do so: because you believe the claims the Roman Catholic Church makes for itself. The reaching of that conclusion entails certain implications if one is to proceed with integrity. And a certain ecclesiologically schizophrenic element of this genre has existed in Anglo-Catholicism since the days of Caldey Island. I think that some of the mudslinging then has been unfair: this really is the traditional Anglo-Papalist objective in execution.

At the same time, those who continue to hold the Saepius Officio line deserve respect for their position as well. The general scholarly consensus is that the arguments advanced by Apostolicae Curae tend equally to undermine's Rome's own position. So those who are not accepting the offer because they are not Roman Catholics conviction are doing the right thing too. You'll read suggestions that those Anglo-Catholics who don't take up the ordinariates might as well give up the game, but I think that rather the two schools of thought, the Newman and the Moss if you will, have coexisted for more or less the history of the Catholic Movement in the Church of England.

The Traditional Anglican Communion gets razzed on account of its size, but the boutique character of Anglicanism is common to the tradition as a whole. Anglicans incredulously tell stories of Roman Catholic Masses with attendances equal to the total Sunday haul in many Anglican places being taken off the timetable due to "not enough numbers." So it seems unfair to be too snarky on this point.

At the same time, there is an unfortunate tendency in some quarters to intemperate language about the ordinariates: some authors appear to suggest that their memers will be "Catholics but not Roman Catholics" but this is probably a bolder extrapolation from the principle of "unity without absorption" than is warranted, as the ordinariates are not sui juris churches, but particular churches of the Roman Rite with an authorized use.

Another facet also frequently missed by the press is the very different character of continuing Anglicanism in various countries. American Episcopalians sometimes deride the Anglican Church in America as one of a number of jurisdictions emerging from the fracturing of the original ACNA that came out of the St Louis Conference, whereas the Anglican Catholic Church of Canada has pretty consistently carried the torch up here, which is why those not swimming have had to scramble to make provision for their continued existance with the aid of sympathetic American prelates. The Christian Episcopal Church of Canada (derived from the Episcopal Synod of America - later FiFNA - via the Episcopal Missionary Church) at least claims online a small presence and a cathedral in Richmond, BC. Unanimity has not been approached as closely in the United States as in our dominion, but ordinariate bound ACAers are preceded by their forebears in the Pastoral Provision and will be accompanied by newly-departing Episcopalians. In Canada only St John the Evangelist, Calgary (for whom I weep and refuse to be comforted) has taken up the offer. I have not heard of anything else from any other of the few possible candidates, such as St Mary's, Fredericton, NB. Apart from whole parishes, Anglicans in the Toronto area are organizing with the assistance of the Church of the Good Shepherd, the Anglican Catholic parish in nearby Oshawa.

The TTAC presence in Britain is marginal compared to Forward in Faith, an inverse relationship from across the pond. The Church of Ireland (Traditional Rite) is of an entirely different character and Not Interested, Thank You. Australia, the primatial see, has been enthusiastic and has managed to get a faster response than Canada. Responses have emerged more slowly from the "Global South", such as the Anglican Church in India, in whose case there is the added confusion of having at least two or three jurisdictions going by that name.

Finally, the terms of the Apostolic Constitution itself are modest. Most significantly, there is no expansion of the exemption for married clergy than there already is: future ordinariate priests will be subject to Latin Rite discipline - the married priesthood is not part of the patrimony. Speculation has abounded over the forms of liturgy to be authorized, with the Sarum Missal in Latin and the "Knott" English Missal put forth as suggestions. It's worth noting that the Book of Divine Worship used by Anglican Use congregations in the US is basically 1979 plus Novus Ordo - hard to imagine the folks at the Cathedral of the Annunciation in Ottawa using it. In any case ordinariate clergy will be permitted to celebrate the ordinary and extraordinary forms of the Roman Rite in addition to permissive use of the ordinariate liturgy, and the Missal of Blessed John XXIII is certainly closer to what you find in die-hard traditional AC parishes than the BDW. Indeed, I would have thought that most Anglo-Catholics regard the prayer book as a constraint - witness the energy traditionally invested by "Western Rite" clergy into wrapping the Missal around it - and having swum and been freed of this constraint would leap to the "real thing". So I think that most Anglo-Catholics who have not swum are not holding out for lack of provision for Anglican-style worship. The Western Rite Orthodox provisions allow for a liturgy closer in chronology to that used in pre-Pian Anglo-Catholic shacks, a normative married secular clergy, and the self-satisfaction of having renounced not only the Church of England's deformation from the bosom of Rome, but Rome's own sundering from the Universal Church! (Why go back to 1054/1066 when you can go back to AD33?)

So while the bull is an important development for those who will avail themselves of it, and undoubtedly will reflect well in the annals of the "pontificate of Christian Unity" along with overtures to the SSPX and Orthodox, I think it's significant enough on its own merits without having to make it into something its not - the end of the Anglo-Catholic movement, a borstal slap-up between Rome and Canterbury, or a major infiltration of traditionalists into the RCC (though in the last respect it is one part of a larger pendulum swing toward softening some of the liturgical iconoclasm of the 1970s, or as it is decried by panicky floppy-albed bloggers, "rolling back Vatican II"). It is no more and no less than the logical end of the aspirations consistently held by a considerable segment of the Anglo-Catholic movement, though not its entirety, and what it certainly is not is an occasion to be used as a bone of partisan or inter-tendency contention.

Calling bollocks

2011-01-12T16:57:00.005-05:00

Controversy is brewing over a ban on gay-straight alliances in the Halton Catholic District School Board. Along with Nazi groups and others in conflict with Catholic doctrine, GSAs are out because school authorities do not want to encourage kids to identify based on their sexual orientation. "I've never been to a GSA," one trustee told Xtra, "...They force people to be labelled as gay." If she had ever been to a GSA meeting, or you know, read its name in print, she would know that their mandate is to provide a safe space where students can congregate without being called upon to identify which part of the initialism they fall on, but we must assume in charity that the good Catholic woman was simply too flustered once "Gay" was on the brain to read the "straight alliance" bit for comprehension. Her characterization of GSAs as "sex clubs" further confirms the hunch that the bogey man the trustee imagines herself to be arguing against bears little resemblance the hapless group of kids back in reality who her policies are victimizing. Personally, I recall large numbers of Tim Horton's cookies consumed over fairly benign after-school conversation some of us might never have otherwise had the ability to do, and the occasional field trip into the city to hear a speaker. "Why can't heterosexual students have a club?" Xtra's source asks. But as every child learns on Mothers' and Fathers' Day and every white person come February, the answer to that question is inevitable: those would be every club in the student handbook.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church takes pains to preface and qualify its opposition to gay families with the proviso that "Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided." The trick, of course, is "unjust" - for subsequent actions make it clear that the Church's definition of "unjust" is sufficiently restrictive as to be meaningless. Apart from GSAs, developments the Church has fought as unacceptable waterings down of family teaching are:

*laws that guarantee the same rights to housing and employment as enjoyed by heterosexuals, so that a gay tenant could not be denied a lease on the basis of their sexual orientation - even if he is fully compliant with the Church's teaching on the expression of the same! Here the bishop argued that such laws could give credence to morality of homosexual relationships. Like the Halton boards, this case belied the Catechism's claim to be content with upholding the Church's understanding of marriage - rather, it is necessary to avoid any action that the faithful might misinterpret as in any way attributing humanity to gay people. Only life as single, homeless, unemployed drifters befits our wretched estate. It's hardly as if anyone is going to be under any illusions about the RC doctrine, so literally pulling the front doormat out from under our feet is above and beyond the call of "apostolic authority" and skirting petty-vindictive territory.

*the placement of children with adoptive parents of the same gender, so that a child unable to find a home can be bounced from one foster home to another throughout adolescence until they graduate to juvenile detention, but will at least be spared the affront to their dignity of being given to loving parents whose junk didn't match.

*the burial by Catholic families of their gay members. In this case, the bishop interfered with the parish priest's duty to minister to the family in its time of - hardly within the ambit of a bishop's power of "Godly admonition" - because the man in question owned a gay dance club. This case too is purely vindictive and groundless even assuming the RC model of moral theology. The funeral was denied because the man's business contradicted Catholic teaching, which apparently His Excellency has extended (by what authority?) to cover dancing, and allowing it to proceed would run the risk of the sin of "scandal." Treating the creation of scandal itself as a sin is a dangerous game. One confessional manual I read advised against allowing non-communicants to approach the altar for a blessing lest the good but clearly rather dim faithful wonder whether he received.

Now, our grandmothers and anyone whose common sense hasn't been eliminated by years of canon law training would know that the obvious answer to that is "Eyes on your own page!" If the laic is indeed so dimwitted as to be unable to imagine a non-nefarious explanation for what he witnesses, it is nevertheless none of his beeswax and the sin of scandal is commissioned by his making it so. Indeed, in some circumstances non-Catholics, even "open" (!) ones, are permitted not only to approach but to receive (e.g. in France). Does recourse to this legitimate canonical provision become sinful because a backseat canonist may second-guess whether the priest availed himself of it correctly? Likewise, the pastoral propriety of a given Christian burial cannot be subjected to a vote of clucking tongues in the CWL. Besides all of which, you would think such a grievous sinner would need the Church's navigational assistance more than ever at such a critical soteriological moment as death. And when you consider the importance of funerals not just to the departed soul but to the family, the whole enterprise becomes even sillier. To bury someone is not to endorse his "lifestyle" but to offer the prayers which are due for all the departed, and bereavement is not a time to be hijacked by the curia to make a polemical point which Martians would have to be deaf not to have gotten by this point.

So the Roman Catholic position on homosexuality is in no way an attack on the dignity of the gay person himself, unless your idea of dignity includes things like a roof over your head. And this is not purely an academic point, for it goes straight to the credibility of the Church's claim that it is "catholic" - open to all people. If the gay person who assiduously observes the RCC's marital discipline is still not worthy of food or shelter, then it's clear that the Church does not merely subject gay relationships to the same disciplinary considerations as other irregular relationships, but in fact does precisely what it claims not to: demonize homosexuals as such, regardless of their moral valour. And then, when gay teens started dropping like flies those few awful weeks last fall, numerous Christians insisted to me that Christianity was not to blame as it had always limited its condemnation to the sin and not the sinner. I assume these people, however, consider eating and sleeping in a bed to be basic rights rather than sins, so unless they imagine that gays have some special perverted way of eating, it is clear that their desire to limit the rhetoric on the record takes considerable liberties with the history.

TRM Ordo Winter 2011

2010-12-22T19:59:00.010-05:00

January
1- The Octave Day of Christmas, being the Naming & Circumcision of Jesus (white, BAS p. 277, Gradual 1113)

2- SECOND SUNDAY OF CHRISTMAS (white, BAS p. 278, Gradual 1116)
3- St Basil the Great and St Gregory of Nazianzus (white or yellow, BAS p. 456, FAtS p. 40, Gradual 2366 or 2259)

4- Requiem (black, BAS p. 456, Gradual 4730)
5- Requiem (black, BAS p. 457)
6- Epiphany of the Lord (white, BAS p. 279, Gradual 1202)
7- In the Octave of the Epiphany (white, BAS p. 457)
8- In the Octave of the Epiphany (white, BAS p. 457); Vigil of the Baptism of the Lord (Gradual 1204)

9- BAPTISM OF THE LORD (white, BAS p. 348, Gradual 1205)
10- in the Octave comm. William Laud (white, BAS p. 468, FAtS p. 44, Gradual 2032)
11- Holy Innocents , comm. Octave (purple or red, BAS p. 398, Gradual 1108)
12- in the Octave, comm. Marguerite Bourgeoys (white, BAS p. 468, FAtS p. 48, Gradual 3412)

13- Octave Day of the Epiphany, comm. St Hilary of Poitiers (white, BAS p. 468, FAtS p. 52, Gradual 2036)

14- John Horden (white, BAS p. 469, FAtS p. 50, Gradual 3121)
15- Richard Meux Benson, (white, BAS p. 469, FAtS p. 54, Gradual 3411)
16- SECOND SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (white, BAS p. 349, Gradual 1303)
17- St Antony of Egypt (white, BAS p. 469, FAtS p.56, Gradual 2042)
18- Confession of St Peter the Apostle (red, BAS p. 399, Gradual 2044), comm. Holy Innocents Octave of Christian Unity begins

19- Requiem (black, BAS p. 469)
20- Requiem (black, BAS p. 469)
21- St Agnes of Rome(red, BAS . 469, FAtS p. 60, Gradual 2050)
22- St Vincent of Saragossa (red, BAS p. 469, FAtS p. 462, Gradual 2052)
23- THIRD SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY, (white, BAS p. 350, Gradual 1304)
24- St Francis de Sales (white or yellow, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 64, Gradual 3211)
25- Conversion of St Paul (red, BAS p. 400, Gradual 2056)
26- Ss. Timothy and Titus (red, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 68, Gradual 2060)
27- St John Chrysostom (white, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 70, Gradual 2062)
28- St Thomas Aquinas (white, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 72, Gradual 2064)
29- Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue, BAS p. 470, Gradual 5574)
30- FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (white, BAS p. 352, Gradual 1305)
31- St Charles Stuart (red, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 74, Gradual 2066)

February
1- Requiem (BAS p. 470)
2- The Presentation of the Lord and Purification of the Blessed Virgin, commonly called Candlemas (white, BAS p. 401, Gradual 2070)

3- St Anskar, Apostle of the North (red, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 78, Gradual 2072)
4- Requiem (BAS p. 470)
5- Holy Martyrs of Japan (red, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 80, Gradual 2076)
6- FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (green, BAS p.353, Gradual 1306); at the office Accession Day (BCP p. xlviii)

7- Requiem (BAS p.4 70)
8- Requiem
9- Hannah Grier Coome (white, BAS p. 470, FAtS p. 82, Gradual 3412)
10- Requiem (BAS p. 471)
11- Requiem
12- Our Lady on Saturday (BAS p. 471)
13- SIXTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (green, BAS p. 354, Gradual 1307)
14- Sts Cyril & Methodius, Apotles to the Slavs (red, BAS p. 472, FAtS p. 84, Gradual 2084)

15- Thomas Bray (white, BAS p. 472, FAtS p. 86, Gradual 2086)
16-18 Requiem (BAS p. 472)
19- Our Lady on Saturday (BAS p. 472)
20- SEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (green, BAS p.356, Gradual 1308)
21- Requiem (BAS p.473)
22- Requiem
23- St Polycarp of Smyrna (red, BAS p. 473, FAtS p. 88, Gradual 2088)
24- Philip Lindel Tsen (red, BAS p. 473, FAtS p. 90, Gradual 3011)
25- Paul Sasaki (red, BAS p. 474, FAtS p. 92, Gradual 3012)
26- Our Lady on Saturday (BAS p. 474)
27- EIGTHTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (green, BAS p. 357, Gradual 1309)
28- George Herbert (white, BAS p. 475, FAtS p. 94, Gradual 2092)

March
1-St David of Wales (white or yellow, BAS p. 475, FAtS p. 96, Gradual 2093)
2-St Chad of Lichfield (white or yellow, BAS p. 475, FAtS p. 98, Gradual 2094)
3-John and Charles Wesley (white, BAS p. 475, FAtS p. 100, Gradual 2095)
4- Requiem (BAS p. 475)
5- Our Lady on Saturday
6- LAST SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY (white, BAS p. 357 & 418, Gradual 1310)
7 – St Perpetua of Carthage & Companions (red, BAS p. 458, FAtS p 102, Gradual 2097)
8 – Edward King, (white or yellow, BAS p. 458, FAtS p. 104, Gradual 3211)
9 – Ash Wednesday (purple, BAS p. 281, Gradual 1403)

Gaudete!

2010-12-20T11:56:00.004-05:00

(Photo: Anglican Ex Fide)

Blessed are you, O Divine Light, herald of the dawn and the doom. In the beginning, God said, Be! and you were chosen to be the first to obey the source of all. In these last days, you return to us to search out all hearts in your inescapable splendour. Come and inflame our hearts with longing for your reappearing. Let all the creatures of the Thrice-Holy say Amen!

Further glimpses of Toronto of old, courtesy of The Star

2010-11-28T14:58:00.011-05:00

An early outpost of the Reformed Episcopal Church advertises services "for Low Churchmen" on Easter Day, 1921
Liberal Catholic Easter notice for Procession, Solemn Eucharist, and Benediction from 1936. (The lot in question is now "Trainers Fitness" just south of Honest Ed's).
Advertisement from St Bart's for the Feast of Dedication the year of Fr Pashler's death, 1959, with notice of the Induction of Fr Belway.

An early Old Catholic mission in Toronto under Abp Grosvold. The dedication suggests a gay-oriented congregation but no direct connection with the present-day Eucharistic Catholic Church in Cabbagetown.

This notice from 1975 (left) shows that St Mary Magdalene had shed its earlier reticent terminology of "Solemn Eucharist", "Devotions," etc and nailed its "Old Western Rite" colours to the mast. By the Garnsworthy years (right), the Papalism of the parish is in full bloom (note "Vespers").
SSPX advertisement for Corpus Christi from the late 1990s.

The English Missal in Pictures

2010-11-23T19:05:00.008-05:00

Solemn Mass with the Society of Catholic Priests at Trinity College Chapel, Monday 22 November, in the week of the Reign of Christ.

Some responses to Citizens for a Canadian Republic

2010-11-22T00:26:00.002-05:00

Unpublished remarks I wrote on Citizens for a Canadian republic as expressed in its statements.

***

Inherited rights in government, symbolic or otherwise, is a concept incompatible with Canadian values of egalitarianism.

A Canadianized head of state should be the embodiment of Canadian sovereignty, diversity and pride - a position to which all Canadians could aspire.

This seems to be the crux of most opposition to monarchy and it rests on a misunderstanding of what a head of state is and does. The Queen has not inherited a position of privilege or any “special” rights. Under our constitution she fulfils certain roles as head of state - roles that would have to be filled by someone anyway. Historical providence has provided us with a means of selecting a politically-neutral “referee” who can uphold the constitution without having to bend to political pressure. Being head of state should not be the end of a political career ladder, nor is the nature of the office such that it is something that in principle must be open to all applicants. It is more important that the function be done than who does it.

It should also be said that the “Canadian values of egalitarianism” are enshrined in laws which the Queen herself has signed into law. This reflects the nature of the Canadian Crown, which does not act unilaterally but only to give force to the will of the people, and thus enacts the laws that we ourselves have mandated our elected representatives to pass. Likewise, while vested with the authority to appoint the prime minister, the sovereign uses this power to designate the leader of the party that has won the election rather than to parachute in her own preferred candidate.

Our head of state should be a true representative of the People of Canada. Presently, the Queen does not represent Canada when she travels abroad and we think that’s not in our best interest...

The act of attaining full-fledged status as a democratic republic within the Commonwealth would be the completion of a process of independence that began over a century ago.

Canada became fully independent in 1931 except by request with respect to constitutional amendment (until 1982) and the judiciary (1949). Because our Dominion and provincial governments could not agree on a formula for amending the constitution, Canada retained the rubber-stamp of the British Parliament for constitutional amendments. This was resolved in 1982, since which time our independence has been “complete.” Transition to a republic would not make us any more “full-fledged” a member of the Commonwealth - if anything the opposite!

That several other countries, including the United Kingdom and Jamaica, have the same relationship with the Queen that we do is a matter of historical circumstance. It is thus understandable that she cannot always be representing any one country. Each realm’s Governor General acts as her full-time delegate for that country and Canadians are hardly deprived of executive representation abroad.

Canada’s head of state should be a Canadian citizen and not be above our laws. Presently, the Act of Settlement of 1701 constitutionally binds Canada to only heads of state who are not Roman Catholics. They must also be required to hold the position of Supreme Governor of The Church of England, thereby also preventing, Jews, Hindus, Muslims or anyone not a member of that Protestant denomination from becoming Canada’s head of state. Section 15(1) of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms expressly forbids discrimination on the basis of "race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability".

First, the assumption that “Canada’s head of state should be a Canadian citizen” is a confusion. The Queen is not a citizen because she is head of state, but that does not mean she is not Canadian. She does not hold a Canadian (or British) passport; they are issued in her name. She does not share our citizenship because she is the fount from which it flows.

The historical factors that led to the passage of the Act of Settlement are varied and complex, and only incidentally about religion. Ironically and presumably unbeknownst to the republicans who attack it, it was in its day a victory for the forces of parliamentary democracy over absolute monarchy. Requiring the monarch to be a member of the national churches was just one way of ensuring Britain’s independence from foreign interference at a time when the Papacy was much more like a monarchy itself. Although the Act of Settlement is itself a part of our Canadian constitutional law, some would argue that it has outlived its usefulness. In the Church of England itself, there is increasing support for disestablishment and the end of a governmental role in church affairs. In any case, the Act of Settlement can be amended without abolishing our system of constitutional monarchy.

Canadians increasingly want to address the so-called "democratic deficit" that’s prevalent in Canada’s political system. In every good democracy, there’s a solid framework of checks and balances to ensure against the proliferation of abuses. One way to address that would be to have an elected head of state (either by the public, parliament or other such body), not an appointed Governor General who is simply the deputy of a distant monarch, chosen personally by the Prime Minister.

The Crown is one of the best safeguards against abuses of power in our constituonal arsenal, and the checks and balances it provides would, on the contrary, be threatened by a republic. A private citizen who became head of state would bring her own political biases to bear. She might exercise the power of veto to prevent bills with which she disagreed from becoming law. Because the Queen’s powers are to be used only to defend the people’s democratic will, she does not override laws passed by our elected representatives. In Canada, for example, Conservative politicans have campaigned against same-sex marriage. In the United Kingdom, the Queen signed the Civil Partnership Act 2004 into law though she is said to be quite conservative on the subject in private. Would Stephen Harper have done the same thing? Canadians can be confident that no matter what their background or station in life, the Queen is a head of state of all of us, and not just those of her race or economic class.

To take another example from the current government, a great deal of controversy arose over the prime minister’s use of prorogation to avoid a finding of contempt of parliament. While the Governor General’s failure to intervene in this case is regrettable, it is an illustration of what the Crown is there to do for Canadians. An apolitical head of state chosen purely by historical and genetic accident can refuse a request for prorogation if it is deemed to be an attempt to thwart the will of the people.

New Canadians should not be subjected to swearing an oath to a monarch who not only isn’t a Canadian citizen herself, but also, in some cases, represents many aspects of what prospective citizens are trying to leave behind. They’re coming to Canada to embrace a way of life that emphasizes equality and the rights of the individual, not peerage, royalty and classism.

The oath to the Queen is sworn because she is the ceremonial embodiment of Canada. We do not pledge to till her fields as vassals. Republics have to find other “personifications” such as the quasi-idolatrous “Pledge of Allegiance” to the American flag. Despite her relative (and often overstated) affluence, the Queen is not an enemy of the working class or a drain on the wallets of Canadians. The cost of her maintenance is less than that of many other heads of state and pales in comparison to the revenue her estates create for public benefit.

The Canadian way of life to which CCR refers is one that we have managed to establish quite successfully within our current system. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the most important expression of our values of individual rights and equality, is without parallel in the republic south of our border. The burden of proof is on republicans to show how those achievements are detracted by the monarchy or could be improved by an elected president.

... one thing that unites republicans throughout the Commonwealth is the belief that the transition will most easily be done by evolving the present Westminster-style parliamentary monarchies into Westminster-style parliamentary republics. This would retain a largely ceremonial, politically-neutral and symbolic head of state as president (with some reserve powers for special circumstances) and a prime minister as head of government.

... with the exception of being the representative of the People of Canada rather than the Crown, it's possible - perhaps even likely - that the functional change will barely be noticeable to most Canadians.

In other words, CCR doesn’t have a problem with what the Queen does per se; they just think it should be done by someone elected, but don’t really want to change the nature of the office itself By their own admission, the years of constitutional overhaul they propose would not change very much. It is unclear then how our society would be more free or just simply by changing the means of selecting the head of state. If anything, an elected head of state would be less effective as a democratic “referee” since he would be accountable only to that portion of the populace to which he owes his election.

Passings

2010-11-21T23:22:00.004-05:00

A brief note to acknowledge that at the Church of St John the Evangelist, Calgary's lone Anglo-Catholic parish, an "overwhelming" majority of parishioners approved a motion to seek entry into Canada's impending personal ordinariate in a special vestry meeting following today's High Mass. I've never had a chance to get out to Calgary but I always hoped to visit St John's when I do. I'm sorry that the diocese will no longer have that kind of Anglo-Catholic witness and that I won't be able to visit as a communicant one day.

I gather that the parish's situation was becoming difficult as a result of the prevailing view on the ordination of women as well as its use of the English Missal. (Interestingly, the honorary assistant, Canon Green SSC, banished the English Missal from the pews when he was our rector in the 80s - I say "our" anachronistically as I was neither yet alive nor an Anglican at the time!) In any case, I commend the people of the parish for having the integrity to follow through on their conviction in the Roman Catholic Church's claims about itself and remember them in prayer as they take this step. Pray too for those remaining in the Anglican Church of Canada to preserve its Catholic tradition from within.

The Catholic Apostolic Church on Gould Street

2010-10-15T16:45:00.007-04:00

From John Ross Robertson's Sketches in City Churches (1886).

NO. 22. -CATHOLIC APOSTOLIC.
A CHURCH WITH CULTURE—A NOVEL AND BEAUTIFUL SERVICE CONDUCTED ACCORDING TO A RICH RITUAL—ITS DOCTRINES AND ORIGIN.

At the corner of Gould and Victoria streets stands a white brick church, with a well proportioned outline, surmounted with a very graceful spire. Aside from the handsome spire which gives dignity and beauty to the edifice there is nothing architecturally attractive about it. The building was originally owned by the St. James' Square Presbyterian church and was sold to its present owners a few years ago for $10,300. An arched doorway in the front, on Gould street, is reached by a flight of steps, the only entrance now used. Above it is a group of lancet, cathedral class windows, with a small "rose" window above, and still higher a stone on which is inscribed: "Christo, A.D. MDCCCLV." A small gallery above the vestibule accommodates the choir and contains an old-fashioned, yellow painted, ten-stop organ, but one whose appearance gives no evidence of the volume and harmony of sound it is capable of producing. The room will seat about 400 people and is very plain in its furnishing; the walls are stuccoed in stone colour, and the ceiling, supported by light trusses, is frescoed in panels. Three gasaliers hang from it, while in front of the altar a perpetual light is kept burning in honour of the Presence of God as symbolized in the eucharistic elements kept in the gold-lined tabernacle. Above the altar is a panelled space, whose background is blue, sprinkled with gilt stars, the arch of which is maintained by white columns. Above this arch and near the ceiling is a group of three cinque-foil windows.

A large section of the front part of the building, on the south, is set apart for the chancel, on either side of which is a dark wood partition, forming a passageway to the ante-rooms and robing rooms downstairs. Against the eastern wall, and entirely without the limits of the chancel, is a large circular enclosed pulpit; no railing divides the chancel from the main part of the room, but it is considered to be a very sacred place. When the reporter visited the building he was particularly cautioned not to set foot upon the highest of the four platforms because it is "holy;" even the caretaker does not go there for the purpose of cleaning and dusting; this work is only done by an official whose consecration gives him admission to the sacred precincts. On the main floor are small kneeling desks for the deacons present who and are habited with black cassocks and white surplices and whose duty it is to assist the priests during the service. On the first platform, about four inches from the floor are stations for the two elders or priests who assist the angel or bishop; here are also, on either side, reading desks, one the Epistle, and the other the Gospel. On the next platform are eight stalls for the nonofficiating priests and a high-backed oak chair for the bishop and a table for the eucharistic vessels. On the third elevation are simply hassocks and cushions used by the officiating bishop and priests while the fourth elevation contains the altar, a pretty but small piece of furniture made of black walnut with red and yellow ornamentation and the monogram J. H. S. inscribed.

The bishop's and other officials' robing rooms are in the basement, a rather dilapidated looking room with the old Presbyterian pulpit still standing. It seems to be in accordance with the tenets of the people worshipping in this church not to lay so much stress upon the outward building as upon the ritualism of worship and the special ornaments, vessels and robes used in the celebration of their services.
"What time do you have service on Sunday morning?" was asked one of the members.
"At half-past ten, sun time," was the reply; "we do not follow times and seasons that man has made; we go according to the time God has ordained, not according to man's changes. After dark then we go according to city time."

Accordingly, last Sunday morning a Telegram reporter entered the church for the purpose of acquainting himself with the method of worship that obtains here. Just within the door is a small wooden box containing a bowl of water into which every member dips his fingers and touches his forehead with it, sometimes making thereon the sign of the cross. Next to this bowl of water is a long narrow box divided into compartments for the reception of the offerings. No collections are taken in this church, but each member is expected to contribute one-tenth of what he earns during the week; if he earns $10 then he should give $1 to the church; if he earns $50 he should give $5, and so on. This part of his alms-giving goes into the "tithes" apartment, and whatever more he can contribute he may give to either the " poor fund," "evangelistic work" or "building fund." All the offerings are purely voluntary; no pews are rented and no assessment of any kind is levied.

In front of a large stone baptismal font and directly behind the pews are three stations for the black-robed under-deacons, whose business it is to supervise the seating and comfort of the congregation. About 150 people were present last Sunday morning; people of all ages from the old, whitehaired man, whose sun of life is very near its setting, down to the little child for whom life is just budding into beauty and joy. They were what would lie termed of the middle-class of our city's population, and had the appearance of sober, earnest and discriminating intelligence. Their distinguishing characteristic was that of sincerity and reverence; although the service was longer than an hour and a half, there was not the slightest token of impatience or of indecorum; even the little children were worshipful, and it seemed as if some other than mere earthly influence kept the congregation so devout and respectful. Service is held Sunday morning at 10 o'clock and in the evening at 5 o'clock, and also every day at 6 a.m. and 5 p.m. On every Sunday morning the eucharistic service is held, the central and most significant of all services and one whose solemnity and cultivated ceremony are not surpassed by any other service in this city. After a brief preliminary service the consecrated elements are removed from the tabernacle of the altar by the celebrant, a bishop or angel, assisted by two priests or elders, and attended by five deacons; in slow and orderly procession these withdraw to the rooms below where the bread and wine are consumed. During their absence an organ voluntary was played; in ten minutes the procession returned, the bishop and priests having removed the plainer vestments and substituted very ricn robes; there is no genuflection before the altar, but there is frequent bowing, and whenever in the service the name of Jesus is pronounced the officials and people always incline the head.

The ritual, while it is a composition of the most elegant portions of the Latin and Greek formulae, yet very closely follows that of the Church of England. The service is entirely choral and the responses and versicles, which are sung chiefly to Tallis' Church of England setting, are given, not by the choir only, but by the entire congregation and mainly without an organ accompaniment. The confession was said while the bishop faced the altar; it, as well as all the prayers and the absolution, were responded to by the congregation in choral unison; the bishop then turned and faced the people while he pronounced the absolution. The epistle was read by one of the priests, a young man, while the Gospel was read by Rev. Joseph Elwell, formerly a clergyman of the Episcopal church, who also pronounced a brief homily emphasizing the distinguishing features of this church, viz.: The guiding influence of the Holy Spirit and the second advent of Jesus Christ who is to come and set up a material kingdom in this world. The speaker, a whitehaired eld man of patriarchal and dignified bearing, used no arts of oratory or diction; he spoke simply, plainly, sincerely and confidently. Indeed the

SERVICE WAS REMARKABLE
for a singular combination of this simple reverence and dignity with the most classical and cultured finish. It was so superfine in conception and so cultivated in execution, and had about it, by virtue of its simplicity, such a refining and uplifting and helpful spirit that no other service can possibly exceed it in these respects. And it was fertile of suggestion; the small company of the "sealed," as the members are called, and their positive conviction of the presence ot the Supernatural Comforter reminds one of that "little upper room" in Jerusalem where only the Master and the twelve communed. The table with its rich and chastely wrought silver service, covered with delicate white linen, the embellished robes of the priests, the perpetual fire before the altar, the rising cloud of perfumed incense wreathing a benediction above the Symbols of the Presence, the white-haired ministers, the simple pomp and dignity of it all — who is not reminded thereby of the tabernacle of the wilderness and the later glory of the golden-walled temple?

"Men amuse themselves with empty abstractions," said the homilist, and while all this ceremony, so beautiful and impressive, may be thought an abstraction by some it is a reality to these sincere people, because directly underneath it is the real living Presence of the Holy Spirit and these vestments and sweetly-smelling incense and emblems are simply the outward robes veiling a spiritual reality. Their faith in the sacrament is very strong, and they sometimes associate with its administration healing properties. One of the members assured the reporter that in a certain critical case when the patient was declared hopelessly ill by several physicians the sacrament was administered in extremis and the patient recovered.

AN IMPRESSIVE RITUAL.
After the homily the people rose and recited the Nicene creed. When the words "He was made man" were said all heads were bowed and there was a pause of a few moments as if the wonderful incarnation were too stupendous a fact to be passed glibly and thoughtlessly over. Then two of the deacons brought the offerings in two cloth bags, prettily ornamented, and passed them to the priests and they to the bishop, who deposited them upon the side table with the sacred vessels. The latter were then carried to the altar; two white-robed boys brought the cense and incense to the deacons; they passed them to the priests and they to the bishop who sprinkled incense upon the live coal and the white smoke wreathed a fantastic column up over the altar and spread a canopy of sweet odour above the shrine. While the emblems were beine placed upon the altar the choir sang an anthem with excellent taste and expression that materially added to the solemn impressiveness of the service. After a prayer, all the officiating ministers kneeling before the altar, the preface to the consecration was said; the choir and people sang a sanctus, in English — all the service being in the English language. The consecration was done while all the people knelt; the celebrant took a large wafer of unleavened bread in his hand and raised it with both hands high above the altar and when he repeated the words "broken for you" he broke the bread which, with a loud, crackling sound, then fell in small pieces into the silver salver below. When he said "this is the cup" the chalice was uplifted in the same way; the cense was swung above the altar after the consecration; at all other times it was quietly held by one of the priests. A litany then followed very similar to that of the Church of England; it consisted of a very long series of prayers, with choral responses, among them being special supplications for the Queen and Royal family, for the Governor-General and Parliament of the Dominion, "now in session," and for the Lieutenant-Governor of this Province; there was also a petition in behalf of the Virgin Mary recognizing her virtue and dignity as the Mother of Christ.

The hymnal of the Catholic Apostolic Church is a special collection issued by the authorities in England and embraces selections of the best order. After the litany a hymn was sung, the congregation standing; another prayer said and then the celebrant knelt and partook of the elements, presented the same to the priests and deacons, then to the people who came forward promptly and orderly and knelt before the altar during the administration. After each sup of wine the minister dextrously and neatly wiped the chalice before passing it to the next communicant; each one when he rose bowed towards the altar, returned to the pew and there knelt for a moment's silent prayer. It was not only an interesting observance to an outsider but its conduct was so dignified and reverential and impressive as almost to create a sensation of awe.

The communion is administered in both kinds to men and women and, on Christmas, Easter and Pentecost, to the children; each child as soon as it can kneel alone receives the communion, but at no other time save on the festival days just named or when dying. The conditions of membership are simply baptism and submissal to the pastorship of a certain bishop, and the baptism administered by any other church is considered valid. With the ministry, however, it is different; only those who are recognized to be ministers who believe in and

stand in the order of Apostolic succession ; hence Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic and Church of England priest only are considered authenticated.

MOVED BY THE SPIRIT.
After all the people had communed the three black-vested under-deacons came forward and were served; the vessels were removed to the table and what of the elements remained was put in the tabernacle of the altar until next Sunday, when the same ceremony will be repeated. At this point in the service a woman seated in her pew began an exhortation; with her eyes closed ana her hands moving gracefully up and down, she uttered such thoughts as, it' is said, were inspired into her by the Holy Spirit. Tms supernatural influence is said to immediately possess and inspire the priest when he preaches. In fact the Catholic Apostolic church is founded upon what is called the restoration to the universal church of prophetic gifts by the direct inspiration of the Holy Ghost. And each official occupies the position he does in accordance with themeasure of his inspiration. Should any member feel called upon to exercise himself in the way of utterance or service it is his privilege to do so without any formality. After a short prayer of thanksgiving a Te Deum was sung, and effectively sung ; then the bishop, or angel, pronounced the benediction; the people all silently knelt a few moments afterward and then, reverently withdrew, thus ending a service the beauty of which has not been seen by a considerable number of Toronto's citizens, and cannot, therefore, be either understood or appreciated. Other churches are more popular and have all the concomitants of wealth, and yet it may be safely said that no church in the city has a service whose aesthetic value is so great as this; with a rich ritual, classical music and a cultivated ceremonial, those people may well rejoice in the possession of a religious faith that comes to them clothed in such beautiful garments. And not only this, but the character of the people who worship there is of the cleanest kind; some of our prominent men are associated with the organization, and their wellknown probity and gentleness of spirit honour not only themselves but the institution in which they have unqualified faith.

Mention has already been made of the excellent music that may be heard there. It should further be stated that the services of the choir, twenty voices, and of the organist are given gratuitously, and in these days when so few good singers are willing to praise the Lord without being paid for it, this is a remarkable fact. The psalms are sung in unison to Gregorian tones; an Agnus Dei, by Webbe, a Gloria in Excelsis, by W. Holmes, a selection from Farmer's Mass in B flat, and one from the Bridgewater service in F were among the excellent renditions.

The pastor, interchangeably called the minister or bishop, or angel, receives no salary. All the tithes are laid at the feet of the Apostles, the superior officers, and they apportion it, quarterly in advance to the angels as a benefice, which is a totally different thing from a salary there is no claim upon the fund.

HOW THE CHURCH ORIGINATED
There are about 300 people connected with the Catholic Apostolic church of this city; a Sunday school is held, where the children are assembled and taught the doctrines. In 1834, Mr. Caird, an evangelist, came here from England and remained two weeks, but no practical results followed his visit; two years later he returned and preached during the autumn until an Apostle came, in November, accompanied by a prophet, an evangelist and a pastor. By their efforts a congregation was organized, and in January, 1837, Rev. George Ryerson was ordained as the minister in charge; several were presented and some were called and ordained to the priesthood and others set apart as deacons and the church was active until 1844. Many ministers moved away because the seat of Government was changed, and this compelled the closing of the church until revived by Rev. Mr. Ryerson in the fall of 1848. He was succeeded by Rev. Mr. Elwell and the present incumbent.

The Catholic Apostolic church originated in 1830 in the west of Scotland. According to its belief the gifts bestowed by the Holy Spirit, which had been lost to Christendom, were restored at that time and in the persons of several distinguished men. It is popularly imagined that Edward Irving is the originator of this church and sometimes its people are called Irvingites; but this is an entirely erroneous idea. It is true that Edward Irving was one of those "called" and specifically endowed but only one; no doubt the movement owes very much to the singularly sweet and gentle disposition of that man, but it was by no means originated by him. Twelve of these especially endowed men, called "Apostles," met and agreed upon a visitation to different lands, first forming, July 14th, 1835, what is called the "College of the Apostles." They separated, examined the cultus of Christianity in all its different forms in different lands, and then culled from this uniI versal life the very best of its ritual and organized the present form of services.

ONE LORD, ONE FAITH, ONE BAPTISM.
The Toronto church is in connection with and subordinate to this Apostolic College, whose headquarters are in Albury England. These apostles, with prophets|attending them, visit all the churches and ordain the priests by the laying on of hands. Every minister must be specially called by the Holy Spirit and every member must recognize this supernatural direction.

It is not a sectarian denomination, but claims membership of the one body to which all baptized persons belong—the one, holy, Cathloic apostolic church. It holds no other faith than that of universal Christendom. It adopts no other confession than the three great Catholic creeds which have been used in the universal church for fourteen or fifteen centuries, viz., the Apostles', the Nicene and the Athanasian creeds; and reaches no doctrine which has not been curtent in the Church, with the exception of the doctrine concerning the second coming of Christ, which was taught in the earlier centuries, but has fallen into neglect and forgetfulness ; and also that of the permanence of the spiritual endowment of the Church and the gifts of the Holy Ghost as taught in the New Testament.

An unreasonable fiat

2010-09-24T12:27:00.001-04:00

(My thanks to John K. for broaching my post passim).

I appreciate the attempt, but I'm afraid there is nothing new here. That there is a difference inherent in the activities themselves is precisely what is at issue - you seem to reiterate this claim without providing any further reason for believing it than has been given so far.

As for Paul on heterosexual marriage, I did state that as a premise without explanation, since as you say I assumed some prior familiarity with (even respect for!) the texts in question, and Paul's toleration of marriage as "better than to burn [with desire]" is a far cry from "an honorable estate."

I'm afraid you've missed the point about gender; it isn't a straw man at all. If the moral status of the behaviour depends on the gender of the parties involved, then clearly something about gender is being assumed. Otherwise, it would be incoherent to claim that God forbids one and blesses the other. As you demonstrate, reasserters are very good at repeating this assumption, but evidence for it is less forthcoming.

You are moreover not "a member of another group likewise limited." You may be constrained from sleeping with other women, but you are not forbidden from sleeping with *any* woman - the Church has an existing approved context for you to do so. Gay people on the other hand have no such option, and so precisely what they are supposed to do in order to gain God's approval is not clear.

As for the burden of proof, again you offer mere contradiction. Gay people are the accused: it is not our responsibility to prove our innocence. That changing the pronouns in the marriage service is a "change" in the first place, much less an "abandonment of the old faith" is precisely the unexamined assumption that I am challenging. Gay Christians who wish to marry wish to do so *because* they believe in the old faith.

I'm a little unclear about your response to the scientific arguments, in which you say "the issue is not orientation." I'm not sure that that makes a difference to that segment: the point is that penalizing people for making what would appear to be, if sinful, the least sinful option feasibly available to them is unfair. Nor do I in fact think that we can draw such a glib line between orientation and behaviour: it puts gay people in the position, as I say, where their orientation precludes them from "behaving" in the approved manner. And since we don't condemn married couples for such behaviour, it would seem that it really is about the gender/orientation. Otherwise, we seem to suggest that there is a morally inherent difference in orifices, which you're free to argue, but smacks a bit of materialism and can hardly just be assumed as a 2000 year consensus - clearly there are many for whom it does not at all go without saying. And as I say (again you don't address this) we seem to have realized this when it comes to women's ordination, so to not extend the same conclusions to SSM seems to be special pleading.

I certainly don't want a religion that changes with the times: indeed, I am attracted to Christianity precisely because of its counter-cultural nature and rejection of the values of the world. But I do want a religion that has the humility to admit when it has been inconsistent, and if it has been teaching different things about these two types of relationships without a moral distinction to support the difference. In the same way, I consider the ordination of women not a "change" but an ironing out of a disparity between our practice of ordination and the Chalcedonian affirmation that Christ's human nature is from his Mother. I do agree that it demonstrates the divide: it's clear that some Christians view the Bible as an omnicompetent text whose stipulations are all equally authoritative irrespective of how absurd some of their possible conclusions can be shown to be. They are entitled to that, but it is unfair to expect the Anglican Church as a whole to affirm their private opinion as a matter of policy. If you believe that same-sex relationships are forbidden by God, good for you: avoid such relationships. But to crusade against those trying to play with integrity the hand they've been dealt is unchristian. (And lest you think I have a dog in this I live a celibate lifestyle myself, but I am acutely aware that this is a vocation from God that must be discerned and cannot be imposed en masse on an entire category of people).

Anyway, thanks for trying, but it still sounds like an evasion of the actual issues I've tried to raise.

A parallel

2010-09-19T22:43:00.004-04:00

Groups of Anglicans such as the Traditional Anglican Communion - not to mention other bodies like the Anglo-Lutheran Catholic Church - are seeking to be in full communion with an ancient see. (In contrast with the Roman Catholic Church's nomenclatural philosophy, I claim no proprietary right to "Anglican" for those of us in what the Continuum - we hope affectionately - call the Canterbury Communion). Taking Newman as their inspiration, they have been able to do so on relatively advantageous and congenial terms(we are talking about the Roman Curia here - though heavy hermeneutics have already begun on the passages relating to future married men in the priesthood). In the coverage of the topic, tribute has been paid to those pioneering co-religionists who "went over" prior to the bull, for whom the decision, which as any of us who has made one like it can attest, is not easy at the best of times, was decidedly less so.

I came to Anglicanism through Old Catholicism. While I continue to appreciate the formation I received in the latter and respect its (now quietly burgeoning) ministry, Utrecht has, rightly or wrongly, given up on North American bodies for the time being, despite close calls in Toronto and New Westminster, which were nail-biters for Ultrajectine-minded Anglicans (a particularly identifiable demographic in the United States). At BCP services, I hum my way through the filioque, I celebrate the Immaculate Conception and Assumption as edifying mysteries rather than mandatory dogmatic definitions, and I believe in the sacramental sufficiency of general absolution (even though I personally find private reconciliation necessary to my spiritual ben esse). But longing for something with, well, a congregation, I joined the Anglican Church of Canada, the only church in Canada in full communion with the Union of Utrecht (apart from an Aglipayan congregation meeting in an Anglican church in Montreal).

By their fruits ye shall know them: a consequentialist analysis of the negative perspective on same-gender unions

2010-09-18T11:04:00.009-04:00

Like a good Kantian, I have tried to focus on the moral reasons for same-sex marriage in my attempts to conduct a reasoned discourse on the public record. Here I will change tracks and look at the reasons why the traditional prohibition of same-gender relationships is not viable irrespective of the witness of Scripture and Tradition on the subject. The following constitutes the bare minimum I expect answered from anyone who wishes to maintain the traditional view, failing which I will take the point to be conceded and expect unanimous assent next General Synod. Apologies for my absence; coverage of Divnity orientation week will follow shortly.

***
It assumes the distinction it seeks to create.

Ultimately, the fatal flaws of the reasserter argument are its question begging and special pleading. Proponents point to a handful of texts concerning some form(s) or other of ancient near eastern same-sex activity. At the same time, the Church blesses heterosexual marriages, about which St Paul is hardly more enthusiastic. Thus in electing not to do the same for same-gender couples, the Church tacitly assumes that there is something qualitatively different about them from the relationships that it does bless. As this is ultimately the conclusion of the reasserter argument, it cannot also be a premise, much less a "missing" implied one. Leaving aside the biblical texts (horrors!), the problem is the paradox of our own practice. Apart from a nod to procreation - and even that is paired with the Godly raising of children - there is nothing in our marriage service that limits its scope to heterosexuals. (I noted with interest that over at the Anglican Samizdat there was as much outrage over +Montreal's tweaking of the existing blessing of civil marriage rite as +Niagara's publication of a rather twee de novo one, even though the former could hardly be said to change any doctrine since the wording is virtually identical apart from the pronouns).

If a distinction is to be made in the Church's response to heterosexual and homosexual relationships, it must either be rooted in some distinction inherent to the relationships themselves, or else an arbitrary commandment or "chuk." Reasserters, unsurprisingly, have not been able to account for this distinction (hint: it's not there).

It has decidedly questionable implications for our sacramental theology and our theological anthropology of gender.

Since the only distinction from all heterosexual unions common to all same-gender unions is the gender part, the assumed qualitative distinction, if it exists, must subsist therein. This model then has to elevate a biological triviality to the level of dogma. If we are going to accept this position, as reasserters would have us do, we should have to admit that genitalia are or can be a real barrier to receiving a sacrament - leaving the "I've got mine" female Essentials clergy who exhausted their capacity for "innovation" in 1976 on thin ice. Reasserters are asking us to accept a view that Anglicans (including most of themselves) rejected with respect to ordination. To arrive at a contrary and inconsistent view with respect to marriage belies their claim not to be singling gays out. It's all very well to complain about revisionist teaching, but rather more opaque when one wishes to pick and choose the instances in which revision is applicable once it has already been made. (As they say in the US Congress, wasteful spending always seems to be done outside one's own district).

It creates a class of Christians who have no hope of fulfilling the Church's teaching on chastity

While heterosexual Christians have the option of marriage, gay Christians are placed in a position whereby anything they do is automatically categorized as sexual sin. Apart from the relatively few Christians of any sexual orientation with a genuine celibate vocation, it is never quite clear what those who find themselves to be gay are meant to do under the reasserter model. Once they have made their case for why we are SOL, they are alarmingly light on advice.

Its credibility is undermined by its proponents

Apart from the odd kapo à la David Ould, the antigay industry is largely a unidirectional enterprise engaged by heterosexuals against a group in which they can be assured of never finding themselves. It is prima facie suspiciously convenient that the form of relationship uniquely sanctioned by God in their view is their own. As Anne Lamott says, "You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do." Reasserters will take pains to profess Christian charity, yet it is still hard to fathom why even someone sincerely convinced of the traditional position on homosexuality would make a theological career out of seeking to deny a sacrament to other Christians. In the secular world, the slogan is "Don't like gay marriage? Don't have one." It is one thing for groups like Essentials to be averse to the notion of equal marriage, but to insist that one simply cannot inhabit a communion where two blokes might tie the knot in the next parish over is decidedly odd from the standpoint of Anglican polity.

It places the burden of proof on the accused, and holds them guilty until proven innocent.

Reasserters avoid defending their position in detail by maintaining that the onus is on those who seek change to prove their view beyond a reasonable doubt. This is backwards, as gays are the ones in the dock and in any case reasserters typically accept Anglican "innovations" on contraception, and yet wish to revert to a strictly procreative model when confronted with a different behaviour they happen to find less palatable. The onus is on reasserters to account for the disparity in their positions if it is to be taken as anything beyond a subjective and rather irrational statement of personal preference.

Certain aspects of it contradict known empirical data

Reasserters typically point out that questions about the aetiology of homosexuality are not settled. A biological or genetic basis has not been proven, they say. The first problem with this, as above, is that it assumes the distinction and is really a question mal posée. Most would be bemused if questioned about the inception of their own sexual orientation, but gay people are assumed to be different. Insofar as we do not ask what "causes" heterosexuality, a corollary question about homosexuality is unintelligible. Whatever the cause of sexual orientation should prove to be, there is no reason to believe that it is different for different sexual orientations. Many however harbour a lingering assumption that heterosexuality is the default or natural human state of origin, from which a few simply fall away. This is easily verifiable: ask a gay person if they previously experienced predominate attraction to the opposite sex. In most cases the reply will be negative, and the fact that sexual orientation sometimes shifts of its own accord over the lifespan doesn't mean that it can be planned on.

The second problem with the above is that it misses what is relevant in the moral debate. Whether homo- and heterosexuality is fixed in the womb, the nursery school, or immediately prior to puberty is something scientists will continue to consider throughout this century - no doubt the answer(s) will be multifaceted. At this stage, however, we do know that it is fixed early on, usually immutable, and almost always involuntary, and that there is no difference between sexual orientations in this respect. Thus while reasserters may claim that the opposite-gender marriage definition is not like anti-miscegenation laws because "being gay is not like being black" the fact is that we do not eschew racial discrimination because race is a genetic trait (insofar as it is a real trait at all) but because of its involuntary and immutable nature. Now I'm not a lawyer but you don't need to take my word for it. In explaining what constitutes an unlawful ground of discrimination, the Supreme Court of Canada speaks of traits that are "immutable or changeable only at unacceptable cost to personal identity." Thus a trait like sexual orientation is held to be "analogous" to race or religion in the sense relevant to us. That some such traits are genetic and others are not does not affect our position.

Moreover, the anthropological assumptions of the argument fall here as well. The Bible indeed says "male and female he created them" and yet we now know of individuals who do not fit neatly into this binary - even (leaving aside questions like transsexuality) in its narrowest understanding, since there are cases of patients whose chromosomal configuration is neither XX nor XY. (If we do not accept such a reductionist view - which as presumably incarnational-dualist Christians we ought not - we have even less grounds for holding the traditional position).

It appears entirely unconcerned with these questions.

Reasserters can be quite casual in assuming that their position is correct and uniquely "orthodox", and it's easy to be complacent when yours is the only position for several centuries. Yet they are remarkably silent when it comes to overcoming these hurdles to accepting their position. As the "reappraiser" argument is distilled and refined, reasserter discourse adds nothing new, preferring to repeat its stump speech about Creation, Paul, and dubious Thomistic metaphysics. Conversations like this show the reasserter tendency to fall back on an ipse dixit when confronted with the hard questions about their position's less attractive implications. They can't answer the objections, and yet do not concede them, an untenable position in debate which more or less boils down to believing gays are sinners because one wants to. This is not surprising to those of us who recognize it as the only grounds, however specious, on which the position can be held, but reasserters continue to demand deference to their view disproportional to the evidence they have for it. It's natural to instinctively dislike something different from us, but if we wish the Church to take us seriously as an "orthodox" voice and repent its ways, we must have stronger reasons than "because I say so." The heterosexual male revulsion at same-gender sex (as they imagine it to be) is understandable psychologically but it is not an argument and until it is backed up by one the Anglican Church of Canada should not be expected to dignify it.

The Traditional Anglican Church of Canada

2010-09-03T18:06:00.003-04:00

A new Anglican body is on the horizon in Canada. Special vestries in a few parishes of the Anglican Catholic Church of Canada have opted out of the terms of Anglicanorum coetibus. To meet the needs of those who wish to continue as Traditional Anglicans (but not too traditional) a new community of churches is in formation. The Traditional Anglican Church of Canada, newly shed of the "Catholic" moniker, is receiving temporary episcopal oversight from the Anglican Catholic Church (Original Province) and the Anglican Province of Christ the King. Dissension centred at the diocesan cathedral in Victoria, British Columbia, where members who do not intend to submit have formed the parish of St Mark the Evangelist. Also remaining are the Thunder Bay, Parry Sound, and suburban Vancouver parishes. The house church in Windsor, Ontario, has already joined the Original Province and one parish in Nova Scotia went over early in TAC's Romeward orientation to the Anglican Orthodox Church, of all things, founded a decade ahead of the first Continuum bodies as an expression of Southern discontent at racial integration and high-churchery. A vote at the Vancouver parish was inconclusive and will be repeated.

The minor orders

2010-08-19T12:57:00.002-04:00

The "Admission of Lay Ministers and Officers" is on page 98 of the Canadian Book of Occasional Offices. Presbyteral celebration is assumed. Forms are provided for servers, and an open-ended form could be used for greeters and subdeacons, the ministry of deliverance being strictly pontifically controlled. The admission of Readers is on page 85. (It is followed by, of all things, that of deaconesses; the distinction from deacons was abolished in 1968).

The Reconciliation of a Penitent

2010-08-07T12:32:00.005-04:00

As a fresher away from home, I found myself in the position of having to reorient my ecclesiastical itinerary. I chose the local Lutheran parish, which was modern Catholic in the Haugen-and-holy water sense, for Sunday mornings and their midweek Communion. A retired couple from the parish volunteered to drive me and two other students who joined us irregularly, one young man and one young woman. Although she did not know the specifics of her church background, a little probing made it evident she attended a Lutheran Church - Canada congregation at home. The pastor's stance was the same as an Anglican priest confronted with a Roman Catholic at the altar rail: fine by us, how you square it with your people is your business.

For absolution I sought out the campus chaplain. While she could be described as having been in the theological mainstream of the Diocese of Niagara, I respected that she was well-versed in the Anglo-Catholic tradition of her upbringing and that our disagreements were mutually well thought out. And so once a month she gamely donned her purple Guatemalan stole to shrive me, as she would say with tongue in cheek, according to a truncated form of the Ministry to the Sick in the Book of Common Prayer. (My pastor himself firmly held the Lutheran line on numbering Penance as the third Sacrament).

At the time, I felt quite strongly about the older book's retention of the "I absolve thee" considered essential by Rome. The relevant prefatory material in the BAS notes only that this form is a "later development." Like the explanation offered for the gutting of the Daily Office Lectionary, I thought it a bit weak. But there are, I think, good Catholic grounds for the reversion to "Our Lord Jesus Christ ... absolve you through my ministry."

Obviously, the basic substance of the BAS revision is more satisfactory. Instead of being buried in the Ministry to the Sick, the rite is printed in a section with Baptism to emphasise the intimate relationship between the original washing at baptism and the ongoing repentance to the baptismal convenant. Orders in the psalm-heavy Byzantine and quick-and-dirty Western style are offered.

The transition from I to God reflects the corporate nature of sin and reconciliation, even when administered in private. In the same way the celebrant's vestments de-emphasize his individual identity or the humeral veil makes apparent our Lord's place as font of blessing, so the new formula points to God as the source of absolution, who "hath given power and commandment to his Ministers, to declare and pronounce to his people, being penitent, the Absolution and Remission of their sins." The priest is not offering forgiveness as an individual on his own behalf, but corporately, as a Minister of Word and Sacrament, in the Reformed idiom which is helpful to recall.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with the old form, and some are too eager to consign the Book of Common Prayer to retirement, but there are insights to be gained from reading the material in the Book of Alternative Services. Because our Anglican doctrine is found in our liturgy, I have been making a point of re-reading the services of baptism and of the ordination of deacons in the BAS to make sure I remember where I have come from and where I hope to be going. Anomalous as it may be, we are oddly blessed with our two-book system, which provides us with two very different expressions of our one common faith.

A few thoughts on Anglican patrimony

2010-08-07T01:39:00.004-04:00

Much ink has been spilled over the concept of Anglican patrimony, but some of the candidates are more dubious than others. Is the reintroduction of traditional Latinate ceremonial (and I of all people mean that in no wise pejoratively) really a gift of Anglicanism to the church catholic? The Use of Sarum has been mentioned by some: others may dismiss it at as antiquarianism, but its recovery seems to have been relatively unproblematic in the Orthodox Church. (I continue to regard the Orthodox Western Rite as a more attractive options for Anglicans with swimming fever, though for various reasons I am not on the market myself. Nevertheless, TAC and its co-petitioners have won the goal of several generations of Anglo-Papalists and their integrity and readiness in "answering the call can only be commended).

Having said that, there are, I think, differences we can observe in the piety of Anglican Catholics and their counterparts in communion with Rome. Although I at first swam the Thames with Henrician intentions of remaining unchanged doctrinally and in practice, diligently praying the rosary and making periodic trips to the confession rail (boxes being nowhere to be found), there are certain things one does not generally find either in Anglican or in Roman Catholic churches.

Any kind of public Office is scarce as hen's teeth in the Roman Catholicism, although the Toronto Oratory offers the archdiocese's only Sunday Vespers (solemn, in the ordinary form, mostly in Latin, and with Benediction). There I notice that worshippers wandered in and out relatively casually - not irreverently, but clearly feeling no obligation to remain in a pew from ten minutes prior the service to the postlude or extinguishing of candles. Indeed, I have childhood memories of trips to the bathroom during the homily - you couldn't get there without passing the tabernacle and so you learned to genuflect with minimum pressure on the bladder.

Although there is the odd rosary group and Mass of the Sacred Heart, and Benediction remains a crowd-pleaser, the plethora of devotional options simply does not exist to the same extent in Anglicanism. It occurs to me that I don't know off hand where my brown scapular and Miraculous Medal are which I once doffed only to shower. Certainly the menu of Divine Mercy chaplets, perpetual Adoration, and Novenas to the Infant of Prague is not a feature of Anglican churches.

Roman Catholic churches often lack a cogent sense of community outside of worship. While many Anglicans cannot conceive of a Mass not followed by the eighth sacrament, coffee, in the church of my childhood "Coffee Sunday" was a once a month affair, and only if you happened to attend the 11am Mass after catechism instead of the 9am prior to, as most families with young children preferred. (As a teenager, I came to be partial to the Mass of anticipation and sleeping in on Sunday mornings). I certainly did not speak to other parishioners outside of the nave on regular basis. They can have a certain warehouse feel: friends tell of Masses being discontinued for attracting "only" 150 or so week by week - for Anglicans, an impressive figure for all Sunday services combined. Even outside of Anglo-Catholicism, Anglican congregations offer a "boutique" niche.

And so while communities of Anglicans received into full communion with the Holy See will be subject to the same doctrinal standards as other Roman Catholics, it seems fair to say that there are noticeable differences in the piety of Anglo-Catholicism that can be hoped to enrich the wider Roman communion in a real way.

Pushback

2010-07-25T10:37:00.003-04:00

Both the MadPriest and The Anglo-Catholic are carrying the story of a playwright who feels marginalized at Toronto's Church of St Mary Magdalene over his "traditional" views on same-sex relationships. Following on the heels of the "dog bites God" story making the rounds, this one plays into a favourite conservative trope: the "illiberal liberal."

This tactic allows reasserters to shift attention from their own pet intolerance (marriages that fall short of the sacred penis-in-vagina ideal) by turning the principles of theological liberalism on their head. See, "liberals" aren't tolerant of intolerance, so we must be intolerant ourselves, get it? Of course, it's only a semantic trick, but it sounds like a good talking point and is second perhaps only to the "bums on pews" trope in terms of dangerous equivocation. (Churches that welcome gays, we are told, are hemorrhaging members - the paradoxical implication being that the way to fill churches is to restrict eligibility for membership).

As usual, the comparison is one of apples and oranges. Mr McKillop wrote a play, on the public record, that is openly disparaging of the plight of gays in the church who seek its blessing. Whether he agrees with them or not, that he then expects to be able to waltz into a community to which a fair number of such people have given their lives and be "welcomed" is the height of hubris. Now, a rational person would say, of course a gay couple in the choir is going to be unnerved by your presence. But in reasserter Bizarro World, it is the gay couple who are the bigots with their ungracious reception of him. Mr McKillop protests that he said nothing to the men "while singing" and so he cannot understand their rudeness and assumes the snub is attributable to "something they had heard about me or what I had written" (gee, ya think?) Funny that - gays can read? If I insult someone else in writing, it still counts? Go figure. I mean, if I had written negatively about black Canadians, I could hardly then show up at the local British Methodist Episcopal church and expect a warm welcome so long as I don't mention verbally what I've already made clear in print.

The headline of the piece is 'An Anglican who no longer feels safe.' This is particularly sneaky prose, since of course it is clearly the gay couple who would be made to feel less than safe by the arrival of a wag like Mr McKillop. This couple has presumably been singing without incident for some time before someone with an agenda showed up to make trouble. I'm sure I would have been similarly concerned in their shoes. My parish family is very important to me and if someone arrived who openly believed that my belonging there was an abomination I would of course consider that a threat. But because they cannot win the battle on theological grounds, "reassserters" have simply inverted the terminology. Now, the Anglican Church of Canada's tepid efforts to afford its gay and lesbian members a modicum of respect are portrayed as a campaign to hound out others. Since they can't argue with trying to make a few people feel a bit more safe, they spin it around and accuse the liberals of what they themselves have hitherto been doing. So now the slow move of the Anglican Church into the 20th century (only ten years late and counting!) is depicted not as a measure of greater safety (for gays) but less. The same phenomenon can be seen at synod where Essentials show up with their Zacchaeus Fellowship, whose mind-bending premise is that by allowing gays and lesbians who wish to enter committed relationships to do so, the church is somehow not respecting the rights of those who do not so wish (!)

Heterosexual Anglicans like Mr McKillop are eminently safe. For most of the church's history, they were the only ones who were. Now efforts are being made to extend that safety to others. But doing so does not diminish the safety of heterosexuals - instead, for once, it simply isn't about them. If Mr McKillop feels unsafe it is because of statements he has chosen to make publicly. That those whom he has attacked take umbrage at his presence is not some conspiracy - it is the consequence of his own actions.

So like much of the reasserter literature on homosexuality, Mr McKillop's tantrum in the Putz is high on scary sounding rhetoric and low on theology (see for example this post, whose author when challenged on his talking points tacitly confessed his inability to defend his matching-bits fetish on theological grounds). If Mr McKillop wishes to inhabit a church where he can write whatever venom he likes about gays on Saturday and they will docilely shake his hand at the Pax on Sunday, he is welcome to the Roman Catholic Church. Anglican gay folk reserve the right to be uppity.

Like Republicans in the United States, conservatives have a tendency to confuse losing with oppression. Finding themselves on the wrong side of history their only chance is to make as much noise as possible on the way out, in hopes of momentarily stunning us. But to anyone who has taken a first-year "reading critically" course, Mr McKillop's column is transparently hollow. While their argument has been indulged until now - and for too long - on the strength of its age, it is becoming clear that the Emperor has no clothes. While reasserters hate the comparison of the gay civil rights movement to its African American antecedent, they do not give people under 30 a reason to resist the analogy. Most of us believe that segregation was wrong not because blacks are some sacredly protected class but because it is unjust to treat a class of persons differently because of an involuntary personal characteristic. To hold this in the case of one group but not another is special pleading. In fact it is simply that the self-styled "orthodox" (who fought desegregation just as hard as gender-neutral marriage) have given up one prejudice but not yet another.

Sea Sunday

2010-07-12T15:01:00.003-04:00

The Mission to Seafarers in the Port of Toronto celebrated an outdoor Solemn Votive Mass of Michaelmas yesterday afternoon, just managing to avoid the rain. A couple of us turned up from St Bart's, where the mission's chaplain assists informally and had invited us that morning to binate.

The chaplain celebrated with the mission's other priest and a local priest of the Oratory of the Good Shepherd as assistants. Archbishop Terry Finlay turned up in the congregation in his role as Episcopal Visitor and gave the final blessing.

We sang hymns and modern settings of the Mass ordinary, including the "Land of Rest Sanctus" from Evangelical Lutheran Worship, with synthesizer organ and tambourine accompaniment provided by the diocese's Filipino congregation. The Gloria was a hymn paraphrase to the tune of Angels we have heard on high, and was followed by the Kyrie (in Greek) to Rule, Britannia, which we tried to fake, but it didn't really take off. A collect of St Nicholas, patron of seafarers, was commemorated.

An amply appointed barbecue followed, by which time the oppressive humidity had broken. (Other parts of the city, as I learned when I returned home, had been shaken by thunderstorms).

Max's service schedule challenge

2010-06-30T14:06:00.007-04:00

Source here.

Rural
8.30am Holy Communion (BCP)
10.45am Morning Prayer
11am Sung Eucharist (BAS or alternating)

Suburban
5pm (Sat) Corporate Confession & Absolution with Anointing (ELW)
8.30am Holy Communion (BAS Rite I)
10.45am Morning Prayer
11am Sung Eucharist
(Morning Prayer and Holy Communion, first Sundays)

Inner city
4pm (Sat) Corporate Confession & Absolution with Anointing (ELW)
5pm La Messe-Basse
9.30am Holy Communion (BCP)
10.15am Sung Mattins & Litany
11am Solemn High Mass (BAS Rite I)
4.30pm Festal Evensong & Benediction

Undergraduate options I decided against

2010-06-28T23:02:00.007-04:00

*Midwifery at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver
*Psychiatric nursing at Brandon University in Manitoba
*Basque Studies at the University of Nevada at Reno
*A double major in sexual diversity studies and the (now sadly defunct) psychoanalytic thought at the University of Toronto (the former through University College, the latter at Trinity) or alternatively in Christianity & Culture and Celtic Studies (at St Mike's)
*Jewish music at Yeshiva University in New York
*Canadian Literature at the University of Victoria, British Columbia
*Cultural Studies and Critical Theory at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario
*Culinary Arts at the Dublin Institute of Technology
*Civil law at the University of Ottawa
*Journalism at the University of King's College, Halifax
*Orthodox Theology at the Greek Orthodox Theological Academy of Toronto through the Université de Sherbrooke, Québec

A truant Mattins

2010-06-27T16:45:00.006-04:00

We fled the city for the duration of the G20 summit, and visited the Church of St John the Evangelist in Elora, Ontario, near Kitchener-Waterloo. The Choral Mattins advertised for second and fourth Sundays was, alas, mysteriously dispensed. Instead we had a Choral Eucharist of Trinity IV.

The service was surprisingly faithful to the BCP. The (Merbecke) Gloria, however, was moved to the beginning, which led to some calisthenics as the entrance rite was otherwise done kneeling. The vesture had the air of pre-Ritualist Tractarianism: the celebrant wore a surplice and stole and faced east on an altar covered in a superfrontal (though he lost his nerve and spun round at the Words of Institution, posts passim). A burse and veil were used, as well as one of those twee little stoles for the lectern. The only spiky touch was the use of apparelled amices on the servers. All the ministers in the sanctuary knelt round the altar for most of the service.

The prayer book lectionary was used, a rarity these days outside of places like St Bart's in Toronto. The gradual psalm, however, was neither that appointed in the prayer book nor the RCL psalm. The last verse was sung as an Alleluia (also the custom at St Bart's) but after springing to my feet reflexively I found myself alone. All rose when the Gospeller (a laywoman from the nave) reached the lectern.

The Nicene Creed was said and the celebrant ascended the pulpit. The rest of the service was prayer book to the letter, complete with manual actions - "He brake it (crack!)" - and post-communion Lord's Prayer. The people joined in the second half of the Thanksgiving ("And here, we offer...") which is common, just as many places also have the Collect for Purity said by all. This phenomenon is likely a part of "organic development" - in earlier editions of the BCP, even the Prayer of Humble Access was said in the congregation's name.

The music of the Mass, incidentally, was Hassler's Missa Secunda. Mozart's Ave Verum Corpus was sung by the excellent choir of St John's. (The music director is also artistic director of the famed Elora Festival, whose choir sings at the church when the festival is underway). It was a rare treat finding such authentic old-fashioned high-and-dry Anglicanism in the country - and I shall return for Mattins!

The Nativity of St John the Baptist

2010-06-24T23:03:00.004-04:00

Montréal is an incredible place. Just walking down the street is a novel experience for those formed in the mores of Orange Ontario. Beer and wine appear in convenience stoor windows, the pedestrian traffic signals are guidelines, and somewhere a spliff is burning. My worldlier friends describe it as "the only place you can touch the strippers" which sounds a little like one of those legal urban myths that you'd get in a bubble gum wrapper. (It is said, for example, that the Fairmont Le Reine Elizabeth must provide a bag of oats for your horse). In middle school, the grade 8s boasted about the tattoos they would get as we stopped at Tim Horton's franchises in Kingston. After the fact, none owned up to having done such a thing, though a few went home sporting short-lived piercings.

Today was the patronal festival of Québec and the Anglican Church of Canada. A Solemn High Mass (sans procession or Te Deum) was celebrated in English and French (well, Latin and Greek if you count the choral parts) according to the rite of the prayer book of 1959 and the traditional Western Rite at the Church of St John the Evangelist. A lovely blue and gold High Mass set was used, complete with maniples and a humeral veil for the subdeacon. The birettas which I saw for the first time at St John's were not in evidence. Hymns were from the English Hymnal, and the Epistle read but the Gospel monotoned rather harriedly. A satisfying lunch of hamburgers and hot dogs followed. Home tomorrow.

From the Anglican Journal comments

2010-06-15T12:27:00.001-04:00

"The document and speakers referenced a paradox in our life as a church. Unfortunately the paradox only exists for those unaffected by continued inaction. For those who don't actually enjoy the 'full inclusion' the document would suggest, there is only injustice. Someone has to pay the price for unity, I'm just sad it has to be me."

Old Catholic schizophrenia

2010-06-11T20:54:00.003-04:00

Bishop David Hamid, suffragan to the Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe, blogs about a particularly bizarre effect of the Archbishop of Canterbury's purge: the removal of the rector of Frankfurt in the Convocation of American Churches in Europe from the Anglican dialogue with the Old Catholic churches. It seems that ++Rowan fears the Episcopal Church's voice cannot be trusted not to contaminate our representation to even the Old Catholics - who are ahead of us in permitting the blessing of same-gender unions and the ordination of gay clergy! It is hard to see how, unlike perhaps with Rome or the Orthodox, the dialogue would be upset by an American representative. Of course, the Archbishop is not about to withdraw his own participation from Communion affairs: as a bishop in the CoE he's free to bless as many such unions as he likes in his province so long as they remain "informal."

Pastoral generosity

2010-06-10T08:41:00.004-04:00

On the order paper today is resolution C009, moved by an openly gay youth member from the Diocese of Toronto. The text is as follows.

Affirm that the most generous pastoral response possible be provided to people in committed same sex relationships; and that in dioceses, with the approval of the diocesan bishop, the most generous pastoral response in each individual context be determined.

This motion is very clever. By granting a local option (the bishop is empowered to determine what constitutes appropriate pastoral care) without saying so outright (the "b" word does not appear) it avoids the Archbishop of Canterbury's jesuitical definition of "formal." It is not the blessing of same-gender unions itself that is problematic for ++Rowan, for such is the common practice of his own province, so long as we do not use the word in a formally enacted resolution.

UPDATE The motion, which was the only way we were going to salvage anything out of this mess, has been withdrawn.

Disingenuous debate

2010-06-08T13:15:00.002-04:00

Israel is in the news again. As is so often the case, the debate appears to have degenerated into a competition of talking points. What's particularly tragic (in the true sense of the word) is that it does not seem that there is a real ideological rift between the two "sides" of this rhetorical war.

Take the Israeli Apartheid controversy at Pride Toronto. Apologists for the Israeli administration argue that the group is a breeding ground for anti-semitism, aimed at delegitimizing the State of Israel's very existence and all together too cosy to extreme groups like Hamas. Israel, they point out, is the closest to a modern liberal democracy in the Middle East.

Palestinian partisans are appalled by the interception of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla. They are outraged that Palestinian workers are walled into a third world zone from which they must make a half-day's commute through deliberately humiliating conditions in order to find work. They point to arbitrary and bureaucratic regulations about spices in the embargo and the underprovision of the residents.

Yet both positions are selective. Both seek to uphold rights of national self-determination and democracy. Both, it is true, have unsavoury supporters in some quarters. Yet mainline political parties in both Israel and Palestine support a two-state solution at least in principle. Having met members of the contingent in question at last year's parade, I can vouch for the fact that most of them were themselves Jewish. Most supporters of Israel, similarly, are not Bush Republicans. They are people whose love of freedom and national pride causes them to be loyal to the cause of Israel's independence just as Palestinians are theirs.

These positions are not inconsistent. Liberally-minded people of all ethnic and religious communities should realize we are common allies against extremism. Under Mr Netanyahu's government, Palestinians live essentially in Bantu townships or indeed First Nations reserves. Citizens and friends of Israel cannot profess surprise when the "A" word rears its head. Countering this talk with censorship rather than refutation (for apartheid is a defined legal term and can be answered on its own merits) is self-evidently suspicious.

Meanwhile, Palestinians in Gaza participate in the reinforcement of their own oppression by electing a government dedicated to opposing Israel's enjoyment of the same rights they seek for themselves. The State of Israel was founded by international consensus in response to an urgent need for a safe haven for Jews. There was no seriously viable alternative, Uganda notwithstanding. And Partition, as noted, has broad cross-community support.

Some have been known to proclaim themselves "anti-Zionist, though not anti-semitic." The truth of the latter will of course vary from person to person, but on the former point they seem commonly mistaken. Only a few interlocutors have tried to persuade me that Israel's existence is not legitimate. More often, they seem to be using "Zionism" as a sort of metonym for imperialist elements within the Western bloc, including the United States and Israel. Yet defenders of Israel are usually, again principle, prepared to concede the possibility of legitimate criticism of Israel.

So then, why cannot moderates in both communities come together in support of mutual recognition and co-operation, unafraid to be critical wherever it is necessary and supportive wherever possible. I realize this is probably necessarily a naïve view, but I am not a political scientist, and my understanding is primarily driven by theological anthropology and what I read in the news. But it seems to me unfortunate to align based on ethnic chauvinism rather than mutual compatibility for the purpose of achieving a path to peace. To use the analogy, it seems rather like the Social Democratic & Labour Party allying with Republican Sinn Féin rather than participating in the governance of Northern Ireland on a cross-community and democratic basis.

Referral

2010-06-07T15:28:00.001-04:00

For coverage from General Synod, visit Dogs at the Table:

I am still not satisfied that there is any acknowledgment that the continuing “gracious restraint” and “ongoing dialogue” is at the expense of a constituency of the church who are already making enormous spiritual sacrifices just to affiliate with the Anglican Church.

Liturgical latitudinarianism and the Anglo-Catholic aspiration

2010-06-07T13:20:00.002-04:00

In the interval between the Catholic Revival and the Liturgical Movement, Anglicans of a Catholic identity wrestled with the perceived inadequacy of rites derived from the 1662 tradition. This question was less problematic in provinces such as Scotland, the United States, and to a certain extent in Canada from 1959. However, books like Ritual Notes, the English and Anglican Missals, and the English Hymnal, represent a way of wrapping the traditional "Western Rite" round Archbishop Cranmer's texts.

Many parishes and clergy, including many we would not consider "extreme" today, made use of these resources to greater or lesser extents. A little cosmetic surgery fashioned a somewhat more satisfactory Canon, and the complete Sanctus and Agnus Dei could be inserted. Others might make use of the "minor propers" or at least an introit and/or gradual. On the far end of the spectrum, there was the sort of parish, of which S. Clement's Philadelphia is perhaps the last true surviving specimen, in which the Tridentine Mass was constructed with more diligence than is typical in the Roman Catholic Church, albeit largely in the vernacular. Yet even "middle of the road" parishes would resort to these books at least in Holy Week.

Arguments about the canonical status of these alterations were at times a bit strained. Today, on the other hand, the 1979 prayer book and its virtually identical rubrical cousin the Book of Alternative Services provide for traditional language services in the Western Catholic shape, with the Gloria At Beginning, explicitly sacrificial Eucharistic Prayers with sound epicleses, and the full rites of Holy Week. The rubrics allow for the interpolation of psalms or anthems in all the right spots, allowing for the use of the Anglican Gradual and Sacramentary. Those desiring completely traditional language including psalmody may avail themselves of the conforming texts in the Anglican Service Book. In Canada at least, even the traditional Eucharistic lectionary is still authorized, if officially discouraged, and to this day as a lector I regularly wrap up with what I will always the find the anticlimactic "Here endeth the Epistle."

Now that full communion with the Lutherans is established, we may hope that we benefit from their sound democratic polity of episcopacy and they from the restoration of certain ecumenically positive aspects of episcopal ministry. In my opinion, on the other hand, amid all the buzz on the episcopate, the (I think) far more pressing dialogue on the diaconate has not commanded such attention. Unlike bishops, deacons in the ELCiC are still not ordained. On the other hand, their own texts are not only pretty much wide open, but only "commended" rather than authorized. Even in the more conservative Missouri Synod and its neighbour the Lutheran Church - Canada, the parameters are broad enough to permit the similarly outlying example of Zion Detroit, essentially a "Lutheran Missal" parish.

Other Anglo-Catholics have more recently found ways to accomplish what has always been a great dream of a large segment of Anglo-Catholics: reunion to Rome or Constantinople (my apologies to the Orthodoxen for the shorthand) without loss of the Anglican liturgical and spiritual identity.

It has been said that Anglo-Catholics won the battles but lost the war, but I think that this is a glib characterization of what is a really a highly promising situation. Anglo-Catholics of all tendencies have found canonical means of accomplishing their goals. Except, perhaps, the English Use enthusiasts, who are long due for a renaissance, but some faithful souls have never ceased quietly toiling.

Selections from conservative talking points in pre-synod web debate

2010-06-02T13:33:00.004-04:00

If the heterosexual community sees itself (and the sacrament of marriage) as being harmed or threatened by the possibility of blessing same-sex unions, whether physically or not, is this not an equally important side of the issue?

If white people in Vancouver "feel" they get a raw deal in university admissions owing to an "Asian invasion," even if they cannot support the assertion, aren't those "feelings" equally important? Remember that we are talking about allowing people into said sacrament: is the implicit assumption that it will be tainted? What is the alleged harm?

Considering that about 1/2 of homosexual "marriages" are what is termed an "open marriage" (meaning that adultery is the norm) means that the very concept of marriage is damaged!

A red herring. No redefinition of the monogamy requirement is proposed. Same gender couples must submit to the same obligations of Christian marriage as anyone else.

Truth of the matter is that God's Word does not change, nor will it ever, just to suit our purposes or the year we live in. It should be our ultimate Map & Guide, these types of issues are to be subservient to its Truth. Why is it so hard to figure out that with its mercy, judgement comes hand-in-hand. This should not be an issue AT ALL. Yes I admit that is the 'narrow' view, but is it not part of our mandate to set an example to the world?

It is interesting how many people are citing the authority of scripture as a grounds for refusing a more compassionate approach to gays and lesbians. No one is advocating stoning adulterers, and the Anglican Church of Canada seems to have accommodated divorce and remarriage without too much of an assault on its conscience. Yet the “texts of terror” on homosexuality suit people’s prejudices, and so are retained.

The need to hold to biblical standards is more important than listening to the experiences of people.

An unwittingly apt encapsulation of the tragedy of the reasserter position: the text is more important than human souls.

The opening statement of this article is very misleading. It reads Once again members at next months General Synod (GS) will be asked to consider issues of human sexuality.This will mark our next step in the now 34-year journey of debate, study, and discernment that began with the commissioning of the first task force by the House of Bishops in 1976. Many, including the bloggers who have commented here, will interpret this statement to say that the issues which are facing our church today have been studied and debated for thiry years. That is just not the case.

In what sense is it not? The theology behind this began closer to 40 years ago, dating back at least to Pittenger's Time for Consent?

Most of those who see themselves as remaining faithful to traditional teachings of the Church and the guidance of Holy Scripture do NOT "hate" gays.

Homosexuality-as-sin was 2004; it's now 2010. We're not backtracking. Do reasserters believe if they don't mention the current position of the Anglican Church, liberals will forget about it? Right now, we acknowledge that these unions are holy yet refrain from blessing them, which is an inherently absurd position.

Vigil of Pentecost

2010-05-23T19:10:00.003-04:00

At this time each year I regret not living in Philadelphia.

Those of us elsewhere must be content with the service leaflet (pdf) from S. Clement's, as the Mass does not appear to have been recorded.

Protestants in petticoats

2010-05-15T13:14:00.002-04:00

A common trope from the "right" of the Anglo-Catholic movement is that those Anglo-Catholics identified as "affirming" are not really Catholic at all, but merely latitudinarians who find inspiration in the devotional aesthetics of Anglo-Catholic ritual. This allegation is perhaps more common in the UK, where "Forward in Faith" and "Affirming Catholicism" are to a greater extent actual organizational entities, rather than the conceptual tendencies they denote in Canadian and American Anglicanism. (Most major Canadian cities have one and only one Anglo-Catholic parish, often resulting in a Margaret Street-style truce).

There are, I think, several problems with this analysis. It is clear that those Anglo-Catholics of a conservative persuasion regard new theologies of gender as an unjustifiable departure from Catholic Tradition. Moreover, they tend to be convinced of the "package deal" nature of Catholicism. However, while the Catholic Faith is certainly not an à la carte affair, it is difficult to see that "liberal" Anglo-Catholics are markedly less consistent in their approach than their "FiF" brethren, much less their Roman Catholic counterparts. (At first glance, it is vexing that Anglicans are vetted individually for catholicity while Roman Catholics are more or less given carte blance by virtue of their submission to Rome. However, the relationship between FiF and Rome is somewhat more nuanced. Despite recent enthusiasm for reunion, many who have gone before have been disappointed to find a church just as troubled as our own, and not a kitsch-free lace and incense paradise).

First, consider what "affirming" Catholics actually believe. The beliefs of these Anglicans about the Eucharist, and about the ministry and sacraments in general, is unrecognizable to Protestants, yet highly similar to that of Forward in Faith! In the Diocese of Toronto, where only one parish offers regular Evensong & Benediction, those who seek the Lord in his Eucharistic presence gather for devotion to express a common faith, whatever their disagreements on the qualifications for Eucharistic presidency. I may disagree with some Anglo-Catholics about whether a woman can be celebrate Mass, but my understanding of what happens when she does so comes straight from the Council of Trent.

Second, consider the nature of ritual aesthetics. Anglo-Catholics have always been clear that it points to a theological truth. Thus the idea of aesthetics being separable from theology is an artificial one to begin with. A "Forward in Faith" Anglo-Catholic may disagree with an "affirming" Anglo-Catholic priest's views on orders or marriage, but when he (or she) dons a chasuble, he is saying something about our faith in the Eucharist - something that our hypothetical FiF observer should find quite familiar - and not merely making a fashion statement. Even female priests, who obviously dissent from FiF's position that they are Teflon-coated for sacramental insulation, should not be assumed to have a Eucharistic theology that is indebted in any substantial way to the Reformation. (One English correspondent whose opposition to WO was not of the "impossibilist" variety complained to me that he had never heard a woman priest chant the Preface. Perhaps this is a pond difference, but my first Anglican parish - on the high end of MOTR by Canadian standards, but what most in the CoE would call "high" - had a female incumbent who unfailingly chanted the preface unless on the verge of laryngitis).

Third, consider the ecclesiology of Forward in Faith. If as is undoubtedly the case the Catholic Faith consists not only in aesthetics but also in the deeper truths they represent, surely one of those truths is that of the nature of the church. Yet in England, with the adoption of provincial episcopi vagantes, "traditional" (read, biological-determinist) Anglo-Catholic parishes, in order to preserve their gin-and-lace ghetto and Y-chromosomal understanding of the priesthood, have sacrificed almost entire the corpus of Catholic teaching on the episcopate. The "Bishop" of Fulham, for example, is not a bishop in any recognizable catholic sense, with no see and no presbyterium of his own. (A makeshift presbyterium is nonetheless often corralled, with faux Chrism Masses drawing crowds of Anglo-Catholics dissatisfied with the real one, and the PEV concelebrating with those under his pastoral care as if a diocese).

Despite our differences then on the question of who may receive the sacraments of vocation, we have broad areas of convergence, and both groups (or tendencies) have made concessions in order to carry on our life of prayer and faith as best we can under present circumstances. Forward in Faith, however, has sought friendly relations with groups such as Reform (most of whom likely to don't even know what a sacrament of vocation is, much less believe in their status as such), describing catholics and evangelicals as two sides of one "orthodox" coin. Thus, while AffCaths (who apart from women and gays are indistinguishable from FiF) are written off as "Protestants in fancy dress," actual Protestants are welcomed with open arms as comrades in the orthodox and apostolic faith!

Election recap: NI

2010-05-06T22:09:00.003-04:00

In Northern Ireland, the Alliance Party unseats Democratic Unionist First Minister Peter Robinson to win its first seat in the House of Commons in a general election, while Lady Hermon, previously the lone Ulster Unionist MP, wins re-election as a newly-minted independent after refusing to stand with the Ulster Conservatives and Unionists joint slate. The Social Democratic & Labour Party's leader is elected, while the Traditional Unionist Voice fails to make any inroads and the UCU are shut out. Volatile Fermanagh South Tyone faces a recount after the bipartisan Unionist candidate appears to win by a single-figure margin.

Good resources in Evangelical Lutheran Worship

2010-04-14T19:00:00.002-04:00

The "cranberry book" - not to be confused with the "red book"! - is authorized for use with the permission of the diocesan bishop; I assume it's the same in the US. Here are some finds:

*A tempered form of the Litany of the Saints (237)
*A congregational penitential service with laying on of hands and absolution, suitable for Saturday night (p. 238)
*Provision for a more "Breviary" style office

Of course, Fr Pfatteicher has spoken out, and the blogosphere has grumbled in response.

On criticism of Israel

2010-04-11T09:08:00.006-04:00

Watching Boston Legal the other day I observed a scene in which "Denny," the character of William Shatner (himself Jewish of course), accuses Israel of "overreacting" against Lebanon. In response, his Jewish girlfriend snaps "Are you saying Israel doesn't have the right to defend itself?" Denny answers: "Of course they do, but you don't blow up a country because you're mad." He is then "dumped" by his girlfriend over his unpalatably nuanced views on the Middle East.

Modern Israel, of course, was reconstituted in the aftermath of the worst genocidal episode in modern history. After centuries of wandering and harsh treatment, the attempted extermination of the Jews was obviously the last straw in demonstrating the need for a homeland of their own. Unfortunately, Israel has at times tended to use its inauspicious beginnings as licence to do whatever it wants, regardless of what international law might have to say about it, and those who criticize such excesses are told, à la Bush, that "we're at war" and "you're either with us or against us."

I have a hard time accepting that dichotomy. I'm clearly not "against" Israel, much less the Jews as a people. (Heck, I like to spend Friday nights in shul!) Indeed, I've often expressed my admiration for their perseverance in the face of pretty much unanimous adversity. The Jews are the great underdogs of European history and one cannot but respect that. But like a new superhero that is still learning its own strength, Israel needs to learn that it is no longer the underdog: it has considerable economic and military strength, unlike the Palestinians living under its rule, who are now the ones in really dire straits. So when I stick up for the Palestinians, it's for precisely the same reasons I've always stuck up for the Jews. So trying to tell me I'm an anti-Zionist for extending the same courtesy to Palestinians that I have in the past extended to Jews is rather like trying to eat one's cake and have it too. (We like it when you speak up for the underdog, as long as the underdog is us).

Take Israeli Apartheid Week. Apartheid isn't just a dramatic-sounding allegation. It has a meaning under international law, and arguments can be made that certain Israeli laws meet that definition. For those who disagree, the appropriate response is to form a counter-argument, not "zomg how can you harrass Jewish students you Shoah-denying anti-semitic assholes?" The even better response would be to acknowledge that notwithstanding our affection for Israel, all governments err, and Israel continues to occupy Palestinian areas and deny its inhabitants labour and mobility rights. Instead some seem to think that the only two possible positions on Israel are "impostor state that needs to be wiped off the map" and "perfect people doing God's work and above the law." Everyone in the international community hates on the US when they take that tone, so when I have the exact same reaction to Israel doing so, it's weird to assume that it must have something to do with Judaism.

Like Denny's girlfriend, some people seem to continue to believe that the world is made up of uncomplicated "good guys" and "bad guys." Most of us, however, learn as adults that people cannot be divided so straightforwardly, and that has nothing to do with being anti-semitic. I have criticisms of Israel, sure - and of Canada, and the Vatican, and Palestine. I don't hate it though, any more than I hate any of those other countries - indeed I probably have fewer reservations about Israel's behaviour than about Palestine's. But a tu quoque doesn't resolve the problems facing the Middle East. If we keep using being shot at as a pretext to shoot back, the shooting will never end.

Anglicanorum cœtibus

2010-04-10T16:17:00.005-04:00

There's been some degree of negative press, too often from those ordinarily of an inclusive sensibility I fear, about the recent papal bull on Anglical personal ordinariates. The Archbishop of Canterbury has (I think not fairly, as some even over at the highly-informative Anglo-Catholic agreed) been accused of sharing this sentiment. I think it's important to remember that the groups involved are Anglo-Papalists of the old school, a large proportion of whom found themselves unable to continue in altar fellowship with us long before this development. The rest are largely Anglicans, primarily in the provinces of Great Britain, who have been in functionally impaired with their diocesan bishops for over a decade. Affirming-minded Anglicans have been known to grumble about the cadre of Papalist-minded clergy "holding things up." We can hardly turn round and condemn them for embracing the Magisterium of Rome. They have fulfilled the great Anglo-Papalist dream, which was thought dead not long ago. Their decision is perfectly appropriate for them. Meanwhile, the Papacy, often regarded with suspicion by liberals over a combination of real and perceived inflexibility, has extended an offer whose intended audience regards it as being on highly advantageous terms.

Moreover, no one is hurt. We continue to remember the Lund Principle, whereby we do apart only that which conscience requires (sometimes taken to some highly innovative extents). Why should not Anglicans congregations in communion with Rome and Canterbury join together for, say, services of Solemn Evensong & Benediction? There would admittedly be an asymmetry in the standards of practice required on either side, but it is not canonically impossible. Roman Catholics, meanwhile, will benefit from the Anglican patrimony in their midst as they do from their Byzantine brothers and sisters, and we from the Mar Thoma Church.

When I was in Hamilton (for those from elsewhere: the next city over from Toronto), I visited the local Reformed Episcopal church for their monthly north-ender. They were engaged with an ecumenical consortium of churches in the area in outreach to nearby McMaster University students. All of these opportunities for ministry (dare we say Fresh Expressions?) will continue to be available and ill-will is really unnecessary, even though I will miss being able to make my communion at the Cathedral of the Annunciation when in Ottawa. The Continuum blogosphere is relatively low in content related to its estranged bodies of origin, in contrast to the Realignment-wave separation, which feature a high editorial emphasis on the evils of "Mrs Schori" and the Bishops of Niagara (theologically conservative correspondents in Niagara hailed his election as the choice of the most fair-minded in a pool of liberal candidates) and New Westminster (who ratified his diocesan synod's third resolution calling for a local option for the blessing of same-gender unions). Here again, however, I cannot see why communities with two viable congregations could not arrange to share the "physical plant," or to negotiate mutually profitable terms of sale where it would otherwise go unused. Here in Toronto, the church of St Clement, Riverdale, goes unused as far as I know, while the congregation of St Clement of Rome meets for Morning Prayer & Holy Communion from the Reserved Sacrament in the hall of a United church in Leslieville, with a deacon from the Independent Anglican Church Canada Synod (which uses a redaction of the 1549 prayer book as its official liturgy).

So while the secular press enjoys trying to dissect the vagaries of ecclesiastical polity, and as we of all confessions continue to engage in self-reflection over the ethical character of our church leadership through our history, I hope that for those of us within the Church life will continue to go on more or less as it has, and perhaps even start to look up if recent signs of opportunity for rapprochement are indicative.

Alleluia!

2010-04-08T17:06:00.002-04:00

The fanfare at the conclusion of the Vigil ceremonies of Easter signalling the commencement of the Mass proper, from Bishop Cronyn Memorial Church in London, Ontario. Sadly due to low attendance we had to forgo the Vigil this year, but the Exultet was sung at the morrow Mass.

TRM Ordo Autumn 2010

2010-03-31T10:32:00.032-04:00

September
9 - Requiem (black)
10 - Edmund James Peck, Apostle to the Inuit (red)
11 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
12 - TRINITY XV (proper 24) (green)
13 - St Cyprian of Carthage (red), I Evensong of Holy Cross
14 - Holy Cross Day (crimson) (proper p. 422)
15 - Our Lady of Sorrows (blue and white) (Sacramentary 2628)
16 - St Ninian of Galloway (white)
17 - Requiem (black)
18 - Founders, Benefactors, and Missionaries of the Church of Canada (white)
19 - St Theodore of Tarsus (white)
20 - TRINITY XVI (proper 25) (green), comm. John Coleridge Patterson
21 - St Matthew the Evangelist (red) (proper p. 423)
22 - Requiem (black)
23 - Requiem (black)
24 - Requiem (black)
25 - St Sergius of Moscow (white)
26 - TRINITY XVII (proper 26) (green)
27 - Lancelot Andrewes (white)
28 - Requiem (black)
29 - Michaelmas (white or gold or best) (proper p. 424)
30 - St Jerome (white)

October
1 - Requiem (black)
2- Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
3 - TRINITY XVIII and St Francis' Eve (proper 27) (green) Blessing of Animals
4 - St Francis of Assisi (white)
5 - Requiem (black)
6 - Requiem (black)
7 - Requiem (black)
8 - Requiem (black)
9 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
10 - TRINITY XIX (proper 28) (green)
11 - Requiem (black)
12 - Requiem (black)
13 - St Edward the Confessor (white or yellow)
14 - St Teresa of Avila (white)
15 - St John of the Cross (white)
16 - St Ignatius Loyola (white)
17 - TRINITY XX (proper 29) (green)
18 - St Luke the Evangelist (red) (proper p. 425)
19 - Holy Protomartyrs of Canada (red)
20 - Requiem (black)
21 - Requiem (black)
22 - Requiem (black)
23 - St James of Jerusalem (red)
24 - TRINITY XXI (proper 30) (green)
25 - Requiem (black)
26 - Alfred the Great (white)
27 - Requiem (black)
28 - Ss Simon & Jude (red) (proper p. 426)
29 - James Hannington and Companions (red)
30 - John Wycliffe and Jan Hus (red)
31 - REFORMATION DAY (red) (Intercommunion concelebrations encouraged) (proper p. 326, FAtS); I Evensong of All Saints

November
1 - All Saints' Day (white and red) (proper p. 427)
2 - All Souls' Day (black) (proper p. 429)
3 - Richard Hooker (white)
4 - Saints of the Old Testament (white)
5 - St Elizabeth (white) (Sacramentary 2818)
6 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
7 - SUNDAY IN THE OCTAVE OF ALL SAINTS (proper 32) (white and red)
8 - St Willibrord of Utrecht (white or yellow)
9 - Requiem (black)
10 - St Leo the Great (white)
11 - St Martin of Tours (white)
12 - Charles Simeon (white)
13 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
14 - TRINITY XXIV (proper 33) (green)
15 - Samuel Seabury (white or red)
16 - St Margaret of Scotland (white)
17 - St Hugh of Lincoln (white)
18 - St Hilda of Whitby (white)
19 - St Elizabeth of Hungary (white)
20 - St Edmund the Martyr (red)
21 - THE REIGN OF CHRIST (best) (Benediction follows Mass) Solemnity of Title in the Diocese of Montréal
22 - Requiem (black)
23 - St Clement of Rome (red)
24 - Requiem (black)
25 - Requiem (black) (In the Order of the Holy Cross, the feast of James Otis Sargent Huntington) (white)
26 - Requiem (black)
27 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
28 - THE FIRST SUNDAY IN ADVENT (purple or dark blue)
29 - Advent Feria (purple or dark blue)
30 - St Andrew the Apostle (red) (proper p. 430)

December
1 - Advent feria
2 - Advent feria
3 - St Francis Xavier (white)
4 - Nicholas Ferrar (white)
5 - THE SECOND SUNDAY IN ADVENT, comm. S. Clement of Alexandria
6 - St Nicholas of Myra (white)
7 - St Ambrose of Milan (white)
8 - The Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (white and blue) (lections FAtS)
9 - Prophets of the Old Testament (red)
10 - Advent Feria
11 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
12 - THE THIRD SUNDAY IN ADVENT (rose) (Litany in Procession is omitted)
13 - Advent Feria (purple or dark blue)
14 - Simon Gibbons (white)
15-17 - Advent feria (purple or dark blue)
18 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
19 - THE FOURTH SUNDAY IN ADVENT (purple or dark blue)
20 - 23 Advent feria
24 - Vigil of Christmas (purple) (Sacramentary no. 1053)
25 - Christmas Day (white or gold or best)
26 - FIRST SUNDAY AFTER CHRISTMAS (white) (proper p. 276)
27 - St John the Evangelist (red)
28 - Holy Innocents (red) (proper p. 398); Ordination of Ludmila Javorova, 1970
29 - St Thomas Becket (red)
30 - Christmas Feria (white)
31 - John West (white); Vigil of the Naming & Circumcision of Jesus (purple and white) (Sacramentary no. 1112)

January
1 - the Octave Day of Christmas, being the Naming & Circumcision of Jesus (white) (proper p. 277)
2 - SECOND SUNDAY OF CHRISTMAS (white) (proper p. 278)

Emancipation Day (August 1)

2010-03-30T17:11:00.003-04:00

Proper 2153 in the Sacramentary.

I have obtained a lovely little gem: a leaflet from a Procession and Solemn High Mass of St Charles Stuart at St Bart's. I hope to find some way to scan it.

Thought

2010-03-30T17:06:00.003-04:00

Protestant thought tends to bristle at the Incarnational implications of the Marian cult. But what could be more Incarnational than a peasant girl in Palestine bearing her Redeemer and thereby being made "More honorable than the Cherubim, and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim"?

(In the Anglican Gradual & Sacramentary that seems to have been more or less adopted by the SCP, the Saturday Mass of Our Lady is titled the "Votive Eucharist of the Incarnation).

Hooker on arbitrary law, from the Masoret blog

2010-03-29T21:38:00.002-04:00

A scholar of the writings of the Anglican divines on halakha has a pair of posts worth reading on chukim - laws or mitzvot having no immediately evident rationale but deemed binding in Judaism by virtue of their divine origin. I found this a timely read given the current same-sex controversy, which is at one level about what place, if any, such laws have in Christianity (hence the hitherto unanswered refrain of the proof-text-weary, "But what's wrong with homosexuality?")

For Good Friday

2010-03-29T08:59:00.001-04:00

Passiontide picture treat

2010-03-28T06:42:00.001-04:00

From St Mark's, Locust Street (the other Anglo-Catholic church in Philadelphia!) courtesy of Davis D'Ambly.

Ms Coulter Goes to Ottawa

2010-03-27T20:31:00.002-04:00

Currently the blogosphere is reeling over an incident at the University of Ottawa, where Ann Coulter was unable to participate in a forum due to "security concerns" (protesters disrupting the event). Inevitably perhaps, the spectre of what the Bishop of Willesden recently called "the illiberal liberal canard" over at the SOF boards has loomed large. There's nothing the hard right loves more than a self-avowed champion of tolerance is caught in the act of intolerance!

I once attended a service at the First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto with family members who are active there. In the sermon, the minister grappled with precisely this paradox. How do progressive folk respond to intolerance without stooping to it?

It's unfortunate that this incident is being used to portray Canada as an effete socialist state feeble on free speech protection. Let's be real here. This is a university campus, a place for reasoned discourse. Thinkers left and right are free to come and express their views: that's academic integrity. But that same integrity obligates us to maintain the intellectual and ethical tenor of the university. No one is hucking tomatoes at George Grant or William F. Buckley Jr here. Ann Coulter is a trash columnist, who has dedicated her career to perpetuating exactly the sort of hollow taking-points political pseudo-debate she professes to deride. She has as much place addressing a community of scholars as does Maury Povich.

Perhaps more importantly, as the provost of the University noted in today's Toronto Star, Canada's conception of free speech is not the same as the USA's. (I know, it never ceases to blow their minds that there are other governments in the world, but it's true. We've got a homemade constitution and everything). Whereas the American formulation is pretty much unbridled (in the rugged individualist tradition they have inherited), our constitutional tradition sees free speech not as an end in itself but as a means to "peace, order, and good government." Indeed, the possibility of overriding provisions of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms when weighing conflicting rights against each other (say, those of Arab UofO students who might not take kindly to being called "ragheads") is built right into the Charter itself (the "reasonable infringement" clause of section 1). Coulter was warned in advance of the relevant law, and how did she respond? She called for an investigation of the provost for "promoting hatred of an identifiable group" (conservatives!) in the letter. And the poor schmuck was just the messenger: it's not as though he crafted the law. Apparently Coulter objected to the implication that as a Conservative she was automatically more likely to commit hate speech (apparently the notion that the concern was based on her actual past comments and not merely hypothetical didn't occur to her).

On a right-wing American blog that happened to be my first Google result on the story, one commenter accused another (who had not taken up the mantle of St Ann's martyrdom) of not representing "all Canadians," just "the socialists," which I found odd given that Americans of that political persuasion tend to consider "all Canadians" to be "socialists." (If universal health care is creeping socialism, someone better call the red squad on the Tories!) The authors of the blog also took issue with the protesters for not being equally vocal in opposing Israeli Apartheid Week (because apparently calling attention to the dismal and unjust conditions in which Palestinians live is tantamount to denial of the Shoah).

Canadian students are exasperated. (As much as student union leaders fondly hope for a Nanterre in the streets of Ottawa, it is Canada after all: exasperated is as far as it usually goes). In the midst of an economic crisis that we didn't cause, it's an insult to bring in an apologist for the broken system to spout racist, misogynist, and heterosexist polemics in our own backyard. Good on the students of Ottawa U for defending the integrity of the academy. Perhaps there is hope for our student movement after all.

Comments on "Same-sex Relationships in the Life of the Church: the Traditionalist [sic] Response"

2010-03-27T09:27:00.003-04:00

Note well what is not in their argument, namely any treatment of the question of scientific evidence about homosexuality. This is odd for several reasons: 1) its treatment was part of our mandate, and 2) it features prominently in popular arguments in favor of the blessing of same sex relations. We would hazard the guess that the data in its ambiguity and inconclusiveness were not helpful to their argument.

Actually, it’s not odd at all. Many liberals chafe at the notion that the scientific aetiology of homosexuality is central to their argument, and the corollary implication that its absence would hurt said argument. And the data are not nearly so “ambiguous” as the authors would have you believe. While the nature of this aetiology, and the various roles of hormones, birth order, and neurology, continue to be investigated, its existence is not seriously questioned at this point. And the scientific question most pertinent to the theological debate, whether sexual orientation is chosen, has been definitively settled in the negative.

There is, of course, an irony in the abstract use of God’s mission to the Gentiles, since it is in the service of a cause which continues to tear at the communion we have as Anglicans from all the nations of the earth.

Again, there is "of course" no irony at all here. The admission of Gentiles to the Church was indeed a “communion-breaking” issue in its day and the “reasserters” of the time considered “inclusion” as unwarranted and ill-advised as do their spiritual descendants today. The comparison is actually quite apt - uncomfortably so for the conservatives, it seems.

Note what a radical change in biblical exegesis this will bring about. We are warned against readings that would constrain the work of the Spirit in the missio Dei. Surely, attention to what the words actually say should constrain readings; otherwise, it is hard to say that it is reading we are doing at all. An important part of the Scripture serving as a canonical authority for the Church is that it can guide, critique, and indeed constrain the judgments and decisions of the Church. This power to address the Church is clearest in cases of “repugnance” (see Article 20 of the 39 Articles), where a matter in question stands in direct contradiction to the plain sense of a passage, interpreted in keeping with the whole witness of Scripture. We will show that such is the case before us. It is precisely at this point that the debate over homosexual behavior, while it may not be (to use the unhelpful language of the Righter trial) “core doctrine,” does become a prime occasion for a debate over a doctrinal issue of great importance, namely the authority of Scripture itself.

This is another conservative canard. No one is proposing a “radical change” in the way we read Scripture. The liberal case is on the contrary that if we are to be consistent in our reading of Scripture, we are obligated to accept this innovation as we have others in the past; that is, same-sex unions follow from the way we already tend to read Scripture. (Recall that all Christians interpret Scripture: a "liberal" is merely one who is honest about it). Moreover as Anglicans and not fundamentalists we know that the “plain sense of the passage” is not always the most relevant one, or even all that “plain!” (I for instance am often perplexed at how reasserters can be so casual about prescribing celibacy for homosexuals in light of Mattew 23:4, which seems to me quite “plainly” to preclude such blithe pronouncements).

If God has acted, as it is suggested in the missio Dei argument of the liberals, who are we to contend with God? For its advocates, the matter is already settled. So they naturally feel they must proceed, without waiting on more debate and regardless of consequences.

In fact, no one is as preoccupied with “culture” as the conservatives, at least in the sense of “going with the flow.” Certainly none of the gay Christians I know are seeking to subvert the Church’s mission of prophetic and countercultural witness. “Culture” seems to be a buzzword with which conservatives can dismiss facts on the ground that contradict the divine fiat of Scripture. So the simple, observable fact that there are gays and lesbians in the Church whom the status quo harms, not fitting conveniently into their narrative, is simply sidestepped as non-scriptural and therefore irrelevant.

...the Jerusalem Council specifically forbids porneia, that is, “sexual immorality.”

What the authors present as a straightforward translation is in fact a specious gloss on their part. There is no patristic warrant for the “conservative” innovation (!) of expanding the sense of porneia to include homosexuality per se. The work of Friar Tobias is illuminating in this regard.

Mark 10. Here Jesus tells us of the nature of marriage, between a man and a woman, as ordained by God “from the foundation of the world.” In so doing, he quotes both Genesis 1 and 2. Yet, inexplicably, the liberal side continues to insist that Jesus avoided citing the former, and they find in this imagined avoidance evidence against what they call “complementarianism.” This is simply inaccurate.

Complementarianism is what is “simply inaccurate.” Perhaps liberals have been lazy in arguing against it; I do not know. It shouldn’t matter, though, as it is the weakest argument in the traditional arsenal and shouldn’t even be on the agenda at this stage. The sexes clearly are not as a matter of fact “complementary” in any meaningful or demonstrable way. It may be a lovely symbolism but more than symbolic arguments are needed for an issue like this. (Indeed, female members of Christian communities – as opposed to religious orders - in the Episcopal Church may marry husbands [or wives?]. No one denies them this prerogative on the grounds of the symbolism of their marriage to Christ). What Genesis does make clear is that “it is not good for man to be alone.” It is the conservatives who want to add an “unless” to that statement by restricting its scope to God's heterosexual children.

Galatians 3:28 The liberals read Paul’s statement that there is no more “`male and female’” in Christ as a warrant for same-sex marriages. However, this ignores the context of the passage, and the rest of the Pauline witness, and so amounts to proof-texting. Paul is, quite simply, not talking about marriage. While in Judaism, only the free, Jewish male could contribute to minyan in the synagogue, now all stand together and equally in prayer in the ekklesia. Indeed, when it comes to salvation, there is no difference between male and female. Neither Paul nor we would suggest anything different, and so the use of this passage in a discussion of marriage amounts to presenting a straw man.

There is nothing in this analysis of the passage for a liberal to disagree with! It is because of our belief that such human distinctions as gender are abolished in baptism that we support SSM. The authors concede that “when it comes to salvation, there is no difference between male and female” yet by wishing to draw precisely such a distinction when it comes to the sacraments, of paramount importance in the economy of salvation, they are indeed “saying otherwise” than Paul. So although they characterize the liberal argument as a “straw man,” I take them to have in fact granted it, as their “rebuttal” simply reiterates the position they are supposed to be criticizing. And since this passage is perhaps the most crucial one from the liberal perspective, why are we arguing again?

Romans 1 and 11. As to the former, the liberal argument ignores what the passage in question actually says. They focus on the criticism of the Gentiles as being oversexed, but they ignore that fact that the passage refers directly to the sameness of same-sex relations, including lesbian relation (so excluding the suggestion that Paul had only pederasty in view).

In contrast to conservatives, who as Jeffrey John explains focus on the lesbian bit, taken out of context, and tend to lose sight of the overall arc of “what the passage in question actually says.” Let’s call this one a tie.

The reader may tire of all this exegetical debate, and may wonder what is really at stake; the answer is “a great deal.” The liberal argument would at the outset have the reader understand their proposal as a modest addition to the traditional understanding of marriage, which remains intact. But as the case continues, we see that a major reinterpretation is envisioned.

It’s highly presumptuous for our opponents to tell us what our argument is. Gay couples just want to get married, like everyone else. We are not trying to ditch the Bible, Creeds, sacraments, ministry, or anything else. We want the “traditional understanding” expanded, not destroyed. But conservatives have to resort to fearmongering and invoking visions of pagan eucharists and polyamorous nuptial masses and unitarian Presiding Bishops if they are to convince the “mushy middle” that the sky is falling and same-sex unions are a hill worth dying on, because their arguments on their own do not sustain their conclusion. Same-sex marriage is certainly a less radical innovation than divorce. In fact, my own views on divorce remain considerably more conservative than my views on same-sex unions. More conservative, in fact, than the views on the same subject of many, like the present Bishop of Winchester and many evangelicals in the Church of England, who lobbied for a more “compassionate” approach to the divorced but while vociferously opposing the extension of the same courtesy to gays.

That's not to say that there is nothing of import at stake here. There is - for gays and lesbians. For others, the question is largely academic. A conservative "victory" would indeed be a hollow one; what profit is it to them to deny others the sacraments?

Procreation is identified as “what the human being shares with the animals,” as if this were a slight on us; for all the talk of bodiliness the argument here has a gnostic tinge.

Oh please! The body is important, and redeemed by the mystery of the Incarnation, but it is not all-important. To characterize the liberal suspicion of the conservatives’ arbitrary anatomical requirements for marriage as “Gnostic” or “anti-breeding” is absurd. The importance of procreation as a Scriptural theme doesn't justify the conservatives' morbid obsession with genitalia. Once again, lacking a sound argument, they are left with recourse to name-calling. We could just as easily turn around and call them Donatists for their preoccupation with episcopal sex lives.

The liberal argument claims for itself boldness, and so we need to track its trajectory, since some of its implications will be different from what we might assume. One such example is the idea of monogamy inherited from the tradition, which turns out to be a vestige, in its two-ness, of the biological fact of conception, and so tied implicitly to the now demoted procreation. If marriage is now really about mutuality and self-donation, would there not be all the more of these in polyamory?

No. I don’t know any gay Christian who views monogamy as a “vestige” or the next bridge to cross.

Second, this is not the proposal of some small addition to an otherwise stable institution. The problematic “male-female symbol system” requires a radical change. The inherited notion was a “warrant for patriarchal violence.” Marriage itself is now to be understood, for all, to be based on mutuality and self-giving regardless of gender.

Actually, that is precisely what this is. Indeed, traditional understandings of gender roles have changed radically, but within the context of heterosexual marriage most of these changes have been accommodated with the Church’s sanction and little controversy - the ship has already sailed. Brides no longer pledge obedience to their intended in the marriage service. The question is once again whether we are to be consistent and follow these changes to their logical conclusion. As the liberals note in their own “response” within the same report: “Our expansion of marriage … retains scriptural principles of moral discipline, nonconformity to the world, witness to Christ, sanctification, and holiness.” The conservatives have not demonstrated why, of two models with these properties, theirs is to be preferred.

At the outset of our dialogue, the traditionals offered as a key diagnostic issue, the following question: are same-sex relations an effect of the fall or a blessing of creation?

Yes.

Yes, all sexuality as we know it in the world reflects the Fall. So, as one author has pointed out, does wearing clothing. In the next world, we are told, there will be no marriage. But, despite the keenness of evangelicals, they are not there yet!

Yes, marriage is nonetheless a blessing of the fallen but still beloved image of God reflected (however imperfectly) in creation. This is not a contradiction of the previous point, but is instead closely intertwined with it. It is a creative, mysterious tension that the Church has lived with for 2,000 years, and the people of Israel for millennia before that.

So the question is mal posée, a false dichotomy. Given their inability at the outset to formulate the right question, how can we trust the conservatives to yield the right answer?

Reasserters: it's your time to shine

2010-03-26T11:14:00.004-04:00

In a previous post, I wrote of the tendency of "conservatives" to talk past the actual objections of "liberals" in their arguments, instead being content to allow Leviticus and St Paul to speak for themselves. So now I'm going to open up the floor. I do not moderate comments except on posts more than two weeks old, and that is only to avoid Cantonese spam attacks. Moreover, I allow anonymous comments as long as they adopt some distinguishing pseudonym, again only so that I can tell if I have one "anonymous" on a given thread, or five. Fallacious arguments will be discounted but not deleted. So here goes:

In 4096 characters or less: What is the morally relevant distinction between opposite- and same-gender relationships?

This doesn't mean "One has Biblical approbation and one does not." (No Anglican of any flavour takes the Bible as her strict guide for marriage. We have, after all, come to regard it as either a sacrament or a sacramental, in either case an "innovation" on St Paul's grudging allowance of it as a next-best choice for the incorrigibly horny). It could thus be stated alternatively as: Why, in your opinion, does God approve only of marriages that involve a penis and vagina?

Take 'er away!

American isolationism and health care reform

2010-03-26T10:37:00.003-04:00

Watching the debates on the various incarnations of health care legislation in the United States, something was nagging at me. Ultimately, I identified the question: do they realize how absurd they sound to the rest of us?

This question may be a rhetorical one: the American collective mindset is fairly autistic. Likely, the rest of the world's population doesn't register in this as in so many other issues. This after all is the country that continues, along with Burma, to hold on to the incomprehensible imperial system (how many furlongs to a mile? Buggered if I know) and instigated the Second Gulf War against blissfully unconcerned with the position of the international community.

Likewise, the United States is an outlier in the developed world in not having a single-payer system. The principle behind the system is fairly straightforward: no one should have to choose death or bankruptcy when a family member falls ill. Private insurance is not a panacea since many if not most people either cannot afford it or do not qualify. And out-of-pocket expenses especially for things like surgery can be exorbitant. (I understand that there is in fact some provision in the US for government aid to "low-income" families, but government definitions of the term tend to be rather optimistic. Certainly my own family is not reckoned as "low-income" for government purposes, but neither could we access private insurance and I imagine we'd have exhausted our lifetime budget for out-of-pocket health care expenses by the time I, the eldest child, reached school age).

And so while, in Canada for example, we might have some empathy with the raging controversies over issues like abortion and same-sex marriage (which were had here recently enough) the idea that the above should be anything but a no-brainer is astonishing. But the United States, of course, was founded on small-government principles, and the right to property - and implicitly by extension the free market - enjoy constitutional status. And so it really is an epic battle for them, because they have to weigh two constitutional imperatives ("life" and "the pursuit of happiness" - a Lockean euphemism for property) against one another. And that I think illustrates precisely what is wrong with the United States: it's a system where unbridled capitalism is such a sacred cow that something as fundamental as the right to adequate health care can be demonized as "socialism." (Indeed, the way politicians on the Right spoke of "socialized medicine" you'd think that the Democrats were proposing genocide rather than simply the United States' belated entry into the civilized world).

And so while Nancy Pelosi, who certainly has odd ideas about Catholicism, took a lot of flack for invoking St Joseph, her detractors are no more "pro-life" than she is. Insofar as they oppose legislation that would save many more children's lives than would the prohibition of their own hobby horse, they can only claim to be "anti-abortion." And the Catholic Church requires much more of its faithful in order to be genuinely "pro-life." (Indeed, on Fr Z and kindred spots on the blogosphere, there seemed to be as much mincing outrage from sacristy queens over the Speaker's fudging of the liturgical nomenclature as to the political content of her talk, which would be entirely recognizable to Dorothy Day and was in no wise outside the mainstream of Catholic social teaching).

Thought

2010-03-08T15:32:00.003-05:00

In many ways, "affirming" Catholic Anglicans are the heirs of the Tractarians: continuing to believe the Church of England both Catholic in heritage and purged of error, opposing Erastianism, and conforming to the authorized liturgy of the province.

The Rose Maniple's Charge to General Synod 2010

2010-03-08T13:43:00.004-05:00

Nearly 40 years ago, delegates from across North America converged on Chicago to found Integrity in order to lobby for the interests of gay and lesbian Anglicans at a time when the Church's traditional approbation of their family life was for the first time being called into serious question by critical Biblical and theological scholarship. In the intervening decades, we have waited patiently as we have been used as a political football for the fomenting or prevention of schism. Reams of theology have been printed, latterly in these very virtual pages, but before me by such writers as Norman Pittenger, Rowan Williams, Jeffrey John, and Tobias Haller. These arguments remain unanswered by the hard-right, which prefers to sit from its comfortable perch of the fictitious "plain meaning of Scripture" rejecting any efforts at meaningful conversation.

In the American church, reactionaries who had made no legal overtures against actually heretical bishops like Spong and Pike made the Righter case a hill to die on. In the Church of England, they blocked the appointment to the episcopate of a gay priest living by the very obligation of celibacy they insisted as the norm, putting paid to any credible claims of non-prejudice. (One regular contributor to the Ship of Fools forums is the current Bishop of Willesden, who is often lauded by Shipmates as a humane, moderate Evangelical. If so, the CoE must be quite a different place as in Canada objection to a celibate gay bishop would have no basis in our discipline and far from being moderate would be a mark of the batshit lunatic fringe).

For their efforts to make the lives of their gay and lesbian members a little easier, the Canadian and American churches have been rewarded with cross-border interventions. The enormous evangelical St John's, Shaughnessy, the largest Anglican church in Vancouver, along with others degenerated into geographical schizophrenia and set themselves up under the province of the Southern Cone. (At last check, the people and clergy of St John's have yet to relocate to Latin America as such a canonical move would according to the Southern Cone's own constitution and canons obligate them to do). Prospective reformers have been warned that a "moratorium" is necessary to preserve unity: the mistreatment of gay and lesbian Anglicans must be resolved at a latter date as to do so now would imperil the Communion. Yet those bishops who have followed the moratorium have not seen reciprocal compliance from the "Global South." On the blogosphere, the reasonable frustration of gays and lesbians is characterized as militant rage, while opponents freely write all manner of invective against "priestettes" and "sodomites." (N-word or No n-word, the Mad Priest can't hold a candle to David Virtue for off-colour rhetoric).

Documents such as the Chapman memo and statements from the American Anglican Council show that in fact despite their benign protestations the ACNA crowd intend to supplant the ACoC and ECUSA as the Communion's presence in Northern America with a pure, heterosexual church. They are not invested in the "dialogue" that our national church has painstakingly attempted to conduct. They made up their mind. Similarly, other groups of Anglicans have sought refuge in special canonical accomodations erected by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches.

As it stands, the Anglican Church of Canada nationally recognizes that same-sex unions are holy, and allows the Nuptial Mass to be offered for same-gender couples provided the Nuptial Blessing proper is omitted. This is akin to the manner in which marriages are solemnized by deacons. Thus our situation is not the same as the Roman Catholic Church's, where any attempt to amend the canonical basis of marriage in such a way would fail owing to that body's ongoing prohibition of all same-gender relationships. We are instead in a kind of limbo, a temporary one that cannot be sustained for much longer. In fits and starts the past two general synods have paved the way for a nationwide enabling resolution. Moreover, Canon 21, On Marriage in the Church, does not seem to bar same-gender marriages as such although it assumes an opposite-gender composition.

This year, synod delegates assembling in Halifax will likely be asked to vote finally on the future of gay and lesbian Anglicans in Canada. Please remember that these are real people whose lives are being debated, and have been with no apparent end in sight for decades. Canadians favour evolution over revolution, and our church has been spared much of the invective levelled at our Episcopalian brothers and sisters in the United States because of our cautious approach. The Canadian church has tried in good faith to accomodate and engage with dissidents, but that good faith has not been returned. Eventually the bandage will have to be pulled. Some will leave the Church, although most who are inclined to do so will already have availed themselves of the multiplicity of jurisdictional options now available to like-minded churchmen. If they have chosen to die on this hill, let them die on it, for any amount of churchianity is yet dead without charity. These dissidents will not suffer if an enabling resolution is passed. Gays and lesbians, however, cannot be expected to remain indefinitely, providing the bulk of "manpower" in the Church while formally excluded from full participation in its sacramental life. Many have already been lost to secularism and alternative religious traditions and are likely too disillusioned to be coaxed back. But as synod delegates you now have the opportunity to do the right thing: some will scorn and deride you for taking such an action but do not lose heart, for history will vindicate you. In 50 years, when the controversy over same-gender marriage has expired, those who left to form an all-heterosexual ecclesiastical club in the ACNA will be remembered with the same infamy as their spiritual forebears who formed their own "Anglican Orthodox Church" (how's that for a Holy Roman Empire construction!) in order to be free of the evils of racial integration. Which side will the Anglican Church of Canada wish to be on?

The Mystery Worshipper goes to shul

2010-03-03T20:35:00.006-05:00

A few months ago I accompanied a friend of mine who was raised in a secular Jewish family and has been looking for a congregation to visit. We first tried out Kabbalat Shabbat, the Friday evening vigil of the Sabbath, at Congregation Darchei Noam, Toronto's Reconstructionist synagogue. While we received a warm welcome, a hearty vegetarian supper, and a lengthy introduction to the building from a gentleman active in gay and lesbian Jewish causes, we were a bit put off by the guitars and hippie-beaded kippahs: it all seemed rather like the United Church of Judaism. As my friend remarked to me afterward, "But I like tradition."

And so our next destination will be at the other end of the spectrum: we shall go to First Narayever Congregation, downtown Toronto's largest shul. Founded as an Orthodox congregation prior to the Great War, it experimented with gender-neutral services using the modern Orthodox Birnbaum edition of the prayer book in the 1970s. In the 80s the "alternative" congregation moved upstairs and became the main congregation, the old guard dispersing to other nearby congregations such as Kensington Market's Congregation Anshei Minsk and Shaarei Tzedek just down the street from St Mary Mag. Today they continue to adhere to a traditional understanding of Jewish law save for the full participation of women in prayer and the celebration of same-sex marriages. They are unaffiliated with any Jewish movement but describe themselves as "traditional-egalitarian."

After that, I suppose we will have to check out Holy Blossom Temple ("the reformiest of the Reform!" as it has been described to me, but a Toronto institution nonetheless). Their original building downtown is now St George's Greek Orthodox Church. I've been inside only one Conservative synagogue, Beth Tzedec, but there's another one that's not so far from me. I'd be curious to visit the Minsker, but I don't know if I'd be comfortable having to be seated away from my friend during an unfamiliar religious service.

But what makes these guys fascinating to me is that they seem rather like spiritual cousins of Affirming Catholicism, and a model for success. In a sense, finding a congregation where the rabbi can marry same-gender couples and perform bat mitvot and prints a form in the congregation newsletter for members to fill out in order to authorize him to sell the leaven in their homes, strikes me as analogous to my dream of a female-priest celebrating a Pontifical High Mass for a same-gender wedding. Perhaps the closest to this vision is the Church of the Advent of Christ the King in San Francisco, where a Missa Cantata is offered in ad orientem in Latin according to the Standard Book of Common Prayer.

Off-topic: thoughts in electiontide

2010-03-02T18:15:00.004-05:00

During the campaign, New York has touted itself as the slate of "change." That seems like a fair demand, and indeed the promise of change swept the United States in their last presidential election. But Students First has a team with a clear record of delivering change, and a New York federation would hinder some of these advances.

(The following will be irrelevant to most regular readers: I'm in effect producing this article for export - Ed.)

New York wants to invest in the bottomless pit of Lunik, which has expended an inordinate sum without yet coming into existence. They want longer hours on the shuttle, while Students First has already been fighting for this service tooth and nail. They promise to "open up" the student union to greater transparency. The fact is that most of the union's proceedings are open and most students don't bother to show up. They want a student transit pass: members of Student First have already succeeded in negotiating the student MetroPass deal and continue to advocate for us at a municipal level. They promise a greater focus on equity issues, but Students First has a vibrant diversity of perspectives and doesn't need to resort to tokenism. A federation led by New York will not make united campaigns for students' interests a priority. Efforts like the Drop Fees campaign aren't just noise made by coffeehouse intellectuals. They matter to real working students, the student working two jobs and waiting for her OSAP to come in so she can meet the rent while paying the highest tuition in Canada because the province has reduced funding for post-secondary education and wants us to make up the difference. Students First represents only the most affluent students at York, those who don't need to worry about paying off their student debt and who can afford to spend evenings congregated in a sports bar.

Voting for your friends because they're popular flies in high school, but it's unsuited even to us lowly undergraduates. A vote for Students First is the perfect Pascalian wager: a small effort that promises a great reward. Don't get swindled by high-tech graphics. Choose real change.

(This article is written in my personal capacity, and I am not a member or representative of any campaign team).

TRM Ordo Summer 2010

2010-02-28T19:35:00.029-05:00

July
2 - Requiem (black)
3 - St Thomas the Apostle (red) (proper p. 413)
4 - SUNDAY IN THE OCTAVE OF SS PETER AND PAUL (proper 14) (green)
5 - Requiem (black)
6 - Octave Day of Ss. Peter & Paul, comm. St Thomas More (red); Royal homecoming: departure
7 - Requiem (black)
8 - Requiem (black)
9 - Requiem (black)
10 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
11 - TRINITY VI (proper 15) (green)
12 - St Benedict, pray for the Order of St Benedict (white)
13 - St Henry of Finland (white or yellow)
14 - Requiem (black)
15 - Requiem (black)
16 - Requiem (black)
17 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
18 - TRINITY VII (proper 16) (green)
19 - Requiem (black)
20 - Requiem (black)
21 - Requiem (black)
22 - St Mary Magdalene (red) (proper p. 415)
23 - Requiem (black)
24 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
25 - ST JAMES THE APOSTLE, Patron of the Diocese of Toronto (proper p. 416), comm. Trinity VIII (proper 17) (red)
26 - St Anne, secondary patron of Canada
27 - 28 in the Octave of St James the Apostle
29 - William Wilberforce (white)
30 - in the Octave of St James the Apostle
31 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)

August
1 - THE OCTAVE DAY OF ST JAMES THE APOSTLE, BEING EMANCIPATION DAY (red) (Sacramentary 2153)
2 - Of Trinity IX (proper 18) (green)
3 - St Stephen the Protomartyr (red) (proper p. 417)
4 - Requiem (black)
5 - Requiem, I Evensong of the Transfiguration
6 - Transfiguration (white or best) (proper p. 418), comm. for Peace (Sacramentary no. 5250)
7 - John Mason Neale (white)
8 - TRINITY X (proper 19) (green)
9 - St Dominic (white)
10 - St Laurence, Deacon and Martyr (red)
11 - St Clare of Assisi (white)
12 - Consecration of Charles Inglis (white)
13 - Jeremy Taylor (white or yellow)
14 - Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Maximilien Kolbe, Jonathan Daniels (red) I Evensong of the Assumption
15 - THE FALLING ASLEEP OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY (white and blue) (proper p. 419)
16 - Holy Women of the Old Testament (white)
17 - John Stuart (white)
18 - of Trinity XI (proper 20) (green)
19 - in the Octave of the Falling Asleep BVM
20 - St Bernard of Clairvaux (white)
21 - Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
22 - OCTAVE DAY OF THE DORMITION (proper 21) (white and blue)
23 - Requiem (black)
24 - St Bartholomew the Apostle (red) (proper p. 420)
25 - Requiem (black)
26 - Requiem (black)
27 - St Monica of Hippo (white)
28 - St Augustine of Hippo (white or yellow)
29 - THE BEHEADING OF ST JOHN THE BAPTIST, National Patron (red) (proper p. 421)
30 - Robert McDonald (white)
31 - St Aidan of Lindisfarne (white)

September
1 - of Trinity XIII (proper 22) (green)
2 - Martyrs of New Guinea (red)
3 - St Gregory the Great (white or yellow)
4 - First Anglican Eucharist in Canada (white)
5 - OCTAVE DAY OF THE DECOLLATION (proper 23) (red)
6 - Requiem (black)
7 - Requiem (black) I Evensong of Nativity of BVM
8 - Nativity of the BVM (white and blue) (lections FAtS) Pray for the Sisterhood of St John the Divine

TRM Ordo June 2010

2010-02-28T12:15:00.019-05:00

1 - St Justin Martyr (red)
2 - Martyrs of Lyons (red)
3 - Martyrs of Uganda and Janani Luwum (red) or Day of Thanksgiving for the Institution of Holy Communion (Sacramentary no. 1708) (best)
4 - Bl. John XXIII (white or yellow)
5 - St Boniface (red)
6 - SUNDAY IN THE OCTAVE OF CORPUS CHRISTI (white) (Early celebration of Trinity I, proper 10, green)
7 - William Grant Broughton (white or yellow)
8 - in the Octave of Corpus Christi (white)
9 - St Columba (white)
10 - Octave Day of Corpus Christi (white)
11 - Divine Compassion (white) (Sacramentary no. 1709) or St Barnabas the Apostle (red) (proper p. 409)
12 - St Barnabas the Apostle (if not kept) or Our Lady on Saturday (white and blue)
13 - TRINITY II (proper 11), comm. of the Octave if desired (green)
14-15 - in the Octave of the Divine Compassion (white) or Requiem (black)
16 - Joseph Butler (white or yellow)
17 - in the Octave of the Divine Compassion (white) or Requiem (black)
18 - Octave Day of the Divine Compassion (white) or Requiem (black)
19 - Bernard Mizeki (red), St Albans Festival Pilgrimage
20 - TRINITY III (proper 12)
21 - Requiem (black)
22 - St Alban the Protomartyr, Secondary Patron of the Diocese of Toronto (red)
23 - Vigil of the Nativity of St John the Baptist (purple) (lessons p. 496 BAS) Blessing of Bonfires
24 - the Nativity of St John the Baptist, National Patron (white or best)
25 - 26 of the Octave (white) (proper p. 410)
27 - TRINITY IV, comm. of the Octave (proper 13) (white)
28 - St Irenaeus (white or yellow), comm. of the Octave; Royal homecoming: arrival
29 - Ss. Peter & Paul (red) (proper p. 411)
30 - in the Octave of the Nativity of St John the Baptist

1 - the Octave Day of the Nativity of St John the Baptist, being Dominion Day (white) (proper p. 412)

TRM Ordo: Editorial Notes

2010-02-27T23:04:00.024-05:00

The basic principle of this kalendar is to reflect traditional Anglo-Catholic practice in conformity to the formularies of the Anglican Church of Canada. Some local, traditional, and American observances are included in italics.

The Ordo assumes the use of the Revised Common Lectionary on Sundays and holy days and the Daily Office Lectionary (or the Weekday Eucharistic Lectionary) on memorials, commemorations, and at daily votive Masses. These lectionaries, together with the major propers for Sundays and holy days, are printed in the Book of Alternative Services. (In communities with a tradition of daily Morning and Evening Prayer, the table of lessons in the Book of Common Prayer is more suited to this purpose, but if the BAS lectionary is preferred, the Weekday Eucharistic Lectionary may be used at Daily Mass). On memorials and commemorations, the collect, secret, and postcommunion are taken from For All the Saints. The minor propers and additional liturgical material, including the propers of Our Lady and of the Departed and proper prayers in traditional language, are always found in the Anglican Gradual & Sacramentary; on days not included in the American kalendar, an appropriate common is used for these. During traditional octaves, a commemoration of the feast is suggested after the orations of the day.

A requiem is assigned on free days. Provision is made for the traditional Saturday votive Mass of Our Lady. The BAS enjoins a distinction between "memorials" (which use the colour of the day and a reading from the Common of Saints) and "commemorations" (which use the colour of the season and the ferial readings). Here the colour of the day and the ferial readings are instead appointed for both.

The colour sequence gives traditional Roman and English options, drawing from Ritual Notes (9) and Western Rite Orthodox sources. I have also consulted the chart at Full Homely Divinity. In parishes of more modest means, purple vestments may take the place of crimson, rose, and/or black. For much of the Church's history, the now oft-lamented "local custom" was the norm rather than an anomaly, and some leeway must be allowed for circumstance.

TRM Ordo Easter 2010

2010-02-27T02:36:00.025-05:00

No fasting is undertaken during the Great Fifty Days.

April
5 - Monday in Easter Week, comm. Emily Ayckbowm
6 - Tuesday in Easter Week
7 - Wednesday in Easter Week
8 - Thursday in Easter Week
9 - Friday in Easter Week, comm. William Law
10 - Saturday in Easter Week
11 - THE OCTAVE DAY OF EASTER (gold or white)
12 - 15 of the Resurrection (white)
16 - Mary Brant (Koñwatsiãtsiaiéñni) (white)
17 - Our Lady in Easter (gold or white and blue)
18 - THE THIRD SUNDAY OF EASTER (white)
19 - 20 for the Departed in Easter (purple)
21 - St Anselm (white or yellow)
22 - for the Departed in Easter (purple)
23 - St George (red)
24 - Martyrs of the Twentieth Century (red)
25 - THE FOURTH SUNDAY OF EASTER (white)
26 - St Mark the Evangelist (red) (proper p. 404); Rogation Mass (Sacramentary no. 5330) (violet)
27 - 28 - for the Departed in Easter (purple)
29 - Catherine of Siena (white)
30 - Marie de l'Incarnation (white)

May
1 - Our Lady in Eastertide. May Festival Station I at S. Matthias.
2 - THE FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER (white)
3 - Ss. Philip & James (red) (proper p. 405) (Crouchmas in the Order of the Holy Cross and the Society of the Holy Cross) (proper p. 422)
4 - St Athanasius (white or yellow)
5 - 6 for the Departed in Easter (purple)
7 - Julian of Norwich. Pray for the Order of Julian of Norwich
8 - Our Lady in Easter - May Festival Station II at S. Thomas; Whitekirk and Haddington Pilgrimage
9 - ROGATION SUNDAY the beating of bounds (purple/white)
10 - 11 Rogation Days (Sacramentary nn. 5334, 5338) (purple)
12 - Florence Nightingale (white or yellow); Eve of the Ascension
13 - ASCENSION DAY (white or gold or best) (proper p. 342)
14 - S. Matthias the Apostle (red) (proper p. 407)
15 - Our Lady in Easter, May Festival Station III: S. Bartholomew
16 - THE SEVENTH SUNDAY OF EASTER: IN THE OCTAVE OF THE ASCENSION
17 - 18 in the Octave of the Ascension (white)
19 - St Dunstan of Canterbury (white or yellow)
20 - Octave Day of the Ascension (white)
21 - for the Departed in Easter (purple)
22 - Our Lady in Easter (white and blue); Vigil of Pentecost (Sacramentary no. 1657) (purple, white)
23 - WHITSUNDAY (best)
24 - Monday in the Octave of Pentecost
25 - Tuesday in the Octave of Pentecost, comm. St Bede
26 - Ember Wednesday in Pentecost, comm. St Augustine of Canterbury (red) (proper p. 395)
27 - Thursday in the Octave of Pentecost, comm. John Charles Roper
28 - Ember Friday in Pentecost, comm. Roberta Elizabeth Tilton (red) (proper p. 395)
29 - In Toronto, the Visitation: May Festival Station IV at S. Mary Magdalene, elsewhere Ember Saturday in Pentecost (red) (proper p. 395)
30 - TRINITY SUNDAY, Athanasian Creed (best)
31 - Visitation of the BVM (blue and white) (proper p. 408); Anglican National Pilgrimage

Request

2010-02-27T01:51:00.002-05:00

Might I ask, in line with policies at a number of other blogs, that anonymous contributors adopt a pseudonym, only for the purpose of mutual distinction?

BCP and BAS

2010-02-27T00:42:00.003-05:00

Unlike some of my fellow parishioners, I don't believe that BCP is necessarily better. I would be quite averse to ordination with the BCP, at least to the priesthood, given the lack of explicit sacrificial intent. The BAS has also given us back rites such as the Imposition of Ashes, Chrismation, the liturgies of Holy Week, the sacrament of reconciliation outwith the context of Extreme Unction, and a daily lectionary for Mass. The various forms of the Canon of the Mass have an explicit epiclesis and oblation. Rubrical provision is made for the minor propers so that the congregation may indeed "sing the Mass" and not just "sing at Mass."

Full communion resources from the Lutherans give us opportunities to use the Asperges and the Litany of the Saints (duly reformed!) and a more breviary-style office for those who prefer it. I once attended Sung Matins in the Waterloo Lutheran Seminary's Keffer Memorial Chapel using the then brand new Evangelical Lutheran Worship (the "cranberry book"). Quite different from the BCP cathedral men and boys experience, but I loved the soaring Venite.

The BCP remains a rich treasury of prayers. The services of Morning and Evening Prayer, the Coverdale Psalter, the collects, and countless prayers for numerous occasions, are all laudably retained. Even its Communion Office has its own internal logic and integrity. So while I admire the convenience of the American prayer book, I remain a fan of our two-book system. I also firmly believe that the slender Canadian Book of Occasional Offices should be preserved, for such oddities as the Admission of Deaconesses and for sundry benedictions, dedications, and civic ceremonies, not to mention the setting apart to the minor ministries. And I still regard the Anglican Gradual and Sacramentary as the best expression of Catholic worship in conformity to the authorized service books of our provinces, although my colour scheme is largely indebted to the Use of Christminster.

Observation

2010-02-24T11:38:00.002-05:00

In the same-sex debate currently ongoing in the Anglican Church of Canada, a number of the arguments contra come from individuals who believe homosexuality per se to be immoral and insist that the Church cannot "bless sin." These arguments, however, are out of order, as this private opinion is not the teaching of the Anglican Church of Canada, which "affirms the integrity and sanctity of committed adult same-sex relationships." And so the same-sex debate has to begin with the premise that same-gender unions are holy. Recall that Nuptial Masses for same-gender couples, minus the blessing itself, are already permitted by the House of Bishops, so the question under debate is not "is homosexuality moral?" That question has already been answered by General Synod, and so authors who argue against same-sex unions on the basis of their alleged sinfulness are essentially talking past the voice of the Church and giving an argument that has already been rejected.

And so reasserters must explain why, given the integrity and sanctity of same-sex unions, and their status as a permissible subject of intercession in votive Masses, they should not be blessed. Alas, many have simply been content to cite Scripture (always focusing on smaller, arcane clauses, of course, and ignoring the more broadly sweeping themes of love and justice) and assume, almost autistically, that their interpretation is equally evident to everyone else.

On Just War

2010-02-21T23:01:00.004-05:00

There is, I think, wide misunderstanding about the Christian doctrine of war. It might best be describes as being akin to the issue of homosexuality in Conservative Judaism, which has approved two conflicting rabbinical opinions on the subject for the faithful to choose from. (One continues the traditional position, while another removes all restrictions up to but not including rectal intercourse; a third responsum favouring complete abolition was rejected).

Two traditions can be found regarding war in the history of Christian thought, and so it may be said that a case may be made for both. Pacifism, however, originates with Jesus, and predates the Augustinian distillation of Just War theory. Moreover, the latter is limited in scope. Christians are not free to approve of just any war, if you will. In fact, most modern wars are total wars, which involve risk of loss of life to non-combatants. Right off the bat, they are disqualified from being salvaged by Just War. And so while it may be said that Christians are not bound to pacifism strictly speaking, the range of permissible belief is not so broad as commonly represented. To say that one who is not pacifist may be a Christian is not say that a Christian can support, for example, the ongoing war in Iraq, much less enlist for armed service. The days of the Major the Reverend (who retires, of course, to schoolteaching) are long gone.

On Exegesis

2010-02-21T19:15:00.006-05:00

Reading Ephraim Radner's review of Reasonable and Holy and the author's responsa thereto, what struck me was how easy it is to get bogged down in exegesis in the same-sex debate. Conservative arguers spill much ink over St Paul's cognitive state and the precise definition of porneia current during Jesus' earthly ministry, but no one needs to persuade me, at least, that Scripture says what it says.

For like my "reasserter" brethren I believe that all Scripture is given to us by God for our edification. I do not, however, believe that "inspired" necessarily means "literally applicable today." That doesn't mean that I wish to discard parts of the Bible, contrary to a common allegation. It's all there, and it's all good. Even the passages in Leviticus that make me squirm teach us about the relationship between God and his Chosen People throughout history, in slavery, exile, war, and also times of peace and prosperity. They teach us about the Covenant, about the struggle of the Israelites to survive under hostile conditions. I may think that the disappearance of temple prostitution obviates my obligation to distinguish myself from my Pagan neigbhours by eschewing same-gender relations, but I am no less a believer in the much-vaunted authority of Scripture per se. Every verse of the Bible has something to teach us, but many cannot simply be invoked at face value anymore. And who decided which those are? Scripture and Tradition (an artificial distinction for the former is a part of the latter) teach us that it is the Church that has been given power to bind and to loose, and for Anglicans, the Church speaks through its synods.

It won't matter how much or how loudly the "reasserters" call for "the plain meaning of Scripture" to be vindicated, or how many smug statements they issue "affirming" the "traditional doctrine of marriage." Unless and until they give a coherent account of why the Church, in Christian charity, ought not now to exercise its authority to "loose" its gay and lesbian faithful, their complaints will fall on deaf ears. In this respect, the problem is similar to that encountered with the ordination of women, where traditionalists often become complacent with the support the Papacy and 2000 years of Tradition, and neglect to address the serious theological problems raised by a male-only priesthood.

As Derek reminded us in a recent comment, the distinction is not, as Radner and Co. would have us believe, between those who interpret the Bible and those who do not, but between those who admit that they do so, and those who do not.

The Rose Maniple Ordo

2010-02-20T18:38:00.020-05:00

From here on in I will be featuring my monthly in-house kalendar for your perusal. This will take us to Easter Day.

February 2010
21 - LENT I (purple or grey; off-white paraments)
22 - Lenten feria
23 - Lenten feria, comm. St Polycarp of Smyrna
24 - Ember Wednesday in Lent, comm. Philip Tsen and Paul Sasaki (purple) (proper p. 395)
25 - Lenten feria
26 - Ember Friday in Lent, comm. Florence Li-Tim Oi (purple) (proper p. 395)
27 - Ember Saturday in Lent (purple), comm. George Herbert (pericopes of the feria) (proper p. 395)
28 - LENT II (purple or grey)

March 2010
1 - St David of Wales (white)
2 - St Chad of Mercia (white)
3 - John and Charles Wesley (white)
4 - Lenten feria (purple or grey)
5 - Lenten feria
6 - Our Lady in Lent (white and blue) (pericopes of the feria)
7 - LENT III, comm. St Perpetua (purple or grey)
8 - Edward King (white)
9 - St Gregory of Nyssa (white)
10 - Robert Machray (white)
11 - Lenten Feria
12 - Lenten Feria
13 - Our Lady in Lent (pericopes of the feria)
14 - LENT IV (rose) (flowers are permitted on the altar and the organ may be played as a solo instrument; the Litany in Procession is omitted)
15 - Lenten feria
16 - Lenten feria
17 - St Patrick (white or red) (fasting relaxed in some jurisdictions)
18 - Lenten Feria, comm. St Cyril of Jerusalem
19 - St Joseph (white) (proper p. 402)
20 - Our Lady in Lent, comm. St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne (white and blue) (pericopes of the feria)
21 - PASSION SUNDAY, comm. Thomas Cranmer (crimson)
22 - Lenten feria, comm. Thomas Ken
23 - Lenten feria, comm. St Gregory the Illuminator
24 - in the Octave of St Joseph (white), I Evensong of the Annunciation
25 - THE ANNUNCIATION TO THE BVM (white) (not a fast day) (proper p. 403)
26 - Compassion of the BVM (purple or grey), comm. of the Octave
27 - Lenten feria, comm. Charles Henry Brent
28 - PALM SUNDAY (crimson or purple)
29 - Monday in Holy Week (crimson) (proper p. 301)
30 - Tuesday in Holy Week (Chrism Mass in the Diocese of Toronto) (crimson) (proper p. 302)
31 - Wednesday in Holy Week (crimson) (proper p. 303) Tenebrae

April 2010
1 - Maundy Thursday (crimson) (proper p. 304)
2 - Good Friday (black) (proper p. 308)
3 - Great Vigil and First Mass of Easter (purple, best) (proper p. 322)
4 - EASTER DAY, OR PASCH: the Resurrection of Our Saviour Jesus Christ according to the flesh, comm. Reginald Heber (best) (proper p. 355 [day], Sacramentary [dawn])

The Prayer of Humble Access

2010-02-17T10:16:00.003-05:00

So-called liberals often have a troubled relationship with the Prayer of Humble Access, while Catholics may resent its temporary ascendancy over the Agnus Dei. It has been derided as the "Prayer of Humble Excess" and the "Humble Crumble Mumble," but Prayer Book champions wear it as a badge of pride.

In the ordo missae on page 230 of the Book of Alternative Services (that is, the Canadian Rite I, if you will) the Prayer is retained in a redacted form. The obvious source of consternation, "we are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy table", is still there. ("Even though the dogs are!" as one ordinand of my acquaintance remarked). Gone, however, is the less evidently objectionable "that our sinful bodies..." In Rites for a New Age, Michael Ingham suggests that this is to avoid the suggestion that the elements can offer remission of sin. This seems dodgy to me, as I think it perfectly orthodox to understand receiving Holy Communion with faith as being unto forgiveness of sin. As a concession to comprehension of Puritanism, the clause "in these holy mysteries" had of course been given up before the first Canadian revision of the prayer book.

It is this understanding of the sanctifying nature of the Eucharist that causes the "crumbs" passage to grate. The Roman Catholic Church, for instance, teaches that venial sin is absolved by reception of the Sacrament. While it is faithful to the Pauline understanding of the Eucharist, I think we have to question how well that tradition squares with that of Jesus himself. Are we to think of Holy Communion as a reward for sanctity or a means thereof? I think that the latter is perhaps a more sensible approach. Since Our Lord commanded us to "do this" it seems disingenuous to plead our unworthiness routinely before going on to fulfil the command.

So there are Catholic grounds for suspicion. There also the "liberal" grounds. They too have a point: it seems liturgically problematic at best to have such an abject prayer after the Confession and Absolution. It might be possible to incorporate such language into the penitential rites if desired, but it seems out of place in the Communion Rite, for how have we made it this far if not having been counted worthy?

Personally, I'm very much a "two book" Anglican. There was a move a few years back to try to get an American-style single book of two rites. I think that both BCP and BAS have their own integrity however. The BCP reminds of the truth of our fallen nature, our inability to save ourselves, and our reliance on God's mercy. The BAS reminds of the truth of redemption by the true Paschal lamb. I wouldn't want us to lose either of these traditions we have inherited. (In some American parishes, Rite I is used in Advent and Lent). The Book of Alternative Services restores practices such as the imposition of ashes, chrismation, Holy Week rites, and an Epiclesis. The rubrics allow for the interpolation of minor propers in the appropriate places. The BCP is dense with wonderful prayers that should be preserved intact.

Radner on Haller

2010-02-12T11:21:00.004-05:00

From the Living Church a review by Ephraim Radner of Reasonable and Holy. The review is generally negative, not because Br Tobias does not refute the traditional arguments but because he apparently fails to "provide...an overarching vision of Christian marriage..." (I have not read the book in its print form, so I must take Radner at his word, but in my experience Haller's work presents a very clear evangelical paradigm for marriage, albeit one which does not suit Radner).

Radner acknowledges Fr Haller's arguments one by one, but feels that they somehow aren't sufficiently tied together - "discrete" is his word, though how else he would have us respond to the discrete (and in many cases far more questionable) contra arguments isn't clear. Particularly telling, though, is this passage:

Ultimately, the kinds of “objections” to same-sex marriage that Haller is trying to refute emerge from such a larger scriptural vision, and not from their status as discrete arguments. The central element of procreation in marriage, for instance, is bound up with the character of Israel’s calling in fallen (and the Fall has no place in Haller’s scheme) human history — genealogy — and ought not simply to be examined in terms of this or that individual person or couple (a rather modern obsession).

In these remarks, Radner falls victim to a common "reasserter" mistake, the treatment of the subject matter as academic theology. For gay people, the debate is very much about individuals and couples - real people whom the Church at present tells that their relationships are not deserving of recognition. Those who would uphold the law over charity (unlike the Anglican approach to divorce, for example) owe these people a good reason, not a poetic vision. "Marriage has to represent the (male) Christ and the (female) Church" (another common "poetic" argument) is not such a reason, for symbols are meant to assist our devotion and not the other way around. Symbols are helpful as far as they go, but if we become so attached to them that we are willing to give up our fellow Christians as sacrificial lambs to preserve them intact, then we are putting the symbol above the grace which it is meant to convey. If you can't wrap your head around same-sex marriage because it wreaks havoc with the "Bride of Christ" paradigm, then set that paradigm aside, and not same-sex marriage. The lives of gay and lesbian Anglicans are not a kindred matter to the timing of the extinction of the Paschal Candle or the direction of celebrant at Mass. "It throws the symbolism all off!" is just not going to cut it as a reason to bar Christians from two of the sacraments.

Granting that procreation is a common biblical motif, marriage must be reckoned with on theological and not literary grounds. The only question to be asked is, Does God care what gender one's spouse is? I cannot fathom a God who would, and Tobias Haller's writing casts serious on the assumption that there is an intrinsic value in sex difference that renders it necessary for marriage. Yet Radner characterizes his arguments as "familiar," which seems a trifle disingenuous. "Reappraisers" are well aware that our arguments are familiar, but if Radner and his ilk are so "familiar" with them then why have they not bothered to rebut them? Of course, much of the "debate" of the past 30 years has consisted of liberals spilling buckets of ink on the subject, which is then ignored by traditionalists, who insist that a stronger case must be made if blessings are to proceed, but stick their fingers in their ears when it is presented. So Radner is perhaps unwittingly apt here.

The fact is that there is no reason why heterosexuality is essential to the "overarching narrative" of Christianity. Procreation is not "bound up" in the Fall and redemption (although in the western, Augustinian conception it figures prominently), and the recognition of same-gender couples will not constitute a recanting of that narrative. But one of the key reasserter talking points is to portray the gay issue as a more dramatic departure than it is. Gay and lesbian Christians are not trying to overhaul Christian theology (contrary to Radner's assertion, I highly doubt that Haller would have us discard the Fall), and while marriage indeed "touches on" a number of central issues, this doesn't preclude its extension to same-sex couples. There is simply no reason why same-sex marriage must necessarily threaten the "larger scriptural vision" on which the Church is founded, and which gay and lesbian Christians take as seriously as any other.

It is time for the Church to decide whether it will use its power to loose and bind for the welfare of its gay and lesbian faithful.

Observation

2010-02-12T06:08:00.002-05:00

Anglican Church in North America apologists are keen to assert that the gay debate is merely a "symptom" of a broader rejection of "orthodox Christianity." When pressed as to what other doctrinal revisions have given offence, however, they are quite vague, yet they get huffy at the suggestion that their raison d'etre is homosexuality, almost as if they are sheepish about the unpalatability of their preoccupation with the domestic lives of their fellow Christians.

The most recent change before same-sex blessings was the ordination of women, and that was nearly 40 years ago, with a plethora of Continuing groups catering to the disaffected. When I pointed this out, a moderator at the Essentials blog protested that she wasn't even alive when TAC et. al. were formed! (I wasn't alive in 1534, but I managed to find my way to Anglicanism nonetheless).

More coverage of Accession Day

2010-02-09T21:57:00.002-05:00

From local Mar Thoma blogger Dr Roy Eappen.

The Lord Bishop of Winchester and the Ashworth motion

2010-02-09T11:53:00.001-05:00

2008

2010

A modest proposal

2010-02-08T10:15:00.001-05:00

With the Church of Nigeria's decision to walk apart in 2005, we ought to provide missionary bishops for those who remain faithful to the See of Canterbury.

The Accession Service

2010-02-08T00:27:00.002-05:00

Choral Evensong today at the Cathedral Church of St James. The Lieutenant Governor and his consort were in attendance, he reading the First Lesson. They attend a nondenominational church in the suburbs east of the city; Her Honour is a Gospel singer of some repute. This must have seemed quite high to them. They were formally seated by the Dean of Toronto, His Honour giving a wave as he passed up the main aisle on his mobility device.

The service was almost entirely choral (but not solemn), including the versicles and responses and royal suffrages (with the 1662 ending to "Give peace in our time, O Lord"). The setting was Stainer in B flat. A few die-hards including myself joined the choir during the psalms, which were entirely singable Anglican chant. The officiant was the Associate Priest; the Dean of Toronto preached. The Royal and National Anthems were sung, along with "I vow to thee, my country."

Encore

2010-02-07T12:42:00.002-05:00

Yet more photos

2010-02-07T12:40:00.002-05:00

Still more photos

2010-02-07T12:36:00.002-05:00

Further photos from Candlemas

2010-02-07T12:34:00.001-05:00

Candlemas photos

2010-02-05T11:29:00.003-05:00

A couple of shots of the from the Sarum Use Procession and Solemn High Mass at St Thomas's, Huron Street. The celebrant, deacon, subdeacon, and in the first photo the clerk, are shown.

Flashback

2010-01-31T18:13:00.001-05:00

I think that it's a real test of the tolerance and comprehensiveness of the church. - Jack Iker on his election in 1992

Those Bishops who stand in solidarity with Gene Robinson should withdraw themselves from further participation in the Lambeth Conference. - Bishop Iker, 2008

Reverendissimum

2010-01-31T14:41:00.003-05:00

Virtue is claiming that the Archbishop of Canterbury's addressing ++Bob Pittsburgum as "Most Reverend" legitimates his primacy. I refer to the Ecumenical Patriarch as His All-Holiness. That doesn't mean I'm in communion with him.

Our best bet I think is to assume a similar stance toward the Anglican Church in North America as our sister church does to the Lutheran Church - Canada. We're happy to be in communion with them if they should want it.

Churchmanship pond differences

2010-01-29T09:08:00.003-05:00

Correspondents in the Church of England are bemused that, for years, the traditional Anglo-Catholic kingpin in the Canadian House of Bishops was a woman.

In Canada, Evangelicals do Morning Prayer from the BCP twice a month. In England, they have free-form services of the word and, when the bishop looks the other way, lay presidency. All of this assumes the universal 8 or 8.30 low celebration. St Paul's, Bloor Street, has an additional one Tuesdays at ten minutes past noon, for the laudable evangelical purpose of attracting downtown employees who can't make it to church on Sunday mornings.

In Canada, Anglo-Catholics typically (but not invariably) use the BCP or the BAS "Toronto Rite" developed at St Mary Magdalene. Vatican II hasn't really kicked in. Even at SMM, which has largely adopted the modern Roman Rite, you will still see burse and veil, a mark of "middle of the road" and not pure laine Anglo-Catholic churchmanship in England. A lay subdeacon in dalmatic and maniple assists and the choirs sing the sequence after the Alleluia verse. Given the thinness of Anglo-Catholic parishes here, "FiF" and "AffCath" types (in attitude: the formal organizations have no real presence here) tend to coexist in the same parishes. (As far as I am aware, only Toronto and Montréal have more than one Anglo-Catholic parish, unless St David of Wales, Vancouver, remains as such).

Thought

2010-01-29T01:21:00.002-05:00

In places where literacy is commonplace, any language may be "understanded of the people" if printed with a paralinear translation.

Canada's head of state

2010-01-26T16:42:00.003-05:00

There was a lot of argument recently when the Governor General spoke of places she has "travelled as head of state." It ended up being a fairly predictable republican-monarchist polarity (in much the same way any discussion of abortion other than among ethicists rarely advances beyond allegations of premeditated infanticide and fascist designs on women's bodies). Since today we had a lecture on Kripke and identity, I have the following reflection to offer:

I think it's uncharitable at best to read Her Excellency's remarks as being a claim that There is a head of state of Canada and I am she and I have travelled. The phrase is relational - she "travelled as head of state." And this she certainly does, for while royal prerogatives undoubtedly continue to have their font in the Sovereign, they are permanently delegated to the Governor General. The Sovereign remains the ordinary minister of these powers, if you will, as monarchists rightly remind us. But by convention she is pleased to entrust them to her viceroy when she is not present to exercise them in person.

Her Majesty, we must recall, is the queen of no fewer than sixteen independent states. The Letters Patent form part of our constitutional inheritence. While the Sovereign is free to alter or revoke them, in the meantime the Governor General's role is enshrined in a special, permanent way, in contrast to the office of prime minister, which was unknown in the written constitutional law prior to the Canada Act of 1982). She exercises royal prerogative at the Sovereign's pleasure, but the office of Governor General is especially set up for this purpose in an officially defined and permanent (though not in the sense of irrevocable) fashion.

We mustn't think of the viceroy as like the White House press director, simply the Sovereign's mouthpiece when she isn't around to speak for herself. Instead, her function is perhaps more like that of the president pro tempore in the United States Senate - the Vice President of the union remains senate president, but there is an officially authorized delegate. Or think of the Bishop of Dover, who functions as the diocesan bishop of Canterbury even though he is not such, when the incumbent's duties are international in scope and he must often be away from his see trying to provide primatial oversight to the United States* (who most definitely did not order that pizza) to ensure that they don't go soft on teh gayz. Indeed, we rightly use the title "Commander in Chief" to refer both to the Queen and to her duly delegated viceroy, who in her absence is appointed to exercise executive authority on her behalf. Think of the Governor General as the Holy Ghost, if you will. Her power does not contradict the sovereignty of its origin.

I'm not a constitutional lawyer, but it seems to me that republicans have at times misused the Governor General's special rôle as a means of reducing the Queen's visibility, while monarchists have at times been too dogmatic in playing down that rôle.

*Yes, I know that the province also includes Haiti, China, Colombia et. al. but there is no good non-US-centric name - just ask the Scots how they feel about their daughter church's rebranding - so tough.

"Man in the street" interviews: the lowest form of journalism

2010-01-24T19:39:00.002-05:00

One article I read in the aftermath of the new papal bull included a quote from an Anglican layman who said that he was attracted to the RCC's strong stance on abortion and homosexuality, but didn't think he could join if it meant signing off on the stuff about transubstantiation or the Virgin Mary (hint: it does). As a gay man who reluctantly swam the Thames in spite of my assent to those doctrines, I was astonished that he would seek out a church on such narrow grounds while sweeping away central Catholic dogmas.

I couldn't believe that he was so offended at the thought of sharing a church with gays and lesbians that any church with a more conservative line thereon than the Anglican Church of Canada was preferable to him, regardless of whether or not he agreed with its central tenets. The Eucharist, the role of Our Lady in the communion of saints, purgatory, the number and efficacy of the sacraments, the definition of the Canon of Scripture - all of these were secondary to the important church-shopping question: are you sound on gays?

Apparently this gentleman couldn't care less if he was Coptic or Amish.

Man, woman, and priesthood

2010-01-18T16:51:00.003-05:00

A couple of years ago at the Trinity College book sale I managed to acquire a small volume, bearing the ex libris of the chaplain to Royal St George's College, entitled Man, Woman, and Priesthood. (If you're about to Google Book it: it's not the one edited by Monseigneur Leonard, but the other).

Its chapters include contributions from the Church of England, the Episcopal Church USA, the Church of Sweden, Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, and Judaism. (Jonathan Sacks and Kallistos Ware are among the contributors). In reading them, I began to get the sense that I, were I around in the 70s, might have sympathized or even broadly shared their position. While they don't address my fundamental objection to their argument, they express worry about the use of secular rights-based arguments to support a change in Tradition.

It seems likely, then, that neither group articulated its case well. Proponents were not able to persuade a minority of Anglicans to accept that women in the priesthood and episcopate were an acceptable theological development. (There does not seem to have been any controversy about the diaconate: female deacons can even today be found within such bodies as Forward in Faith and certain Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and besides they're in the Bible, which settles it for Anglicans at least)*. These Anglicans were not assuaged by the arguments used at the time. And again today, we find the Church of England on the defensive on women in the episcopate, stuck in a situation considered ecclesiologically incoherent by all parties.

The authors of the book evidently had not been given coherent theological arguments for the opposing position, and that is precisely the language we need to speak when discussing the sacraments. While I'm proud of Canada's human rights laws, I think the ordination of women is justified not because God is bound by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms but because a male ordained ministry is questionable theology, and should be challenged on those grounds. It rests on an assumption of a metaphysically distinct and binary manhood and womanhood. In Ordinatio sacerdotalis, the Ven. John Paul II makes no attempt to reconcile the traditional position with the principle that what was not assumed was not redeemed, which is where any argument for the traditional view needs to begin. The age of this apparent incoherence is not an argument in its favour. The fundamental problem with a male-only ordained ministry is not that it violates the principles of the secular feminist movement; it's the creation of two classes of baptism, the preservation of a sacrament of the Church to those of a wholly arbitrary characteristic. What needs to be given first is a credible explanation of what would constitute a fundamental difference in the esse of all women to that of all men. We need to hear why it is important for ministerial priests to share this particular attribute of the historical Jesus, and what it means to be "female" and coated in a sort of ontological Teflon that ordination-proofs women.

Until we know what that argument would be, we cannot possibly begin to answer it, and we just won't get anywhere with each other, will we?

My list of churches to hit up when I make it to New York one day

2010-01-14T18:44:00.004-05:00

*Church of the Resurrection
*St Mary the Virgin, Times Square (for Solemn Evensong & Benediction)
*St Thomas', Fifth Avenue (to experience the now rare "Frankenmass" in one of Manhattan's toniest settings)
*St Ignatius of Antioch (in hopes of spotting a bemanipled female priest offering Solemn High Mass ad orientem).
*St Peter's Evangelical Lutheran Church (on an incense day)
*the Cathedral Church of St Thomas the Apostle, Harlem
*First Reformed Episcopal Church. (No website, but photo here: whence the Welsh flag, I wonder?).

And out of town:
*Christ Church Bronxville (for the increasingly hard to find Sarum-derived ceremonial tradition)

Apostolicae Curae: an observation

2010-01-14T16:30:00.004-05:00

Are you a Roman Catholic who accepts the teaching of Apostolicae Curae? If so, you should contact your local Anglican or Episcopal church about reception into the Anglican Communion. According to Leo XIII, an explicit conferral of sacrificial ministry is essential to valid priestly ordination. Therefore all Roman Catholic ministers "ordained" since 1969 except by indult lack the grace to confect the Sacrament, and the bread and wine you receive from them lacks the effect of transubstantiation. But fear not, for Anglicans have picked up the slack and incorporated such a formula, so there is still a place of refuge for the conscientious Catholic. So get on it, separated brethren! Catholic obedience obligates you to submit to Canterbury!

Old 100th

2010-01-14T09:39:00.002-05:00

Another musical treat from YouTube. Some may find the video content unpalatable.

Doings at S. Clement's

2010-01-14T09:29:00.005-05:00

S. Clement's, Philadelphia (see links at right) is perhaps unique in the Anglican Communion: faithfully adhering to the Roman Rite as it existed in 1955. The only Anglican interpolation into the kalendar is S. Charles Stuart, and the Easter Vigil is at four o'clock in the afternoon. The deacon at High Mass serenades a blank wall with the chanting of the Gospel, a historical anomaly in the manner of the "north-ender" that only a sedevacantist would defend if pressed. (Even Christminster's Vigil is at night). Our Clementine readers will be able to tell us whether Holy Communion is administered at the Mass of the Pre-Sanctified on Good Friday.

A message from a member of the S. Clement's staff yesterday tipped me to a change in the Sunday services, specifically Solemn Vespers & Benediction, which is sung at three o'clock from October to Pentecost. Previously Vespers followed the Anglican Breviary. Now the Breviarium Romanum and Liber Usualis in Latin will be used, according to the Solesmes method. Benediction is bilingual.

Our correspondent Paul Goings writes that "the Hours (Prime, Terce, Sext, and None) were recited before the Mass of the Vigil, and Prime on Christmas Eve has that interesting passage from the Martyrology. First Vespers of Christmas was solemnly sung, but without coped assistants. The Midnight Mass was followed by Lauds, and the Hours and Second Vespers of Christmas were recited the next day, before and after the High Mass."

The Naming and Circumcision of Jesus, II

2010-01-01T06:03:00.003-05:00

Festal Te Deum and Sung Mass yesterday at St Matthias, Bellwoods. Fr Craig wore a splendid gold chasuble. The Te Deum paraphrase, to Rustington, was delightful, as was "Judge eternal, throned in splendour" to Rhuddlan. Also fun to trot out "Unto us a boy is born" and "'Twas in the moon of wintertime" (I always like belting out Gitchi Manitou).

The four o'clock time is very student friendly, and the Te Deum offers a fun alternative to the Levee at the Cathedral (but then, pontifical concelebration!)

The Naming and Circumcision of Jesus

2009-12-31T19:41:00.001-05:00

Timely thoughts from the Bishop of Buckingham on law, grace, and the mystery of today's feast. A happy civil new year to everyone.

Observation

2009-12-30T23:01:00.002-05:00

"Reappraisers" don't need to "win" The Debate: they need only wait for the baby boomers to retire: Anglicans my age who oppose the blessing of same-gender unions are as unusual as those of my parents' generation who still hold out in "safe" parishes.

The Solemn Preface for Christmas

2009-12-27T20:47:00.001-05:00

A recording from Fr Tay.

Credo

2009-12-25T16:42:00.003-05:00

With thanks to Michael, here is Candlemass in the Use of Sarum. St Thomas's, Huron Street will celebrate this tradition on 2 February 2010.

Ideas for the next revision of the Book of Alternative Services

2009-12-23T11:56:00.003-05:00

*Extend Christmasstide to Candlemass
*Provide a form for the full Vigil of Pentecost
*Provide propers for a Mass at Dawn on Easter Sunday
*Designate the Thursday in Trinity week as an optional memorial in Thanksgiving for Holy Communion
*Raise all feasts of Our Lady to the rank of Holy Day
*Provide propers for Accession Day

Further to female deacons in Forward in Faith

2009-12-22T17:41:00.002-05:00

q.v. et q.v.

(Tip of the biretta to TD)

Anglo-Catholics in the Anglican Church in North America

2009-12-20T20:17:00.003-05:00

I'm assuming this is a border difference: in the American news, we read much about "spiky" trad-minded bishops like Iker and Ackerman joining the new body. In Canada, it was an entirely Evangelical venture. The only AC parish to join the Network was St John the Evangelist, Calgary, which now along with three other parishes forms a rump of Network congregations remaining in the Anglican Church of Canada.

In fact, it surprises me that Anglo-Catholics in the US were drawn to ACNA. When it was first announced, one of the bishops of the Anglican Catholic Church of Canada wrote an op-ed in the Post waspishly but aptly criticizing the ACNA folks for accepting change that suited them (such as women clergy, who freely populate ACNA) but then deciding that gay relationships were "too much" of a break from Tradition. And certainly, the ecclesiology of ACNA is not Catholic. Mind you, "traditional" Anglo-Catholics in the Church of England have been occupying a thoroughly Protestant ecclesiological no one's land for nearly two decades (for what could be more Protestant than a statutory right to opt out of communion with one's diocesan?) and they don't seem to be bothered. But here we have "Catholic" Anglicans who withdrew from their province over a dispute over the sacrament of matrimony, only to settle in a body that enshrined the 39 Articles! (And no Newman tricks here: the "literal and grammatical sense" is the definitive).

I live and write in Toronto. The city of Toronto falls within the purview of at least three ACNA dioceses including the Reformed Episcopal Diocese of Central and Eastern Canada. If I were a prospective ACNA ordinand, I could easily shop around, without actually moving around! And now Bishop Iker is saying that if Archbishop Duncan ordains women bishops, Fort Worth will pull out. Well, why not? They did it once. And no doubt when the next metropolitan they pick out does something they don't like, they'll move on again - and, again, try to take the silver with them! That's understandable, and it's human, but it isn't Catholic, and it's unworthy of someone who (presumably) fancies himself an episcopal defender of Catholic order.

(Thanks to my friend Max at Stuck in the Myddel for triggering this train of thought!)