From the Rector
EDITOR’S NOTE: At Mosaic’s September gatherings, Fr Robert reviewed what Anglicanism is and what it means to be an Episcopalian. The emphasis of the classes was on the comprehensiveness of Anglicanism, i.e., how part of its essence is to hold together things that sometimes seem (and have often been) in conflict.
As Saint Philip’s welcomes people from many different faith traditions who become part of the community, it seems important for people new to the Episcopal Church to do just that: appreciate what is helpful from their traditions and individual histories, and incorporate that as they continue to explore how they understand God and the Episcopal tradition.
This perspective is not new to Fr Robert. In 2014 he wrote a series of blog posts about this topic. This week is the final article in a three-week series* where a portion of those blogs (updated where appropriate) is shared in this space.
Below, Fr Robert continues to answer the question: “What does Catholic Evangelism look like?
A Grounding in Scripture that welcomes the Word of God into our daily lives
A people who read, mark, and inwardly digest the word of God will be marked by that word. There is something life-giving and powerful from engaging with the deepest stories of our faith. In the same way that we can appreciate the complexity of a dish when we’ve delved into a cookbook or two, the complexity, joy, and demands of our faith take on a new depth each time we open God’s word and let ourselves be transformed by it.
Of course, this means we will wrestle with hard passages, frustrating bits, and confusing narratives. We will stumble over names, dates, and places. We will be told things we might not want to hear and delight to discover things we didn’t dream were written for us.
Reading the Bible is like being told stories of your family tree—sometimes shocking, sometimes a little boring, sometimes liberating, always telling us a little more about who we are and where we come from. God’s holy word, passed on to us through the work of the Holy Spirit (and no small amount of Byzantine maneuvering), is given to us as guide and gift to be the place where we begin to know the story of God’s unfolding work, the nature of Christ, and the birth of the Church. We will be unsettled and convicted—and welcomed in new ways into the story of salvation.
A Pattern of Prayer that shapes our days
Paired with a daily pattern of Scripture reading is a daily practice of prayer that marks and shapes our daily life. A Church prays. Period. If we are to be the Church outside the walls of our buildings then we have to pray. Period. We are given a pattern for this in the Daily Office.
A young nun was once walking through the halls of the nunnery away from the chapel. A much older nun saw her in the hallway and asked, “Sister, are you not going to prayers?” The younger nun replied, “I just don’t feel like it today.” The older nun, sighed and smiled and told her, “Sister, I have not felt like going to prayers for 20 years—which is why I go.” And off they went.
The purpose of a regular pattern of prayer is not our enjoyment. It is a way of structuring our day with God’s will for us in mind. We hear a bit of Scripture and remember the One who guides our days. This will not always be an unadulterated joy or moment of bliss. Prayer (like life) is often a thing of offering and struggle which is punctuated by moments of clarity, understanding, and joy. Like so many things, without the investment of ourselves in regular patterns of spiritual discipline, it becomes harder and harder for us to hear the Holy Spirit speaking in, through, and to our days.
One of the things about a regular pattern of prayer is to hear God’s charge to us in the morning (to serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness as we go before the face of the Lord). We close our day of work hearing the promise of God (He that is mighty has done great things for us and fills the hungry with good things). We go to bed with Compline (Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit). Prayer brackets our days and prepares us to hear, serve, and trust more fully.
A Sense of the Power and Promise of Worship
Whether in the joyful strains of a full Gospel choir, the rich hymnody of Choral Matins, the simplicity of an 8:00am Low Mass, or the choreography of Solemn High Mass, there must be a sense that worship is an act of profound and holy joy.
We are given injunction, over and over again, to praise God with our whole selves. With all of our being we lavish upon God our share of Mary Magdalene’s fragrant oil. We offer from the bounty of God the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. This is a necessarily Evangelical and Catholic act; it engages the whole person and deepens the encounter with the Holy One who makes himself known to us as the blessed company of all believers.
If we want people to think something important is happening at church, then we need to act as if something important is happening. In a world of hyper-marketing, there is nothing more winning and latent with potential than true, unvarnished honesty. The power of lovingly and attentively offered worship is that we can give others a glimpse not only of the majesty of the one we worship but a sense of just how we are caught up in the wonder that is his presence among us.
There is Holy Mystery
In the unanswered questions of our faith, in the divine-human interplay of the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection, and of Baptism and the Mass—in all of this and in countless other ways there is Holy Mystery at work in our faith.
Our attempts to explain the Sacraments or explain the nature of Salvation are ultimately the grasping attempts of creatures to ascribe motive to the Creator. We know the story of faith and we grasp for its deeper meanings in the eddies and currents we feel washing about us. Beyond the order of expectations and the patterns of explanation is the salient fact of our faith: we see through a glass dimly.
We are left with the one great mystery which we explore together in Word and Sacrament, by fits and starts, as individual believers and the whole Body. We offer together the lasting Good News and the joyful proclamation: Christ has died, Christ is Risen, Christ will come again.
These are not the only marks of Catholic Evangelism or Evangelical Catholicism, but they are a beginning such that we can more cogently articulate the particular vocation of the Episcopal Church and deepen our shared life and labor as we work, pray, and give for the spread of the Kingdom.
Yours in Christ,
—Fr Robert
* Click here for the first article in this series. Click here for the second article in this series.