[IVING CHUR( an INDEPENDENT WEEKLY SERVING EPISCOPALIANS• MARCH 6, 2005 • Help Your Parish Prepare for the Word
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THE [IVING CHUR( AN INDEPENDENT WEEKLY SERVING EPISCOPALIANS• MARCH 6, 2005 • Help your parish prepare for the Word Illuminationshelps your congregation prepare their hearts for the Word they are about to hear each Sunday. When lectors and lay readers preface the lessons with a concise Illuminations meditation, worshipers are better able to put the scriptures in context, and focus more clearly on the sermon. For even more impact, Illuminations can be reprinted in your weekly service leaflet. Help your parishioners make a stronger connection between the scriptures and their everyday lives with Illuminations meditations. Call 1-877-822-8228 to order now. Or visit THE LIVING CHURCHwebsite at www.livingchurch.org to preview a sample meditation and subscribe. Illuminations A publication of The Living Church Foundation The objective of THELIVING CHURCHmagazine is to build up the body of Christ, by describing how God is moving in his Church; by reporting news of the Church in an unbiased manner; and by presenting diverse points of view. THIS WEEK 9 Features Opinion 9 Slow Recovery 14 Editor's Column Hurricane Ivans effects Carrying on with Questions continue to befelt 15 Editorials in Grenada Many Thanks, Associates News 16 Reader's Viewpoint 6 Report shows average Sunday The Mystery of Suffering attendance in decline BY MATI GUNTER 17 Letters OtherDepartments More Criteria 4 Sunday's Readings 5 Books 20 People & Places MARCH 6. 2005 · THE LIVING CHUR.CH 3 8~tid Ovl,k, SUNDAY'SREADINGS CHOIR CHAIR Empoweredthrough Oil 'Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him ... ' ( 1 Sam. 16: 13a) Fourth Sunday in Lent (Year A), March 6, 2005 BCP: 1 Sam. 16:1-13; Psalm 23; Eph. 5:(1-7)8-14; John 9:1-13(14-27)28-38 RCL: 1 Sam . 16:1-13 ; Psalm 23; Eph. 5:8-14 ; John 9:1-41 It's popular today to lament the empowering for them over the course dependence of American society on of the centuries. In today's reading oil. We shake our heads at a foreign from 1 Samuel, David is anointed as policy which obviously centers around king over Israel, "and the spirit of the oil, even as we jealously guard our Lord came mightily upon David from right to cruise around in SlNs. We that day forward" (16:13a). And in with FIBRE RUSH SEAT stare with anguish at the posted prices today's gospel a sinner born blind is in front of gas stations, but that never illuminated through the water of bap Since 1877 seems to stop us from filling up. tism, an act which has been accompa R.Geissler-2 Inc. We're loathe to change our lives nied by anointing since the earliest much partly through simple inertia. On days of the Church. "Then I went and P.O. Box 432 reflection, however, many of us realize washed and received my sight," he tes Old Greenwich, CT 06870 that oil empowers us for all sorts of tified (John 9:llb). Phone: (203) 637-5115 things impossible for people in the Our Church today is increasingly past. Mobility frees us from having to rediscovering the value of baptismal live in the industrial parks where we anointing, and its effect is real for work, adding greatly to our quality of those who are privileged to receive it. life. And modem air travel means that It underscores the power received in nowhere on the planet is more than 24 baptism, and it confinns the vocation Nashotah House hours away, a boon to our cultural of all Christians to active membership enrichment. in the body. It celebrates the opening Pilgrimage God's people have been dependent of our spiritual eyes as we start to live on oil since the earliest days of our his "as children of light" (Eph. 5:8b). Christian Origins in tory. It isn't Nymex Crude, but rather If fossil oil empowers us today in Ireland and Wales consecrated olive oil. Despite the ways unknown to our forebears , then laments of some radicals at the time of olive oil can empower us in a way well June 8-21, 2005 the Reformation , most people of faith known to our ancestors. Let us rejoice have found this oil to be incredibly in our rediscovery of this truth. Escorted by: The Very Rev Robert S. Munday , LookIt Up Dean and President of The word Christ comes to us from the Greek Christos ("anointed one"). What Nashotah House form does Jesus' anointing take at his own baptism? (Matt. 3: 13-17) Visit holy sites little changed ThinkAbout It since the 6th and ih centuries. In what sense might the traditional anointings at confirmation and at ordination be Enjoy time for reflection seen as extensions of baptismal anointing? and prayer, solitude and fellowship . See: www.nashotah.edu NextSunday Call: 1-800-627-4682 FifthSunday in Lent(Year A), March13, 2005 Email: [email protected] BCP: Ezek. 37:1-3(4-10)11-14; Psalm 130; Rom. 6:16-23; John 11 :(1-17)18-44 RCL: Ezek. 37:1-14; Psalm 130; Rom. 8:6-11; John 11 :1-45 4 THE LIV ING CHURCH · MARCH 6. 2005 BOOKS AnglicanIdentities man's six volumes of Parochial Ser man chose these sermons carefully By Rowan Williams. Cowley. Pp. 149. mons, published between 1834 and out of hundreds of other sermons $13.95. ISBN 1-56101-254-8. 1842. Victor Lams departs from the preached during this period because Once again Archbishop Rowan critical consensus of Newman schol of their inter-relatedness; he then Williams shows us the breadth and ars in his contention that these ser formed what Lams calls "sermon clus depth that mark his writing, the same mons are significant works of ters" which were in turn organized that have always characterized the theological literature in their own into successive volumes. The effect best Anglican theological reflection, right with an extraordinary degree of was to allow "converging points to even (perhaps especially) among internal organization and coherence. merge, like a beam of focused light, to scholar bishops. Anglicans have liked illuminate" Newman's "comprehensive explo to have a place for scholars in the epis a fascinating fresh analysis copate, and for good reason. ration" of Christian life Of the eight chapters, some began of a significant portion and duties. life as written pieces, some as lec While Newman's tures. Five have been printed before, of Newmans thought and writing. Anglican Georgie would and all were written or have benefited from ROWAN delivered from 1995 to more introductory mate WILLIAMS 2003. Since some of In calling this body of Newman's rial on the Oxford Movement and these pieces are not eas sermons his "Anglican georgic," Lams some treatment of Newman's audi ily found, it is good to sees the Parochial Sermons as an ence or preaching practices, it gives a have them collected extended "moral reflection on the con fascinating fresh analysis of a signifi here. ditions of human life," addressed to cant portion of Newman's thought and In so much current those who now believe and practice writing. debate in the Church, Christianity, and to those who may in Richard J. Mammana, Jr. Anglican Identities Anglicanism can seem so the future embrace it more fully. New- New York, N. Y. small, so cramped. To have here, from an Archbishop of Canterbury, a collec tion of articles on subjects that range from William Tyndale to Honest to God author John Robinson, is itself a testimony to the precious heritage that appears to be known to fewer of OPENING DOORS TO GREATER GIFTING: those who claim to know what Angli canism is really about. The introduction to this collection PLANNED GIVING might serve as a primer on Anglican ism. A better short essay on the sub ject is hard to find. Most important is his claim that it "is not true that there I PLANNED GIVING I is no distinctive Anglican doctrine." Each reflection in this book seeks to bring out this distinctive Anglican Holliman Associates, in partnership with the Episcopal doctrinal voice. As usual in Williams' Church Foundation, can help you establish or enhance a writings, his concern is both to illu mine his subject and to ask what we in highly effective planned giving program that informs and the Church today may learn from inspires your supporters. Build endowment by encouraging those who have gone before us. parishioners to remember the church in their estate plans (The Very Rev.) Peter Eaton Denver, Colo. and through life income gifts. Newman'sAnglican Georgie 24 North Fourth Street , Newport. PArp74 ParochialSermons HOLLIMAN telephone:1-800-516-8322 By Victor J. Lams. Peter Lang Publishing. associates e-mail:[email protected] Pp. 126. $53.95. ISBN 0-8204- 7092-9. FUND RAISING CONSULTANTS web:www.hollimanassociates.com This remarkable new book offers a close reading of John Henry New- MARCH 6, 2005 · THE LIVING CHURCH 5 NEWS StatisticsIndicate the Churchin Decline Despite some encouraging excep decline is irrelevance and death." tion and the Episcopal Church Center tions , according to the most recent sta Whereas the interim report lacked do not provide churches with adequate tistics presented to the Executive statistical data on the extent of the resources to help build up their local Council at its Feb. 11-14 meeting in decline, accompany faith communities. Austin, Texas, the Episcopal Church is ing reports by the According to Dr. Hadaway, the Epis moving by some measures alarmingly Rev. William L. Sachs copal Church is retaining a smaller per in the wrong direction of achieving its of the Episcopal centage of those brought up as goal of doubling average Sunday atten Church Foundation Episcopalians .