The St. Francis / St. Clare Prayer Book

Sweeney, Jon M. The St. Clare Prayer Book: Listening for God's Leading. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2007. $14.95

_____. The St. Francis Prayer Book: A Guide to Deepen Your Spiritual Life. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2004 15.95


These two prayer books are similarly formatted, along two different themes. They contain an introduction and biographical chapter that commend the life and witness of Francis and Clare of Assisi, followed by short offices (prayer services). The offices can each be prayed slowly and meditatively in ten to fifteen minutes. There is one separate morning prayer and one evening prayer office for each of seven days, and a quick compline (night prayer) that's the same for each night. Each day includes collects (set prayers) quotations, and Scripture readings that enlarge upon a particular theme in the spiritual life.

In the St. Francis volume, these are themes in Franciscan spirituality:

• Following Christ
• Disregard for possessions
• Peace and care in human relationships
• Love for all creatures
• Preaching the Good News
• Passion more important than learning
• Joyful simplicity

The St. Clare volume is oriented toward discernment, or "listening prayer":

• Embracing Christ
• Purity
• Walking the path of conversion
• Listening with the heart
• Adoring Christ
• True discipleship
• Redefining family

What I Like. It's important that a breviary (book of short prayers) be accessible and easy to use. While they are paperbacks, they are well bound and attractively designed. The type is reasonably large and the different sections are easy to read. Finding one's place requires only to know what day of the week it is, and the prayer offices require no flipping back and forth. They are also very attractively priced.

What I Don't Like. It is a common poetic device of Franciscans to thank God in all circumstances by offering prayer of praise to Lady Poverty, et al. You know, like Brother Sun, Sister Moon, and all of that. I don't imagine that Francis, Clare, or any of the Order's members suppose there to be an actual heavenly persona named Poverty, whom we would care to address in real terms. I understand the poetic device and find it pleasant. Christian prayer, however, is addressed to the Father, with the Son, through the Holy Spirit (leaving aside the question of intercessions to departed Saints). The Psalms seem to entreat Creation to praise God along with the worshippers, but when I'm teaching beginning disciples to prayer, I don't want to have to go through the trouble of explaining/defending that particular literary device.

Bottom line: The introductory material provides an excellent popular account of these Christian saints and their contributions to the spiritual life of the wider Church. The book itself is easy to use for prayers, aesthetically attractive, and well-priced. If you don't mind the aforementioned literary device, these volumes are an excellent gateway to the practice of regular structured prayer as well as Franciscan Christian spirituality.

An Annotated List of Lenten Reading Suggestions

Go here for my Lenten Letter for 2010.

Benedict of Nursia. The Rule of Saint Benedict. Various editions.

Written by the father of Western monasticism, this “little rule for beginners” is a challenging and insightful path for following Jesus and growing in Christian love.

Cook, Jeff. Seven: The Deadly Sins and the Beatitudes. Grand Rapids, Mich: Zondervan, 2008.

Cook’s accessible study contrasts the Christian tradition of capital vices (habitual sins that destroy the with-God life) with the growth of virtue as expressed in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. This is a valuable and insightful introduction to how believers can cooperate with God in becoming more like Jesus.

DeSilva, David Arthur. Sacramental Life: Spiritual Formation Through the Book of Common Prayer. Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Books, 2008.

It’s a common joke in post- and sub-Christian cultures that many people only want Jesus and the Church in their rites of passage: “hatching, matching, and dispatching.” But more important than the emotions of those days or the beauty of the rites is the framework for living that the Christian story provides. As many people ask, ”what on earth am I here for?” DeSilva demonstrates that the answers can be found in the sacramental rites of baptism, the Lord’s Supper, marriage and burial, as he explicates the implicit theology offered by the services in the Book of Common Prayer.

Homan, Daniel, and Lonni Collins Pratt. Radical Hospitality: Benedict's Way of Love. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2002.

This short book looks to the Rule of Benedict to provide balance between ministry to others (both at work and at home) and the inner life. I highly recommend it.

Kinnaman, David, and Gabe Lyons. Unchristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity-- and Why It Matters. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Books, 2007.

For Christians who grew up in deeply religious environments in the American South, it can be shocking to discover what outsiders think of Christianity, and what their experiences with Christians have been. This book can offer a stark challenge for disciples to reach out to their neighbors with creative and sacrificial love, while avoiding some of the hurt that our co-religionists have caused.

Marin, Andrew P. Love Is an Orientation: Elevating the Conversation with the Gay Community. Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Books, 2009.

Andrew Marin grew up religious and homophobic – but after three of his best friends came out to him, he started to reconsider his unChrist-like treatment of gay people. This book doesn’t revisit the normal arguments about the Christian Bible and sexuality, nor does it argue for a revisionist ethic; instead Marin shares his journey as a missionary of Christ’s love to gay people, and offers suggestions for moving the discourse to a place of understanding and common ground. Here's a good introductory video at his blog. Andrew writes graciously and with humility, and his book is a must-read for anybody struggling with Christian sexual ethics and the challenge of loving broken people.

Mathewes-Green, Frederica, and Andrew. First Fruits of Prayer: A Forty-Day Journey Through the Canon of St. Andrew. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2006.

We are often tempted in the Christian life to minimize and excuse our own sins, while remaining quick to name those of others. Praying through the Canon of Saint Andrew, an ancient litany of repentance, is a wonderful (and at times difficult) antidote to this tendency. Mathewes-Green provides insightful and accessible commentary, as well as a hagiography of Mary of Egypt, an important figure in Eastern Christian penitential literature.

Mathewes-Green, Frederica. The Jesus Prayer: The Ancient Desert Prayer That Tunes the Heart to God. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2009.

Mathewes-Green invites us to meditate upon and rest in the Lord’s presence by praying without ceasing: “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

Nouwen, Henri J. M. Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1975.

This short and outstanding essay explores the challenge of living deeply with Christ in the midst of the world.

Nouwen, Henri J. M. The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming. New York: Doubleday, 1994.

This is a book-length meditation on both the parable of the prodigal son as found in the Gospel of Luke and depicted in Rembrandt’s painting. Nouwen invites us to deeper intimacy with God as he helps us identify with the father, the wayward son, and the older brother of the story.

Nouwen, Henri J. M. Show Me the Way: Readings for Each Day of Lent. New York: Crossroad, 1992.

This is a daily devotional taken from the writings of one of the twentieth century’s most beloved Christian writers.

Pennington, M. Basil. Centering Prayer: Renewing an Ancient Christian Prayer Form. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980.

The only people who find prayer easy are those who never do it. Prayer is challenging, and meditation can be a great struggle, especially for the beginning. Pennington’s book offers a great place to start as he teaches readers to meditate upon Scripture and wait in silence upon the Lord.

Sweeney, Jon M. The St. Clare Prayer Book: Listening for God's Leading. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2007.

This short book for daily prayers (called a breviary) is inexpensive, attractive and easy to use, and each day guides believers through seven themes in spiritual discernment and listening prayer.

Sweeney, Jon M. The St. Francis Prayer Book: A Guide to Deepen Your Spiritual Life. Brewster, Mass: Paraclete Press, 2004.

This short book for daily prayers (called a breviary) is inexpensive, attractive and easy to use, and each day guides believers through seven themes in Franciscan Christian spirituality.

Volf, Miroslav. Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace. Grand Rapids, Mich: Zondervan, 2005.

What is it like to forgive others of the most heinous crimes? What is it like to seek forgiveness for deep wrongdoing? How can we begin to forgive people who hurt us, and seek healing? Volf refuses easy answers and cheap clichés as he walks through the challenges of forgiveness, mixing personal narrative with good theological thinking.

Williams, Rowan. Where God Happens: Discovering Christ in One Another. Boston: New Seeds, 2005.

It is often said of the ancient Christian spirituality of the east, that those believers knew how to judge their own sins harshly, but to show unending mercy toward the sins and weaknesses of others. In four accessible lectures, pastor and theologian Rowan Williams walks us through the thoughts and prayers of the mothers and fathers of the desert.

Ash Wednesday 2010

This is my Lenten letter to the Georgetown College community:

Dear Friends,

Greetings in the name of the Lord! As Christ followers everywhere begin our forty days of penitence and preparation for the Easter celebration, I regret that I am unable to join you in worship for an Ash Wednesday liturgy. I would like to share with you instead some short comments on how to keep a holy Lent.

Disciples of Jesus observe the Christian calendar as a way of ordering time according to the life and work of Christ. The 40 day period is intentionally evocative of Israel’s 40 years of wandering through the desert wilderness, Moses’ 40 days on Mount Sinai with God, and Jesus’ 40 day fast that marked the beginning of his public ministry. Accordingly, this is a time of greater intentionality in the spiritual life, situated in preparation for Jesus’ execution in the holy city, and his resurrection on the third day. We prepare for Easter’s joy by remembering our own fragile mortality, and engaging practices of repentance and self-denial.

The Ash Wednesday liturgy brings the stark reminder (from the book of Job), “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.” We are all made of mud, but we also bear the image and likeness of God. We are also a people who suffer the effects of the Fall: the separation from God and his life that brings death into the world, and inhabits our own hearts.

Our right response to this remembrance is to open ourselves to receive God’s gift of repentance. I commend to you today’s Scripture readings, Joel 2 and Matthew 6, which offer guidance on works of repentance both public and private. We seek to return to God by agreeing with him about the sin in our lives - those attitudes and practices that destroy his life in us, and mire us in bitterness and unforgiveness against others. This is an urgent call for all of us, whether we consider ourselves highly religious, or if we have drifted from the Faith. The good news of God’s forgiveness and healing in and through Jesus Christ is offered to all of us. If you stand in the Faith, let this be a time of spiritual reading and examination of conscience. If you have drifted from the Faith, or fallen into some habitual sin, come back. It’s difficult, but it’s at least simple. Come back. People fall into sin. We say yes to evil in small ways, and these small choices turn into big and habitual choices. There’s freedom in admitting that we’re walking down the wrong road, and then turning around.

Finally, this is a time of self-denial and deliberate conformity to the cross of Jesus Christ. God himself suffered and died for our salvation. We remind ourselves of this daily, and think on it intently. We pray in that place. We offer gratitude to the Crucified. As a way of remembering and walking along side him, we fast, and practice abstinence in various ways. We fast from something good in order to gain control over our actions, or simply to deny ourselves in some way, because in the Christian faith we understand that it’s actually good and needful to deny ourselves. (I would caution you, in conformity with the command of our Lord, not to share details of your fasting with anyone but your pastor or spiritual director, and the people you live with only in so far as can and will join you in the fast.) Follow in the way of Jesus over Lent by showing love to people close by that you find it really hard to live with.

If I can offer a listening ear, reading suggestions, or advice as you take your Lenten journey with Jesus, please let me know.

Because of the difficulties presented to me by the weather and my present medical condition, I have taken furlough from work through the rest of February. I will not be on campus until then, so weekly Evening Prayer is suspended at present. I would encourage you to continue reading Scripture, praying Psalms, and practicing Lectio Divina. In the meantime, call or e-mail if you need me.

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you will return.

Pray for me, a sinner.

Kyle

Week of the 3rd Sunday after the Epiphany

Highlight(s) of the week: Yesterday I joined a seminar that our philosophy department has offered on the works of St. Thomas Aquinas. It has a few really thoughtful students in it, so it's going to be fun. I have very little background on medieval philosophy or theology, so it's entirely new ground for me.

Ministry update: This is our second week back for this semester, so we're getting back into the pattern of daily Vespers on campus, along with a weekly longer service of Evening Prayer. The EP service is my platform for teaching about Christian discipleship and particular spiritual disciplines in a group setting.

Stuff at work: I finished an inventory of our media holdings before the students returned; we only lost 1.5% of our popular film collection to theft. For better or worse, this is within acceptable parameters. Now comes the database clean-up - not gripping work at all. I'm looking forward to teaching bibliographic instruction sessions next month, so I've been reviewing notes for those.

Book(s) I'm Reading: Flannery, an autobiography of Flannery O'Connor by Brad Gooch. It's well-written, and I'm enjoying learning more about a woman whose work has influenced me so much.

Media I'm Enjoying: Every day when I return to the empty house, the cat is sitting alone in the middle of the living room floor, nodding his head as a Lady Gaga album plays. I shiver and scurry on to my room. I don't ask questions, and the cat tells no lies. (In case you didn't know, Lady Gaga is a robot invented to approximate a woman.)

Lately I've been watching really creepy movies on the Netflix while punishing myself on the exercise bike. I saw Perfume: Story of a Murderer. I don't recommend it. I saw Spiral. It was neat - the creepy worked. Book of Eli (in theatres): neat (and triumphalist) religious story, but our consensus was that it got really heavy-handed by the end.

Something that blew my mind: I made a really nice chicken soup last week, using nothing but two chickens, a pile of veggies, and the spice rack. From scratch, children, that's what that means. I own you.

Something I've been chewing on: You know, the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that credit cards are evil. I think they're a source of serious spiritual and fiscal bondage, and it amazes me that this has never been obvious to me, and that it doesn't seem obvious to other people.

Looking Forward To: A Robert Burns party deferred to the weekend, and two birthday outings.

Heresy and the Book of Revelation

2 Advent
Martyrdom of Leocadia & Eulalia
Today's Lectionary Readings

The appointed Bible readings for this week are especially challenging. They come from the Old Testament book of Amos, the New Testament book of Revelation, and the Gospel of Matthew. In all of them, God and his representatives are upbraiding God's people for matters of what we would call "theological ethics" - the way folks are living with God together.

The book of Revelation is a piece of apocalyptic literature. That means it understands itself to expound on the hidden meaning of what's going on in the world, and to let us in on the behind-the-scenes view (hence the English title "Revelation"). As the documents open, we are introduced to the author, John, who relates a vision of Jesus Christ in which he is told to draft some letters for God for the benefit of the various Christian churches of Asia Minor.

I find the warning to the Ephesian church to be particularly striking. Our Lord praises this Church for standing against heresy - testing and rejecting false apostles - but at the same time warns them that they have abandoned their first love. The implication here is that the first love is for Christ himself. How could it be that this community which manifested such zeal in protecting the faithful from false teaching had actually grown cold in their love for Jesus?

In my own ministry context, I often reach out to people who come from alternative versions of Christianity in which the Gospel is obscured or outright rejected. I know honest and well-meaning believers who stumble and fall away from the Faith because they cannot navigate a path between false dichotomies or between childrens' Sunday School answers and the challenges of real life. As I see this happen, I find my anger waxing hot against people who obscure the Gospel, and tell lies about God. I begin to spend a great deal of time thinking about false teachers and how to debunk their different gospels, and it becomes easy to loose focus on Christ and what's actually true about him. In my determination to prove that heresy is ugly, I forget that this is only because Christ is beautiful. We don't fight heresy as an end in itself, we fight heresy to make space for the Truth.

May God grant me the grace to love him first, and keep this work of teaching the Faith in right perspective.

Friday Update

Highlight(s) of the week: James and I spent a few hours with Lee and Jessica, for which occasion I made a stellar meatloaf. Adam came to stay with us at the end of last week, so we all got to spend some nice down time, eat nice meals, pray the Office - all the good stuff.

Ministry update: I finalized my end-of-year report, and after due consultation with my students and fellow pastors, created an outline for next year for the Community of the Resurrection at Georgetown College. Worship, meals, prayer. Love people well. Not really complicated, but the challenge always seems to be sticking with those things. I've had a great time keeping in touch with some of the students via the telephone device, but for the most part I've been trying to take it easy and spend my time on prayer, penance, and writing.

Stuff at work: I've been tinkering with my research guides, and preparing to give a small faculty demonstration on electronic research tools.

Book(s) I'm Reading: Sexual Authenticity, by Melinda Selmys (Publisher); Spirit of the Disciplines, by Dallas Willard (for Schola - Publisher / Library).

Media I'm Enjoying: True Blood and Malcolm in the Middle. Yah, I know.

Something that blew my mind: Presumption.

Something I've been chewing on: How do I talk to people about their sins against others when they're decades older than me?

Looking Forward To: Having a few people over this weekend to formally welcome James to our household with a house blessing and a party.

Monday Brief: 07/20/09

Highlight(s) of the week: Jeff Asher joined us for our Schola (Saint Patrick's ministry reading group) to discuss a book on Ritual studies and early Christianity. We were joined by Lee and two Adams, and intermittent visits from James. Also, I spent part of the day Saturday shoveling compost with Amy for the garden, and had the Looses and McLeods for grilling and bad horror films (what else?) for the evening.

Ministry update: I've been trying to spend most of my extra-curricular energies on formation this summer, so ministry work has been limited to a few lunches and coffees with students, and some reading. I've been chatting with the other Catechists, my students, and the Religious Life folks at the College about my plans for the Fall. Like Jesus and the Cylons, I do have a plan...

Stuff at work: Media inventory. 'Nuff said.

Book(s) I'm Reading: I just finished Tribes by Seth Godin, The New Testament in its Ritual World by Richard DeMaris, and The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene.

Media I'm Enjoying: Our household started watching HBO's True Blood. I'm not really into vampirism (outside of the Mass, of course) but I knew anything by Alan Ball would be worthwhile. And it is.

Something that blew my mind: I was really surprised at the relative lack of obfuscation in the Episcopalians' legislation at GenCon09 last week.

Something I've been chewing on: I'm thinking about going to library school in a year.

Looking Forward To: A week with very few plans. We have a new housemate, so we're all being purposeful about building up the home monastery.

I stole this format from Dean and Alex.

How to Live in an Intentional Christian Community

I’ve spent the last five years living in and among what are often called “intentional Christian communities.” The use of this phrase typically implies that a group of people share their lives together in a number of structured ways with the common goal of greater personal and corporate faithfulness to Jesus Christ. These communities have been:

• The Vine and Branches Christian Community, Lexington, Kentucky
• The hOME Community, Oxford, UK
• Saint Patrick’s Anglican Church, Lexington, KY
• The Priory of St Columba, Saint Patrick’s Church
• My own household

This involvement hasn’t often been exclusive; some of the communities overlap (St Patrick and St Columba) and my time in some of them has overlapped as well (VBCC, hOME, St Patrick). While there was some diversity in the particular practices of these communities, this is what they all had in common:

Learning to Pray. We came together to pray to the Lord for ourselves, one another, and the world he’s teaching us to love. We prayed our hopes. We prayed our doubts. We prayed our joys, our pains, our fear, and our despair. We learned to do this by praying the Psalms, and reading the Scripture together.

We learned to do this by sitting down together, and not running away. We didn’t learn to do this from the latest awesome book on the religion bestseller list. We learned to say to God, “I’m sorry.” “Thank you.” “Yes.”

Learning to Love. We ate meals together. We learned to fight, and not run away. We learned to say to one another, “Thank you.” “I’m sorry.” “I forgive you.” “Let’s do this together.” In learning to say these things, I became the kind of person who can say these things, and mean it.

Living in this way didn’t necessarily make the Christian life easier – in fact, it showed me quite a bit about how difficult it is. What this way of life did was show me what it looked like to really love God, and to know what it is to be loved by God. It broadened my imagination to see and know and feel what it’s like to be a forgiving person. This life teaches me that I can suffer with and for people around me without running away. Belonging with a people like this, and living life in this way has taught me that people really can become like Jesus, and that it’s possible to live our lives without trying to protect ourselves from the people we’d like to love us.

By all means, embrace “community.” But I’m always going to ask you these questions:

• Do you eat?
• Do you pray?
• Do you hold your own feet to the ground?

If you can – if you will – it will make all the difference.

How to Use the Christian Bible

Use only as directed.

1. Pray, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner."
2. Pray a psalm.
3. Read a long passage of Scripture.
4. Say "Thank you."
5. Say "I'm sorry."
6. Pray, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner."

7. Be less of a jerk to people. Refer to what you learned in steps 1, 3, and 6 for guidance in this.
8. Perform steps 4 and 5 again, in the company of others.

Practices to avoid

- Applying the lessons of Step 3 to other peoples lives, without their permission or cooperation
- Reading teeny, tiny excerpts of Scripture that sound nice
- Performing Step 3 without the other steps
- Using the Christian Bible without the support of a loving, caring community

Results may vary, but probably not by very much.

Where To Find God

At the beginning of my senior year at Georgetown College, I suffered an auto collision while driving on a rural road. My torso was crushed, and I broke many of my more interesting bones, most notably my neck and my back. I remember quite a bit about that dark period (especially the asphyxiation bits), but one of the things that stands out to me the most was - you guessed it - a theological conversation.

After several days in hospital, I was still non-ambulatory and doing nothing on my own. The day after my chest tubes were removed and I was charged with the terrible task of independent respiration, I received a visit from a chaplain in training from the local Evangelical seminary. The young man had little time for small talk, and got right to the point: "I know you want to put it off, but before long you're going to have to ask yourself, 'Where was God in this?'"

Though I couldn't laugh, this struck me as very funny. The only thing this man knew about me was that I was twenty-one, had bruised-purple skin, a broken back, and bolts sticking out of my skull. The only thing I knew about him was that he couldn't grow a beard and had taken out gigantic grad school loans to buy the privilege of theologizing to my broken ass. "I know... where he was," I rasped.

One of my friends from the College dorm (an atheist who dabbles, if I remember rightly) had taken the crucifix from my room and and nailed it to the wall across from me in the UK Medical Center. "He... is always... there. That's ... really... all there is... to say."

The God of the Christians (in either our Bible or our tradition) never talks about suffering in quite the ways that we want. I'd like to know why a careless driver and a rainstorm left me with a few years worth of arthritis, more pain than I'd ever imagined, and a lasting fear of the dark. I'd like to know how and why I survived all of that. I'd like to know why the dark, painful places of my soul are there. Wouldn't you? I don't have a proper answer, but this is what I do seem to have: a god who hangs on a cross, naked and dead. That's no easy answer. This is a god who suffered, and and suffers along with me. As I hang upside down, suffocating as my beard grows thick with my blood, the corpse god Jesus Christ suffocates outside the city walls. His blood pours to the ground for the life of the world, and fills the chalices on our altars.

As I suffered alone, so did he.
As I wondered - and wonder - if it meant anything, so did he.

This is our hope. This is the faith of the Church. The God of Jesus Christ - who raised him up from death and exalted him as the world's true Lord - gives life and hope to all of us.

Lent: A Short Introduction

I published this short introduction to the Christian season of Lent in the campus newspaper last week.

“Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.
Turn away from sin and be faithful to Christ.”

Christians around the world heard these words last week as they began the season we call “Lent.” Keeping the “Christian year” – marking time according to God’s saving work – arises from the conviction that twenty centuries ago, God raised up the executed insurrectionist, Jesus of Nazareth, and enthroned him as the world’s Lord. All of life is oriented to this affirmation: that God loves the world, grieves its brokenness and sin, and has graciously acted to redeem it in and through Jesus the Christ. Marking time in this way is one aspect of that orientation.

The Christian year follows the life of Jesus, and tells the story of the world through that lens. Before Jesus began his public ministry of healing the sick, casting out demons, and proclaiming the arrival of God’s Reign, he spent 40 days fasting in the wilderness. This echoes a theme that runs throughout the Scriptures: the number 40 represents a special time of refining the soul for the service of God.

Now, in the 40 days before Easter, we enter the last days of Jesus’ ministry, when he begin to orient himself and his disciples to his vocation of suffering and death for the sake of Israel and the entire world. The story has taken a dark turn, and we join the Master as he sets his face resolutely toward Jerusalem. This is why a cross, draped in penitential purple, stands above Giddings Lawn. The rhythm of our lives has taken on a cadence of mourning and hope as we walk in “bright sadness,” journeying with Jesus through his suffering and into Easter’s light.

As we consider Lenten disciplines, we ask, “what can I do to set my own face toward Jerusalem?” What are the sinful patterns in my life that need to die, and what does God wish to heal? Lent is not meant for Herculean efforts of spiritual zeal - like boot camp for Jesus - but for a time of greater intentionality. We rededicate ourselves in practical ways to learning more deeply the Way of Life found in Christ. Our goal is not a particular spiritual experience, but to be with the Lord and offer to him our readiness to turn in unexpected directions, to listen to words we would not have anticipated, and answer yes to God in ways we would not have imagined.

The time of Great Lent is upon us. May it be a holy one as we walk into the dark places of ourselves and discover that the Lord Himself leads us into the stillness of our solitary fears, to sit with us, to heal us, and to absorb all of our darkness into his Cross.

Twenty-five Fascinating Facts...

Fifth Week after the Epiphany

... about me. Yep, finally did it.

1. I cook a mean lasagna, but I hardly ever do it because I want to make three at a time, and decide that lasagna is somehow too expensive.
   
   
2. Except for the two month period that I lost it in my backpack, I wear my name tag at work all the time. You think it’s because I want to be helpful, but it’s really because I’m terribly narcissistic and think everybody should know my name.
   
   
3. One of my most surreal moments working at the bookstore was explaining to management that middle-aged Baptist women buy Beth Moore books, and that therefore we should stock them. Also, emo kids buy eyeliner, gamers have minty green skin, and the Pope is Catholic.
   
   
4. I take that back – the most surreal moments probably involved the ugly guy who was angry we didn’t have more/any books on “tantric sex” (sir, I don’t know what either of those things are, frankly), or the woman who demanded that Chris draw her a map to Barnes and Noble.
   
   
5. I really enjoy Science Fiction. Can’t stand Star Wars. I fell asleep in the cinema when I tried to watch the big re-releases in high school. I did watch a pirated copy of Episode I when I was in Kosovo, however. Couldn’t really follow it.
   
   
6. I love horror novels, especially short stories. I can’t stand anything in the Fantasy genre.
   
   
7. I’m an introvert, specifically an INTJ: the “jerk” type in the Myers-Briggs. I know what I know, and I know what I don’t know. I also know what you don’t know, which can make it really bad.
   
   
8. If I like a particular food, I could eat it for at least 7 meals in a particular week. I also chew each bite 32 times.
   
   
9. I once threatened to physically fight a roommate over a hygiene concern (no, not my hygiene). He moved out the next day.
   
   
10. I reject much of institutionalized Christianity, but sadly, I usually accept the really unpopular bits, and condemn the parts that most people really like. That’s okay, though. It’s really bad for them.
    
    
11. I have no independent taste in music or films. I watch, listen to, and generally enjoy whatever my friends tell me.
    
    
12. I get really nervous that I might end a sentence with a preposition… in public.
    
    
13. I’m rarely capable of hiding my emotional state. Especially when I think I’m playing things cool, people can read me like a book. It took me forever to discover this; Jim just told me one day, “I would love to play poker with you. You don’t have any unexpressed emotions.”
    
    
14. There are a few people in my life, that regardless of their faults, I would defend them in almost any situation: “Really? He buried a guy in cement after knocking over a liquor store? Hm. He must have had a good reason.”
    
    
15. My housemates and I rescued an old cat from the Humane Society in Summer 2007. The cat follows me around constantly and cries if I come home late. He meows constantly and annoys the piss out of all of us, but I can’t help but delight in a little critter that thinks about me all the time – could you? So much for my tough guy image. Ahem.
    
    
16. Every few months, somebody sits me down to (re)explain the concept of “tact,” and explains how it might be useful in a particular situation – sometimes with diagrams. I always respond with wide eyes and a smile, and vigorous nods of my head, but never have a clue what they’re talking about.
    
    
17. I was in a college play.
    
    
18. No man ever loved a dead woman like I love Flannery O’Connor.
    
    
19. I believe that much of the grave error in American religion stems from asking the wrong questions.
    
    
20. The broader I smile at you when you talk, the wronger you must be.
    
    
21. The people I trust the least are the people I never hear say “I’m sorry” to anyone.
    
    
22. I have no problems beginning twenty-five sentences in a row with the word “I.” I could have a problem, I think.
    
    
23. I was within a week of buying an engagement ring, once.
    
    
24. I broke my neck and my back during my senior year of college.
    
    
25. Sometimes I think my primary “ministry” to some people is to be an enacted parable of judgment. Demonstration to follow, so stay tuned.

That Thing I Do Every Day

So I’m a campus minister these days. I catalog media, teach research methods, and talk about grace and judgment.* It’s pretty sweet, I won’t lie. So here’s my philosophy and practice of Christian ministry for the first year:

1. Know and love these people well
   
   
2. build a culture of prayer

Since I set foot on campus again in June, I’ve led the Daily Office nearly every weekday. Often I pray alone** but usually one or two other students will join me.

The Daily Office is shorthand for the Christian practice of “fixed-hour prayer.” Office means work. At various times in the day, Christians stop to attend to the presence of the Lord, read Scripture, pray portions of the Psalter, and to offer prayers for the sake of themselves, and others. Each of these regular services is called “an office.” There are three elements to this culture I’m trying to build – all of which are typically given lip service by the Evangelical culture, but not often practiced:

1. Praying the Scripture. Not having, constructing, or sharing options about the Bible. Not deciding what it “means.” Not contriving “applications” to the “real world.” This is about taking seriously the idea that the Holy Scriptures are the Word of God by actually listening for the voice of God in the text. This is not about reading the Bible to “get something out of it,” but rather to spend time with the Lord simply for its own sake.
   
   
2. Praying with others. I would surely like to see all Christians raising up holy hands for the sake of the world in the privacy of their “prayer closets,”*** but this practice is only one aspect of Christian prayer. Christians pray together. I meet a lot of disciples who can’t or won’t pray audibly in the presence of others – that tells me that we really need to spend time learning to pray. That’s just fine, because God intends to teach us how through the Scriptures and the ancient practices of his Church.
   
   
3. Regular prayer. Our Master calls us to discipline ourselves for the sake of the Kingdom. One of the most basic ways for disciples to do this is by making the time for regular common prayer. We don’t pray just when we feel like it, and certainly not just because we feel like it. We are called to live lives steeped in Scripture, and to join in Christ’s priesthood offering prayers for the world because this is the stuff of God’s intention for our lives. Not because we feel like it, or even because we want to “grow spiritually,” but because we seek to be faithful to the one who loves us so very much, and intends to heal broken people through our ministries.

That’s my agenda for Year One. More shall be added for Year Two (it's not like I'm going to quit the first two points of the agenda, after all). Stay tuned, and thanks for reading.

Oh yeah - and feel free to join me for prayers any week day in the Campus Ministries Lounge at 4:30. We usually pray for 15-20 minutes.



*I’m also a library tech, hence the cataloging and judgment bits.

**Mind you, one never really prays “alone,” since we offer our praises to the Father, with Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, and this along with the whole Communion of Saints.

***This phrase alludes to Jesus’ caution against making public prayers for the sake of impressing others with one’s eloquence or piety. He told them to go to their “closets.”

Holy Scripture and Authority in the Church

Sometimes I'm asked about where I stand on the doctrine of the "inerrancy" of Scripture. As a Catholic Christian - specifically an Anglican, I have philosophical problems when I try to interact with the 1977 Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy. Here's what I can say.

I read and meditate daily upon the Bible, usually in the context of the Daily Office, and often in a practice of Lectio. My reading of the Scriptures continually guides me in understanding my own life within the larger story of God's salvation of the world and ongoing creation of his Church. In reading, marking, learning, and inwardly digesting the Scriptures, I am challenged and directed to grow more deeply into the likeness of Jesus Christ, and to give glory to the Father, empowered by the Spirit.

A discussion of the authority of Scripture is essentially shorthand for how God exercises his authority in the Church through Sacred Scripture.* The canonical Scriptures represent the theological basis for all development in the Church's teaching and piety, and as a "norming norm," it also critiques the faithfulness of those developments in terms of their fidelity to the person and work of Jesus Christ, the head of the Church. The biblical narrative offers the story of the triune God who created and loves the world, and seeks to save it through the Incarnation, the Atonement, and the sending of the Church which began at Pentecost. This narrative guides the Church in its faithfulness to this mission. The authority of the New Testament is expressed wonderfully in a statement from the bishops gathered at Lambeth in 1958:

"The church is not over the holy scriptures, but under them, in the sense that the process of canonization was not one whereby the church conferred authority on the books, but one whereby the church acknowledged them to possess authority. And why? The books were recognized as giving the witness of the apostles to the life, teaching, death and resurrection of the Lord, and the interpretation by the apostles of these events. To that apostolic authority the church must ever bow. 

Jesus Christ himself is the mediator and fullness of all revelation, and the New Testament authoritatively offers the apostolic witness to that revelation, from which we may never deviate. The Scriptures teach faithfully and without error that truth which God wished them to contain. As God sends his Church into the the world on mission, he continually calls us to receive afresh that apostolic testimony.

*See N.T. Wright's little book, Scripture and the Authority of God, or in the US, The Last Word.

Thinking about Mission

Two questions about mission... any takers?

1. What are the riskiest ventures you see being taken to incarnate the Gospel in a particular milieu, rather than attract people to "church programs"?
   
   
2. Where and how are our people working as missionaries to the undereducated, working class, or poor? What are some contexts in which Anglican missioners are faithfully preaching the gospel and engaging the poor in the worship of God?

Regarding the first question, some of my readers will be familiar with the distinction increasingly made in discussions about Christian mission, between "attractional" and "incarnational" practices of mission. In models of the former persuasion, people set up an attractive program that strangers will find attractive. Normal practices of this might include a "contemporary" worship service designed for people who would otherwise "find church boring," billboard ads, or giveaways. An incarnational model entails befriending people and teaching the gospel from in inside rather than on the outside of a social group.

Regarding the second, Anglicanism in North America finds much of its natural affinity with more educated populations. That's not necessarily awesome.

Thoughts?