In Shusaku Endo’s famous novel Silence, two Portuguese priests are sent as missionaries to Japan. The year is 1637, and the Japanese church is struggling under the weight of religious persecution. These priests want to encourage the fledgling flock, so they give their lives to a dangerous voyage and the possibility of martyrdom.
When they […]
It has been nearly one year since our parish last gathered together for worship without any COVID-19 restrictions in place. We had an Ash Wednesday service together, but only a few weeks later we were holed up in our respective homes and celebrating Holy Week on Zoom. Our great joy at the resurrection of Christ was overshadowed by […]
In November of 2019, I sat in our priest’s office at church with my ministry partner, Jessi, as we naively discussed small group plans for 2020. It had been a discouraging season in ministry, but we had finally found a topic to get excited about. We would spend the beginning of the year […]
(Note: Anglican Compass has a book about Advent! Check out A Thrill of Hope: Celebrating Advent at Home [Revised and Expanded for 2020], by Ashley Wallace!)
Advent is the first season of the Church year. It lasts for four weeks leading up […]
Today I found myself completely distracted by my little robot vacuum. (We call him “Eufy.”) While I should have been helping the kids with their homeschooling, I found myself increasingly frustrated by his sense of aimlessness.
All I wanted was for Eufy to clean the kitchen. With four teenagers in the house all day, that […]
Years ago I started researching a book about celebrating Advent. I learned so many things along the way! Here are ten of my favorite unusual discoveries about Advent.
In England and Ireland, plum pudding […]
Pentecost is, for many of us and our congregations, the Sunday (or season) in which we turn our attention to the person and work of the Holy Spirit. The reality, however, for many of the people in our pews, is that the Spirit is often conceived of as more like the Force from Star Wars than a distinct divine person. […]
Note that the ACNA collect is a bit different from the two collects for Ascension […]
During Rogation Days last year, I joked with our priest about making the drive to our home to pray over and bless our little garden patch for the spring. Rogation Days seemed like a charming ritual, sweet and a little antiquated. After all, if our zucchinis failed, there was the farmer’s market, the grocery store, the bulk warehouse, all […]
Days of fasting and prayer in the midst of a feast season seem counterintuitive. However, Rogation Days remind us that our lives and seasons are in God’s hands.
“Rogation” comes from the Latin noun rogatio, meaning “asking” (the verb is rogare, “to ask”).
The Sixth Sunday of Easter (the fifth Sunday after Easter […]
Fasting is intuitively a bodily and a liturgical act. The Liturgical Year invites us to “days of discipline, denial, and special prayers” in Lent, Fridays outside of Christmastide and Eastertide, Rogation Days, and Ember Days (BCP, pg. 689). While intermittent fasting has recently been a diet fad, ordinarily fasting in our North American context is connected to the Church Year.
And, […]
Today is Easter Tuesday, the third day of Eastertide, which for Christians traditionally marks a period of fifty festal days.
This past Sunday, Christians gathered across the country, dressed in their finest (or most comfy) and raised the roof with their hallelujahs. They likely greeted each other, through their digital screens, with shouts of “Christ is risen!”, to which others […]
Assist us mercifully with your grace, Lord God of our salvation, that we may enter with joy upon the meditation of those mighty acts by which you have promised us life and immortality; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
If you’ve ever had a horrendous […]
O Lord our God, whose blessed Son gave his back to be whipped and did not hide his face from shame and spitting: Give us grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, […]
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the Cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with […]
Almighty and everliving God, in your tender love for the human race you sent your Son our Savior Jesus Christ to take upon himself our nature, and to suffer death upon the cross, giving us the example of his great humility: Mercifully grant that we may walk in the way of his suffering, and also share […]
This week, the Presbyterian theologian Carl Trueman reflected on what Christians ought to learn about ourselves and about the world from the COVID-19 pandemic. One thing, he says, seems obvious: “The levels of general panic indicate that few of us have been properly prepared for the reality of our own mortality.”
Many Christians have reflected on the significance of the […]
When a crisis hits, it’s easy to lose track of time. “What day is it today?” has been asked in our (virtual) office a lot this week. Our minds are all muddled, our senses are in overdrive, and our routines have been disrupted.
This is why, even though I otherwise expected it, I was surprised when the Daily […]
Editor’s Note: You can listen to this Ash Wednesday Sermon on Restoration Anglican Church’s podcast.
The life of Jesus is marked by healing. We marvel at the messiah as he travels through Galilee and Judea performing miracle after miracle, bringing wholeness and restoration to those who feel broken.
Does the solemn reminder of mortality we receive at the outset of […]
I belong to the generation that no one appears to understand: The Millennials. We have been referred to by the “e” word (entitled), and some spend thousands to purchase books and attend conferences in an attempt to understand this “everyone gets a trophy” generation. It’s pretty wild.
We are the generation that grew up with the rise and transformation of the […]
Despite its focus on repentance, Lent is no exception to the gracious focus of all Scripture—Jesus Christ himself. Scripture is always about redemption.
Before we look at that question, we have to lift a few burdens.
The very first time I gave anything up for Lent, I did it with a desperate heart: not sure what I needed, not sure what I wanted, and not sure what the whole thing was about anyway. I was raising and homeschooling three growing children, teaching literature at my homeschool co-op, running 30+ miles a week, and […]
If you are new to Lent, you can go to any Anglican, Lutheran, or Roman Catholic Church on Ash Wednesday. Or find another type of church that has an “Ash Wednesday” sign.
None of the traditions listed here require that you be a member to participate in the Ash Wednesday service. Just note that Orthodox churches (Greek, Russian, etc.) have […]
The following list (drawn from our book, Lent: The Journey from Ash Wednesday through Holy Week) is not exhaustive, but consider these Lenten lessons.
We are sinners and we need to repent—even after we are baptized, saved, forgiven, and healed. Yes, we continue to be a part of this […]
