ACNA cathedrals are an ideal destination for anyone wanting to experience Holy Week at its Anglican fullest! Whether it’s carrying Palms in procession to mark the triumphant entrance of Jesus, or special services of prayer and reflection marking the days leading up to Spy Wednesday and the traditional Triduum, the ACNA’s cathedrals provide some wonderful opportunities to observe Holy Week among the body of faithful believers.
The Liturgical Home: Fig Tuesday
As we continue through Holy Week, we find ourselves in the last days of Jesus’ earthly life. After his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, he now moves between Bethany and the city, teaching in the Temple during the day and withdrawing again in the evenings. While in Jerusalem, Jesus taught in the Temple, confronted the religious…
Today in the Spirit: Palm Sunday A
In our walk with Jesus through the liturgical year, Palm Sunday is designed so that we might contemplate Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and his death on the cross as a unit. Yes, the reading of the Passion or our Lord on Palm Sunday is no doubt an accommodation to the fact that many churchgoers would…
St. Joseph and the Virtues of Silence
Saint Joseph was the head of the holy family and an indispensable figure in sacred history. Yet one of the most striking qualities of Joseph in the gospels is his silence.
Today in the Spirit: Lent 5A
The designation of Lent 5 Sunday as “Passion Sunday” in the BCP 2019 is a return to the same designation in the BCP 1928, where the two-week period from Lent 5 Sunday through Holy Saturday is also called “Passiontide.” The Collect and readings assigned in Lent 5A continue the trajectory of the penitential season, highlighting…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 4A
Lent is a season the church employs to teach that, by the light of the Son of God coming into the world, darkness opposed to his arrival is exposed. In these middle weeks of Lent Year A, the church assigns long Gospel readings from the Book of John in which there is significant dialogue between…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 3A
“It gives me great pleasure to see the stubbornness of an incorrigible nonconformist warmly acclaimed.” The scriptures, contrary to Albert Einstein, regard stubborn disobedience to the word of God as a non-conformity in which the Almighty takes no pleasure (though he forgives through Christ). As a group, the readings assigned for Lent 3 perhaps deliver…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 2A
In our worship during Lent 1, the church introduced, in dramatic fashion, the intense opposition in the world to the revelation of the Son of God. Now in Lent 2A, the prayers and propers highlight a critical internal conflict within the believing community: faith versus works as the path to fellowship with God. The assigned…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 1A
Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent and an abrupt shift in the church year from the Incarnation cycle (Advent through Epiphany) to the Paschal cycle (Lent through Pentecost). If, in general, the celebration of the incarnation of Christ has oriented us to wonder at the glory of Christ in the world, our worship now…
The Liturgical Home: How Epiphany Prepares Us for Lent
We’re still enjoying the glow of Christmastide when Epiphany comes, bright, radiant, and full of revelation. The season begins with the Wise Men, led by a star, arriving to worship the child King, and ends with the blinding glory of the Transfiguration. It’s a season of manifestations, of seeing Jesus clearly for who he truly…
Living Inside Psalm 51: A Conversation with David Roseberry
In a sense, Psalm 51 is emblematic of the Old Testament. It struggles with sin and the distance it creates from God—a distance King David is very nervous about personally experiencing—but it doesn’t offer a path to reunion and redemption except through the offering described at the end of the Psalm.
Behold This Thy Family: Cranmer’s Good Friday Collects
Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, who led the development of the Book of Common Prayer, crafted collects for Good Friday with a special emphasis on the church as the family of God. There are three collects for the day, the only occasion for which Cranmer appointed more than one. The first asks God to “behold this thy…
