Reformed Churchmen

We are Confessional Calvinists and a Prayer Book Church-people. In 2012, we remembered the 350th anniversary of the 1662 Book of Common Prayer; also, we remembered the 450th anniversary of John Jewel's sober, scholarly, and Reformed "An Apology of the Church of England." In 2013, we remembered the publication of the "Heidelberg Catechism" and the influence of Reformed theologians in England, including Heinrich Bullinger's Decades. For 2014: Tyndale's NT translation. For 2015, John Roger, Rowland Taylor and Bishop John Hooper's martyrdom, burned at the stakes. Books of the month. December 2014: Alan Jacob's "Book of Common Prayer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Book-Common-Prayer-Biography-Religious/dp/0691154813/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417814005&sr=8-1&keywords=jacobs+book+of+common+prayer. January 2015: A.F. Pollard's "Thomas Cranmer and the English Reformation: 1489-1556" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-English-Reformation-1489-1556/dp/1592448658/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1420055574&sr=8-1&keywords=A.F.+Pollard+Cranmer. February 2015: Jaspar Ridley's "Thomas Cranmer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-Jasper-Ridley/dp/0198212879/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422892154&sr=8-1&keywords=jasper+ridley+cranmer&pebp=1422892151110&peasin=198212879

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Snoozing During Illiterate Episcopal Sermons Authorized/Required: "ZZZZ" for Katie Schori, PB of TEC

Entirely justified article by the Midwest Conservative Journal.  We'd add, that snoozing during TEC sermons is warranted, authorized, healthy and required.  I've heard some God-aweful, literally, some God-aweful sermons from Episcopal clerics.  Aweful!  The old hymns and echoes from the old Prayer Book, including the Creeds, still offer light, redemption and salvation...but those sermons?  Just some aweful sermons as TMCJ notes.


http://themcj.com/?p=39347

ZZZZZ…

Thursday, March 21st, 2013 | Uncategorized

Experts agree that the worst preaching in Christendom occurs in the Episcopal Organization. The rector could get off a good one every now and then. But one of the other ministers there got into the habit of making his point a paragraph or two in and then repeating it over and over to the point where I regularly thought (and occasionally thought about screaming), “THAT’S BEEN ESTABLISHED!!

The associate rector (the wife of the rector) didn’t really have a particular method but just went into the pulpit and started emoting all over everything. In her 2013 Easter message, Katharine Jefferts Schori demonstrates a third method. String together a few “spiritual” sentences and hope you get something meaningful and not something that reads like the Federal Register:

Rejoice, rejoice and sing, rejoice and be glad… for earth and heaven are joined and humanity is reconciled to God!

As the Lenten season ends in Easter rejoicing, note what has been wrought in you this year. A remarkable cross-section of America has been practicing Lenten disciplines, even some who are not active Christians. There is a deep hunger in our collective psyche to re-orient our lives toward life and light, healing and peace. We share a holy hunger for clarity about what is good and life-giving, and we yearn to re-focus on what is most central and important in life.

Easter celebrates the victory of light and life over darkness and death. God re-creates and redeems all life from dead, dry, and destroyed bones. We are released from the bonds of self-obsession, addiction, and whatever would steal away the radical freedom of God-with-us. Our lives re-center in what is most holy and creative, the new thing God is continually doing in our midst. Practicing vulnerability toward the need and hunger of others around us, we have cultivated compassionate hearts. We join in baptismal rebirth in the midst of Jesus’ own passing-over.

Better luck next year, Kate.

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