My mum and I were on holiday last week and, as is our wont, we visited a number of churches, mainly around Rutland Water where we were staying, but also one the way too and fro. Mostly they were open; sadly, the one exception was in Ledbury. I say sadly because my granny used to be a church watcher there to help keep it open. Hopefully that ( Read more... )

I love Corpus Christi and over the last few years in Cardiff and Bristol I've struggled to find places which keep it as well as LSM did in Cambridge on the historic date of the Thursday after Easter. For example last year at All Saints', Clifton only the Sanctuary party processed and only around church. So this year as I had two days off (my ( Read more... )

While doing my Christmas shopping I spotted The Shack and succumbed to temptation and bought it. I'd heard interesting things about it and so wanted to read it for myself ( Read more... )

Well due to the organist being away our MC had to play the organ. I'd found one other server (newish to the congo LEM but hadn't served with us before) and then at the crib service we acquired another (a teenager from the other church in the parish) which gave us two acolytes and me as Thurifer cum MC ( Read more... )

I've been thinking about the tensions that can arise between the pastoral and the prophetic. The pastoral focusses on caring for people in the world as it is, while the prophetic speaks about how the world is not how it should be. Last night, the issue that brought this up was war. Pacifism is prophetic -- war should not be. Army chaplains are ( Read more... )

I decided I needed to indulge my Methodist tendencies this morning and went to Cathays Methodist Church".* On the whole it was a good service. Stephen coped with the issue of children's address (which isn't part of the liturgy) and Epiphany by having a hymn, reading (Matthew 2), talk, hymn, children left, Covenant liturgy. He lost points by only ( Read more... )

I had a PM on the ship today asking permission to use something I'd posted on the Liturgy of Unrest Thread which now resides in Limbo. I vaguely remembered the piece though I'd forgotten I'd posted it there. Re-reading it I wanted to alter the punctuation slightly ( Read more... )

I was slightly surprised to find us singing Come ye faithful raise the anthem as the offertory hymn this evening because I associated it with cheerful occasion, not quite Eastertide but nearly (partly I think because of Come ye faithful raise the strain. However, I had forgotten until we got to the relevant verse (4?) that is was definitely ( Read more... )

Auricular confession raises Protestant hackles as soon as it's mentioned. `Christ is the only Mediator; we do not need to go through a priest to be forgiven', they say. And yes, that's all true, but it completely misses the point. It's not about having to go through a priest to be forgiven, but a gift from God, a Sacrament, for our benefit. We don' ( Read more... )

A reminder about the Christians in Unity in Cambridge Service for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity this evening at 7:30pm in Clare College Chapel with the Bishop of Peterborough as the preacher.