Installation

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Today was the Installation service for me, which for my non-Episcopal readers means that I was formally installed as rector of St. Paul's. If you want to see the liturgy, you can read it its in the Book of Common Prayer on page 559. Its a nice service where members of the parish get to participate in various ways in the liturgy, bringing me symbolic items like a bible, holy oil, and a set of keys, etc. If you want to read the liturgy online, you can go here and scroll down about 3/4's of the way down the page to the section called "Celebration of a New Ministry."

We had a good turnout, including an Orthodox priest friend of mine from Lincoln who drove up and stayed with us for the weekend. (He's the one in the red hat in the pictures.) The Bishop-elect of South Dakota and his family came up, and he did most of the service with the permission of the current active bishop and preached a fabulous sermon. Another priest from Sioux Falls also attended and gave me a very nice edition of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Sanctorum Communio, as he peruses my blog and knows who my blog's patron saint is.

We decided to use the readings from the Feast of the Transfiguration which the Bishop-elect and I thought was most appropriate for the occasion. The feast is really Thursday, but we moved it to Sunday instead, as it is a major feast. Those proper readings can be found here.

We had a very nice lunch after the service of grilled pork loin and various and sundry other goodies brought by parishioners, including a very nice cake. It was a lovely day, and a very good service. Thanks to all who attended and helped out.

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