The Arrow's Path

Being the first nice Wednesday in many months, the Wednesday church school activities involved drawing some sidewalk sketches with chalk. We have a dinosaur, a woman, and our dog, Max. I thought they were pretty good for 6 and 7 year-olds.

It is customary in Catholic, Anglican, and Orthodox circles to have days of the calendar devoted to commemorating certain saints. For instance, December 6th is the Feast Day of St. Nicholas. Today, being my birthday, it is the Feast Day of St. Anselm of Canterbury on the Roman and Anglican calendars. Anselm is best known for his theological work, Cur Deus Homo , in which he came up with (or greatly elaborated on) the theory of substitutionary atonement. You can read or listen to more about Anselm here . In the Orthodox calendar, which usually has a whole bunch of saints the West has never heard about, this is the Feast Day of Hieromartyr Januarius. You can listen about him here . Not a bad group, I must say.

I have received 15 birthday well wishes via Facebook, and they still keep coming. Amazing...this new fangled technology. In other birthday news, I apparently placed 3rd in the Boston Marathon . I didn't even know I had run in the Boston marathon. Good for me...uh, I guess. Never let it be said I didn't do the least I could do. I'd like to thank the academy...

He's taunting me!

"For the power of Man to make himself what he pleases means, as we have seen, the power of some men to make other men what they please." --C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man

My house and office is about 4 or 5 blocks south of South Dakota State. As I peer out my office window, I often see students walking to campus 10 to 15 minutes before the hour. As I was working on my sermon just now, I happened to glance up as I was sipping my coffee. Out of the window in my office, I think a Star Trek style Borg, masquerading as a student, walked by my window. The Borg drone student had a large Bluetooth and so was talking to the mothership Borg cube someone on the phone while simultaneously carrying a laptop under an arm, texting in one hand, and fiddling with an IPod with the other. "Resistance is Futile...you will be assimilated !"

The rector is back at it, hard at work...with some help from a friend.

(You may have to click on 'Fullscreen' to view the slide show)

The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

O God, Creator of heaven and earth: Grant that, as the crucified body of your dear Son was laid in the tomb and rested on this holy Sabbath, so we may await with him the coming of the third day, and rise with him to newness of life; who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 1979 Book of Common Prayer, Contemporary version

After the Maundy Thursday service, it is traditional in a lot of Episcopal Churches to do a vigil watch at the Altar of Repose from the end of the service until sunrise. This is not unlike the disciples at Gethsemane. Usually, there is a schedule for people to sign up for in hour increments, so people can come at some point in the night and sit and pray with Jesus on the night before Good Friday. Apparently, it had been a few years since this was done at my current parish. I decided to restart the tradition, and had enough people so that there was always someone in the chapel until sunrise. A few people who signed up had never actually done it before, so I left on a music stand some devotional materials for people to read if they needed something. After pondering what to put out, I decided to go with an Anglican theme, so all the works came from Anglican sources. Here's the list I came up with, which was apparently well received: 1. CS Lewis' The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardro...

Almighty God, we pray you graciously to behold this your family, for whom our Lord Jesus Christ was willing to be betrayed, and given into the hands of sinners, and to suffer death upon the cross; who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 1979 Book of Common Prayer, Contemporary Edition

Almighty Father, whose dear Son, on the night before he suffered, instituted the Sacrament of his Body and Blood: Mercifully grant that we may receive it thankfully in remembrance of Jesus Christ our Lord, who in these holy mysteries gives us a pledge of eternal life; and who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 1979 Book of Common Prayer, Contemporary Form

Lord God, whose blessed Son our Savior gave his body to be whipped and his face to be spit upon: Give us grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. -From the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and the Collect from the 10th Station of the Cross in the Book of Occasional Services

O God, who by the passion of thy blessed Son didst make an instrument of shameful death to be unto us the means of life: Grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ, that we may gladly suffer shame and loss for the sake of thy Son our Savior Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. 1979 Book of Common Prayer, traditional form, pg. 168 and the Collect Prayer from the 9th Station of the Cross from the Book of Occasional Services.

The Major League Baseball season started in earnest yesterday with Opening Day 2009. I find myself again having to adjust to the baseball landscape. Having lived in different areas of the country (Tennessee, Nebraska, Chicago, Nebraska, South Dakota), I keep finding myself in different regions with differing baseball allegiances. Growing up in the South, it was always the Atlanta Braves. It was hard to be a Braves fan back in the 80s when they were perennially in the cellar. Then they good really good during the 1990s run. One of my fondest memories from middle school was dancing around the house late at night with my parents the year Sid Bream scored in the 9th inning over the Pittsburgh Pirates to get the Braves to the World Series. We were all suppose to be in bed, but my parents said I could listen to the game on the radio. (They apparently were doing the same thing.) The Braves are still my favorite team, although they are trying really hard to get back to the glory days of being ...

So, as I blogged about (or was it Facebook?) earlier, my church decided to go with the Eco-friendly Palm leaves this year for Palm Sunday. Someone in my parish who teaches Environmental Sciences at SDSU found some resource through the Presbyterian Church that you could order Eco-friendly Palms that are fair trade. I am sometimes a little dubious of "fair trade" stuff, as it can be just another money making scheme to profit off gullible Christians, or else self defeating as such economic tactics can actually have the reverse effect and inflate a 3rd world market, thereby making local growers more dependent on White, Western consumers and not more independent because it can create an artificial market where growers are getting more than their crop is worth on an open market and thereby get dependent on it. Thus, when fickle 1st World Customers start buying elsewhere or local political instability comes into play, the artifical market collapses, and the farmers are left in wors...

I've been waste deep in Holy Week planning this week, so I have not had a whole lot of time to blog. (What's a few extra sermons to write up?) However, I think I have a handle on it now. Our Holy Week Schedule at St Paul's in Brookings, SD is: Tuesday of Holy Week : Morning Prayer: 8AM Eucharist, Rite II: 12:30 Evening Prayer: 5PM Wednesday of Holy Week : Holy Eucharist: 8AM Soup dinner and devotions, 6PM Maundy Thursday with Foot washing and the Stripping of the Altar: 7PM Good Friday Liturgy with Veneration of the Cross: 12:15 Stations of the Cross, 6PM on Good Friday Easter Vigil with the Lighting of the Paschal Candle and Renewal of Baptismal Vows: 8PM Easter Day : 10AM with Easter Egg Hunt after church service Confessions will be heard from 8:30 to 9, Tuesday-Friday or by appointment All are welcome to attend.

3 Days, 10 hours until the start of the Major League Baseball regular season. My winter sports hibernation will come to an end. (I've tried, but I just can't get into basketball.)