Liturgical Necessities

[0:00] I will start by, you know, I just had a conversation before this, talking about different liturgical traditions, and in one liturgical tradition, I may have been going, yeah, brother, say it, say it, brother, say it, brother.

[0:18] I, of course, am in agreement with Jim. We are here, you all have been given prayer books on your seats.

[0:29] These came from my house. When people come over, they often remark on, what is this house? You've got these prayer books on a shelf. So you may not take them away with you unless you speak to me, please.

[0:42] So at the end, if you could, I have some boxes and either leave them on your seats or put them into the boxes, which we will put out. But we are going to use them at one point.

[0:54] So the title I gave this talk is Liturgy, A Kindness of God, and have a question mark at the end of it.

[1:05] I think liturgy does cause all kinds of dissension and has right from the beginning. So we might look then this morning at liturgy.

[1:20] We are all probably going to be taken up in liturgy this morning as we go to church together, or we may have been at 7.30 communion as I was.

[1:31] We will be enacting something, not just casual observers, but hopefully those who are intentionally present with the Lord in our hearing and speaking and praying the word.

[1:48] The most important ingredient of a holy Christian life is to be steeped in scripture so that our thoughts and actions embody the truth of our condition.

[2:01] The word liturgy is Greek for any public service and has come to be shorthand for all the ordered worship in public or private, which brings us into a heightened and focused awareness of God.

[2:26] We lift up tired hearts looking for relief from the things that haunt us and that wake us up in the middle of the night.

[2:37] Even the person who claims no knowledge of God will admit to wondering from time to time what it might be like to have the burden of so many layers of disappointment lifted.

[2:50] Even such a person has something to learn from our liturgy. How we carry out the conversation between heaven and earth.

[3:01] The language we use. The ordering of the great themes. The Godward motion we make as we reach to be known and to understand.

[3:13] This is what I want to look at this morning. I'm not going to open the Pandora's box as I was trying to do when I was writing this talk.

[3:24] And I had all these, you know, the way I talk is kind of threads all over the place. And my paper was getting to have, you know, Microsoft Word allows you to have all these things everywhere.

[3:36] And I am not going to open the Pandora's box of examining doctrine of church practice regarding Holy Communion or the differing views on the formularies of church authority, which we're all kind of overloaded with these days.

[3:53] And I want to remind you to pray for the church, particularly this weekend. And tomorrow is the day that the network clergy have been given to give Michael Ingham their answer about what will be happening with the charge, very serious charge of abandonment of ministry that has been made against them.

[4:14] So do pray for the church. Instead of opening all these heavy, weighty questions, which I'm not really qualified much to talk about, I'm going to talk about what is very near to my heart, an affection for the prayer book, and particularly the offices of morning and evening prayer, and the liturgy for those that are laid out in the prayer book.

[4:46] This liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer, morning and evening prayer, is very flexible. And I hope to be able to show you some different ways of using it.

[4:59] For we all go, and if you were at 730 Communion, we heard from Matthew about not being like the hypocrites and praying to make a big fuss.

[5:11] But we are called to go into our closet to pray, and we need to have an intimate relationship with our Lord and God.

[5:22] Salvation has to begin from that relationship that we have to Him. I do not think, though, that we are merely folks getting together when we come together congregationally.

[5:39] Individuals praying to God. We are more than that. There is some mystery and requirement of us coming together as a body, and that is where this happens.

[5:51] And the liturgy is an important structure directing us. And there is a common romantic. The romantic were particularly prone to thinking that you could go into any meadow anywhere and be close to your God, and you don't need to be in church.

[6:08] I think that you will not come to a mature faith with that kind of thinking. So there needs to be a cohabiting that we have of the two.

[6:24] A very well-developed, individual, intimate relationship with the Father, and we must also come together as a congregation.

[6:34] And I would also like to touch on this morning other ways of more intimate groupings of people. Praying, perhaps, I mean, what I've been trying to get people interested in is praying the daily office, and I will describe that a little further in here.

[6:52] The liturgy, as I say, is quite flexible and may be used on a Sunday morning in some traditions, sung in the Masses, leading into Holy Communion.

[7:04] And I will only touch on the idea of singing scripture, because scripture is what we're up doing. And I think that a lot of work is being done on how the brain functions.

[7:16] I don't know about you. I find sometimes when I'm in trouble, the scripture I remember best is the scripture which I have sung. So, you know, I grew up at a time, I hated Sunday school when I was a kid.

[7:30] It's humorous that I used to run a Sunday school here. I would much, I much preferred being in church with my parents, because I liked sung liturgy. And I find still, when I'm in trouble, I can sing some of the psalms because I had sung them.

[7:47] So, I think there's a lot to be said. Masses, the sun, morning prayer, which then would lead to Holy Communion in some traditions. Evening prayer is very similar to morning prayer, which I'll show you soon on a chart that I've made.

[8:03] The prayer book lays this system of prayer. And actually, I'll just turn this on now. Hopefully this will make sense.

[8:16] The prayer book lays out a template that we can use in different ways. One might use this as, as I say, a skeleton to support your private devotions.

[8:29] So, I'm always going around telling people, come and get a prayer book for me. And I get people to put little ribbons in so you can keep straight where you are. It's a wonderful tool for private devotions.

[8:42] The prayer book is, what the rubrics in the prayer book actually require of the clergy. And I point this out sometimes, rather roguish, or in a waggish kind of way.

[8:57] In certain circles and the rubrics, the little italic instruction, how you use this system, And clergy are required to do the office of morning and evening prayer every day in the church.

[9:16] Now, we have a different culture we live in. Our congregation does not live in a village. We can't walk over to the parish, hall, or church when the bell rings anymore.

[9:28] And we need to have a little bit more sympathy for our clergy. And I certainly don't expect that. But it is a rich thing to do.

[9:40] When Anglicans gather as the church in this parish, and oftentimes in this book, we are called, when we're praying for the parish, we're called the church in this parish.

[9:54] We are part of the larger body of the church, and we are the church. We gathered in this room are the church, part of the church in this parish. So we use this as a template for our worship on Sunday.

[10:10] And I've made this chart because I think it's more edifying to actually be aware of some of the purposes of the parts of the structure.

[10:21] So I would like to point out that I've got a little circle up here and here, which more or less frame structurally this very important central part, which you will look and see is basically scripture and a lot of scripture.

[10:47] And then the Apostles' Creed comes and we say a very clear statement after we have heard this much scripture and prayed this much scripture.

[11:03] The credo. This is what I believe. It is not something that comes out of the air. We have a reason. We say this clearly after we read and pray scripture.

[11:19] So we come to church as an unruly bunch in our own mindset, with our own purposes, with our vain imaginations. And after a short sentence of scripture, so in the top little circle, we open with a statement, usually in the Book of Common Prayer.

[11:40] And we are boldly confronted by an exhortation. And that is where we are reminded that we need to get straight to the urgent business of acknowledging our sins and wickedness.

[11:54] We are called to get on our knees and pray together. And some of the best sentences ever written in English in the general confession.

[12:06] And there's nowhere to hide when the general confession is prayed. Now, I don't know that we've got time and I tend to go over time. So I was going to do a little exercise of seeing if we, I bet most of us, could actually recite the general confession.

[12:21] It's a very, I would suggest when you go home, that it's a wonderful thing. It's a wonderful way to open your morning. Far from dwelling on our wretchedness, we ask mercy for it.

[12:39] Ask to be restored from the effects of our wretchedness. And dare to resolve from this moment to lead a life renewed in restoration of purpose.

[12:51] We are reminded then, in the words of the absolution, which follows the general confession, of the sure promise that Christ has given us. How he has suffered for us, forgiven us our sins.

[13:04] And if we will only understand and accept it, he has taken the burden off our shoulders. Then as Christ himself taught us to pray, we pray the Lord's Prayer.

[13:19] And so that is this great section in that little circle up at the top. Then we come to the benighted. And this is Psalm 95, which leads us into praise and prayer, reminding us who we are.

[13:38] We are sheep, and God has made our earth, and this is how we fit into our place in the universe. And then we have a very serious reminder, which doesn't always have to be added.

[13:55] I think probably depending on what the Psalms for the given morning will be, which is, we go astray. And the children of Israel wandered in the desert for a very long time.

[14:08] And that this is serious business, wandering off in the desert. And anyway, we come next to the Psalms. And the Psalms are multifaceted.

[14:22] They are prayers as poetry and song. They are what our Lord would have known intimately well. They present us with a way in which to be transported to a place, a time, and prayer that goes beyond time.

[14:41] So much of what is prayed in the Psalms, and they are meant to be prayed, I think, reaches deeply into what we are.

[14:53] And with the Psalmist, we pray directly, sometimes lifting our hands and hearts in joyous praise, sometimes acknowledging our utter disobedience, and along with Israelite's contrition.

[15:07] We marvel at the imagery that touches our souls with phrases like this. And I'm just going to go through some of my favorite songs. Like as the heart, and that's talking about fear, desireth the water brooks, so longeth my soul after thee, O God.

[15:27] My soul is thirst for God, yea, even for the living God. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint.

[15:38] This is from the Psalms for this morning, and we will pray that. Can you just tell us where you're reading those Psalms? The Psalms? I have no idea, is that the one that you just read?

[15:49] The particular one? I mean, that's actually from, I believe, Psalm 102 or 3, somewhere in this morning's Psalms. I'm afraid that, if you haven't already figured out, I'm not a very linear person.

[16:04] I get completely muddled with numbers. The only Psalm I actually remember for sure is Psalm 139, and the 23rd Psalm.

[16:15] I know 119 is the long one. I picked out my favorite quotes, but I kind of see them differently than, I'm sorry, I can't help you with that.

[16:25] I do know, though, that the one I just read is in this morning's Psalms, and we will pray it together at the end. Psalm 42. Oh, that's, oh, okay.

[16:36] Well, it's also, it's in another one as well. So, anyway. Yea, the sparrow hath found her an house, and the swallow a nest, where she may lay her young.

[16:49] For he knoweth whereof we are made. He remembereth that we are but dust. The days of man are but as grass. For he flourisheth as a flower of the field.

[17:01] For as soon as the wind goeth over it, it is gone, and the place thereof shall know it no more. And this is a good one, actually, for us to pray right now, when church unity is such a huge question.

[17:21] I've always been trying to say unity in what, because we have to be careful of that. Behold, how good and joyful a thing it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.

[17:34] It is like the precious oil upon the head that ran down into the beard, even unto Aaron's beard, and went down to the collar of his clothing. And then my favorite song, For thou didst form my inward parts.

[17:50] Thou didst knit me together in my mother's womb. I will give thanks unto thee, For I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvellous are thy works, And that my soul knoweth right well.

[18:05] My frame was not hid from thee When I was made secretly, And fashioned beneath in the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, Yet being imperfect, And in thy book were all of them written.

[18:18] I am sure you must hear it. This language is like the intersection Of how we carry out this conversation Between heaven and earth.

[18:30] The language we use is Godward motion. This reach to be known and to know. So what is the language of that conversation?

[18:44] Liturgy is a kindness of God Because we are made in the likeness of God As those who communicate. We long to communicate with one another. One of the most painful things Is feeling misunderstood.

[18:58] And it afflicts probably all of us. Although we imagine everybody else Has that problem solved. Augustine, at a young age, Wrote in the first book of Confession, At the beginning of his great life, And he became a lion Protecting the doctrine of the church, About this longing, And I think the longing Very common to all people.

[19:30] And how shall I call upon my God, My God and Lord, Since when I call for him, I shall be calling him to myself. And what room is there within me, Whither my God can come into me, God who made heaven and earth?

[19:48] Is there indeed, O Lord, My God, aught in me That can contain thee? To then heaven and earth, Which thou hast made, And wherein thou hast made me, Contain thee?

[20:00] Or because nothing which exists Could exist without thee? Doth therefore whatever exists Contain thee? These questions people have been asking For a very long time, And I hope we all recognize That we ask them.

[20:17] Those are some of the questions I think we ask in the middle of the night When we wake up. People are created in God's image. We have mind and heart and spirit.

[20:27] We long for intimacy With our Lord and God. People are created As this kind of being. God as we know him In the Christian faith Is not distant And stone-like, Inert.

[20:43] He is a God who speaks. He spoke creation into being. He spoke to his people In covenantial relationship. And when he speaks to us It is in a particular And a specific way.

[20:59] We all happen to be caught in time now. He is a God of relationship And a God of detail. He is the God who We heard in our sermon A few months ago About the tabernacle That amazing and mysterious Instruction on how to make the tabernacle And how exquisitely beautiful And detailed it was.

[21:23] So he is a God of detail. He made us to be in relationship In detail. An I and thou relationship And one that we are called To be in relationship Together with God.

[21:42] Anglican liturgy Is based on the understanding That is ancient. That holy scripture Is the language That defines this communication.

[21:55] There is no other form of liturgy Which I am aware of That is set so that we pray Holy scripture As much as Anglican liturgy does.

[22:05] For all that Anglican liturgy Can have is danger signs And I know that there There are dangers in this liturgy. That if we understand And if we have A relationship with Christ The fact that we pray So much holy scripture Is us at the business Of that communication.

[22:30] Simply put. I can't say more strongly What a good system this is For holding our feet To the fire of holy scripture.

[22:43] Why is good liturgy Important to the church? God uses liturgy First to shape us I would say. He is the potter We are the vessel.

[22:55] And God's people Create and participate In liturgy To express our love And adoration To him. We do that in our closet We do that When we are together.

[23:09] Because this is the way That we are actually engaging With the one who made us. Liturgy also Protects the doctrine Of the church.

[23:22] Perhaps we could get Into that. It can't be a little bit Of a thorny issue. We could perhaps get into that In the question time. Anglican liturgy Is a particularly good vehicle For this purpose.

[23:36] It meets humans How we are. How we are made. It is the tonic required To live a life of holiness. And it is a very flexible system.

[23:48] And can touch I would think Any culture Any person At any time. Now I have been Some of you may know And this is not a boast It is just something I am not On my own A very disciplined person And my sister is visiting This morning From Calgary And she can tell you As growing up She being the second sister And I the elder sister And I was Pretty Free spirit And I am not terribly disciplined But I have found it very helpful To be coming here Five mornings a week To pray The office At seven in the morning And with a small group And any of you Are welcome to do that It is not advertised anymore Because I realize That without a team of us Sharing the responsibility It simply meant That I was never even allowed To go and visit someone Somewhere else Or have a cold

[24:49] And have to sleep in So it is not advertised We communicate In that modern way Of email And say yes I will be there tomorrow See you there Any of you who want to Do this after this talk Just come and speak to me But because I have been doing this I have been learning Wonderful new things And I would like to Just use this chart again To say a few things About this center part How it is That scripture Shapes us In this form of liturgy The psalms I think As evangelicals Sometimes In our liturgy We tend to undervalue And I said this the last time And I still think we do You have more time When you are together In an intimate group To do the full complement Of the psalms

[25:50] And we will do them together This morning Which is why you all Have prayer book But If one Looks at the psalms As being Sort of a A way of bridging A gap It's something I've really Started appreciating As I'm praying them In the cycle We've been doing it Almost six months now And so You get to that Part of the month And you go Yes Here are these psalms And now That I'm reading them Along with Traveling through In a linear fashion Through scripture And we have just finished In the lectionary Exodus And we're almost finished Deuteronomy And we have gone through The gospel of John And have been doing acts For a month And it's fascinating To see The whole breadth

[26:51] Of history The way that The Jewish church Understood The questions Of what was important In psalms Very related To justice We pray some of those psalms About justice And laugh a little At how the Hebrews Could be naive Asking for justice Shaking their fist And asking for justice I think they had A very fine sense In the psalms Of knowing That only God Would bring justice The Christian Angle On justice Is That Christ Has brought us The justice We go back Into the psalms And augment Certain understandings That are in what The Jewish tradition Taught And I think It is

[27:51] In a linear sense The Jews Actually They pray And understand the psalms In a way That is Very fine I think we And it's interesting I'm sure that Jewish people Who become Christians It is Like a light Goes on And they understand With that End of time It's the end of time Justice That we understand The psalms With As Christians It is It is quite a Marvelous Co-mingling Of ideas And so I like The fact That the psalms When you pray The full complement Of psalms And if you pray them The way the daily office Would have you pray them You pray all 150 psalms Once a month And they are laid out In the book of common prayer If you haven't noticed In the psalms They're laid out Even More And that's what that is about

[28:53] And what I'm noticing Is just as when you Hear the parables That Christ Taught And we hear them Over and over again And we read them Over and over again And we go Oh I've heard that Parable a hundred times And I've just heard Something fresh in it So with the psalms And so with The lessons from The Old Testament And the New Testament Sitting They come after the psalms So the psalm Sits underneath of them Gives your heart A new way of thinking In your mind A new way of thinking Of scripture That you are then Going to be reading And when you follow The system of doing The daily office You read Usually Four chapters of scripture A day So it's a lot of scripture And to have

[29:53] The new understanding That the psalms Bring to that scripture Is a wonderful way Of being brought To maturity In the faith And so I really Am finding This the most Wonderful experience I can't tell you enough And I don't have The discipline To do it on my own I've tried before So I even come To St. John's In the mornings Getting out of bed Getting dressed Driving in my car And a month ago I was going to scrape My window every morning I'm about a third Of the time By myself But I'm finding It is a very good thing As Martha Stewart Would say It And another thing I can't tell you enough And I was asked To give my goddaughter Some wisdom recently Because she was Being confirmed And I had to think

[30:56] Long and hard About what I would Say to her And it was this At least once In her life You should try To read the psalms For six months In this way And try to go And read them Out loud somewhere And let the words Pour off of your tongue And then go Into your heart And mind There is something Different that happens When you read And pray The psalms And the very Intimate thing That's been happening In our little Group Of those of us Who are praying Together And we sing Coverdale songs Which are what Are in the prayer book Are divided You will see And you will have noticed With You know The little lines I don't know What those are called But To be sung Antiphonally When you call Back and forth This is You know The call back In an Anglican sense A service

[31:57] Is call back and forth Praying the psalms Back and forth To one another You call That truth Into one Into one another's Attention It's You hear it Differently And so the other Thing I'm going to Recommend is If you're married Or if you Like reading out loud To your children Or you know If you If you have a good friend I would try To read the psalms Pray the psalms This way At least once In your life All the way Through the cycle But it even Is more exciting When you do it A second And a third And a fourth time And see What new things Come to you Out of the Holy scripture I think it informs us And equips us well So That's that And I'll turn off My little chart I well I didn't say very much About the end We We have

[32:57] In the layout Of the service These other things Which actually In the same way And I'll apply The canticles Which Well I think this is Perhaps in the questions We could come up With that But I would just point out That the Magnificat And I'll use the Magnificat As an example Because we These are important parts Of morning and evening prayer The Magnificat Being prayed In evening prayer That is Luke 1.46 And it's where Mary Is praying that prayer Which I used to find Perplexing That we had that In our liturgy How were we praying With Mary My soul doth magnify You know The gracious Sort of acceptance That Mary had Of the mystery That had come upon her And I think that When we put it In the setting Of where we are With this understanding

[33:59] Of history With the Psalms And our place With Mary We with Mary pray this Prayer Let it be thy will Where my eyes Have now seen The purpose of history And I think that We can pray that prayer And all of the Canticles Have that other way Of taking us And showing us Newly Again and again Remember these things Remember these things Here is what Your salvation is about So we have This wonderful Thing Which I'd like In part two Of the service Which sits And tethers us To who we are In our father And brings us To maturity And it is then After we have Spent this incredible Time

[34:59] Amount of time With scripture That we And we end With the credo As I said before We then Bring our petitions To our father And that That maturity Comes in how We make Our prayers By being shaped By our understanding Of how to ask God The proper And right things I think that That is a right order And that is actually What I mean You know The doctrine Of the church Is held together To have us As God's people Have a proper Understanding Of where the Authority To come And ask God For things In prayer Where that Authority Comes from So anyway I would like to

[35:59] End With two things And I always Do kind of Eccentric things That I think This is serious Business That we are About as Christians And we have Serious responsibilities We need to go Into our culture And our world And things Are in great Disarray In our culture And we need To learn How we Confront This sobering Reality Of the chaos In which we live And for those Of us Who have children Or grandchildren Or know Young people I would like To read A quote From one Of my Favorite Commentators On the culture She was One of Ronald Reagan's Speech writers Peggy Noonan And she's a Catholic And a very faithful woman And she's talking about What is

[37:00] What We are awash In our culture And we need some Serious help And so Here is what she said After the Columbine massacre Which You know Culturally We recognize that As a shocking moment In our history Think of it this way Your child Is an intelligent Little fish He swims In deep water Waves of sound And sight Of thought And fact Come invisibly Through that water Like radar They go through him Again and again From this direction And that The sound From the television Is a wave The sound From the radio The headlines On the newsstand On the magazines On the ad On the bus As it whizzes by All are waves The fish Your child And I would say We ourselves You can't even Being aware

[38:00] But Is bombarded And barely knows it But the waves Contain words Words like this Which I limit To only one source The news Was found strangled And is believed To have been Sexually molested Stop Had her breast Implants removed Stop Took the stand To say the killer Was smiling The day The show aired Stop Said the procedure Is in fact Legal infanticide Stop Is thought To be Connected to earlier Sexual activity Among teens Stop Court battle Over who owns The frozen sperm Stop Contains songs That call for Dominating and even Imprisoning women Stop Died of lethal Injection Stop Had threatened To kill her children Stop Had asked Kivorkin

[39:01] For help In killing himself Stop Protested the game Which they said Had gone beyond Violence to sadism Stop Showed no remorse Stop Which is about A wager over Whether he could Sleek with another Student Stop Which is about Her attempts To balance Three lovers And a watchful fiance This is the ocean Which our children In which our children Swim And I would say We ourselves We have We've become quite Anesthetized to these Things that surround us We need strong medicine To become To fight These powers And principalities And to rise To the requirement We must be armed well And we must arm Our children well It is very important To our maturation In the faith

[40:01] To be bathed In scripture It is important In the way That the end Of the letter To the church At Ephesus Paul speaks Of being armed And we're going To be studying Ephesus Over the next Weeks We are called To remember And to remember And to remember And to be armed With holy scripture We know how to do so By recollecting What God has called us to Through time And so To end today What I'd like us to do Is open our prayer books And it being the 20th We will turn To page 458 And you'll see That says The 20th day Morning prayer And I think We'll probably pray Two of the songs Together

[41:04] And we'll do it responsibly I will pray The Well actually We could No I'll pray The odd verses You pray The even verses And listen to the sound Of these words Hear my prayer O Lord And let my crying Come unto thee Cry not My place For me In time Of my trouble In time I hear Unto me Though here Be my call And that I assume For my days Consume away Like smoke And my bones Are burnt up As it were A firebrand My heart Is sitting down With a bed Like grass For I forget To eat my bread For the voice Of my groaning My bones Cleave to my flesh But my name Come like a pelican In the wilderness And my cowl Is in the desert I watch And am even

[42:05] As it were A sparrow That sitteth alone Upon the housetop My enemies Revival me All the day long And they Are magnanimous To use my name To curse For I have eaten Ashes As it were bread And mingled My drink With weeping And that Because of My indignation And the wrath Without Hath taken me up And cast me down My days Are gone Like a shadow And I am Withered Like grass But thou O Lord Shalt endure Forever And thy remembrance Throughout all generations Thou shalt arise And have mercy Upon Zion For it is time That thou Have mercy Upon her Yea The time Has come And provide Thy servants To get upon The stones And visit Them to see The nations Shall fear Thy name O Lord And all the kings Of the earth Thy majesty When the Lord

[43:06] Hath filled up Zion And the name Of higher Deer in his glory When he hath Turned him Unto the prayer Of the poor Destitute And hath not Despised Their desire This shall hear To those That come after And the people Which shall be born Shall praise The Lord For he hath Looked down From his sanctuary Out of the heaven Did the Lord Behold the earth That they might Hear the warnings Of such As there are Injectivity And deliver them To our point Unto death That they may Declare the name Of the Lord In Zion And his worship In Jerusalem When the people Are gathered together And the kingdoms Also As the spirit of the Lord He hath brought down My strength In my journey And shortened my days I will stay Before my life And take it not Away In the midst Of my age As for many years They endure For the whole generations Thou Lord

[44:07] In the beginning Hast laid the foundation Of the earth And the heavens Are the work Of thy hand They shall perish And thou shalt endure And they also Have a soul And thought of their minds And as a vesture Suck felt Thou change them And they shall be changed But thou art the same And thy years Shall not fail The children of thy service Shall continue And their peace Shall stand past In thy sight And then too Put it into Its true significance Historically We say Glory be to the Father And to the Son And to the Holy Ghost And you say As of the beginning Is now And ever shall be Glory be to the Lord And thy time Amen And I will just finish I think I'll let you Read the rest of those songs Read them tonight In your bed Or you know I'll finish

[45:09] Because of where we're at In our church life Right now With a prayer On the very very last page Of the prayer book Perhaps you would turn with me Since you all happen To have them And we're going to pray For the parish Let's go together Most merciful Father We beseech thee To send down Thy heavenly blessings Upon thy church In this parish And all its members May dwell together In community And our daily love Keep your heart From us All self-will And discord Endure thy ministers With righteousness And enable them Faithfully To send us Thy holy word And sacraments To bring again The outcasts And to seek the lost Grant that we may So receive their ministrations And use thy means of grace That in all our words And these We may seek thy glory

[46:10] And the advancement Of thy kingdom Through Jesus Christ Our Lord Amen Thank you And now Are there any questions Yes Well this is a question Really which In terms of the I can't answer But I think In the end of the church In England The evangelicals In fact almost Almost completely Abandons the use Of the prayer book There Yes Do you have any Sort of Comments Or differences Between Why You know In Canada The evangelicals Are hearing Of the prayer book What One of the things That Made me Tear up Slightly After we I was one of the people That walked out of the Synod of New Westminster

[47:11] And we all went To St. Martin's In North Vancouver And had Holy Communion And we got to that part Of Holy Communion Where the priest says The Lord be with you And there were two of us In the group Who said And with thy spirit And the rest went And also with you And I It was like this little Realization that I had Which is Most of the Those gathered No longer use The liturgy Of the prayer book I think there are Huge problems With the alternative Services I don't think It's The people Who Were Some of the people Working on Those new liturgies Were of goodwill And were orthodox And some were not And some of the Doctrine Of the teaching Of the church Has been taken Off course And I Even hear Some evangelicals When they're speaking

[48:11] Of baptism Now They just fall Into the language Of the liberals Which is Baptism is all About community It is You know We are What baptism does Is welcome Y'all come in here And that is not The teaching Of Christendom On baptism So I get worried Sometimes Because I think The liturgy Is quite important In keeping us On track I'm hoping You know I've been noticing On the internet Now That people Are talking About You know A lot of us Have been Frustrated Because it's Taking so long For our problems To get straightened Out In church Authority Questions And what That authority Is about And people Keep saying Oh we've been Six years now This is a long Time But I've been Noticing on the internet

[49:11] People are talking Forty years now And that's A good It's a good precedent For thinking Forty years We see it A number of times But I I think That That liturgy Is Vitally important In Anglicanism So I That's That's why I keep wanting To talk about this And I I have a feeling There's got to be Some reckoning Happening As we're all Reconfiguring And this muddled Mess is happening But I am hoping That A common liturgy Will develop again Peter Toon Who Was the president Of the American Prayer Book Society And I'm told Went He and Jim knew One in other In university days Has done A vernacular Of The offices

[50:12] And It's an interesting book If you want to look at it The problem with Often times With trying to Come up with new liturgy Is Vernacular language Actually goes out of date Much more quickly It's pretty hard By the time you get Something published Often times You are actually looking Old fashioned This You know I think there Are more worrisome Things About A lack of Solid liturgy In Corporate worship And practice Than just Language problems And I I don't know how To You know I I don't know how To solve that problem I think Essentials Was a unique Little organisation It's Got some interesting Problems developing And I think Part of The problem Is that we never Hammered out Some of those things I think that God in his wisdom Brought together

[51:12] Charismatics Evangelicals And prayer book people And We didn't get down To the serious business Of trying to hammer Some of those questions Because I think It's really important But I haven't got much Of an answer I But You know Obviously I like the prayer book So I would like to See us Yes Yeah Hi I have a wonderful talk Thank you Oh thank you I haven't run into it Nearly as deeply As you have But it just strikes me That Whenever I've brushed up Against A new version Of liturgy Or something Modern Was to get us all With it I'm in a very Believe Not only doctrinal differences But the depth The richness That we have In Cranwell's original You know You just He was brilliant I mean He was that Emotion in history It seems to me Where He was the right mind At the right time With the right heart

[52:13] And thought And just created This wonderful thing I have never seen Anything to touch it No Is there anything Out there Or is that why You are sort of You know This morning You know Getting purple You know Because If there's something That's out there I'd like to know about it But I haven't I've always been disappointed Well me too Because the problem is We have There's nothing like In the general confession You know These things And they pin us They nail What we're like You know Almighty and most Merciful Father We have erred And strayed From thy ways Like lost sheep We have followed Too much The devices And desires Of our own hearts Now The language Is Very It I think It touches Possibly Because we know The language Well So we've already

[53:14] Dealt with what It means I think It touches Something very deep As good Art Does As you know So I myself Have usually Been disappointed And I don't know How you get Around that I think That what's needed Is more education And C.S. Lewis When he was talking In prayer letters To Malcolm Said that If you're ever Going to start Revising Make sure You You do it Slowly So maybe One word Every 50 years Or something I think you said In the book It has to be done Very artfully And You have to Make sure It's not at a time Of total chaos In the church And You know I I think We have to Be very careful The The other problem Though I I didn't bring This quote But P.D. James Who I love

[54:15] Her mysteries And Just I just read One Again Recently Innocent blood And there's a quote In it Something Like She's talking About schoolgirls Who've gone I'm assuming To an Anglican School And how You know They were High Anglicans And High Anglicans Have that Perfect marriage Of I wish I'd Brought the quote It's a great quote Of You know Perfect Beautiful liturgy Which marries Myth And I can't remember It's that understanding That these are all Just myths And that It's that Beautiful language We meet people Every day Who actually Know the words Of the prayer book Because They were brought Up with it But they are asleep They haven't met Their lord They And That is one Of the dangers And And I don't know How you solve That problem I mean For me I will just Keep plugging away

[55:16] At trying to educate People On What some of You know I've had arguments With many clergy About the word Quick The quick and the dead Well what does Quick mean And I say Well it's too bad This word has fallen Out of use Women The first time The baby moves In the womb That's called Quickening And we Gardeners know About the quick Because if you cut The quick of the tree All the way around Which is the part That brings life To the tree The reason You see all the Little plastic things On trees When they're planted Is so that These weed eaters That gardeners use Won't Cut the quick Of the tree When they're gardening Those silly machines Because it will Kill the tree Now when you know That about the word Quick It gives a new Understanding of Quick and the dead And that is Something I mean The language Is impoverished Now anyway And But I Think that It isn't just Tasteful language

[56:16] That the prayer book Is It's actually When you're Shaped by Holy scripture And when you Start Allowing God To shape you Through the liturgy And actually Pray those prayers Then I think God has a chance Of doing something In you And then It isn't just That cultural Loveliness Yes Could I follow up On that Writing a footnote As it were To what you Just said By making Two points About prayer book Language And I Perhaps I should First say this I was in England When all this Longing For revised Forms Of worship Blew up In the Anglican communion And the Thought was

[57:17] That By having Up to date Vernacular Prayers In the Language The streamlined Language Of the Mid 20th Century You would Attract back Into the Church Any number Of people Who have Now Lapsed And ceased To be Cumber Ceased to be Worshippers And so These Thin Vernacular Literatures Began to be Invented Everywhere I mean the Whole Anglican Communion Fell for this Idea And I say Fell for it Because I think That it was The wrong track All together By two points One What we need To do With the Prayer book That we've Got Is first Of all Get people Accustomed To the Idea That when You talk To a Person Who is As transcendently Special As our

[58:18] God The Father Son And Holy Spirit It isn't Appropriate To have Special Language For the Purpose And the Language Needs to be Learned I think I've said In this Learners Exchange Context Before That we Have a Little bit Of that Still If you Have an Audience With the Queen For instance You don't Walk in And hold Out your Hand To shake Hers And say Hello Queenie How are You doing There is An appropriate Way of Talking And so It is I think So we Ought to Teach people That it is With God And the Second point That goes On from That one Is that In fact As you Said yourself The Prayer book Language

[59:18] Is Bible Language Prayer book Prayers Are soaked In scripture And if you Want to get People to Appreciate the Prayer book Well what You have to Do is to Teach them The Bible This was What I Wanted to Scream For the Last 50 Years of This Discussion You know That if we Have prayers In the Vernacular Everybody Will think They're Wonderful And come Back to Church Hoppycock They don't But if you Teach people The Bible And if You further Teach those People The way Of a living Relationship With the Lord Jesus And life In the Holy Spirit The real Christian The real Christian life Well then The result You get Is something That was Said to Me

[60:18] By a Lady On the Island Actually I was Taking a Meeting Fairly Soon After I Come to Vancouver She was Telling me How she Had had An experience Of the Holy Spirit And she Said Since This Happened To me The Prayer book Glows She chose That word Every word She said Glows Well In my Heart I said Hallelujah You've Got it Man You've Got it Because Though I Never thought Of using That word Bless me That's what Prayer book Language Does for me It glows And if You know The Lord And you Know your Bible Prayer book Language Will do the Same for you If you Let it If you Use the Prayer book For personal Devotion You will Find it

[61:19] Glowing Too In your Hearts Well that's That's point Two If you want People to Appreciate the Prayer book Teach them The Bible And the Spirit Blesses the Teaching of The Bible And that's The effect And I Would Say We need To be Sensitive One of The One of The little Other painful Experiences I've had Over these Last years In grappling With us All coming Together In this Large Community With evangelicals And charismatics Is One time We were Having a Secret Service On April First A few years Ago And some Bishops Flew into Town And we Had this Meeting In a Hotel And we Were going To have Holy Communion And Dan Gifford Told me That I Was allowed To set The liturgy And I Thought Yeah I'm finally Going to Be able To do This And I Brought a Kneeler From St.

[62:19] John's And I Printed out The prayer Book Communion But the Person Leading Was This Wonderful Lovely Priest Who's Chinese And he Just looked At me And he Said I Don't Use that Language We Don't Use that My Congregation Finds it Really Hard To say Those Words Physically And It was Just Kind of Like Oh It hadn't Even Occurred To me And I Felt Badly For him He said Do I Have To do This And I I Really Watched Lookingなんか But First Sometime Suspect Happy and everything quite properly.

[63:17] And the opening service of Evensong had no one to celebrate. And I looked at Felix and said, Felix, would you be the priest? And he said he wanted help. So he said, yes.

[63:27] Well, half an hour before the service, he came to me blushing. Or I imagine he was blushing. And he said... He's very, very black, but...

[63:38] Anyway, he said, Nora, I have to confess something to you. I have never prayed evening prayer. I don't actually know it. He said, I didn't know that the prayer book still existed because he was taught at DST.

[63:54] He didn't actually know the prayer book was in use, and he had never done evening prayer. And so I let him off the hook because I think there's no sense in putting a person on the spot that way.

[64:08] But it's more complicated than just... You know, we need to be sensitive to one another in this. And anyway, any other questions?

[64:21] But by the way, if anybody finds now that I have made you so excited about praying in the daily office, and I know we all live all over the map, if you want to come to morning prayer at 7, you have to come to the south door chapel.

[64:36] That's a safety thing. I like only opening one door at that time in the morning and knock, but you also have to check with me to see if we're going to be here. And I always check my email right up till 6.30 in the morning.

[64:50] So get my email address if you think you might even be interested before you go. Yes? Nora, thank you for this. And thank you too for mentioning P.D. James, who was president of the Prayer Book Society in England.

[65:04] Yes. We know that. Yes. And she does use Anglo-Catholic churches in some of her. Yeah, and the thing that I like about her quote that I had in all my little threads of disjointed stuff was that she was using it as a caution, and she was criticizing Anglo-Catholics as one.

[65:26] I mean, high Anglicans. And I think some of us make the mistake of criticizing the other guy too much. But anyway, sorry. And she uses Bethlehem and Pauline Prayer Book titles.

[65:37] Yeah. Oh, I know. Devices and Desires. Sort of man, this kind of stuff. That's actually not my major point here. I wanted to make you feel good about the Prayer Book by saying that I am in this church partly because of the liturgy.

[65:52] I was for most of my life, I won't tell you how many years that was. I'm a Baptist. When I came here, I was surprised at how familiar the Prayer Book was.

[66:05] How many Reform-type ministers have been using stuff from their Prayer Book for quite possibly centuries without actually subscribing to the liturgy.

[66:16] And of course, I knew that some of the complaints that were made about Anglicans just keep repeating those words week after week and they don't really mean them much anymore. They don't think about it. Well, the same could have been said about us praying the Lord's Prayer day after day or week after week.

[66:31] The meaning doesn't come from the words. It comes from your response to the words. But I found the whole of the Gospel is in the Communion Service.

[66:43] If you never went to Sunday School, if you never heard it anywhere else, it's there. And somebody, Cranmer, I imagine, has made, I know this was revised in 1662 and he wouldn't have done that.

[66:56] But it's there for you to hear and respond to. And I think that we could do it without sermons. Off your ears, Dr. Packer.

[67:11] I'm bracing myself. Well, actually, it is the sermon-based churches that really have abandoned the prayer book in many ways.

[67:26] And so, even though you get the same elements of adoration and contrition and thanksgiving and supplication and so on that occur in the prayer book some other way in the service, there isn't, to my way of thinking, a good reason for abandoning this now.

[67:45] At the same time, I have watched it being eroded in this church and this is really my question to you. When I first came here, we had four pieces of scripture every morning, every Sunday morning.

[68:00] Old Testament, New Testament, a psalm frequently sung by the choir but not always, and the gospel. And we stood for the gospel.

[68:11] Now, I do realize that our clergy are under tremendous pressures to keep producing more services for us here and that therefore they have to be shorter.

[68:22] But I sort of wonder what's next? Does this concern you at all? Yes. I mean, to those who know me well, yes. but I think it's very, very complicated and this could open a whole new discussion.

[68:42] Yeah. And I think we have to be very careful, all of us. For the ones in the room who know me, you know, Bill said to me before we were starting that he couldn't find anything wrong with me and so he didn't, you know, I can't remember how he put it, but I think, oh, I have a lot wrong with me and for those who know me well, you would know that I'm pretty vocal about what frustrates me.

[69:09] And so, I probably have some similar concerns but I think, as Fran said one time, and Fran and I have both had the embarrassing experience of having to stand up in the lectern at St. John's Shaughnessy and read in front of the whole congregation, wives, obey your husbands, in the part of scripture we were reading that day, and that she had to recognize in herself, and this was very important for me to hear her say this, and she said it in front of the whole congregation, that when she is perplexed or upset, and especially when she's faced with something in scripture, but I would say in like manner when we're frustrated with how our service is going, and we are right to listen to what we're worried about, but I think we have to use caution, and Fran said, I look at that scripture and say, why does it bother me so much?

[70:11] What is it that is happening in that book that's causing me to... So I would probably share some of your worries, but what I try to do because I am so vocal is try to ask myself that question, what is it about me that's...

[70:29] why is this getting under my skin? And be careful and pray to understand which part of your frustration is a godly and bright frustration and which part...

[70:44] I mean, we are all... we are all made the way we're made, and we've all brought our own, as I said in part of this talk, we've brought our own, well, the modern vernacular baggage with us, and so I think we need to all examine ourselves and be careful because, I mean, I appreciate what you're saying about the sermon.

[71:07] I mean, I don't think we really mean that, though, that we could do without the sermon, but... and I know that that's not what you're saying exactly, but I... Anyway... If you didn't have someone to preach, you would still get the message that going on should it happen?

[71:23] Well, yes and no, but that's a complicated question, and I think that deserves another talk. I'm not saying that I have to do that talk anymore.

[71:34] I think it's more complicated than... And I get the signal now that this is the end. So, thank you. I'd like to hear more about your wild earlier life.

[71:47] Well, as this sister, this sister, my sister Tracy, who's here in Calgary, my other sister, the last time I did Learner's Exchange, coincidentally, my other sister was here, and she's the one...

[72:02] I used to... I got swept into the church. Well, I was already in the church, as I was saying, in my Sunday school years. I liked sitting, listening to the sermons the best, or listening to the liturgy.

[72:16] And... But, I got swept into the fervor of the Jesus People movement and went to a Pentecostal church for three years.

[72:27] And my other sister tells me, and I have put it out of my mind, that apparently I used to answer the moment at my parents' house, praise the Lord. So, that was...

[72:41] I was... And my mother worried that I had joined a cult because I was going to the Anglican church on Sunday morning and teaching Sunday school, and then about six or seven times a week to the Pentecostal church.

[72:54] And, as David was talking about in his sermon, he was sort of jumping up and down. So, yes, I'm wild, and mostly, I'm still wild, I'm a total jazz fanatic and so, there you go.

[73:07] Anyway, thank you. Thank you, Nora, and we will be having you back to the end.