Lent 5 March 17, 2024 Bulletin

THE FIFTH SUNDAY IN LENT

Passion Sunday

March 17, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTION.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS

Today marks the beginning of Passiontide in our church calendar, which comprises the final two weeks of Lent leading up to Easter. Our Scripture lessons for today set the “tone” for the season, setting forth something  of what the sacrificial death of  Christ on the Cross is, and  how the Cross of Christ provides us with the model and pattern for our own lives. The Epistle lesson from Hebrews speaks to us of what Christ has done for us. He is the mediator of the new covenant, that by means of death, we are set free from our sins, our consciences are purified by means of forgiveness, and we receive the promise of an eternal inheritance. Christ has done something for us, once and for all, which we could not do, but can only faithfully and thankfully receive. But the sacrifice of Christ is not just something that was done for us. It is something that must be done in us and through us, transforming our minds and hearts, and ultimately our lives, day by day. This is precisely the message of our Gospel lesson for today where in place of the pursuit of worldly ambition, power, and status, Christ calls his disciples to take His attitude of humble obedience, and make it their own. 

Hebrews 9:11-16

Continue reading “Lent 5 March 17, 2024 Bulletin”

Lent 4 March 10, 2024 Bulletin

THE FOURTH SUNDAY IN LENT

March 10, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

In the Sunday Eucharistic lections in The Book of Common Prayer, the season of Lent is understood as pilgrimage of the soul. It is a hazardous journey through a spiritual wilderness of demonic trials and temptations that separate us from the true and living God, and hold us in bondage and captivity.  The first three Sundays of Lent have been all about how it is that Christ liberates us from the deceptions and power of the Evil One. On this the Fourth Sunday in Lent, the Church holds before us the goal and end of our journey. IN our Epistle reading from Galatians, St. Paul refers to “Jerusalem which is above is free and is the mother of us all.”  In symbolic terms, Jerusalem is our spiritual home, a place of freedom and peace where we  enjoy union and communion with God in  a fellowship of love.   Such also is the parish Church, the earthly counterpart of the heavenly city, which brings us to birth through the waters of baptism, and like a good mother, nourishes us through Word and Sacrament and guides us in our way. The Gospel lesson relates the story of Christ’s  feeding of the 5,000 in the  wilderness with 5 loaves and two fish, which is for us an image of the Eucharist, where our “bodies and souls are preserved unto eternal life”, and where we are refreshed and given the strength we need  to continue the journey home.

THE LESSON:  Galatians 4:26-31

Continue reading “Lent 4 March 10, 2024 Bulletin”

Lent 3 March 3, 2024 Bulletin

THE THIRD SUNDAY IN LENT

March 3, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS

Lent is a season in which we are confronted with the reality of “ spiritual warfare,” that is  our battle with the demons, which is to be interpreted  not merely in a reductionist  psychological sense, but in an actual spiritual sense of demons aactual “ malignant intelligences” and “ evil powers” that impact our lives and seek “to corrupt and destroy the creatures of God.” ( Book of Alternative Services p. 154) Our Gospel lesson today portrays Christ as the one who through the finger (power) of God casts out demons and overpowers Satan. In baptism, when we renounced “ the world, the flesh, and the devil” and united ourselves to Jesus in His death and Resurrection,  we became partakers of Christ’s victory over sin, death, and the devil, and the house of souls was swept clean. But as we see in the parable which Christ tells, unless we continue in repentance and acquire  thevirtues, the house of our souls remain vulnerable to demonic attack. In our Epistle lesson St. Paul unpacks Christ’s teachingwarning us to be especially on guard against the demons of sexual sin, covetousness, and idolatry.

Continue reading “Lent 3 March 3, 2024 Bulletin”

Lent 2 February 25, 2024 Bulletin

THE SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

February 25, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

THE LESSON:  1 Thessalonians 4:1-8

Continue reading “Lent 2 February 25, 2024 Bulletin”

Lent 1 February 18, 2024 Bulletin

THE FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT

February 18, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

The Gospel lesson for this First Sunday in Lent presents us with the story of the temptation of Christ in the wilderness, which is of great importance for the pilgrimage of faith that is ours in the season of Lent, and extends throughout our lives. We are a party to and participants in a cosmic conflict between God and His Christ, on the one hand, and the devil, on the other.  There are temptations to be faced, and choices to be made. The Good News is that Jesus Christ has unmaskedexposed and defeated the devil at the point of temptation, and shares His victory with us. It’s why in our Epistle lesson for today St. Paul exhorts us not to accept the grace of God in vain,  but to see the rough and tumble of life as the occasion for the proving of our faith and the faithfulness of God.

Continue reading “Lent 1 February 18, 2024 Bulletin”

Quinquagesima Sunday February 11, 2024 Bulletin

QUINQUAGESIMA SUNDAY

February 11, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

Quinguagesima is the last of Pre-Lenten Sundays. In today’s Gospel lesson Jesus declares to His disciples, “Behold We up to Jerusalem, and everything written about  the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished.” ( Luke 8. 31.) Here we see that Lent is a spiritual journey with Jesus to Jerusalem. It is not an accident that this prophecy of the Passion is followed by a miracle whereby Jesus restores the sight of blind man who then follows him on the road. Lent is a time for us to be healed of our spiritual blindness in regard both to our sin, and the forgiveness of God, which is our healing. The Epistle for today, St. Paul’s famous “ hymn to love” provides us with a further illumination of the character of our Lenten journey, and the journey through life as disciples of Jesus. It is a journey into spiritual maturity, of “giving up childish things,” and the perfection of love: God’s love for us and our love for God.

THE LESSON:  1 Corinthians 13:1-13

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect;  but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

THE HOLY GOSPEL: Luke 18:31-43 

Then he took the twelve aside and said to them, ‘See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For he will be handed over to the Gentiles; and he will be mocked and insulted and spat upon. After they have flogged him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise again.’  But they understood nothing about all these things; in fact, what he said was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said. As he approached Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. When he heard a crowd going by, he asked what was happening.  They told him, ‘Jesus of Nazareth is passing by. ’Then he shouted, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ Those who were in front sternly ordered him to be quiet; but he shouted even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ Jesus stood still and ordered the man to be brought to him; and when he came near, he asked him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ He said, ‘Lord, let me see again.’  Jesus said to him, ‘Receive your sight; your faith has saved you.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him, glorifying God; and all the people, when they saw it, praised God.    

PARISH LIFE NOTES

WELCOME Bishop Helen who will be preaching and presiding at The Holy Communion and administering the laying on of hands with prayer to Anya, who is renewing the vows of her  baptism today. Sunday Salad lunch will follow the service in the Upper Hall. Please bring a salad to share!

PRAYING FROM WITHIN THE BELLY OF A WHALE. Today the Faithquest Children begin a new unit on story in The Book of Jonah. “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here! ” (Matthew 12.40,41.)

CONDOLENCES to the family of Malcolm Tait who passed away in Calgary on February 4. May he rest in peace and rise in glory.

ASH WEDNESDAY PENITENTIAL SERVICE WITH IMPOSITION OF ASHES  will take place next Wednesday at 5.45 p.m.

LENT is not intended to be an annual ordeal during which we begrudgingly forgo a handful of pleasures. It is meant to be the church’s springtime, a time when, out of the darkness of sin’s winter, a repentant, empowered people emerges. 

Put another way, Lent is the season in which we ought to be surprised by joy. Our self-sacrifices serve no purpose unless, by laying aside this or that desire, we are able to focus on our heart’s deepest longing: unity with Christ. In him—in his suffering and death, his resurrection and triumph—we find our truest joy.” ( Dorothy Sayers)

RECTOR’S RETREAT. Claude Schroeder will be on spiritual retreat at Kingsfold Retreat Centre this week, returning to the parish next Tuesday.

LENTEN MISSION 2024

XIR193456 Sermon on the Mount, Scenes from the Life of Christ (mosaic) by Byzantine School, (6th century) mosaic Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna, Italy Giraudon out of copyright

Blessed are You: Living the Beatitudes

Guest Speaker: Dr. John Patrick,

President and Professor of the History of Science, Medicine and Faith

Augustine College, Ottawa

February 23 – 25

Friday and Saturday at 7:00 p.m.

Sunday at 10.30 a.m.

PUBLIC LECTURE with Dr. John Patrick: “What Hyppocrates Knew and The Practice of Medicine in the Modern Age.” The loss of transcendent values and religious faith in the modern age has had  a profound effect on the practice of medicine  for physicians and patients alike. What role, if any, does faith play in the practice of medicine, and what does Hippocrates, the “Father of Medicine” have to teach us?   Saturday, February 24 10.30 a.m.

SALT OF THE EARTH AND LIGHT OF THE WORLD LENT PARISH BIBLE STUDY. In the Sermon on the  Mount Jesus declared to His disciples, You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden under foot by men. “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.  Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” ( Matthew 5. 13-16.) Join us for 5 week Lenten Bible study on Chapters 5 and 6 on “The Sermon on the Mount.” Sign up sheet and contact information available on the table in the Narthex.

2023 TAX RECEIPTS will be available for pick up after the service today.

NOMINATIONS FOR 2024. Our Churchwardens, Andrew and John will be seeking out nominations for people to serve as warden and vestry members for the coming year. 

ANNUAL MEETING has been scheduled for Sunday, March 3rd. The business will be to review ministry reports, financial statements and to elect parish officers for the coming year.

WORSHIP THIS WEEK

Morning PrayerTuesday, Thursday, and Friday at 8:30 a.m.  
Wednesday at 9:00 a.m.
Ash Wednesday Penitential ServiceWednesday at 5.45 p.m. 

Sexagesima February 4, 2024 – Bulletin

SEXAGESIMA SUNDAY

February 4, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTIOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

On this Sexagesima Sunday we continue our pre-Lenten preparations with the  Parable of the Sower where we are encouraged this Lent to cultivate the soil of hearts so that “hearing the word of God, we might hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance.” In our Epistle lesson St. Paul describes just how much need there is for patient endurance in the face of outward circumstances and inward weaknesses that would impede our progress, on account of which need to encourage one another in community and pray for God to defend  us against all adversities.

THE LESSON:  2 Corinthians 11:21-29

To my shame, I must say, we were too weak for that! But whatever any one dares to boast of—I am speaking as a fool—I also dare to boast of that. Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they descendants of Abraham? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. Five times I have received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I have been beaten with rods; once I was stoned. Three times I have been shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brethren; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure upon me of my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?

THE HOLY GOSPEL:   Luke 8:4-15 

When a great crowd gathered and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable: A sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell on the path and was trampled on, and the birds of the air ate it up.  Some fell on the rock; and as it grew up, it withered for lack of moisture. Some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew with it and choked it. Some fell into good soil, and when it grew, it produced a hundredfold.’ As he said this, he called out, ‘Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’ Then his disciples asked him what this parable meant. He said, ‘To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God; but to others I speak in parables, so that “looking they may not perceive, and listening they may not understand.”  ‘Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. The ones on the path are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. The ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. But these have no root; they believe only for a while and in a time of testing fall away. As for what fell among the thorns, these are the ones who hear; but as they go on their way, they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature. But as for that in the good soil, these are the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patient endurance.

PARISH LIFE NOTES

LOWER HALL RENOVATION UPDATE. Our thanks to Simon, Len, and Nino for their work on Thursday and Friday in painting the walls of the Lower Hall. Next week, a professional painter will be spraying the ceiling, and we look forward to the installation of new flooring at the end of the month.

2023 TAX RECEIPTS will be available in the coming weeks. If you would like to receive yours electronically, please send Blair a note. If you have previously received yours by email, Blair will email your 2023 receipt when it is ready. 

2024 PLEDGE CAMPAIGN. To date we have received 38 pledges for a total of $ $115,280If you have not submitted a pledge for the coming year, please be encouraged to do so, and so aid the Vestry in its plans and stewardship.

RECTOR’S FORUM will follow the service today (Sexagesima). Topic: Making the most of Lent. What is Lent? Where did it come from? How can I enter into Lent with depth of purpose and meaning?

BURNING BUSH ALERT! Please visit the “Burning Bush Exhibit” in the Upper Hall from the story of Moses and the Burning Bush ( Exodus 3.1-14) which the Faith Quest children are studying. What is God telling you, challenging you,  or promising you? Write a prayer on the flame and tape it to the bush.

CONFIRMATION SERVICE. On February 11th, Bishop Helen will be  at St. Mary’s to administer the laying on of hands with Prayer  to Anya. Salad Sunday lunch will follow in the Parish Hall. Please bring finger food/salads to share.

NOMINATIONS FOR 2024. Our Churchwardens, Andrew and John will be seeking out nominations for people to serve as warden and vestry members for the coming year. 

ANNUAL MEETING has been scheduled for Sunday, March 3rd. The business will be to review ministry reports, financial statements and to elect parish officers for the coming year.

LENTEN MISSION 2024

XIR193456 Sermon on the Mount, Scenes from the Life of Christ (mosaic) by Byzantine School, (6th century) mosaic Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, Ravenna, Italy Giraudon out of copyright

Blessed are You: Living the Beatitudes

Guest Speaker: Dr. John Patrick, President and Professor of the History of Science, Medicine and Faith Augustine College, Ottawa

February 23 – 25 Friday and Saturday at 7:00 p.m. Sunday at 10.30 a.m.

PUBLIC LECTURE with Dr. John Patrick: “What Hyppocrates Knew and The Practice of Medicine in the Modern Age.” The loss of transcendent values and religious faith in the modern age has had  a profound effect on the practice of medicine  for physicians and patients alike. What role, if any, does faith play in the practice of medicine, and what does Hippocrates, the “Father of Medicine” have to teach us?   Saturday, February 24 10.30 a.m.

WORSHIP THIS WEEK

Morning Prayer: Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday at 8:30 a.m.  Wednesday at 9:00 a.m.

Evening Prayer: Wednesday at 5.30 p.m.                                                                                 

Septuagesima Sunday – January 28, 2024 – Bulletin

SEPTUAGESIMA SUNDAY

January 28, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS.

Today is Septuagesima (from the Latin word for 70) Sunday, which marks the beginning of the season of Pre- Lent, and our symbolic “countdown” to Easter ( March 31) and the 40 days of Lent. (February 14). It is time for us to begin thinking about the spiritual labour and the pilgrimage or journey that is Lent. Our Epistle reading speaks to us about the necessity of learning self control so that we may not be disqualified from the prize that is the  new life in the Spirit through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In our Gospel lesson Jesus tells the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard where we learn that both the invitation to spiritual labour, and the reward is sheer gift and grace.

THE LESSON:  1 Corinthians 9:24-27

Continue reading “Septuagesima Sunday – January 28, 2024 – Bulletin”

Epiphany 2 – January 14, 2024 – Bulletin

THE SECOND SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY

January 14, 2024

THE FATHER IS MY HOPE; THE SON IS MY REFUGE; 
THE HOLY SPIRIT IS MY PROTECTOR.
ALL HOLY TRINITY, GLORY TO THEE!

LIVE AUDIO STREAMING during today’s service is available on the Order of Service page. Recorded audio will be added following worship.

GETTING READY FOR SUNDAY: PREVIEW OF THE READINGS

In this season of Epiphany, the Church continues to celebrate and rejoice in the manifestation of the God/ Man Jesus Christ, and holds before our eyes some of the most wonderful and powerful manifestations of Christ’s Divinity described in the Gospels. Today’s Gospel describes the miracle and sign Jesus gave at the wedding at Cana in Galilee. In today’s Epistle Paul describes how  it is that through the gift of the  Spirit  we, in turn, manifestations of the glory of Christ, who renews our life in brotherly love, turning water into wine. 

THE LESSON:  Romans 12:6-16

Continue reading “Epiphany 2 – January 14, 2024 – Bulletin”