Lent Course

Does anyone have any reccomendations for Lent course material?

Ideally we might be after something that would be good for those who are not yet commited Christians as well as established believers.

We're hoping to support Bishop Wallace Benn's Lent course too, which I believe draws on Rev'd Dr Peter Walker's book, The Jesus Way.

Simnel Sunday

Since we finished our Christmas cake on 2nd Feb I've been looking forward in hope to a Simnel cake for Easter, but it turns out that I need not have waited so long. If Wikipedia is to be believed, Mothering Sunday has also traditionally been known as Simnel Sunday and Refreshment Sunday. Families would often get together on this day and Simnel cake would be enjoyed in a lessening of the austerities of Lent. I'm afraid I've no Lentern fast to set aside, but any excuse for some Simnel cake...

Cross in a bag

Mrs Lloyd and I attended a concert at Christ Church, Southgate on Saturday. We were surprised to see that they had put six prominently displayed items, mainly on big sticks, but some fastned to the wall or on tables, in upside-down purple bags, tied up at the bottom.

It later occoured to us that these mysteriously concealed items were probably crosses.

We think this is unlikely to be some multi-faith / secularist move but may refer to the ecclesiastical season of Lent, what we are in. But we are not sure about the purpose of it all? Presumably Lent is an appropriate season to be reminded of the cross? Presumably there will be a great unveiling on Good Friday?

This is one of the things I have not learnt at theological college. I will have no idea what to do if a kindly parishoner presents me with a range of bags on Ash Wednesday. Is this a gospel issue?

We have not covered up the cross in our sitting room, but I think some kind of drape coloured appropriatly to the season might be rather good. No doubt Wipples can offer some wierd and wonderful stuff at sky high prices. Maybe next time the ecclesiastical outfitters visit college I might enquire.

Marriage Enrichment for Lent

There's a marriage enrichment weekend going on at Oak Hill this weekend where I believe men are being told to listen to their wives, and so on. Obviously I was far too busy blogging to attend.

Here are a couple of marriage enrichment tips:

• make sure the wife has an extremely lucrative skill that can be put to good use from home while being pregnant and looking after the kids
• jobs for the kids (chimney sweeps etc.)
• pay the wife a salary for all the stuff she does at home so that she's tax deductable (the C of E provides a guide booklet on this for clergy)

As its lent, I thought people might enjoy this excerpt from a wedding sermon preached in Lent by Revd Dr Peter Leithart:

During the forty days of Lent, Christians have traditionally meditated on the isolation, betrayal, passion, and death of Jesus. The liturgical colors of Lent are subdued, and fasting is the rule. This somber season might seem an inappropriate setting for a wedding, but in fact it is not. Marital love is all about imitating Christ in His self-giving, the very act we are remembering during Lent. Marital love is about the daily practice of Lent - not the practice of self-affliction and fasting, but the practice of self-giving love. More importantly, Lent is a good time for a wedding because Lent is never the end of the story; it is always, every year, followed by Easter - the greatest example of an event that cannot be adequately explained by what went before, the Event of events, the Surprise of surprises.

Josh and Abby, I urge you to devote yourselves to practicing Lent throughout your marriage - that is, to devote yourselves to mutual self-giving. And when you do, you can expect the Easter sun to rise again and again. The surprise of love which has overtaken you will be followed by the surprise of love returned. You are embarking on a voyage of self-sacrfice and self-giving. You cannot know where the voyage will lead; you cannot know the depths of self-sacrifice that may be required of you. But you can embark in faith, confident in God's promise that every embarking becomes a journey home, that everyone who gives his life gains his life, that every Lent is followed by Easter, and that for every death, God, the Ever-Living and Eternally Loving God, promises the surprise of resurrection.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

A Great Mystery: Fourteen Wedding Sermons (Moscow, Canon Press, 2006), ch 7, Surprising Love (texts from Song of Songs 1, 2, 8), p52

Dydd Gwyl Dewi hapus!

1st March is, of course, the Lesser Festival (White) of David, Bishop of Menevia, Patron of Wales, c.601

At the synod at Llanddewi Brefi, 42 miles north east of Cardigan, David is said to have stood on a cloth on the ground which then rose up as a white dove came to sit on his shoulder. A real crowd pleaser. He was then made an Archbishop, which is one way to high office. We Reformed types should note that Saint David denounced the Pelagian heresy.

Those seeking alternative Episcopal oversight may wish to recall that in the Celtic tradition Bishops had the freedom to roam across borders.

Collect

Almighty God,
Who called your servant David
To be a faithful and wise steward of your mysteries for the people of Wales:
In your mercy, grant that,
following his purity of life and zeal for the gospel of Christ, we may with him receive the crown of everlasting life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

On 2^nd March the Church remembers Chad, Bishop of Lichfield, Missionary, 627.

All these feasts in Lent are proving helpful in making me feel less guilty about my Lenten “Aspirations”. Unfortunately David would probably not approve of a pint of SA in his honour. He was allegedly a teetotaler, hence the alternative title of 'Dewi Ddyfrwr' meaning ‘David the water drinker’. In the 10 monasteries he is said to have founded he wanted the monks to eat a strict diet of bread and herbs and harness themselves to the plough rather than using oxen. He liked a nice cold bath.

George Herbert Day tip

I feel slightly ashamed (though it might be thought a good thing by some around here) that Revd Dr David Field (independat pastor) just had to inform me (Anglican ordinand) that tommorow is George Herbert day. Or rather, the lesser festival of George Herbert, Priest, Poet, 1633 (White) according to the Church of England.

Dr Field had to further tell me that this prayer can be found on p456 of the red Common Worship: Daily Prayer.

(What do they teach you at theological college? What is Cert Min for? Sorry, Marrian, you probbaly did teach me this. I may have been trying to learn Hebrew from flash cards at the time.)

Collect:

King of glory, king of peace,
who called your servant George Herbert
from the pursuit of worldly honours
to be a priest in the temple of his God and king:
grant us also the grace to offer ourselves
with singleness of heart in humble obedience to your service;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Apparently the optional canticles and refrains: Common of Bishops and other pastors (page 530) may also be used, but I don't think we'll bother. How's that for Reformed and free from the law and under grace and all that? Sausages for supper.

What does one do if a lesser festival falls in Lent, by the way? Which takes priority: the fast or the feast? Can we get off the fasting by observing the feast? What colour alb should David be wearing?

This must call for an outbreak of Herbert poems in the blogosphere from the erudite, please?

Lent Plans

I failed to even make (let alone keep) any new year resolutions this year, which feels like a really wasted opportunity.

I didn't think about it enough or plan it sufficiently in advance and I was put off by the fear of failure or the embarassment of having such patheically poor ambitions.

Resolutions (like all goals) need to be time specific, realistic, challenging and clear.

Here are some possible lent resolutions:

(1) No blog related activity between 8:30am and 6:30pm

(2) No alcohol unless offered in by others (not including the wife!)

(3) No snacking between meals

(4) No milk (in tea or coffee, with cereal etc.)

(5) When wanting any of the above, remember the Lord Jesus and pray.

Obviously these wouldn't apply to a Sunday since it is a feast day not a fast day. And I would still look forward to eating the bread and drinking the wine.

I might also make a point of having lots of extra sausages in Lent to prove that I am properly Reformed and not under law.