An update to the Journey Forward Guidelines was shared with clergy and wardens on Friday, March 26, 2021.
Long before it was versified and set to music for hymnals, St. Patrick’s Breastplate was part of the Celtic Christian tradition. While we may be more familiar with it as #370 in The Hymnal 1982, the original piece dates from the eighth century. It is a prayer known as a lorica, the Latin word for “body armor,” referring back to St. Paul’s writings about putting on the armor of God. The lorica was to be prayed daily while giving one’s attention fully to God in order to invoke God’s protection.
The text of Bishop Hughes' sermon at the Service of Remembrance & Gratitude on March 13, 2021.
On Saturday, March 13, the Diocese of Newark gathered for an online service to honor the memories of those we lost to death and celebrate the many ways the parishes and people of our diocese have rallied to care for each other and our neighbors.
How shall we keep a Holy Lent this year? It will help to start with where we are right now.
The past 11 months of pandemic seems like one incredibly long Lent, Bishop Hughes notes – but one that also has had much restoration, with prayer, contemplation, self-evaluation and turning to God. This Ash Wednesday, she reframes the invitation to a holy Lent as an invitation to take even deeper what we have been experiencing in our spiritual lives during this time.
Praying with beads as a form of contemplative prayer dates back to ancient times. However, it was not until the 1980s that the Anglican Rosary was created. The basic Anglican Rosary is made up of 33 beads (years in Jesus’ earthly life): 4 groups of 7 beads called Weeks (7 represents spiritual perfection and completion), 4 Cruciform beads between the groups of Weeks beads (forming a cross), and an Invitatory/Dismissal bead between the Cross and the wheel of beads. Some include an additional Resurrection bead (a reminder that Christ lives on) just above the Invitatory Bead.
God has been doing new things among us during the pandemic: growing in the faith, sharing the faith, and caring for the community. Fueling these is the power of relationships, and Faith Groups are a place to build those relationships with each other and with God.
Happy Spring! In the Celtic calendar, at least. The ancient Celts celebrated February 1st as Imbolc, the first day of spring – and in the Christian tradition in Ireland and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, it also became St. Brigid’s Day. (Brigid’s name may be spelled in various ways.)
"For us in this time that has been pandemic, God has turned on a light," says Bishop Hughes. "We've been learning something about what the church could be. We've been learning something about who we are called to be as faithful people." (Time: 4:48.)
