St. Mary the Virgin Anglican Church, Regina, Saskatchewan
(Modified 2021-03-16: Modified registration form for new dates.)
Bishop Rob has granted permission to churches in the Diocese to open their doors once again, and resume worship services in the church building. If you would like to join us Sundays for Morning Prayer with hymns and sermon, please register on line using the form below. Alternatively, you may call the church office and leave a message. Attendance will be limited to 30 people, following the accustomed public health orders.
March 14, 2021
10.30 A.M. Morning Prayer With Hymns And Sermon Claude Schroeder preaching.
GODLY PLAY for children 3-6 years via zoom. Today’s story is ‘Lent-Crown of Thorns’ Matthew 27:27-31.
CHILDREN’S LENTEN ALMS. For our Children’s Lenten Alms Family Ministries has chosen City Kidz. We will be collecting alms for City Kidz, an organization that exists to help children living in low-income communities by providing inspirational experiences and personal relationships.
FAITHQUEST (for children 7-13 via zoom). Continue the Road to Emmaus rotation with Divine Diversions. Memory Verse/Key Verse: Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, and he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” (Luke 24: 31-32 NRSV) Leader: Len, Anya
1.00 P.M. “BENEDICITE” PRAYER WALK begins at the Lych Gate at St. Mary’s. All are welcome! “All ye works of the Lord, bless ye the Lord. Praise Him and magnify Him for ever!”
Monday to Friday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
“IN PERSON” SUNDAY WORSHIP resumes today. You are asked to please register ahead of time, and observe public health protocols. AUDIO RECORDING of today’s service and sermon will be posted to the parish website following worship today.
MID WEEK SERVICES. You are warmly invited to join in the daily services of Morning Prayer at 8.30 a.m. and Evening Prayer at 5.30 p.m. starting Monday, March 15. There will also be services of Holy Communion on Tuesday, following a shortened Morning Prayer at 8.30 a.m., Wednesday at 12.15 p.m., and Thursday, following shortened Evening Prayer at 5.30 p.m. In the wake of the isolation and upheaval of these past months, these quiet, meditative services offer us the opportunity to gather with small group of fellow parishioners to refocus our attention in anticipation of Easter, be refreshed, and find healing for bruised and battered hearts. Pre-registration will not be required.
‘RISEN WITH CHRIST’ A PALM SATURDAY VIRTUAL CELEBRATION on Saturday, March 27. Watch St. Mary’s Facebook page for details.
MEND WITH CARE. Any clothing in need of repair? We are a small group of menders offering to do some basic or creative mending for all your worn wear! All proceeds will go directly to the Refugee Fund. We welcome ripped seams, unraveled knitwear, holes to patch, wool to darn, loose or missing buttons. Please contact Clara at mendwithcare@gmail.com
HAND-DIPPED BEESWAX CANDLES from St. Mary’s may be purchased for $5.00 a pair by contacting Yvonne in the parish office. Phone: 306 522-6052, email: stmarysanglican@sasktel.net Parishioners can pick up their candles from the newly installed mailbox at the Montague St. entrance, and leave a cheque in the proper amount. Proceeds to Refugee Fund.
FASTING FOR FEEDING. Join us next Sunday at 4.30 on zoom from the kitchen of Nat and Mary as we cook a Vegetable Biryani. See attached recipe for ingredients. Zoom link will be made available next week.
I know of at least two Bob Dylan fans at St. Mary’s. (You know who you are). Sad to say, Dylan’s music remains somewhat unexplored territory for myself. I am, however, in tune with Dylan’s preaching. In a recent interview in The New York Times, Dylan stated:
Continue reading “Hear the Music, Listen to the News”Pastoral Letter for June 28, 2020
I’m wondering if anyone recognizes the face of this kind-eyed, elderly gentleman?
It belongs to Terry Waite, who back in 1980 was appointed by Robert Runcie to serve as the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Assistant for Anglican Communion Affairs. In 1985, Terry Waite accompanied the Archbishop of Canterbury on a visit to Canada, that included a stop here in Regina (does anybody remember?) and Edmonton, where I was able to attend a special diocesan service to mark the occasion.
In his role, Terry Waite was involved in negotiating the release of Anglican clergy and British Nationals held hostage in the Middle East. But Terry Waite was himself kidnapped in Beirut in 1987 by members of the Islamic Jihad, and spent the next four years in solitary confinement, before finally being released. Throughout those years, a member of the chapel community that I was a part of then, would constantly intercede for Terry at our weekly Eucharist. “Taken on Trust” was the title of the book Terry wrote about his experiences.
In an interview in 2013, Terry Waite was asked how he coped during all this time in isolation in a dark cell.
He said,
You have got to be able to discipline your mind, because everything is lived from within. There is no external stimulation. There is no books, no one to speak with, no one to feed your identity back to you.
I was fortunate, firstly, because through life I had been an avid reader and therefore I had built up a store of books, poetry and prose in my memory. Secondly, I’d been brought up as an Anglican—I’m an Anglican Christian—and had been brought up with the Book of Common Prayer. The language of that was very, very helpful. I had unconsciously memorised it as a choir boy. If I can just give you an example of what I mean from one of the great old collects of the prayer book:
Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, O Lord; and by thy great mercy defend us from all perils and dangers of this night . . .
That is very, very meaningful when you’re sitting in darkness. That collect not only has meaning, but it also has poetry and rhythm. There is a relationship between identity, language and prayer; somehow they help you hold together at your centre.
Some people may find this strange, but I never engaged in what is called extemporary prayer during that time. I felt that if I did I would be begin to, sort of, go down a one-way track, reveal my own psychological vulnerability and just get into the business of saying, ‘Oh God, get me out of here’—which isn’t prayer at all. That’s just being like a child. So by falling back on that which I knew, the Prayer Book and the balance of that, I was able to keep a bit more balance in my mind and also maintain some degree of inner balance… (1)
Well, it’s been 15 weeks since we began our own “isolation” under COVID, and 15 weeks since we dusted off and started praying through The Order of Service for Morning Prayer from our own Book of Common Prayer. Some of us, perhaps, are getting a little tired of this, but then again, perhaps some of us are finding the poetry and rhythm of the prayers are working their way not only into our hearts, but our memories, giving us an anchor for the soul in these tumultuous times. As Terry Waite discovered, “ life is lived from within” and “there is a relationship between identity, language, and prayer that help you hold together at your centre…and also maintain some degree of inner balance.”
With every prayer and blessing, from “my cell” to “yours”, as together we lift up holy hands, hearts and voices in prayer and praise to the Lord,
Claude +
(1)For the whole thing see: https://hope1032.com.au/stories/open-house/2013/terry-waite-break-my-body-bend-my-mind-but-my-soul-is-not-yours-to-possess/
by Henry Friesen
Almost exactly nine years ago my family and I were in Saskatoon attending the evening prayers and the funeral service for one of my older brothers. As he and his family were members of the Antiochian Orthodox Church, both services involved the liturgy of scripture, songs, prayers and acknowledgements. The open casket with my brother’s body was there and all of us had time to view him and pause for a few moments with the body.
Continue reading “A Prayer Posture in a Time of Uncertainty”
One of the ancient spiritual writers of the Church, St. Dionysius, wrote about the three liturgies that take place. The first is the liturgy that takes place before the altar in heaven, as described for us in Chapters 4, 5. 7 and 8 of the Book of Revelation. The second is the liturgy is that which takes place on earth, which we celebrate before the altar St. Mary’s. (see photo above). And third liturgy is the one that takes place in altar of our heart.
The purpose of the liturgy that takes place on the earth is to unite the liturgy in heaven with our heart. And so it is that in the Holy Communion we pray,
Lift up your hearts!” “We lift them up unto the Lord!
Let us give thanks to the Lord! “It is meet and right so to do!
Therefore with angels and archangels an all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify thy glorious Name, evermore praising thee and saying,
Holy, Holy, Holy…
Our purpose in the liturgy at the altar at St. Mary’s on Sunday morning, is that that we should “at all times and in all places give thanks unto thee, O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty, Everlasting God, Creator and Preserver of all things”( BCP p. 78) in a ceaseless offering of our lives in thanksgiving and praise to God.
But what are we to do in this time when our liturgy before the altar at St. Mary’s has been silenced?
This is where we need to undertake the difficult work of entering more deeply within our own hearts, to find and serve at the altar of our hearts, and to find the Lord there.
Now that Holy Week is upon us, “ Let us dust off the altar of our heart, place the Gospel back in the centre, take what is given to us in this life( both good and bad) and offer it to God in thanksgiving ( Eucharist). When we do so, we will find that we will receive Christ Himself in return, and every encounter with Christ is Pascha, a passing over from death to life.” ( Abbot Sergius Bowyer)
In support of this collective spiritual effort of ours at St. Mary’s this week, I am attaching a table of lessons and psalms for Holy Week from The Book of Common Prayer, which will serve as our spiritual guide.
I have also attached an Evening Service for Light and Peace for parents to celebrate with their children, in conjunction with the video of the service which was taped at St. Mary’s yesterday afternoon, and can be found here: https://youtu.be/jLIp8gK9xwA
In addition you can also expect to receive by e-mail the following Holy Week services for you to celebrate in the safety of your home, and in spiritual communion with your family at St. Mary’s:
These services will also be posted on our web-site.
Families will also receive “Stations of the Cross” Service which may be used at home, or as part of a prayer walk on Good Friday.
Finally, sanitized palm crosses are available for you to pick up at 15 th Avenue entrance of St. Mary’s today and tomorrow as you make your way home perhaps from a trip to the grocery store.
Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory shall come in
Who is the King of Glory? It is the Lord strong and mighty, even the Lord mighty in battle.
Psalm 24. 7,8
With every prayer for a rich and blessed Holy Week,
Yours faithfully,
Claude +
Now I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say, as with a voice of thunder, “Come!” 2 And I saw, and behold, a white horse, and its rider had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer.3 When he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red; its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that men should slay one another; and he was given a great sword.5 When he opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” And I saw, and behold, a black horse, and its rider had a balance in his hand; 6 and I heard what seemed to be a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; but do not harm oil and wine!”7 When he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!” 8 And I saw, and behold, a pale horse, and its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed him; and they were given power over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by wild beasts of the earth. (Revelation 6. 1-8).
Are we living in the end times?
Continue reading “FROM THE RECTOR’S STUDY: ARE WE LIVING IN THE END TIMES?”
Dear Beloved People of St.Mary’s,
Some of you will perhaps recognize the figure of the man in civilian dress standing to the right of centre of a group of uniformed British Army chaplains. It is C.S. Lewis, celebrated author of children’s stories, and most celebrated Anglican lay theologian of the 20th century.
In a lecture he gave to his students at Oxford University during World War II, Lewis said, “The war creates no absolutely new situation, it simply aggravates the permanent human situation so that we can no longer ignore it. Human life has always been lived on the edge of a precipice. Human culture has always had to exist under the shadow of something infinitely more important than itself. If men has postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure, the search would never have begun. We are mistaken when we compare thewar with “normal life.” Life has never been normal.”
Replace “the war” with “the corona-virus” and you have some sobering words for us to take to heart in the midst of what we regard as an abnormal situation and our longing for and our wondering how long before things return to normal…As far as our calling as Christians is concerned, nothing has changed. We must go about our business.
“My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
Your face, Lord, I will seek. (Psalm 27:9.)
On a practical front, please note the following:
With love and prayer.
Yours faithfully,
Claude +
… As a matter of extreme caution, and after consultation with the diocesan executive committee and Saskatchewan bishops, I suspend, with immediate effect, all regular church services, study groups, fundraising events, and other social gatherings in the Anglican churches of the diocese of Qu’Appelle…
https://www.quappelle.anglican.ca/assets/docs/bishop-letter-mar162020-covid19.pdf
WE beseech thee, Almighty God, look upon the hearty desires of thy humble servants, and stretch forth the right hand of thy Majesty, to be our defence against all our enemies; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
O Lord and Master of my life! Take from me the spirit of sloth, despondency, lust of power, and idle talk. But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to Thy servant. Yea, O Lord and King! Grant me to see my own faults and not to judge my brother; For Thou art blessed unto ages of ages. Amen
(The Lenten Prayer of ST. Isaac the Syrian)
Water is the dominant motif of the texts for the Third Sunday in Lent, leading in various ways to reflection upon human need and divine grace. The Old Testament lesson is one of the many accounts of the people of Israel complaining in the wilderness, in this case because of thirst. The Lord’s response is to tell Moses how to bring water from the rock. The psalm, one of praise, responds directly to Exodus 17. In the epistle, Paul presents a picture of endurance in suffering that contrasts with that of Israel in the wilderness, and celebrates God’s love in Jesus Christ as the foundation for rejoicing. The gospel reading is the account of Jesus at the well in Samaria, offering living water of the Holy Spirit to the Samaritan woman.