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Almighty God, you know that we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves: Keep us both outwardly in our bodies and inwardly in our souls, that we may be defended from all adversities which may happen to the body, and from all evil thoughts which may assault and hurt the soul; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Almighty and merciful God, you raised up Gregory of Rome to be a servant of the servants of God, and inspired him to send missionaries to preach the Gospel to the English people: Preserve in your Church the catholic and apostolic faith they taught, that your people, being fruitful in every good work, may receive the crown of glory that never fades away; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
You may notice that the church seems a little plainer, a little less decorated than usual. You’re not imagining things—it is, and the reason, of course, is because we’re in Lent. Specifically, what you’re not seeing includes: flowers on the altar, and the Paschal Candle in its accustomed position near the baptismal font. In many places there are distinctive altar vestments (purple or unbleached linen) that denote the penitential character of the season, and sometimes different candlesticks are used. The liturgy itself also has a peculiarly Lenten feel: the Christian expletive of praise—Alleluia—is retired until the Easter Vigil, the General Confession is often moved to the beginning of the service. The service music is more restrained in tone. Instead of a blessing at the conclusion of the service, there is usually a “solemn prayer over the people.”
Nonetheless, please note that this is the second Sunday in Lent—the preposition is important, for Sundays in the season are manifestly not of Lent. Lent is a time of penitence and fasting; all Sundays are, by definition, feasts of the resurrection, “little Easters,” whenever they occur. For those observing dietary abstinence as a Lenten discipline, it would not be inappropriate to relax such measures on Sundays in Lent.
The word “Lent” is related to the same Old English root from which we get “lengthen,” alluding to the fact that, in the northern hemisphere, the days are getting longer at this time of year. Christians in the early centuries of the church put a great deal of energy into the annual observance of our Lord’s death and resurrection. Baptisms were saved up to be performed at the Great Vigil of Easter (Easter eve into Easter morning). Those who were under penitential discipline were restored to full fellowship with the church in time to make their communion at the vigil liturgy. It seemed appropriate that there be a time of focused preparation for these observances, a time in which all the Faithful could live in solidarity with those who were going to be baptized or restored. This period of preparation eventually evolved into Lent.
There are two lesser commemorations in our calendar:
Tuesday—St Gregory of Nyssa was one of the bright lights of eastern Christianity as a bishop, philosopher, and theologian in the last fourth century.
Friday—St Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome. Pope Gregory served in the late sixth century and briefly into the seventh. Through his administrative skill and pastoral aptitude, he did a great deal to consolidate the leading position of the Roman church in western Christianity. The plainsong musical idiom known as Gregorian Chant is named for him, as is the Gregorian Calendar. As Anglicans, our particular inheritance from Gregory flows from his sending the monk Augustine on a mission to the English kingdom of Kent (597), where the See of Canterbury was established.
Since then, Dr. Wells has completed his doctoral studies and become executive director of The Living Church Foundation; Craig Uffman assists at St. Anne’s Episcopal Church, Warsaw, Diocese of Northern Indiana; and nearly fifty editorial contributors stand together in commitment to the Anglican Communion’s developing covenant, and to robust theological conversation.
We now happily take our place within The Living Church Foundation’s mission of supporting and promoting Catholic Anglicanism. We are honored to have the continuing support of three patrons: Graham Kings, Bishop of Sherborne, United Kingdom; Edward S. Little II, Bishop of Northern Indiana; and James M. Stanton, Bishop of Dallas.
Our Mission
cov•e•nant (kuv'en ent) from the Latin convenire: agree, assemble, summon, combine, be convenient or suitable, unite. [1250–1300; ME < AF, OF, n. use of prp. of covenir < L convenire to come together, agree; see convene]
We are evangelical and catholic Anglicans, and fellow travelers from the wider household of God, assembled and summoned to a common labor in the ecumenical Church of Christ, not least through the present struggles and gifts of our communities.
We recognize that the Anglican Communion — the first instance of ecclesiality with which we, in this particular online assembly, wrestle for a blessing — is incomplete by itself, because we have seen with our eyes and touched with our hands the wounds of our Lord’s body: the countless factions and disputes that do not bring him glory, leaving us all together far short of our call to “share,” as sisters and brothers visibly united, in the “partnership” of his offering (1 Cor. 10:14ff.).
In a sense it has ever been so. We recall Saint Paul’s outrage with the Corinthians, who “came together (synerchesthai) … not for the better but for the worse,” a sobering point too little reflected upon in our day by those, on all sides, who find the Church’s unity and orthodoxy uncomplicated — either simply given, or obviously taken away. Against both of these views, Paul insists that “there have to be factions (hairesis) among you, for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine” (1 Cor. 11:17-19). And yet the Apostle does not on that account “commend” the Corinthians for showing “contempt for the Church of God and humiliat[ing] those who have nothing” (1 Cor. 11:22). Rather, Paul’s argument devolves to his prior exhortation to learn from the “example” of “Israel,” “written down to instruct us,” “so that we might not desire evil” but instead the singular “blessing that we bless.” Only upon this, objective basis: the blood and body of Christ unveiled, will the Corinthians learn to “do everything for the glory of God,” that is, to “give no offense to Jews or Greeks or to the Church,” to “please everyone in everything,” and not seek their “own advantage,” so that “many … may be saved” (1 Cor. 10).
In this “communion” (koinonia) of the humiliated church of Corinth, a church with “nothing that it has not received” — thus learning “of unity through its nothingness before the Cross of Christ,” and seeing “in the Apostolate its dependence upon the one people of God, and the death by which every member and every church bears witness to the Body which is one” [1] — we come together again, even online (though not primarily here!): because we have already been assembled, “convoked or convened by an act independent” of ourselves that reflects the Church’s very “character as a community" [2]. In this shared experience of death and life, over and over again (see 1 Cor. 15:31), we recognize a common faith and hope in Christ’s twofold call upon our lives: to humility and penitence in the teeth of painful division, and to reconciliation in love. Indeed, we “eat” together as we “wait for one another,” the two actions indistinguishable as they are joined in the single body of the One whose blood is our “new covenant” (1 Cor. 11:33, 25).
[1] Michael Ramsey, The Gospel and the Catholic Church, (London: Longmans, 1956), 220.
[2] Rowan Williams, Why Study the Past? (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 111.
