Augustine, Archbishop. (St. Augustine of Canterbury). He was a Roman monk, the chief agent in the conversion of the Saxons, which was primarily the work of Gregory the Great. He landed in 596, baptized King Ethelbert in 597, was consecrated in Gaul as first Archbishop of Canterbury in 598, and founded the Bishoprics of Rochester and London before his death in 604. He was apparently an earnest and eloquent but not a great man, guilty of some harshness and arrogance in relation to the old British Church, and leaning throughout for guidance on the larger and loftier mind of Gregory; but rightly honoured as having been privileged to be the founder of English Christianity. -- May 26th.

-Teacher's Prayerbook

Dunstan, Archbishop (A.D. 924-980). The victorious champion of the Church and the cause of monasticism and celibacy of the clergy, in the struggle under Edwy and Edgar, and, after his elevation to the primacy, virtually the prime minister and ruler of England. Educated at Glastonbury, of which he became Abbot (introducing the Benedictine rule), afterwards Bishop of Worcester and London, and Archbishop of Canterbury in 959, he was a man of high ability and education, fanatic in what he believed to be the cause of God, ready alike to suffer and to persecute for it; a stern reformer and an able ruler, but wanting in gentleness of spirit and scrupulousness of action.

“Let us exult, Beloved, with joy of soul, and rejoicing with fitting praise in Godís presence, lift up the now free eyes of the soul to that place where Christ abides. Let not earthly things hold here the souls that are called above; let not perishable things fill the hearts that are chosen for external things. Let no false allurements hold back those who walk in the way of truth.” - St. Leo the Great (d. 461)

The Collect for Ascension Day:  Grant, we beseech thee, Almighty God, that like as we do believe thy only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to have ascended into the heavens; so we may also in heart and mind thither ascend, and with him continually dwell, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen.

The Epistle: Acts 1:1-11                        
The Gospel: St. Luke 24:49-53

An Historical Note.

In the Sarum Missal, the Petition simply reads: “. . . so we may also in mind dwell in heavenly places.” Cranmer made 3 important additions (in 1549) and in what follows we will briefly consider the significance of each of them. First, he added “in heart,” an addition which Goulburn calls a most “happy” alteration. “The reason why our minds are so little occupied with Christ, is that our affections are so little set upon Him. One who is the object of earthly love is much thought of; the mind flies off to him whenever it is disengaged, simply because the heart is bound up in him.”[1] One is reminded of St. Paul’s instructions: “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:1-4).

The second Cranmerian change is the addition of the word “ascend.” Whereas the Sarum only makes reference to dwelling (mentally) in the heavenly places, Cranmer adds this request for ascent there, making a connection between the state of our hearts and minds upon earth and the future state for which we hope (again, see Colossians 3:1-4).[2]

Finally, Cranmer added the phrase “and with him continually dwell.” This change seems to have been suggested to Cranmer by an Ascension Collect from the Sacramentary of Gelasius which reads “according to thy promise, thou mayest ever live with us on earth and we with thee in heaven.”

A Reflection on the Significance of Jesus’ Ascension

Forty days ago we celebrated the resurrection of Jesus from the grave. We do well to recall that this was not merely a spiritual resurrection, but a truly bodily resurrection. The body of the resurrected Lord was not simply a reanimated physical body, rather it was an immortalized, glorified body – a human body wonderfully perfected. Following his resurrection, on numerous occasions Jesus appeared in this amazing body to his apostles and disciples, until his final appearance (recorded in Acts 1) at which time they witnessed him Ascend into Heaven. By this glorious Event the resurrected Jesus was exalted by the Father to his right hand on high and crowned as the Lord of lords and King of kings – as Psalm 24 sings and prophesies.

With the Ascension & Exaltation of Jesus Christ, the nature of heaven itself was transformed forever. What caused this transformation? The entrance of God incarnate into heaven, for when Jesus ascended into heaven he retained his full humanity (though now in an immortalized and glorified form). Thus into the sphere where the angels and archangels eternally adore the Holy Trinity, Jesus brought human nature and a human body; and heaven – which was already perfect – was given a higher degree of perfection and grace. Because the Incarnate Son of God is in heaven, those who are united to him (enclosed, as it were within his glorified human nature by the action of the Holy Ghost) are also united to the Holy Trinity.

Thus within the Triune Life of the Holy Trinity there was and there remains glorified human nature!  This is an amazing thought and truth, with most holy and saving consequences for human beings, not least the possibility of the beatific vision of beholding the glory of the Father in the face of Jesus Christ.

Previously the angelic hosts and choirs alone praised and magnified the Holy Trinity with their perpetual cry, “Holy, Holy, Holy,” but now the human voice of the exalted Jesus – High Priest, Son of God, Lord and Mediator – is heard as well.

Additionally, from the time of Jesus’ Ascension and onwards, a constant procession of redeemed and sanctified human beings (both the saints from the Israel of the Old Covenant and the martyrs and saints of the Church of the New Covenant) have been entering Heaven by, through, with and in him. Thus now in heaven, the heavenly choir is comprised of both angelic and human voices – all of whom joyfully sing in the Name of Jesus to the glory of God, who is the Blessed, Holy and Undivided Trinity.

Let us rejoice and be exceedingly glad that Heaven was eternally changed, being marvelously developed and expanded, through the Arrival and Coronation of the Lord Jesus.  Through Jesus, the Way, the Truth and the Life we have the hope of entering into the holy sphere of Heaven, in which he has promised “are many mansions” for the heirs of Abraham’s promise.

So on Ascension Day we celebrate not only the Exaltation of the Lord Jesus Christ to the supreme place of authority alongside the Father but also the raising of our human nature into the very centre of heaven.  Where he has gone those who are united to him by faith and in love by the Holy Ghost will also go - in heart and mind now and in full bodily reality at the End time.

As St. Augustine put it long ago - "All our activity will be Amen and Alleluia." For "There we shall rest, and we shall see; we shall see and we shall love; we shall love and we shall praise. Behold what shall be in the end and shall not end." (The Latin is most evocative - Vacabimus et videbimus, videbimus et amabimus, amabimus et laudabimus. Ecce quod erit in fine sine fine.)[3]

So we ask: Why, O Why is the Festival of the Ascension so neglected today?  As Prayerbook commentator Evan Daniel wrote:

The festival of the Ascension, though in modern times much neglected in comparison with the other great festivals of the Church, was evidently intended by the framers of the Prayer Book to be celebrated with special honour. It has assigned to it Proper Psalms, Proper Lessons, a special Collect, Epistle, and Gospel and a Proper Preface, and stands, therefore, in the same rank with Christmas, Easter Day, and Whitsunday (Pentecost). St. Augustine speaks of it as universally observed in the Church, and argues that it must have been instituted either by the Apostles themselves, or by Church Councils. He says: ‘For those things which are received and observed all over the world, not as written in Scripture, but as handed down to us by tradition, we conceive to be instituted by the Apostles themselves or some numerous Council whose authority is of very great use in the Church. Such are the anniversary solemnities of our Saviour’s passion and resurrection, and ascension into heaven, and the coming of the Holy Ghost from heaven.[4]

We do well to recall that this is the Festival without which the other Festivals cannot fulfill their meaning and purpose! For unless the Lord Jesus is exalted into heaven, his work is incomplete and thus there is no salvation, redemption, divinization and beatification for the human sinners whom he came to save.

Jesus is risen from the dead. Alleluia.
Jesus is exalted to the Father’s right hand. Alleluia.
Jesus has transformed and remade heaven. Alleluia.
The Father sends the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, in Jesus’ Name. Alleluia.

Jesus will come to judge the living and the dead at the end of the age. Alleluia.

- Dr. Peter Toon (with J. S. Patterson)


[1] Gourburn, 226.
[2] Goulburn, 227.
[3] Augustin, City of God, Book XXII, chapter xxx.
[4] Evan Daniel, The Prayer-Book: It’s History, Language and Contents, 1901, pg. 281.

Source: http://www.pbsusa.org/the-christian-year/13-ascension/235-a-reflection-on-ascension.html

O Lord, from whom all good things do come: Grant to us thy humble servants, that by thy holy inspiration we may think those things that be good, and by thy merciful guiding may perform the same; through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Epistle: St James 1:22-27                     
The Gospel: St John 16:23-33

An Historical Note.

This Collect is taken from the Sacramentary of Gelasius (mid-8th century) and thus it was composed long before this Sunday came to be called “Rogation Sunday,” which did not take place until 1662. The name is derived from the 3 Rogation days that follow it (these being the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday before Ascension Day).

The Collect’s content has changed little, with only 3 notable changes made by the English Reformers (in 1549): (1) the addition of two adjectives – “holy (inspiration)” and “merciful(guiding)”[1] and (2) the substitution of the word good instead of “right” in the phrase think those things that be good.

The 3 Rogations Days before AscensionA note on the Rogation Days

In the old tradition of the Ecclesia Anglicana and of the Catholic Church in the west, the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday before the Feast of the Ascension are called Rogation Days. These days of fasting and abstinence are preparation for the feast of the Ascension. The Rogation Days are much neglected in today’s church, but if we are to have a Harvest Festival (Great Britain) or a Thanksgiving Day (USA), it makes good sense to observe the Rogations Days, as these days are the days upon which special supplication for fruitful seasons and a good harvest are made to God. Furthermore, the spiritual disciplines of fasting and prayer that are meant to characterize the 3 Rogation Days is a means by which we prepare for our celebration of Christ’s glorious ascension, which we will observe on Holy Thursday (the 40th day after his mighty resurrection).

The origin of the 3 “Minor” Rogation Days

In the past these days were called the “Minor Rogation Days” in contrast to the Major Rogation Day, which was kept on April 25th. The origin of the Minor Days seems to be an order by Mamertus, the Bishop of Vienne in about AD 470. After an earthquake he instructed that special litanies be offered for God's care and protection, asking for provision by heaven of the fruit of the earth. The custom spread through Gaul, to England and to Rome. In England the custom was required by Canon 16 of the Council of Clovesho in 747.

The Rogation Days survived the Reformation in England and thus in 1559 we find Queen Elizabeth requiring by Royal Injunction the restoration of a perambulation of the parish boundaries/fields to pray for a good harvest. Likewise, in 1562 the official [Second] Book of Homilies included “An Homily for the Days of Rogation Week", which was divided into three parts in keeping with the 3 Rogation Days.[2]

The Rogation Days were typically kept by the clergy and people processing around the parish boundaries, while saying or singing prayers. It is from these Rogation Day prayers, as they are found in the Sarum Missal, that Cranmer formulated the Litany (1545), his first work of liturgical reform.[3] After this it became the custom that in any parish in which the Rogation Day procession was not being observed, the Litany was sung in the church instead.

The Collect for the Rogation Days.

In 1661, Bishop Cosin proposed a Collect, Epistle (James 5:13-18) and Gospel (St. Luke 11:1-10) for the 3 Rogation Days before Ascension Day but nothing came of this and thus there are no Propers for the Rogation Days in the 1662 BCP. The Collect that he wrote provides an insight into how this period of intercession and abstinence was viewed by the faithful at that time: "Almighty God, Lord of heaven and earth, in whom we live, move and have our being, who does good unto all men, making thy sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sending rain on the just and the unjust; favourably behold us thy people, who do call upon thy name, and send us thy blessing from heaven, in giving us fruitful seasons, and filling our hearts with food and gladness; that both our hearts and mouths may be continually filled with thy praises, giving thanks to thee in thy holy Church, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."[4]

In the American 1928 BCP, there is a Collect as well as an Epistle (Ezekiel 34:25ff.) and a Gospel (Luke 11:5ff.)[5]. There are also two Collects "For Fruitful Seasons," which are commonly prayed on Rogation Sunday and the Rogation Days, in the section of this Prayer Book called "Prayers and Thanksgivings" (pgs 39-40).



[1] “If these epithets cannot be said to add much to the sense of the Collect, they at least do something for its sound. Great and commendable pains were taken by the compilers of our Prayer Book to make the prayers rhythmical to the ear, under the view, possibly, that rhythm is not merely an ornament of style, but also an assistance to the memory.” Goulburn, 220.


[2] The homily is followed by "An exhortation to be spoken to such parishes where they use their perambulation in Rogation Week for the oversight and limits of their town”, written by Archbishop Parker.


[3] Peter Blake, 182.


[4] John Cosin, Collection of Private Devotions (1627).


[5] See pg. see pg. 261. The Collect is based upon the one written by Cosin.

Source: http://www.pbsusa.org/the-christian-year/13-ascension/234-rogation-sunday-and-the-rogation-days.html

"St. John ante Portam Latinam: The reference is to the legend (as old as the time of Tertullian) that, in the persecution of Domitian, the aged Apostle was cast into a caldron of boiling oil before the Latin Gate of Rome, and remaining unhurt was banished to Patmos. The Roman Church of "St. John before the Latin Gate" is of early date."

Along with Feast days and Saints days, the liturgical calendar also has other memorials.  Today, May 3, we commemorate the "Invention of the Cross."  

Since the name of our church is "All Saints," I thought that it might be a good idea to commemorate all the saints here on our blog.  As we go through our church calendar and come upon Saints Days and special feasts and fasts, we will be posting information on those day here.  For the time being, we will be following the calendar of the 1662 Book of Common Prayer, which may be found here.  

"It seems impossible to give any sufficient reason for coupling together these two Apostles. (The Greek Church separates them, keeping St. Philip's Day on November 14th, and St. James' Day on October 9th.) The union of the two, however, suggests the harmony of the desire of knowledge characteristic of St. Philip (see the Gospel) with the stern practical reality characteristic of St. James the "brother of the Lord," who is evidently (though perhaps erroneously) identified with St. James the Less, the Apostle.
      Of St. Philip we have notices only in St. John. he was one of the first disciples "found" by Our Lord, and he brought Nathanael to Him; he is associated with St. Andrew at the feeding of the Five thousand, and the coming of the Greeks to Christ; and (see the Gospel) he is described as especially craving for the knowledge of God (John i. 43; vi. 5-9; xii. 21, 22; xiv. 8, 9). Beyond this we know nothing. Early tradition speaks of his preaching in Phyrgia, and later apocryphal books raise a strange fabric of legend concerning him.

Of St. James the Apostle, the son of Alphæus (Matthew x. 2; Mark iii. 18; Luke vi. 15), sometimes supposed to be the same as "James the Less" (or rather "the little") of Mark xv. 40, we know nothing except his name in the Apostolic catalogue. James, "the Lord's brother," with whom he is clearly identified by the use of the Epistle (though the identification is, to say the least, very uncertain) is one of the most marked figures in the Acts of the Apostles and in contemporary history. As Bishop of Jerusalem, he is essentially the representative of Jewish Christianity; presiding at the first Apostolic Council, and holding out to St. Paul the right hand of fellowship; held in reverence as "James the Just" by all Jerusalem, and martyred in vengeance for his Christianizing influence by Pharisaic violence. His Epistle, essentially Jewish in character, is a storehouse of godly morality, in which Christian doctrine is but implied, and not explicitly brought out; and was probably addressed both to Jewish Christians and to those Jews who, though not Christian, would listen to 'the servant of Jesus Christ'." --taken from the "Teacher's Prayer Book"

On Ash Wednesday, we began our journey with the sober reminder that, “Dust thou art, and to dust shalt thou return.” Over the following weeks during Lent, we focused on Jesus’ light rather than on the darkness that our Lenten repentance illumines. For many of us, this Lent was a beautiful time of reflection on the joy that comes from journeying with Jesus toward Jerusalem.

In Holy Week, we noticed the capacity for both praise and betrayal in Jesus’ followers on Palm Sunday. We prayed together over the accounts of Jesus and the disciples at the Last Supper on Maundy Thursday and over Jesus’ path through Jerusalem on Good Friday.

We celebrated Christ as our Paschal Light at our Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday evening, and we were especially filled with joy at the Easter Vigil as the strong, beautiful light of the Paschal candle was shared with Claire and John in their baptisms! We thanked God for the empty tomb of our Risen Lord on Easter Sunday morning, as the words of the “young man dressed in white” echoed in our ears: “He is risen. He is not here!”

The week after Easter Sunday, “Low Sunday,” we all breathed a sigh of relief that we had made it through such a busy season, and wondered over the peace that the Risen Jesus shares with us as he shared it with the disciples when he stood among them and said, “Peace be with you” (Luke 24:36). 

At our confirmation service on April 22, we celebrated the completion of the work begun at Patti's baptism and her commissioning to the new work ahead of her to further Christ’s kingdom. We also enjoyed introducing Bishop Bill to our parish and hearing from him of all that’s being done in the diocese at large and being encouraged by him in our church planting efforts.  Thanks be to God!

A Global communion for the twenty-first Century:

Praise the Lord!

It is a great joy to greet all of you in my capacity as the Chairman of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans in the precious name of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ, through whom we are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. I believe that our time together here is a key moment in the unfolding purpose of God for our beloved Anglican Communion and its great encouragement to have leaders drawn from some thirty [30] different nations as we gather here this evening. We are indeed a global communion for the twenty-first century. We have come together because of the Lord’s leading as we follow His guidance towards overcoming challenges of our times and the continuing crisis which afflicts our Communion. I want to frame my address with some words of scripture in Micah which I believe are a particular word from the Lord for us right now.

Micah was a prophet during a particular time of crisis in the history of God’s people, the later half of the eighth century BC, during which the people of the northern kingdom of Israel, lost their identity and the people of the South: Judah nearly suffered the same fate.
In Micah 6:8 we read: 
He has showed you, O man, what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you? 
To act justly and to love mercy 
And to walk humbly with your God.

What does the Lord require of you?

This is the greatest question facing us this week.  It demands that we have a clear headed understanding of the situation we face and are willing to let go of comfortable illusions. It also, and most crucially, calls us back to what God has said. Micah affirms that “he has showed you, O man, what is good”. Discovering the will of God, what God requires, is not dependent upon our ingenuity or imagination. He does not play games with us. He speaks through the scriptures. The question is whether or not we will allow the Holy Spirit to apply that word to our hearts and then obey it.

What does the Lord require? First we need to bring a biblical mind to the situation we face. None of us looked for this crisis and we may be tempted to think we can get back to a time when the life of our communion ran along more predictable and familiar lines. But that is an illusion. Faith is not escapism, but facing things as they are in the confidence that God will act. The crisis we face is also an opportunity. Its origin can be traced back many years. The unprecedented challenges to Anglican identity forced upon us by the revisionist scriptural interpretation have in the mercy of God, given us an historic opportunity to rediscover the distinctive reformed catholicity of our Communion as shaped so profoundly by the witness of the sixteenth century Anglican Reformers.

Trusting God’s providence, we can be confident that in God’s own time He is putting right what has been going wrong, but He takes us up into His purposes and if we are to understand the implications of this crisis for the recovery and renewal of Anglican identity, we must first be clear on what sort of crisis it is.

We cannot treat this as simply an institutional crisis. The breakdown of the existing governance structures of the Anglican Communion is a symptom of a deeper problem. It is now generally recognized that the instruments of Unity eg. The Primates Meeting, the Anglican Consultative Council, the Lambeth conference… no longer command general confidence.

Subsequently, when the Global South Movement Primates gathered in China last September felt compelled to state in a communiqué that; 

‘the Anglican Communion’s instruments of Unity have become dysfunctional and no longer have the ecclesial and moral authority to hold the communion together’.

If we were facing a merely institutional problem, then we would have expected that the heavy investment made in Anglican Covenant would have brought a resolution. But now with the rejection of the Covenant, even in the Church of England itself, it is obvious that institutional remedies for the crisis have failed and that the problems we face are far too deep seated to be dealt with by merely managerial and organizational strategies. As Primates of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, we recognized in our communiqué of November 2010 that the Anglican Covenant was I quote: “Fatally flawed!” It had become clear that it was little more than a form of words to disguise conflict rather than resolve it. The heart of the crisis we face is not institutional, but spiritual.

Micah can ask ‘what does the Lord require?’

In the confidence of that what the Lord requires has already been revealed. But the Lambeth Conference of 1998 showed that a determined minority were willing to bend the word of God to fit the fashionable ideas of their cultural context and that they were not willing to stand in solidarity with the clear mind of the communion’s bishops when opinion was tested.

The subsequent history of our communion unfolds from this point. Some sections of the Anglican Communion have been echoing the words of the serpent; ‘has God really said…?’ And their strategy has been to continue this dialogue endlessly in order to wear down resistance while all the time pursuing their self determined mandate of radical inclusion. In this they have been greatly helped by those Anglican theologians who claim that our identity is found in what they call ‘the grammar of obedience.’ They want us to step back from the plain sense of scripture and excavate ‘deeper truths’ of God’s revelation concealed below the words themselves. It is little surprise then that we find scripture can be bent into all sorts of convenient shapes and that so called ‘gospel’ truths can contradict the plain meaning of scriptures.

While we should never shirk the hard work of biblical exposition, we can never disregard the plain teaching of the inspired text. It is that text, that Archbishop Cranmer was so keen to have available in the English languages in every parish church and translation of the scriptures into ethnic languages has been fundamental to the cultural transformation that the gospel brought in Africa and the rest of the world. The ‘grammar of obedience’ is a theological Trojan horse for profound disobedience. This accommodation to false teaching by Anglican Communion institutions has had a grievous effect.

Let me illustrate by contrasting between our conference in Jerusalem in 2008 which launched the GAFCON movement and the Lambeth conference which took place shortly afterwards.

In the space of a week we, though from many and varied cultural contexts, were able to agree and receive with great joy and celebration a clear statement of Anglican Identity in the form of the Jerusalem Declaration. We rejoiced that through the Holy Spirit the Lord had given us such unity in the truth and we knew that God was setting us free or a clear and confident witness to Jesus Christ in a way that was simply not imaginable through the traditional channels.

At Lambeth Conference, which many felt unable in conscience to attend, it was a different story. Much talking and conversation, but no shared mind and no attempt to resolve the substance of the fundamental doctrinal and ethical differences which have been so destructive to our unity. At Lambeth there was a loss of nerve and nothing more than conversation, at Jerusalem we boldly reaffirmed our confidence in the faith we confess. There we recovered our genuinely Anglican identity and in the Jerusalem Declaration set out a coherent framework for global witness in the twenty-first century. The Jerusalem Statement, the preamble to the Declaration, clearly sets out Anglican identity. Let me remind you;

We, together with many other faithful Anglicans throughout the world, believe the doctrinal foundation of Anglicanism, which defines our core identity as Anglicans, is expressed in these words: The doctrine of the Church is grounded in the Holy Scriptures and in such teachings of the ancient fathers and Councils of the church as are agreeable to the said scriptures. In particular, such doctrine is to be found in the Thirty nine Articles of Religion, the Book of Common Prayers and the Ordinal. We intend to remain faithful to this standard and we call on others in the communion to reaffirm and return to it.


Our conference in Jerusalem was truly a mountain top experience, a rich time of fellowship in the Holy Spirit, of inspired teaching and prophetic insights. But we have to come down from the mountain top and not simply rest on the experience or think that by articulating a vision we have somehow done our work. What does the Lord require? He requires, says Micah: that we act, that we act justly and with mercy, not just write and think about things. We must act out of our God given identity, we must be true to ourselves as we are in Christ crucified, redeemed through the cross where God’s Justice and Mercy meet. This is what it means to act with authenticity. It is not a matter of following our subjective dreams and feelings, but being true to the one who has risen from the dead, so that we might live not for ourselves, but for Him who died and rose again for us.

Living in this way is beyond our human capacities. In the words of the collect for the Nineteenth Sunday of Trinity in the Book of Common Prayer we pray:

“ … forasmuch as without thee, we are not able to please thee; mercifully grant that thy Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts.”

This for me is a personal truth. On being elected as Chairman of GAFCON/FCA’s Primates council in April last year, I said this:

‘I recognize that we have set ourselves a truly monumental task, but we serve God for whom nothing, not even overcoming death itself is impossible.’

So we must act in obedience to what the Lord requires and, knowing our weakness, in continual dependence upon the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a truth which is precious to some of us through our roots in the East African Revival when the spirit of God renewed the church brining a humble walk with God- conviction of sins, a thirst for God’s word, a simple lifestyle and an unquenchable desire for evangelism. It is these qualities that we need to animate our Global fellowship as we move forward together. As a powerful movement of renewal and transformation for that is what we are.

Since 2008, we have acted, perhaps not always as quickly or as clearly as we should, but there has been action. In accordance with the Jerusalem Declaration, the GAFCON primates sponsored the Anglican Church in North America as a new province and ceased to be in communion with The Episcopal Church of the United States and the Anglican Church of Canada. It is a cause of great joy to see that despite aggressive use of the courts and the loss of property which previous generations intended for the work of the gospel, the ACNA is far from being just a place of shelter for the wounded. It is dynamic missionary body which is growing remarkably through visionary church planting.

Last year, it became clear that provision need to be made for England too. The Anglican Mission in England was formed last June after four years of discussion with senior Anglican leaders in England had failed to find a way in which those genuinely in need of effective orthodox oversight in the Church of England could receive it.

This week we will apply ourselves to discerning the next stage in what it is the Lord requires. I hope that our taking counsel together will lead to action that will shape the future of the Communion in profound ways but as we pay attention to the great questions of theology and strategy, we need to be careful not to neglect the way we act towards each other so that there is a consistency and integrity to the identity we claim.

To act justly and to love Mercy includes behaving towards one another with honesty and fairness, as ends and not means, not being infected by cynicism and pragmatism that can creep in when issues of power and influence are at stake. It is true that the FCA is a prophetic movement and God has given us some stern things to say, but the sternness should be all the more striking because of the kindness and generosity for which we are known.

And all this we do with humility and prayer, not setting ourselves up above the word, but recognizing that it is the Word of God which judges and searches us. We shall also be alert to the fact that the word, which is God’s truth for all cultures and all times is not the privilege possession of any one culture and global gathering such as this has a potential to open new perspectives on the unsearchable riches of Christ.

To do what the Lord requires will also take courage. These are things we need to attend to if the Anglican Communion is to recover its biblical identity. The challenges are indeed monumental and I think they can be summarized as follows:

1. We must keep the glory of God and the fulfillment of the great commission at the heart of the movement. We defend the gospel because we want to promote the gospel. GAFCON was launched as a rescue mission for the Anglican Communion, but that is because the communion itself should be a rescue mission. In particular we should be building global partnership to encourage evangelism and church planting.  We need each other, for instance the south can benefit from the experience of those in the North who have resisted and understand the dynamics of a western secularizing culture which is rapidly spreading around the globe. The North also can benefit from the Missionary enthusiasm and vigor which is characterizing the growing Churches of the global South. As a global communion we should be at the forefront of the work. We cannot be content for Anglicanism to be as a kind of chaplaincy to dwindling enclaves of those who have been left behind by the tide of history.

2. We should look to the pioneer the new wineskin of the global governance structures which will help and not hinder the task of evangelism. Four years ago the Jerusalem Statement spoke of the ‘manifest failure’ of the instruments of Unity in the Anglican Communion, and since then it has become entirely clear that these instruments have failed us. Orthodox leaders must now do more than simply stay away. We have to go back to the basic principles and develop new structures while remaining firmly within the Anglican Communion. We need to consider how we can build on the model of councilor leadership initiated in Jerusalem in 2008 with the setting up of the GAFCON primate’s council. Our communion has come of age and it is now time that its leadership should be focused not on one person or one church, however hallowed its history, but on the one historic faith we confess. There is added urgency to these concerns and need for creative thinking so that a pattern of global governance that is no longer fit for this context is not perpetuated by default.

3. We must resist the temptation to be theologically lazy. Our aim of a renewed, reformed Anglican Communion will not be sustained if we are unwilling to support and encourage those who are gifted to do the training and the theological heavy lifting so essential to give depth and penetration to our vision both within the Church and beyond it. We need to recover the vision of the Anglican Reformers, of ordinary believers knowing scriptures and being nourished by biblical teaching. Equally we need leaders, lay and ordained, able to give a robust defense of apostolic faith in the global public square. If we do not, secular ideologies which have so powerfully shaped liberal and revisionist Christianity in the Communion will tighten the grip. The Lord our God cannot allow it. He calls us to move on.

So what does the Lord require? He has called us to a great prophetic purpose at this critical point in the life of our communion. After some 450 years it is becoming clear that what some have called the ‘Anglican experiment’ is not ending in failure, but is on the verge of a new and truly global future in which the original vision of the reformers can be realized as never before. We do not need to repudiate or belittle our history, but learn from it and set ourselves now to walk humbly with our God into the future and that hope that he has planned for us.

May I take this opportunity as I end my remarks and invite you and your churches to GAFCON II in May of 2013.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN!


Source: http://gafcon.org/news/a-global-communion-for-the-twenty-first-century/

They were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?” [Mark 16:3]

Preached by the Most Reverend Robert Duncan at the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh Vigil, in St. Peter’s Church in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, on Easter Eve, 7th April, A.D.2012.

In the Name of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, One God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Blessed and Praised forever:  Amen.

In all four gospels it is women who come first to the tomb. Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell us the purpose: to anoint Jesus’ body.  Burial on Friday had been hurried.  At least the soldiers had not broken his legs to speed death.  He was already dead.  The Sabbath was at hand.  In the moment, Joseph of Arimathea was moved to give his own freshly hewn tomb, which was, St. John tells us, very near to the Place of the Skull.  Nicodemus, John tells us, had given spices, but Jesus’ own inner circle had not been able to care for his body in the customary way.  There had been so much hurry.  They had loved him so much.  Nevertheless, they could still do what was right, what at the very least they owed him, when the Sabbath ended. 

They surely recognized their problem.  They surely knew that the immense wheel-like stone had been rolled over the entrance to the tomb.  St. Mark tells us that they had actually seen this happen.  Maybe they had also heard about Pilate’s order that the tomb be sealed and a guard set to keep things that way.  It is St. Matthew that records for us this detail.

So the women meet very early on Sunday, sometime after sundown on Saturday.  They must do what it is right to do and what could not be done on Friday.  They can now prepare the spices and the ointments.  It is still dark.  They will arrive near first light.

Everything is, of course, very confused and confusing.  Their grief is overwhelming.  Have they forgotten about the stone?  Do they not think about the stone until they are actually on their way?  Do each think about it earlier, but not discuss it?  We cannot know.  All we can know is that on their way to the tomb they are saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?” 

Followers of Jesus often face what seem to them insurmountable problems…challenges for which there seem to be no apparent solutions.  They will nevertheless do what is right, what they can do, even if there is a part of the puzzle they do not have or cannot conceive.  Trust in their God drives them on.  With God, there has always been a way through in the past, so why not trust Him now?

A terribly injured child?  An impossible situation at work?  A marriage in tatters?  Some debilitating illness or handicap? An unjust accusation?  An adolescent in rebellion?  A friendship betrayed?  Wars and rumors of wars?  Domestic or civil violence?  Whatever the present impossibility…  We Christians will trust him with this too.

We can wonder what the women spoke of as they went in the darkness toward the tomb of Jesus.  Was there more than “Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?”  Might they have remembered the Passover story of long ago, the very feast being celebrated in these same days?  All the first-born of Israel had been spared.  Might they next have recalled the victory at the Red Sea, when all God’s people were saved and all of Pharaoh’s army drowned?  Might they have remembered Jericho, where the walls miraculously tumbled down?  Could they have encouraged one another with the stories of Ruth or Esther, or Daniel or the Three Young Men?  Might they have spoken of Judas Maccabeus or the miracle of Chanukah?  Could they have rehearsed some of the miracles they had seen at the hands of their crucified rabbi?  The healings, the feedings, the castings out, the raisings from the dead?  Might they have even dared to wonder about his teaching concerning what would follow his own death?  We cannot say what broke the silence of their preparation of the spices and ointments, or the silence of their walk to the tomb.  We are sure of their grief – for that is why they were meeting – and we are sure of the one question:  “Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?

In all of our speculation about the run-up to the arrival of the women at the tomb, it is very hard to imagine that the women could have imagined in advance what actually confronted them on arrival.  God is so much bigger than our thoughts or imaginings.  Even the rehearsal of earlier mighty deeds does not prepare us for the immensity of what he can do in the present moment, in the face of our seemingly insurmountable challenges. Yes, he often appoints brothers and sisters, or sometimes even strangers, to help us – to help us in quite ordinary, quite natural ways.  But sometimes there is the supernatural, and the great stories seem to be filled with this.  Indeed, at their arrival, they would soon have the greatest story of all time to tell.  God would act.  God powerfully, God unmistakably.  God alone.  Without man’s help.

God addresses our human challenges both naturally and supernaturally.  He is God, after all.  Our chief attitude needs to be to trust him, no matter what we face.  His operation, whether natural or supernatural, is his choice, his provision by whatever means.  He is Creator, sustainer and end of everything, so why do we doubt?

But tonight’s work – this dawn of the day work – is God’s alone.  “Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?”  God will.  God does.  There is earthquake.  There is an angel, dazzling light.  The guards fall away.  The stone is rolled back. 

But there is more, much more.  The tomb is empty. “He has been raised, as he said.”  They are invited to see the place where the body had lain.  They are given a message.  (Forget the spices and the ointments.)  “Go tell his disciples.”  It hadn’t been about the stone after all…or about a dead body.  The crucifixion wasn’t the last word.  Not at all.  They had mis-read what God was up to.  Yes they were being faithful, but their plan – their challenge – was much too small.  Fear – a different kind of fear – and great joy are now theirs.  They hadn’t run from their problem, from their grief, but had headed straight into it.  Now everything was changed.  So now they run with a different purpose.  They are bearers of the greatest good news of all time.  And suddenly he himself meets them:  “Greetings!”  They fall and worship, and so do we.  And his last words to them are “Go and tell.”  We, too, now fall and worship.  Our next step is to go and tell. 

There is now, with Jesus, no challenge we cannot face, not even death.  For now the last challenge has been swallowed up in victory, and – for those who put their faith in him – no stones that cannot be rolled away.  There is nothing now that can separate us from the Father’s love or Jesus’ resurrection or the Spirit’s power.  Rejoice this Easter Day!  Rejoice like never before!  Rejoice for the stone on the tomb proved no problem to our God. 

Alleluia!  Christ is Risen.  The Lord is Risen indeed.  Alleluia. 
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