Early modern English Protestants, at least the more earnest among them, were known to be a rather dour bunch. “Better it is to goe sickly (with Lazarus) to Heaven,” wrote Lewis Bayly in his The Practise of Piety, “than full of mirth and pleasures, with Dives, to Hell.” That Bayly’s devotional manual was [Read More…]
Lenten Confessions: The App
March 17, 2014 by Leave a Comment
It was bound to happen. As apps proliferate for all kinds of purposes, it was probably just a matter of time before one was invented to probe the recesses of conscience for sin. With version 1.0 appearing in 2011, “Confession: A Roman Catholic App” was released several months ago in its 2.0 version. 2.0 not [Read More…]
Blessing upon Childbirth–Royal and Otherwise
June 24, 2013 by 2 Comments
The imminent birth of an heir—Prince William and Duchess Kate’s baby due within a few weeks—recalls the potential of royals to (re) set expectations about birth. When anesthesia was pioneered in the nineteenth century, its appeal in obstetrics was obvious. Chloroform, applied to a cloth and held over the nose and mouth of the laboring [Read More…]
FROM CRANMER TO WELBY
March 21, 2013 by 1 Comment
This year more than most, March 21 is a date of multiple significance in the Church of England. You might justly ask whether the English church still matters much on the world stage, but the wider Anglican Communion assuredly does: by the middle of this century, there could well be 150 million Anglicans worldwide. Historically, [Read More…]
THE PRIEST IN THE TEMPLE
February 25, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Attending a church service can be a sobering experience, and not necessarily for anything said or sung. It’s shocking to read the birth and death dates of the various composers of the words and music of the hymns used by my own Episcopal church. We realize with horror just how short the lifespan was in [Read More…]
THE CHURCH VANISHES
July 16, 2012 by 4 Comments
I am a member of the Episcopal Church, USA (hereafter TEC). I am increasingly worried that in a few years, I might be THE member of the Episcopal Church, USA, the last of my kind. As Rod Dreher, Ross Douthat and others have pointed out, the church has just issued a summary of its attendance [Read More…]
REFORMATION UNRAVELLED
June 27, 2012 by 12 Comments
I just got hold of Eamon Duffy’s latest book Saints, Sacrilege and Sedition: Religion and Conflict in the Tudor Reformations (Just published in Britain, and due out in the US in August). Duffy is a wonderful historian whose 1992 book The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580 was a staggering evocation of [Read More…]
G.K. Chesterton and the Nightmare Goodness of God
May 29, 2012 by 2 Comments
Recently I read G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday, A Nightmare (1908), a roller-coaster of a novel, full of surprises and thought-provoking theological reflections. (It is also, happily, one of the public domain titles available for free on Kindle.) I don’t want to summarize the book because The Man Who Was Thursday is best read the way I did — [Read More…]
SOUTH SUDAN
May 18, 2012 by Leave a Comment
I am normally reluctant to link to articles that need a subscription, but I’ll make an exception here. The current Weekly Standard has a lengthy piece by Armin Rosen titled “Birth of a Nation: With American Evangelicals on the Ground in South Sudan.” By way of background, Sudan was for many years divided between its [Read More…]
For Falls Church Anglican, Farewell to a Historic Building
May 15, 2012 by 2 Comments
This Sunday was the final meeting of Falls Church (Va.) Anglican at its historic location near Washington, D.C. The parish dates from 1732, the church’s brick sanctuary from 1767. George Washington and George Mason were among the church’s early vestrymen. Falls Church’s removal from the property resulted from the latest in a series of nationwide [Read More…]
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