This post is a response to a previous post in which I talked about the Problem of Individualism in the Church. I claimed that Individualism has hurt the church, and I stand by that position. This post is a warning of the dangers of collectivism in the church.
When mentioning to our family members and friends how we are Anglican, we get a lot of confused looks and questions. Once they hear the word “father,” they think that we’re Catholic. Also, in conversations with friends who are wives of Anglican priests, they talk about getting flack for being married to a priest–thinking that all men who wear collars must be celibate! Well, this post is a little unpacking of the tradition of calling pastors ‘father,’ the clerical collar and the allowances of the men who wear them.
Welcome toTips & Tricks #4
THE TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS
Merry Christmas one and all! We celebrate the first coming of our Savior, Lord Jesus Christ, in this Christmas season. We call it “Christmastide” or the “Twelve Days of Christmas.” Most all of us have heard of the song The Twelve Days of Christmas, but pay it no mind as we dutifully take down our Christmas decorations the day after Christmas. (If we leave them up past New Year’s Day, we are considered lazy and disrespectful!) But the celebration of Advent an Christmas in the Anglican Church calendar is very different from what we are used to here in America. Here are some major differences:
Now that we have a daughter, the question of what to do about Santa comes up. As Christians, we know that Christmas is all about Christ! The true meaning of Christmas has almost nothing to do with what Santa Claus has become today (a highly commercialized fictional character who travels with flying reindeer, fits through chimneys, and rewards children for being good).
The original Santa Claus was based on Saint Nicholas, who was an actual person who lived in the third century in the village of Patara, (now Demre, Turkey). Nicholas was born into a very wealthy family and was raised a devout Christian. When Nicholas was still very young, his parents died. He decided to obey Jesus’ words from Matthew 19:21 “Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me,” and so he used his entire inheritance to help the sick, needy and suffering. He was later made the bishop of Myra and became known for his generosity.
Individualism. It has ruined the church. We all understand as Christians that there is a need for the individual to come to faith, repent and believe in Christ Jesus as his personal Savior in order to be considered righteous in God’s eyes. We understand that we cannot rely on the faith of others to enter the gates of heaven. We must work out our individual salvation in fear in trembling. In this context the individual is important and we should focus on that. But is individualism consistent with Christianity?
The blood of Christ bought the Church (not an individual) (Eph. 5:25); all of us together (not individually) are the body of Christ; where two or three are (not one) (Matt. 18:20), there Christ is; Christ said we will be known by the love we have for one another, not for ourselves (John 13:35); Christ said the moral law is summarized in how we love God and one another, not how we love ourselves (Matt. 22:38-39). The whole Christian perspective is otherly, not individualistic!
Welcome to part 3 of How to Pray! If you’re interested in the background and reasons to read and pray every day using the Daily Office, check out Part 1. If you need the schedule and resource links for when and what to pray, check out Part 2.
This post is the detailed elaboration on Option 1 of the ‘Simple Plan’ with Morning, Evening and Night Prayer discussed generally in a previous post here.
Welcome to Tips & Tricks #1
CONSIDER HOME DECOR
I’m going to be coming out with weekly tips & tricks about how to make an Anglican home, so stay tuned!
Besides the outright Anglican things like the advent wreath I blogged about here before, there must be some ways to incorporate a representation of God into our daily lives. I was surfing a lovely Anglican Forum and found a mother asking for advice regarding how to bring her Anglican faith into her home. The excellent suggestions ensued, which I want to share with you!
Before I do, just a word on the purpose of these small additions to your home. These small things like colors and symbols do not take the place of our faith. They are also not empty symbols that become an act of legality. We live in a world of symbology: soldiers wear emblems, each country has a flag, each company has a logo! The emblems and flags themselves aren’t honored, but rather it’s the things they represent that are honored. The little things I’m going to suggest in creating an Anglican home are symbols of our faith to help remind us, bolster us, and encourage us toward that spiritual walk we each have with God through Christ His Son.
Before I was Anglican, I was Baptist, and the only time I’ve heard of the word “Liturgy” was at a nondenominational Christian conference seminar about the importance of liturgy. I was 16 years old and didn’t give a care to the word so I’ve forgotten everything he said about it.
After being led by my husband to consider Anglicanism, I had to learn the word! A short explanation from a previous post:
What is liturgy? What is Anglican liturgy? Liturgy is an orderly and structured form of church worship that consists of a combination of prayers, readings, songs, and sacraments. The Anglican liturgy is uniquely defined in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer. It specifically contains a 3-year schedule of prayers (where you sometimes stand and sometimes sit), readings from the Bible (at least one from the Old Testament, one of the Epistles, and one from the Gospels), and the sacrament (Communion). Each year is broken down into liturgical seasons where upon a different theme is focused. This sounds boring, you may be thinking. With centuries of knowledge and time dedicated to figuring out the best chorus of verses and prayers, the liturgy is quite exciting and helps focus the soul on what’s most important: Christ. Check out this article on “Why Millennials Long for Liturgy.”
I’ve attended church my entire life, and I feel like I’ve seen all type of churches – nondenominational, pentecostal, free, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Catholic and Baptist. From my experience with people from each kind of church, it seemed like there were the ‘dead’ churches (Lutheran, Presbyterian, Catholic) and there were the ‘alive’ churches (nondenominational, pentecostal, and free). So I came to the conclusion that the ‘dead’ churches were the ones with liturgy, so the aspect of liturgy must be why those Christians don’t seem to have a faith that is alive.
This is the first year that we decided to make our very own advent wreath. First, let’s get some questions out of the way.
The Anglican Mom 
