The Sacrament of Monastic Profession

Photo:  Before the Profession of Vows Liturgy, 
Chapel of the Apostles, Sewanee, TN.  2010

So you say that there are only seven sacraments?  Really?  No way!  What about the burial office?  And what about monastic profession?  I believe that there are more than seven sacraments--external, visible signs of an inward spiritual grace.  For me, I cannot imagine grace being contained and complete in mere seven.  More of that later...

On the Feast of the Confession of St. Peter (Jan. 18th), I professed simple vows in the Order of St. Anthony the Great.  The "OPC" Brothers and Sisters are a mixed contemplative community in the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta, GA.  Founded in 2006 by Abbot Kenneth Hosley, OPC, the young order is in process to seek full recognition by the General Convention of the Episcopal Church.  To date, we have 8 members under vows and several postulants.  We seek to embrace a rule of the contemplative life that helps teach others the richness of the Christian spiritual tradition and cause renewal in our Church.

My heart was full that night;  God has called me down a new road in my life and one that gives voice (or silence!) to a very important part of me.  More over, I had a lot of dear friends present with me--and many who were unable to be there praying for me--which impressed upon me the love that so many have for me and our Church.  I was, and still am, in awe.

As part of my discipline, I decided to write an icon of our Order's name-saint, Anthony the Great and present it to the Order upon my profession.  Admittedly, I got the idea from seeing the Icon of the Brotherhood of Gregory the Great.

It is the largest icon to date that I have completed.  It was exciting to see the image come alive and then to customize it with important emblems from the Order.  I painted a frame to surround the saint and placed the Order's initials in each corner, OPC, which is Ordo Precis Contemplativae or "Order of Contemplative Prayer."

The flash does do justice to the brilliant color.  Anthony's hands are holding a scroll with the Order's motto, Silentio Coram Deo, or "Silence before God." I began this icon at the beginning of January, and it helped me get through the GOE exams!  I can see an improvement in my hand each time I write an icon, plus a willingness to embrace imperfection (which is something that I've been working on for years).  The icon was blessed during a Eucharist in the Seminary's Chapel by our Associate Dean of Community Life.  It was graciously received by my abbot and will travel to Atlanta to live with our Order.

~Silentio Coram Deo

New Year's Blessings To You

World Without End

The 30,000 foot view of creation (taken from an airplane). By the author.

John Donne, in his Christmas sermon delivered at St. Paul’s Cathedral in 1626, opens with a rather pointed message:

The whole life of Christ was a continual Passion; others die martyrs but Christ was born a martyr. He found a Golgotha even in Bethlehem, where he was born; for to his tenderness then the straws were almost as sharp as the thorns after, and the manger as uneasy at the first as his cross at last.  His birth and his death were but one continual act, and his Christmas day and his Good Friday are but the evening and morning of one and the same day.[1]

I have always appreciated the reminder that Donne points towards—the connection of Bethlehem and Golgotha, that Christmas cannot be separated out from Good Friday.  In fact it is an even more appropriate statement of the whole of salvation history, that God as author purposes creation to move towards its ultimate fulfillment in the Kingdom.  This imagery is even reflected in the collect from the Vigil of the Nativity of the Lord:

O God, who makest us glad with the yearly expectation of our redemption: vouchsafe; that as we joyfully receive thine Only-begotten Son for our Redeemer, so we may with sure confidence behold him when shall come to our Judge, even Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord: Who liveth and reigneth with Thee in the Unity of the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end.  Amen.[2]

So we come to the title, “World Without End,” a traditional ending for prayers in the catholic tradition.  Christmas, the birth of God’s Eternal Word born into our very midst, is the ultimate beginning of our salvation.  It is God’s most sacred action in loving God’s creation.  The powers and principalities of this world, even from the tender birth of a babe in the manger, see this Jesus as a threat to their world.  Recall Herod’s quest to quash this new king and resulting slaughtering of the innocents throughout the land.  This is also a sign of the threat to the Kingdom that has also endured throughout time.  And yet, the Kingdom, and the visible Body of Christ on earth the Church, stands as the judgment upon it.  Christians in every time and place work assiduously for justice, peace, and love to bring to fulfillment God’s eternal purpose.

The whole of creation sings out, “Glory to God in the Highest Heaven.”  We join with the angels’ song to add our hearts and voices in proclaiming God’s redeeming love to the world.  While so much of this has been lost in the commercialization of our culture today, remember that there is no Christmas without a Good Friday.  Easter is around the corner and it is more glorious than any Wal-Mart super sale.  Thanks be to God! 

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[1] The Showing of Christ, Sermons of John Donne.  Edmund Fuller, ed.  (New York: Harper and Row, 1964), 76.

[2] Missale Anglicanum, The English Missal, 3^rd altar ed. (London: W. Knott & Son, 1934), 12. 

At Last, We Are Official

On the Feast of Saint Andrew, members gathered in the Chapel of the Apostles (Sewanee) to officially establish the Sewanee Society of Our Lady of Walsingham.  What joy there was among those gathered to be able to bring together interests in Anglo-Catholicism and seeking to enrich their prayer lives with Our Lady.  At the founding, we have many non-residential members from as far away as Texas, Virginia, and Pennsylvania.  Members may elect to wear a Sarum Blue scapular over a black cassock to signify membership--though this is completely optional.

The Charter was approved unanimously with the only question regarding whether or not we should incorporate a yearly membership fee as opposed to what is currently stated as a one time $15 fee.

The rules of the Charter were suspended in order to elect officers to serve up until the week prior to Spring Break, and then the newly elected officers will serve a full year term as stated in the Charter.  The election results were: Karen Workman-Booth T'11, Clerk;  Charles Canon T'11, Prior; and Chad Krouse T'10, Superior General.  We had some fun in choosing the titles!  Some dull seminary humour.

We are female, male, black, white, religious, ordained, and lay.  We embrace a broad theology of inclusion, seeking to undo the baggage that has been heaped upon Walsingham by various factions in the Church.  We proudly claim an Anglo-Catholic heritage while also proudly claiming The Episcopal Church.  Our answer is "yes," that it is possible to embrace both and help work to heal a broken world.

Our Lady of Walsingham, I believe, is a source of unity for the Body of Christ. She is the only vision that is highly regarded amongst Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and Anglicans alike.  If we allow ourselves to break free from the chains that have so wrongly tied down this noble vision, we may find that Our Lady's grace and intercession will help us all.  Thanks be to God!

P.S.  The chains in the new seal for the Society reflect those from the seal of The University of the South, a simple way in heraldry to illustrate our connection to the University's School of Theology.