Traditional

Proper 11    The Sunday closest to July 20

Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdom, you know our
necessities before we ask and our ignorance in asking: Have
compassion on our weakness, and mercifully give us those
things which for our unworthiness we dare not, and for our
blindness we cannot ask; through the worthiness of your Son
Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the
Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Composed for the 1549 Book of Common Prayer, (presumably by Cranmer himself) this lovely, familiar and beloved Collect of the Day for Sunday, July 22 would hardly express the theology and faith of a 21st century progressive Christian. But the Church means it to help us gather our hearts and thoughts in unity for worship; and we Anglicans who cherish quaint old medieval things are always reluctant even to put Tradition on the shelf, much less flush it. So we say it, use it, pray it. No harm done, though this Collect for the Day does not set the tone for what is to follow, as the Collect could and perhaps should.

My liturgical and theological preference for this coming Sunday is one of the alternative collects that the Church has authorized for use in place of the prayerbook collects for the Season after Pentecost, and we will be opening our ten-thirty worship with it:

Beloved God, as we approach your Presence, guide and stir us with your Holy Spirit, that we may become one body, one spirit in Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

Last week and this Monday, I appreciated working with the pastor of First United Methodist Church down the street from HNEC, and learning some things about their Sunday morning use of their magnificent new facilities. The family life center on the west end has a wonderful gymnasium, set up for basketball and all sorts of things. On Sunday mornings it’s worship space. They have two services, both at ten o’clock and drawing about equal crowds. The traditional service is in the sanctuary. In the gym they have their contemporary service, informal, no vestments, the younger pastor told me that he wears flipflops, sometimes no shoes at all. I love it.

Years back, before I went out to St. Thomas, Laguna Beach to be their priest for five years, I was working toward offering some such worship service in the auditorium at Holy Nativity Episcopal School, thinking it might appeal to neighborhood folks who wouldn’t even think of darkening -- or lightening -- the door of a --- shudder -- church.

TW+