One of my favorite places to visit online is Father Jake’s place. Jake is a priest who posts his musings about various goings-on in the Episcopal Church and the wider Anglian Communion. He encourages comments, and there is a lively community of Episcopalians, Roman Catholics, Baptists and seekers of all stripes who bring their perspectives to the table. Although Jake comes from a pretty solidly liberal stance, he is welcoming and gracious to commenters with other perspectives, providing they play nicely!

(As always, this is just the opinion of your humble website administrator and is not an endorsement by this parish or the Episcopal Church.)

written by AmyGee

If you weren’t able to catch the investiture of our new presiding bishop last Saturday, the church has made streaming video available on the Episcopal News Service website as well as photos of the event.

written by AmyGee

I’m writing this from my room at the Springfield Sheraton, where we have gathered for Diocesean Convention. We just finished Evening Prayer and the Bishop’s address, which I will write about in more detail after dinner. I’m heading back down to the cocktail hour and dinner. Not sure if there is a speaker or entertainment.

The highlight so far: Bishop Scruton presenting Newark Bishop-elect Mark Beckwith, currently of All Saints Worcester, with a “Western Mass Mitre”:

written by AmyGee

Ooops! If you noticed some down time on the site this week, it’s entirely my fault. I was attempting to upgrade some stuff behind the scenes and instead of waiting for the server to finish doing its thing, I kept restarting the procedure. Dragon Networks, our gracious hosting company, thought we were being hacked and shut everything down. How embarrassing!

I’ll try to be more careful in the future!

written by AmyGee

A press release from the Episcopal News Service notes that Bishop Katherine will be invested as Presiding Bishop on Saturday November 4th at the National Cathedral in Washington DC. If you’re interested in getting tickets, you need to get your request in the mail tomorrow. They’re being issued 2 per requester on a first come, first served basis. This is an historic occasion, so I imagine they’ll go pretty quickly.

written by AmyGee

One of the decisions made at the 2006 General Convention involves the lectionary, which is the schedule of scripture readings we use in worship. Currently we use the lectionary found in the Book of Common Prayer, which is a 3 year cycle based on the lectionary of the Roman Catholic Church. Since 1983, some members of the Episcopal Church and other Anglican churches have been using a new lectionary on a trial basis. The Revised Common Lectionary, as the current version of this lectionary is known, is also a 3 year cycle of readings. It is extremely similar to the BCP lectionary, but contains some innovations, as described by the Office of Liturgy and Music:

The option of semi-continuous reading of the great Old Testament narratives on the Sundays after Pentecost, to provide exciting new preaching opportunities, vacation Bible School ideas or informal summer story-telling for adults as well as children.
• Genesis through Judges in year A; the Davidic Covenant and Wisdom literature in Year B; the prophets – Elijah, Elisha, Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Joel and Habbakuk – in Year C.



The option of lections in thematic harmony with the Gospel of the day for the Sundays after Pentecost.

• This follows the pattern of the present lectionary in which the readings from the Old Testament and the New Testament are chosen in relation to the Gospel.



The Inclusion of women and their role in salvation history, offering texts about women never heard on Sunday before.

• The most notable example is the account of the woman anointing Jesus at Bethany [Mark 14:3-9]. Jesus responded by saying “wherever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.” This text, omitted in the present lectionary, is included in the Revised Common Lectionary as part of the Passion narrative read on Palm Sunday in Year B.

The resolution passed at GC’06 states:

Resolved, That the 75th General Convention direct that the Revised Common Lectionary shall be the Lectionary of this Church, amending the Lectionary on pp. 889-921 of The Book of Common Prayer, effective the First Sunday of Advent, 2007; with the provision for continued use of the previous Lectionary for purposes of orderly transition, with the permission of the Ecclesiastical Authority, until the First Sunday of Advent 2010.

What does this mean for the lay person? Not much, really. But expect there to be some variation in readings among the churches you frequent as we make the transistion.

written by AmyGee

Summer is slow around here. Vestry is off duty, choir and church school are on hiatus and Father Perry and Donna are using much-deserved vacation time. Which means that the blog has been languishing. So I thought I’d liven things up a bit by posting some of the interesting tidbits I’ve come across as I surf the Web.

Today’s Episcopal fun fact is:

The Episcopal Church is an international one!
You may have heard that the church changed its name at General Convention this year. That’s not quite the case. The name of the church has officially been “The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America” since 1789. In 1967 a preamble was added to the Constitution stating in part that the PECUSA was

otherwise known as The Episcopal Church (which name is hereby recognized as also designating the Church)

The name of the church has since then often been abbreviated to ECUSA, but this does not reflect the fact that many of our dioceses are outside the US. There was a concerted effort at this year’s General Convention to remind church members and the press that “The Episcopal Church” or TEC is a more accurate name for the church as a whole.

written by AmyGee

Our parish of Reconciliation exists primarily not to meet our own needs but rather to be a community that reaches out to transform the lives of all sorts and conditions of persons in our area from hopelessness and anxiety to peace and new life. What are your thoughts as to how best we may do this? Do we want to make our worship more attractive for persons who have never attended church before? Do we need music more familiar to young people? Do we provide relief services to those in need? Or do we go out and ring doorbells and let peoiple know God loves them? If you were going to select ONE THING that is most important to do to help the folk out there to come and be fed by God, what would you do? What do you think is the first thing we should do in order better to reach those outside? Where should we start? We can’t do everything in a small church but we can do something with God’s help.
P.A. Kingman+

written by Father Perry

I tracked down the other 3 Reconciliation churches in the US and since I was playing around with Wayfaring, thought I’d make a little map:

written by admin

Our parish is one of only four in the Episcopal Church that bears the name “Reconciliation.” It helps to give focus to what our ministry is about. The months ahead will be a contentious time in our Episcopal Church as we come to our General Convention. It will be a time when various points of view in the church will be clamoring for recognition. It will be a time when those who believe that in order to be faithful our church needs not to make changes in a modern world and those who believe that God is calling us to reach out to our world in new and more inclusive ways will be talking together to discern God’s will. It is an important time for our church. Reconciliation is vital. Our ministry is to pray and do what we can for reconciliation and common ministry. Please share some thoughts as to how as a parish we can do this.

Fr. Perry Kingman+

written by Father Perry