Affirming Catholicism

Does the Anglo-Catholic part of the Anglican church need to be politically conservative? Apparently not. The group Affirming Catholicism (based in England, with many local chapters there) recently released a press release expressing deep sorrow about the meeting in Rwanda, chaired by Peter Akinola, Primate of Nigeria, which was convened with the goal of establishing alternative Episcopal oversignt for conservative Anglican parishes in the United States. Both the editors at Affirming Catholicism and your own Daily Officer believe that the venerated Catholic liturgucal tradition is not at all incompatible with an inclusive church that welcomes all to God's table. I believe that the most important thing is celebrating the sacraments, and to me that simply transcends politics.

That's enough of that for now.

Thanks to an avid and pious reader (see comments from Sept. 26), I can now tell the difference between Luke and John. Your Daily Officer is never upset about being corrected when he screws up.

The novella of Esther continues. Mordecai has been spared according to Esther's wishes, and Haman, who himself was only recently promoted to Grand Vizier, is now swinging from the rope he hung for Mordecai. A quick and fascinating read. Those following along have noted the distinct lack of theology in Esther; this is basically an entertaining story about a beautiful virgin who saved the Jews from destruction by her wits and rightousness, but we don't learn a whole lot about the ways of God. In fact, some have suggested that the abscence of theology in Esther was deliberate. That view proposes that Esther was written as a basically secular book in order to distance the popular festival of purim from explicitly religious holidays. But I'm getting ahead of myself... more on purim later.

A brief comment on the Collect of the Day: those of you who have been following the BCP without any augmentation have noticed that we've had two Feria in the Daily Office this week, which means that instead of turning to LF&F (or other sources) for collects, we've been staying with the collect for Proper 20. I find that good and comforting, becaue the line "Grant us, Lord, not to be anxious about earthly things..." seems like great advice for everyone. I find myself basically saying the same thing (although not in the same words) frequently at work.

Don't forget: tomorrow we interrupt (or augment) our regular readings because of the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels. See page 999 of your prayer book.