Over the past six months, the Council of Advice and the Bishop have together been undertaking a process known as a “Mutual Ministry Review.” All clergy in the Convocation, as a part of their letters of agreement, agree to take part in this...
Back in June, as the protests against police brutality against communities of color in the United States were echoed in Paris by large demonstrations demanding accountability for the death in police custody of Adama Traoré, the Convocation and the cathedral went in together on a large...
It is perhaps not surprising that the summer of this annus horribilis has brought with it a bitter and bumper crop of hopelessness. It’s somehow in vogue to speak and write of hopelessness—not as you might imagine, but instead as the needed catalyst for change, perhaps a...
We are headed into a stretch of parables this month, all of which Jesus tells as an effort to help people understand what the kingdom of heaven is like. It is not always a comforting picture. “Parables are not parallels,” my old preaching professor used to...
Tomorrow at the cathedral in Paris we will ordain two new priests in the Convocation—Stéphanie Burette and Jean Dumond Chavanne. Each of them, in their own ways, are stories very different from the usual account of a person who senses a vocation to ministry and follows...
Since the pandemic began to reshape our lives in early March, we’ve tried to be in regular touch with all the people of the Convocation. And for the past two months now, we’ve put out a weekly message—providing information about on-line worship services and formation programs...
When the day of Pentecost had come, the disciples were all together in one place. Pentecost, the great feast of the church’s founding, comes on Sunday. It is always a liminal sort of festival; it comes in near proximity to the end of the school year, and at the threshold of the...
Q. Is God’s activity limited to these rites? A. God [is not limited] to these rites; they are patterns of countless ways by which God uses material things to reach out to us. An Outline of the Faith [“The Catechism”], BCP, p. 861 We are going back to...
Sunday’s reading from John’s gospel brings around the sixth of seven “I am” statements by which Jesus discloses to his followers who he is and why he has come: “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Taken as a whole, however, the reading itself contains a...
This Sunday brings around the familiar image of the Good Shepherd. We hear the comforting words of the twenty-third psalm again; we hear Jesus describe himself in John’s gospel as the “gate for the sheep.” And he tells us something more about what it means to be a good...