Why the Lectionary?

Recently, a wonderful question landed in my email inbox:

Why do we read the Old Testament, Psalms, Epistle, and Gospel every week in church?

One of the gifts of our liturgical tradition, a gift that we share with the Orthodox, Catholics, Lutherans, and others, is the use of the lectionary. Every week, a cycle of readings prescribes what Scripture we hear in church. While some of the details of the how the lectionary works have changed over the years, one thing has stayed the same. The church, not the clergy, chooses the Scripture we read publicly in worship. This means that what we hear proclaimed as the Word of God isn't down to our whims or personal preferences - we all have to wrestle with the Bible together, in its entirety. What's more, using the lectionary means that we hear from all parts of the Bible, and not just our favorite bits.

We read the Old Testament…

…because it is the story of God's enduring faithfulness in choosing Israel to be his people, and as Christians we read the Old Testament as those who in Jesus Christ are grafted onto the promises of Israel. Not to take them over, but to take our part in a conversation and a covenant that has been going on long before us. The Old Testament also reminds us that there is one God, and that the God we see revealed in Jesus is the same God who called the prophets and let Israel out of bondage.

We read the Psalms…

…because they are our greatest treasury of songs of worship. But they also remind us that the life of faith is a life of joy and sorrow, anger and reconciliation, tears and shouts of joy. John Calvin says that in the Psalms, "there is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror." Another very ancient way of reading and hearing the Psalms is to imagine that Jesus is the one speaking. Try it sometime and see if your experience of the text changes!

The Epistles…

…connect us to the very earliest churches, and in them we see that the first Christians encountered the same challenges that we do today. They are some of my favorite parts of Scripture, as they set out what it means that God is with us and for us in Jesus. When we say that they are "the Word of the Lord," we acknowledge that they are inspired by the Holy Spirit and can speak to us now, just as they did for the first readers.

Finally, we hear the Gospel —

…the story of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. We stand for the Gospel reading as an acknowledgement of their place at the heart of our faith. But, having heard the other Scriptures read as well, we also acknowledge that they don't stand alone. They stand within the story of God's acts: past, present, and future. Scripture helps us to interpret Scripture, and the more we can explore the relationship between the texts in the Bible, the more we can grow in relationship to the one who inspired them.

Do you have a question about the Bible, theology, or the church? Email me!

The Challenge of Baptism

Grace and Peace to you from our Lord Jesus Christ!

I am writing to you from Bethany Beach, Delaware.  Being able to come out here and decompress, if only for a few days, is such a gift.  Sitting at the water this week, I’ve been thinking a lot about baptism – and not just because we have a baptism this Sunday (everyone get excited!  It is always a great gift to welcome a new member of the family).  Our Gospel reading this Sunday mentions baptism as well: Jesus foreshadows his Passion, saying, “I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed!”  More on that in the homily on Sunday. 

One other thought on baptism: in his final sermon before his assassination, titled, “I Have Been to the Mountaintop,” the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. details the struggles of the Civil Rights movement and the Poor People’s Campaign.  About halfway through the sermon, King speaks specifically about the encounter with the notorious Bull Connor in Birmingham.  In what amounts to some of his most apocalyptic rhetoric (ask me more about that in person), King writes:

I remember in Birmingham, Alabama … by the hundreds we would move out.  And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth, and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, “Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me around.”

Bull Connor next would say, “Turn the fire hoses on.”  And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn’t know history.  He knew a kind of physics that didn’t relate to the transphysics we knew about.  And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out.  And we went before the hoses; we had known water.

What King is talking about here is exactly the power of Baptism, or rather, the challenge of it.  In baptism, we, as St. Paul puts it, die to ourselves and are born in Christ.  We are baptized into his death and his resurrection, which means that the whole world is transformed.  King knew the stakes of his baptism.  He had lived it for years.  But he also knew its promise: that he would not be overcome, for Christ had been raised from the dead.  No water could harm him – he’d already known it.  Death was no threat.  In baptism, Christ’s resurrection had annulled all fear of it.  And as King’s life is an ever-present witness to, when the fear of death is taken away, so too is the fear of the Enemy.  And there, exactly there, is where baptism works: it frees us to love our neighbour. 

I can’t wait to see you on Sunday.  Enjoy your forgiveness – and your freedom!

Peace in Christ,
David King, PTS Summer Intern

Kickoff Sunday with Kaya Oakes

It's a tremendous joy to announce that our Kickoff Sunday speaker for 2022 will be Catholic author, journalist, and academic Kaya Oakes. Here's a bit of the profile from her website, oakestown.org:

Kaya Oakes is the author of five books, most recently including The Nones Are Alright (Orbis Books, 2015) and Radical Reinvention: An Unlikely Return to the Catholic Church (Counterpoint Press, 2012). The Defiant Middle: How Women Claim Life’s In Betweens to Remake the World, was published by Broadleaf Books in 2021. Her sixth book, on the limits of forgiveness, is forthcoming in 2024.

Kaya’s essays and journalism have appeared in The New Republic, Slate, Foreign Policy, The Guardian, The Washington Post, Sojourners, National Catholic Reporter, Commonweal, Religion Dispatches, Tricycle, On Being, America, and many other publications.

Since 1999, Kaya has been a faculty member in the College Writing Programs at UC Berkeley, where she teaches creative nonfiction, composition, and research writing. She has also been a distinguished visiting writer in nonfiction at St. Mary’s College as well as guest faculty at Bellarmine University and The Jesuit School of Theology at the Graduate Theological Union. Kaya was born and raised in Oakland, California, where she still lives.

Kaya's own journey has taken her from an Irish Catholic childhood, to atheism, and back to the Catholic Church as an advocate for social justice and marginalized voices within the Church. She is also a faithful friend to Christians of all denominations who works in both ecumenical and interfaith contexts. Please join us Saturday, September 10 (time TBA), and Sunday, September 11 (at the 9:30 forum) for a special East Coast visit with Kaya Oakes!

Find out more about Kaya's books here: oakestown.org/books

And read some of her articles here: oakestown.org/essays

Backpacks for Homefront Kids

Needed by August 15!

We a seeking school supply donations to pack 30 full backpacks to donate to Homefront. We have purchased the backpacks and now are calling on any who can help purchase school supplies for us to fill them. This is a quick campaign as they need the backpacks by August 15.

Please see the list below. We would like to fill each backpack from the list of supplies listed as "All Ages." If you wish to donate supplies, please leave them in the slype near the coat racks. We are also going to set up an Amazon order list as an eblast on Monday so stay tuned.

Please contact Ann Zultner or Phil Unetic if you have any questions.

An Update from Our Partner Arm In Arm

Please take a look at the video update above from David Fox, the executive director of Arm In Arm. Trinity Church helps them in their mission through grant funds from our Turkey Trot each year. David outlines their successes and struggles as they increase support for the Princeton and Trenton communities through these difficult times.

Many members of our church volunteer at Arm In Arm. If you would like to join them, please let me know and I can help you get in touch with them to sign up.

Phil Unetic,
Junior Warden

Fellowship Is (Also) Formation

They love their friends truly who love God in them, either because God is already in them, or in order that God might be in them.

— St. Augustine of Hippo, Sermon 361.1em>

At the heart of [abundant life] is friendship. For it is through friendship that our willful loneliness...is overwhelmed. Friendship is not the desperate attempt, based on our presumption we must manipulate another to recognize us, but rather friendship in the Christian tradition names such an engagement that we call worship. For it is in worship that we discover that we are related to one another in ways that we could not imagine, by being made friends with God through the sharing of the body and blood of Christ. That is why the world should stand and wonder of these people called Christian, because they would say see how they love one another. How wonderful it is to simply be given in this life something to do. We can pray. We can worship. We can be friends, because those are not activities that can be used up.

— Stanley Hauerwas, “Abundant Life,” Lecture at the Trinity Institute

In the past, we've shared with you before the four pillars of spiritual growth: weekly participation in the Eucharist, engagement with Scripture, regular prayer outside of church, and fellowship. Much of our adult formation programming has focused on the first three of those pillars: the sacraments, the teachings of the church, Scripture, and prayer. But now we are coming back together after a time of being apart, of having opportunities for fellowship tragically limited. What’s more, we have heard from many of you about how much you wish we had more opportunities to be together as a community. This year, we’re going to do something about that.

Christian friendship is one of the greatest gifts we can share with each other — an opportunity to know each other and to be known, a place to grow towards God together. This, too, is formation. It’s a way of learning by doing, by loving one another in a Christ-shaped love.

Both in our Adult Forum time between services, and in other gatherings throughout the program year, we will have the opportunity to be with each other. For some, this may mean renewing old friendships. For others, it may mean getting to know the Trinity community for the first time. Here are a few fellowship ‘teasers’ for the coming year:

• First Sunday breakfasts will return with no agenda, just good conversation.

• Common Grounds Café will return to the other half of Pierce Hall between the services.

• Book groups will return for learning and small group discussion.

• Fellowship and social opportunities will be expanded for members at various stages of life — from children, youth, and families, to 20s and 30s, to older parishioners.

• And, of course, we will celebrate throughout the year with the special events you know and love around the holidays and at other times.

It is our hope and my prayer that in the year ahead, each member of Trinity will find one place where they can grow in Christian friendship with others. And if you have ideas, please give Paul, Joanne, or me a shout. We want to hear from you - and we're excited about everything coming up in the fall.

The Rev. Cn. Dr. Kara N. Slade, Associate Rector

P.S., What’s the deal with the postcards? If your last name starts with "A," you might have already received a postcard from us. Or, you might receive one soon! We have begun the process of slowly praying through the entire parish roster at Morning Prayer. We'll send you a postcard to let you know that your name was lifted up in prayer that day at Trinity Church. Hopefully it will come as a reminder of God's love for you - and of our love for you here at Trinity.

The Philadelphia Eleven

On July 29, 1974, eleven women were ordained to the priesthood by Bishops Daniel Corrigan, Robert DeWitt, and Edward Welles II in a service at the Church of the Advocate in Philadelphia. The “Philadelphia Eleven” were the first women ordained to the priesthood in the Episcopal Church: Merrill Bittner, Alla Bozarth-Campbell, Alison Cheek, Emily Hewitt, Carter Heyward, Suzanne Hiatt, Marie Moorefield, Jeanette Piccard, Betty Schiess, Katrina Swanson, and Nancy Wittig. At the time, the cause of women's ordination was gathering steam, but General Convention had not yet approved it. These ordinations were at first considered "invalid," but then declared to be "valid but irregular" because they followed the ordination service in the Prayer Book and were performed by bishops in good standing. Just two years later, in 1976, General Convention officially approved the ordination of women, and the ordinations that had taken place earlier were regularized.

Yesterday, we remembered those eleven. We give thanks for the women who said yes to God then, so that many others who stand on their shoulders could say yes to God now.