Blessed are you, Lord God,
Father all-holy,
for your boundless love
The tree, once the source of shame
and death for humankind,
has become the cross
of our redemption and life.
When his hour had come to
return to you in glory,
the Lord Jesus,
Our King, our Priest, and our Teacher,
freely mounted the scaffold of the cross
and made it his royal throne,
his altar of sacrifice, his pulpit of truth.
On the cross,
lifted above the earth,
he triumphed over our age-old enemy.
Cloaked in his own blood,
he drew all things to himself.
On the cross,
he opened out his arms
and offered you his life;
the sacrifice of the New Law
that gives to the sacraments
their saving power.
On the cross,
he proved what he had prophesied:
the grain of wheat must die
to bring forth an abundant harvest.
Father,
we honour this cross as the sign
of our redemption.
May we reap the harvest of salvation
planted in pain by Christ Jesus.
May our sins be nailed to his cross,
the power of life released,
pride conquered,
and weakness turned to strength.
May the cross be our comfort in trouble,
our refuge in the face of danger,
our safeguard on life’s journey
until you welcome us to
our heavenly home.
O LORD, Master of my life,
grant that I may not be infected with the
spirit of slothfulness and inquisitiveness,
with the spirit of ambition and vain talking.
{Making a prostration}
Grant instead to me, your servant,
the spirit of purity and of humility,
the spirit of patience and neighborly love.
{Making a third prostration}
O Lord and King,
grant me the grace of being aware of my sins
and of not thinking evil of those of my brethren.
For you are blessed, now and ever, and forever.
Amen.
Lord Jesus Christ, King of Kings,
You have power over life and death.
You know what is secret and hidden,
and neither our thoughts nor our feelings
are concealed from You.
Cure me of duplicity;
I have done evil before You.
Now my life declines from day to day
and my sins increase.
O Lord, God of souls and bodies,
You know the extreme frailty of my soul and my flesh.
Grant me strength in my weakness, O Lord,
and sustain me in my misery.
Give me a grateful soul that I may
never cease to recall Your benefits,
O Lord most bountiful.
Be not mindful of my many sins,
but forgive me all my misdeeds.
O Lord, disdain not my prayer –
the prayer of a wretched sinner;
sustain me with Your grace until the end,
that it may protect me as in the past.
It is Your grace which has taught me wisdom;
blessed are they who follow her ways,
for they shall receive the crown of glory.
In spite of my unworthiness,
I praise You and I glorify You,
O Lord, for Your mercy to me is without limit.
You have been my help and my protection.
May the name of Your majesty be praised forever.
To you, our God, be glory.
Amen.
After the previously-planned interview fell through at the last minute, David sat down to record a solo episode to talk about his newborn son, Sidecar Day, blue flowers in Narnia, and also to make his tongue-in-cheek case as to why C.S. Lewis is better than J.R.R. Tolkien.
The Gray Havens are an American Christian folk pop husband and wife duo, David and Licia Radford, from Crystal Lake, Illinois. On October 8th they will be releasing their new album, Blue Flower, so David Radford came on the show to talk to Andrew and David about how C.S. Lewis inspired their recent work.
As we approach the end of Season 4, David is joined on the show by Michael “Gomer” Gormley. Among other things, they discuss Ted Lasso, tea, and the Atonement. Also, find out what Gomer would do if he ever became the Pope!
New York Times bestselling author, Patti Callahan, returns to the show to talk about her forthcoming book, “Once Upon A Wardrobe”, which will be released on October 19th.
A few months ago, John and Greta from The Tolkien Road podcast did a series of episodes on religion in Tolkien’s Legendarium. David invited him onto the show to talk about those episodes and to encourage the Pints With Jack listeners to listen to them.
Author Rod Bennett joined David to talk about a presentation on he gave at a big Christian rock festival about C.S. Lewis’ relationship to “Pulp Fiction”.
Today’s song is another from Kari Jobe, “Revelation Song”:
VERSE 1
Worthy is the Lamb who was slain Holy, holy is He Sing a new song to Him who sits on Heaven’s mercy seat
CHORUS
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty Who was and is and is to come With all creation I sing praise to the King of kings You are my everything and I will adore You
VERSE 2
Clothed in rainbows of living color Flashes of lighting rolls of thunder Blessing and honor strength and glory and power be To You the only wise King
VERSE 3
Filled with wonder awestruck wonder At the mention of Your name Jesus Your name is power, breath and living water Such a marvelous mystery
A couple of weeks ago, a friend sent me a question that I’d like to answer in this post:
So, what’s the deal with Latin? It seems to be considered holy or at least holier than the vernacular and I was wondering why. I know that shortly after Christ’s death the church was based in Rome and that Latin was the primary language of most of the Church fathers, I just didn’t know if that was all that was behind it or if there was more. Is it at all important to learn to pray certain prayers in Latin? Or even work to understand the Mass in Latin?
So, what’s the deal with Latin? In my opinion, it’s a horrible language that I was forced to study for three years in school which I absolutely hated. Next question? Okay, maybe that’s not the answer you were looking for.
Why Latin?
I suppose that you could say that Latin is important to Catholicism for a few reasons…
1. Lingua Sacra
The Catholic Church’s love of Latin finds an echo in Judaism. Although most Jews spoke Aramaic (or Greek outside of Palestine), it was Hebrew that was the language of the Temple and the Sacred Scriptures. Latin in Catholicism occupies a similar position as a “Lingua Sacra” (Sacred Language).
2. History
As you rightly point out, a few centuries after Christ Latin is starting to overtake Greek as the common language of the Roman Empire. Starting with Tertullian, the Early Church Fathers increasingly wrote in Latin. This meant that, at least in the West, Latin became the language of theology, liturgy and learning in general. All this resulted in the Latin language being tied to the faith in a very special way. Even once the general use of Latin started to decline, it was still used in the Church, as well as being the universal language of published scholarly works, law, science, …
3. Catholicity
I never really saw the point in Latin Mass until I travelled abroad where my knowledge of the vernacular wasn’t too strong. I could typically follow along with the liturgy, knowing as I did the words of the Mass by heart. However, I remember my joy when we started singing the Sanctus, Benedictus, Amen*… I got a little taste of what a universal liturgical language could bring to the sense of oneness and catholicity of the Church.
* Please note, the “Kyrie” isn’t Latin, but Greek.
Should you learn it?
Now, is it important to learn to pray certain prayers in Latin or understand the Latin Mass? You could that is isn’t because typically most of the Masses you’ll attend will be in the vernacular (something which, by the way, the Eastern Churches have always done).
However, on the other hand, you could that it is very important because it is the patrimony of the Western Church and therefore deserves our attention, since it roots us to the historic Church. Personally, I go to Tridentine Mass a couple of times a year. I prefer my usual liturgy, but I attend periodically so as to gain an appreciation for the liturgy which was celebrated by many of our great Saints. Finally, please remember this great saying:
“Quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur” “Anything said in Latin sounds profound”
A couple of years ago, Jason Stellman, a Presbyterian pastor converted to Catholicism. I remember when he converted that there were lots of nasty comments in his Comment Box saying that he was converting for the “fame” and the “money” which apparently comes with being a Catholic convert. Well, two years later, on the anniversary of his entrance into the Church, Jason posted a reflection concerning his life now he’s Catholic. It’s a sobering read.
If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. – Mark 8:34
By the way, if you’re ever looking to study Paul’s epistle to the Galatians, I can thoroughly recommend the six-part series freely available on Jason’s website. It’s really good.
Seventh Day Adventists (SDAs) believe that Christians shouldn’t worship on Sundays and that the Saturday Sabbath is still in effect. In recent weeks I’ve been having a discussion in a Seventh Day Adventist in response to my post Why do Christians worship on Sundays? The exchange has been good and I think it’s well worth a read and I’d invite you to check it out.
I haven’t had much interaction with SDAs before and I hope to do some posts looking at their more interesting doctrinal positions, of which there are quite a few. However, in preparation for this, today I would simply like to do a post where I catalogue all the places in the New Testament where Sunday is mentioned:
2. Resurrection Appearances
Jesus appears to His disciples on Sundays (John 20:19, John 20:26).
3. Pentecost
The original Pentecost took place on a Sunday (Lev. 23:16) and therefore so did Pentecost in the New Testament (Acts 2:1). On this day the first sermon is preached, three thousand convert and are baptized.
4. Preaching and celebrating the Eucharist
In Paul’s travels, it is recorded that the Christian community came together to hear Paul preach and break bread (Acts 20:7).
5. Gathered collections
Paul instructed the Corinthians to gather their charitable donations on Sunday (1 Corinthians 16:2).
6. Vision of Heavenly Worship
Jesus gave the apostle John the vision of Revelation on the first day of the week (Revelation 1:10).
I’ve referenced this podcast quite a few times recently in online discussions, so I thought it deserved a post. In the following article from Called To Communion, there is a thirty minute lecture on what we know about Christian worship in the First Century:
Today’s song is another from Kari Jobe, “Revelation Song”:
