Reflections of a Canadian Churchman

During a recent meeting of our Lenten series at Holy Trinity, a well-esteemed and highly respected member of the community made the suggestion that the clergy of this parish (and many clergy in the Anglican Church, at large) have either rejected or neglected the Articles of Religion (i.e., The Thirty-Nine Articles ). In particular, it was suggested that we were acting in contravention of Article XXVIII, “On the Lord’s Supper.” I would not presume to speak on behalf of any other cleric, but as the suggestion of neglect or contravention was made publicly to this cleric I wish to issue this public response, on my own behalf. The Articles of Religion, or as they are commonly known, The Thirty-Nine Articles , are a “set of doctrinal formulae finally accepted by the Church of England in its attempt to define its dogmatic position in relation to the controversies of the sixteenth century.” (F.L. Cross, Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church , 3rd ed., p. 1368). The Articles, approved by ...

For parts I & II of this series click on the links, below: Part I (click here) Part II (click here) If you have ever participated in a Bible Study, the following experience will probably seem familiar to you: The leader asks you to turn to a particular passage, which you find after some searching. The leader then asks a member of the group to read the passage. As you follow along, it becomes clear to you that you have must have turned to the wrong passage as the reader seems to be reading from a different text altogether. However, you occasionally pick up on some similarities in the text you have in front of you. You begin to realize that you haven’t turned to the wrong page – it just seems like you are reading from different Bibles. Well, you are; at least from different translations. Choosing the right translation, in accordance with your intentions and goals in reading Scripture can make all the difference. A Plethora of Translations When purchasing a new Bible it is easy to bec...

A parishioner recently asked me about the rather pretentious-looking list in the right-hand column of this page labeled “Currently Reading.” He asked if I was really reading that many books at one time. Before I get around to telling you how I answered him, perhaps a word is in order as to why this list, and its companion list “Recently Read”, are even on this page at all. Many will know that I was, for many years, the Retail Sales Manager of Toronto’s Anglican Book Centre. I spent a good deal of my time reading catalogues, meeting publishers’ sales representatives, ordering books, classifying books, recommending books, publicizing books, and of course, selling books. One of the great joys of bookselling was to receive what we called the “front-list” catalogues, that is, the catalogues of new titles for the upcoming season. It was as much an art as a science to come up with order quantities for any given new title. Much was involved in making that particular decision. In additio...