• A sermon for Y’All

    Here is a sermon that I preached on Sunday. You can find the audio here. (This one is more fun to listen to than to read, I think).

    I have learned in the course of my travels that it sometimes takes people a few minutes to atune to the way I speak. I’ve learned that people sometimes need a few sentences before they get used to my accent – the way that I speak.

    And of course, it works the other way around too.

    I am getting used to listening to the sounds of voices that I am not used to hearing. And of course, coming to here, the first time I’ve been in the South has meant me having to listen extra carefully.

    Before I came on this here I decided to lose weight and get fit. Over the course of a year I managed to lose 30 pounds. What I hadn’t realised was that when I came to the South, the hospitality would be such that I would put those 30 pounds back on. During breakfast.

    Whilst I was eating that first breakfast, I had something to ponder. For the very first night that I was here I had the strangest of dreams. I’ve been up at Sewanee, the University of the South. It is a beautiful university and an excellent seminary and I was their guest. That first night, I dreamed that I had encountered angels. It is a strange dream to have these days though it would not have been particularly unusual in Biblical times. [Indeed, one might think that a very great deal of John’s Revelation, part of which we heard this morning, was just such a dream].

    Anyway, I woke up on my first full day in the South absolutely sure that I’d encountered angels in my dreams. And as I came to, I desperately tried to remember what they had been saying. I knew that something was important. I tried and tried.
    However, to this day, I can’t remember anything of the conversation.

    I do remember one thing though. (more…)

5 responses to “Exciting Day for the Scottish Episcopal Church”

  1. Chris Avatar

    In the excitement of welcoming the news, let’s remember a wee prayer for the people of St Michael’s, who are going to miss our new bishop dreadfully. A well-loved priest’s departure leaves a huge gap in people’s lives.

  2. ryan Avatar
    ryan

    Exciting! I suspect that those with names beginning with ‘Ke’ and ending with ‘in’ are uniquely suited to the episcopate 😉

  3. Stewart Avatar

    That’s an idea Ryan – another SEC episcopate is about to go vacant if I have read the latest issue of Inspires on-line correctly.

  4. Stewart Avatar

    Ryan – We should also note that there is a vacancy in the Southwark Diocese with +Christopher, the Area Bishop of Woolwich, now the Bishop-designate of Southwark.

    1. kelvin Avatar

      I used to live round the corner from +Christopher when he was Rector of St Dunstan’s in Stepney.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Blog count

    Another 10 days or so and the blog will have had 20000 hits since I started at the end of August last year.

  • Voting Systems

    So, there will be Single Transferable Voting in the next elections for councillors in Scotland – the bill finally passed through the parliament yesterday. [Note the use of the definite article in the last part of that sentence – it contains within, the entire ambiguity of the constitutional settlement]. Liberal Democrats have achieved one of…

  • Vet day

    Tilly due at the vet today for her annual check-up. Another bout of all in wrestling to get her there, I suppose.

  • Bishop Watch

    Surprising things I have seen bishops do in the last 2 weeks: 1 – Attempt to celebrate holy mass in brown shoes 2 – Try to concelebrate uninvited from 20 yards away from an altar (retired bishop) 3 – Pray the daily office during a dull synod debate. (All the more impressive as I was…