What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Change your life

    [This post is reposted from a previous year. No-one who has ever kept the triduum with me has ever told me that what I promised fell short of their experience].

    Every year I make a promise to people. I say that if they keep the triduum with me at St Mary’s then it will change their life and change their faith.

    The Triduum is the three days from Maundy Thursday to Easter Day. Although the various services take place over several days, it is really one big feast, which is what makes it so extraordinary when you keep it in one place and experience the whole thing. It really is life changing stuff.

    I blogged a bit about it [one] year, and it might be worth pointing people to those blog posts:

    Maundy Thursday
    Veneration of the Cross
    Three Hour Devotions
    Good Friday Evening
    Holy Saturday – all hands on deck!
    The Vigil

    I’d say you’d kept the Triduum with me if you come to the Maundy Thursday evening service, two of the three services on Good Friday (try for the three hours if you can), the clean and polish on Saturday and the early fire Vigil and the main Festival Mass on Sunday.

    It really is life-changing if you do it all and there are people around who will testify to just that.

3 responses to “Freshers: How to Choose a Church”

  1. Alan McManus Avatar
    Alan McManus

    You’ve missed out one that I know is important to you: a clear commitment to social justice, local, national and global. Sublime aesthetics are all very well but most Freshers are young people and they want to know what you stand for. Otherwise, saying, in a nutshell, ‘all is well’ rings rather hollow. So a church that doesn’t indulge in party politics but does for instance condemn the malevolent stupidity of attempting, again, to fight an anti-Western ideology with indiscriminate Western bombing would let Freshers know that this church at least is smart enough to read the signs of the times and apply relevant Gospel values. Rather than just be vaguely lovely when our government is getting away with murder.

    Reply
    1. Fr Steve Avatar
      Fr Steve

      These are wise comments Alan. Several decades ago when i was a fresher…the anti-Vietnam protests in Australia were in full flight.
      I don’t think the church took a high enough profile, but many of us participated.
      Then there were the anti-apartheid demonstrations, when South African Rugby visited…these too were important.
      A wise Archbishop of Adelaide (later Australian Primate) Keith Rayner reminded us that one of the roles of young Christians is to pursue causes, be enthusiastic, and to challenge the church.

      Reply
  2. Fr Steve Avatar
    Fr Steve

    Having been a University Chaplain (University of Adelaide, South Australia), and now a priest in an inner city church of a University town (Adelaide, South Australia http://stmarymags125.blogspot.com.au/) I perceive much wisdom in your comments here
    I also want to add another dimension, which is true both of our church (St Mary Magdalene’s Adelaide, & of the Cathedral Church of St Peter, Adelaide):
    that social outreach is important.
    A very Anglo Catholic principle.
    Two decades or more ago a group of ‘earnest’ (quite the wrong word to describe the lovely kids who were uni students in the 80s) but genuine Christians ….sat around for weeks wondering about how they should put their faith into practice. Finally they just decided they needed to DO something. That something was putting on a slap-up meal on Saturday nights. That has continued for nearly thirty years. Diocesan parishes and schools volunteer every week.
    Really looking forward to my first Christmas here, when the parish will outdo itself with a proper Christmas dinner for those who we are called to love.
    I am impressed by the quality of University and young professional volunteers who staff this wonderful ministry.

    It strikes me that most freshers get this as authentic Gospel…and so do I

    Reply

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