What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • In just three days…

    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. I think that keeping the Triduum helps make sense of all that we do in church for the rest of the year. In just three days, you can learn things about the faith and why Christians believe the things that they do that are much harder to learn during the rest of the year.

    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.

    A few years ago, I blogged about it, and it might be worth pointing people to those blog posts. There’s a few things we do a bit differently and I’ve changed my mind about one or two things too, but these blog posts do capture the essence of what we are up to.

    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.

    On Good Friday in the evening there will be a simple sung service of Night Prayer called Compline. On the Saturday evening we’re going to try something completely new. My colleague Maggie McTernan and I often go to a folk singaround in a local pub. We’re going to be leading a session of singing on the Saturday evening of Songs of Hope and Lament. People can bring a song to sing or simply come and listen to the singers and join in the choruses. (Only rule – no alleluias until Easter Day).

    This year we are having a revival on Easter Sunday and there will be a number of people who will be baptised at the Easter Fire Vigil.

    This is all open to anyone. You are just as welcome to participate if you have been at St Mary’s all your life or if you’ve never been. Some people come to keep these days here with us because their own church isn’t keeping them like this and they’ll be going back to their own church once Holy Week is done. That’s fine too. I’m also happy to answer questions as we go through these days about what it is all for. (The Saturday morning is a good time to talk).

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

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5 responses to “Heresy hunting”

  1. Nick Brindley Avatar
    Nick Brindley

    It is probably helpful to be clear about the distinction between “dogma” (which is best understood as the definition of orthodoxy and of heresy, of the things it is mandatory to affirm and the things it is forbidden to affirm) and “church order” (the rules about how people are to conduct themselves). These are related but by no means the same thing.

    “Doctrine” is a third thing again, to my mind. It is the body of teaching that the church affirms but is much more extensive and changeable than dogma.

    Of particular relevance is who has the authority to pronounce on these things. Denominational authorities quite properly establish church law and discipline (this needs to be done and there’s nobody else to do it) but would go beyond their proper sphere (in my view) if they tried to establish new definitions in the field of dogma.

    Reply
  2. Andrew Avatar
    Andrew

    I feel the need to separate praxis and doctrine, but I suppose that is probably a minor heresy in itself, in a church that hides its doctrine in its liturgy. Although I suppose the deftness of the ‘McCarthy Liturgy’ has maybe sidestepped that pitfall as deftly as an 18th century non-juring bishop side-stepping western orthodoxy and the rest…

    Reply
  3. Rosemary Hannah Avatar
    Rosemary Hannah

    To a degree I think it is a matter of tradition. Anglican churches have tended (and it is only a tendency) to insist of orthopraxis. Church of Scotland churches have tended (same health warning) to emphasise orthodoxy of belief, call it doctrine or dogma. St Andrews is not of course a C or S institution, but it used to be, certainly in my day, and to a degree in yours, heavily steeped in C of S ethos. St Mary’s trained C of S ministers and that was ALL the training they got, because then they knew Orthodoxy.

    Reply
  4. Jimmy Avatar
    Jimmy

    The links on this post have led me to think of this –

    The Inner Party – The Outer Party – The Proles.

    The model demands tight control of the middle class, with ambitious Outer Party members neutralised via promotion to the Inner Party or “reintegration” by Miniluv, while proles can be allowed intellectual (and sexual) freedom because they lack intellect. Winston nonetheless believed that “the future belonged to the proles”. Wikipedia.

    Reply
  5. Allan Ronald Avatar
    Allan Ronald

    There was most definitely a C of S ethos at St Andrews in my day [67-71]. Robin Buchanan-Smith was running a packed college chapel and one president of the SRC and one president of the Union were St Mary’s men who went on to ordination and, in one case, to be Moderator of the Kirk. Perhaps they got their orthodoxy from Matthew Black at St Mary’s and their skill in future clerical politics from their student posts…….

    Reply

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