• A Preface for Ash Wednesday

    The following preface was written to mark the beginning of Lent and reflects the language and character of the Lenten material in the Scottish Liturgy 1982 and Daily Prayer of the Scottish Episcopal Church

    Dear Friends in Christ, it is the custom of Christian people to prepare to mark the time of Christ’s passion and resurrection by a season of penitence and fasting.

    The church calls each of us during these forty days to repent of all that causes harm to ourselves, harm to our earthly dwelling place and harm to our relationship with God.

    By carefully keeping these days, Christians take to heart the call to repentance and the assurance of forgiveness proclaimed in the gospel, and so grow in faith and devotion. In turning our hearts towards God, we discover anew the boundless grace of God.

    For God will help us to create beauty even within the turmoil of this chaotic world and will help us to gather a harvest of joy and gladness from lives of sorrow and care. Today and every day, God calls the wandering exile home.

    We are invited therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy word.

4 responses to “That Damn Magnificat”

  1. Sue Matthews Avatar

    We don’t get a word, as the mother of one son, a miracle having been told early in my adult life there would be no babies, a son arrived. No words would have been possible, having nurtured, taught, loved, HOW, HOW, HOW has it come to this. Yet all His life she had known He was different, witness the wedding wine, only His mother could have asked for the miracle, because she knew !!!and maybe always knew it could not end well so stood in speechless sorrow lest she scream out.

  2. Rod Gillis Avatar
    Rod Gillis

    Thanks so much for this! I watched the video version as part of my daily office for this Holy Saturday. Much appreciated.

  3. Peggy Brewer Avatar
    Peggy Brewer

    One of the best sermons I’ve heard! Thank you!

  4. Rosemary Hannah Avatar
    Rosemary Hannah

    All I ever knew when I believed my own child would die, that the only person I could bear to think of in the agony of grief and fear was her. Because she knew. She KNEW.

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