This Week at All Saints Archives - All Saints Anglican Church, Charlottesville VA

February 16, 2017 By Fr. Spencer

This Week at All Saints

Parable of the Wheat and the Tares – Bloesmaert 1655

Mass Schedule – Septuagesima (Feb. 12, 2017)

13, Feria
14, St. Valentine, Martyr
15, Martyrs of Japan
16, Feria
17, Feria
18, Feria

+ Wednesday Agape & Christian Education for all ages is into the pre-Lenten term and will meet next Wednesday, February 22, 2017. We will begin serving the meal at 5:45 and after a time fellowship and classes for all age groups. All blessings!

+ Around this time of year, many persons ask: “Who was St. Valentine, and what does he have to do with sending romantic cards and flowers?” St. Valentine is a martyr from before 312, commemorated on the 14th of February. He was likely martyred on that date, but nothing else is known of him. There was a priest in Rome named Valentine, as well as a bishop in Ternia and both have traditionally been commemorated on 14 February. They are now generally assumed to be the same person. In many parts of Europe, it was once said that birds began to pair off for the nesting season in mid-February. Since our forebears often spoke of a given day by naming a saint connected with it rather than by giving the month and the number of the day, we find them saying that birds choose their mates on St. Valentine’s day. There are several stories making the rounds that try to explain the connection between valentine cards and flowers and Valentine but they all sound to me like they have been made up by some overly romantic Victorian low-church clergyman lecturing to children.

+ Ash Wednesday is March 1 this year & only a little more than two weeks away. It is one of the most popular and important holy days in the liturgical calendar. Ash Wednesday opens Lent, a season of fasting and prayer. Ash Wednesday takes place 46 days before Easter Sunday, and is mostly observed by Catholics, although many other Christians observe it too. Ash Wednesday comes from the ancient Jewish tradition of penance and fasting. The practice includes the wearing of ashes on the head. The ashes symbolize the dust from which God made us, as well as being a token of grief, in this case, grief for our sins that separate us from God. As the priest applies the ashes to a person’s forehead, he speaks the words: “Remember oh man that thou are dust, and unto dust thou shalt return.” It is important to remember that Ash Wednesday is a day of penitential prayer, fasting & abstinence. Some faithful take the rest of the day off from work and remain home. Small children, the elderly and sick are exempt from this observance.While the ashes symbolize penance and contrition, they are also a reminder that God is gracious and merciful to those who call on Him with repentant hearts.

+ All Saints Men’s Group will meets each Tuesday at 7:00 a.m. in undercroft.

+ Our Monday Morning Bible Study meets each Monday morning at 10:00 a.m. For further information contact Priscilla King at kingplk@gmail.com.

+ The Holy Communion is celebrated Monday through Saturday at 12:15 p.m.

+All Saints parishioner may obtain a Mass card from the Church office. A Mass card is a greeting card given to someone to inform him or her that a deceased loved one or friend was remembered and prayed for at a weekly Mass. It is a specifically Christian way to express one’s love. Call Julie McDermott at the Church office (434-979-2842) and she will help you fill out the form. The celebrant will sign the card and we will mail it from the Church to the family of the loved one.

January 25, 2017 By Fr. Spencer

This Week at All Saints

Mass Schedule – Epiphany III (January 22, 2017)

23, Feria
24, Feria
25, Conversion of St. Paul
26, St. Polycarp,
27, St. John Chrysostom
28, Feria

+ Wednesday Agape & Christian Education for all ages is into the Epiphany term and will meet this Wednesday, January 25, 2017. We will begin serving the meal at 5:45 and after a time fellowship and classes for all age groups. All blessings!

+ Polycarp was Bishop of Smyrna (today known as Izmir), a city on the west coast of Turkey. The letters to the “seven churches in Asia” at the beginning of the book of Revelation include a letter to the church in Smyrna, identifying it as a church undergoing persecution. Polycarp is said to have known the Apostle John, and to have been instructed by him in the Christian faith. Polycarp, in his turn, was known to Irenaeus, who later became Bishop of Lyons in what is now France. We have (1) Irenaeus’s brief memoir of Polycarp; (2) a letter to Polycarp from Ignatius of Antioch, written around 115 AD when Ignatius was passing through Turkey, being sent in chains to Rome to be put to death; (3) a letter from Polycarp to the church at Philippi, written at the same time; and (4) an account of the arrest, trial, conviction, and martyrdom of Polycarp, written after his death probably by a parishioner who claims to have been an eyewitness. Polycarp was denounced to the government, arrested, and tried on the charge of being a Christian. When the proconsul urged him to save his life by cursing Christ, he replied: “Eighty-six years I have served him, and he never did me any wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?” The magistrate was reluctant to kill a gentle old man, but he had no choice. Polycarp was sentenced to be burned. As he waited for the fire to be lighted, he prayed, “Lord God Almighty, Father of your blessed and beloved child Jesus Christ, through whom we have received knowledge of you, God of angels and hosts and all creation, and of the whole race of the upright who live in your presence: I bless you that you have thought me worthy of this day and hour, to be numbered among the martyrs and share in the cup of Christ, for resurrection to eternal life, for soul and body in the incorruptibility of the Holy Spirit. Among them may I be accepted before you today, as a rich and acceptable sacrifice, just as you, the faithful and true God, have prepared and foreshown and brought about. For this reason and for all things I praise you, I bless you, I glorify you, through the eternal heavenly high priest Jesus Christ, your beloved child, through whom be glory to you, with him and the Holy Spirit, now and for the ages to come. Amen.” The fire was then lit and shortly thereafter a soldier stabbed Polycarp to death by order of the magistrate. His friends gave his remains honorable burial, and wrote an account of his death to other churches.

+ All Saints Men’s Group will meets each Tuesday at 7:00 a.m. in undercroft.

+ Our Monday Morning Bible Study is also into its Epiphany term. The Bible study meets each Monday morning at 10:00 a.m. For further information contact Priscilla King at kingplk@gmail.com.

+ The word Epiphany, which Church Season we are in, takes its name from the Greek epiphania, which references a visitation, a manifestation, an unveiling of God before his people. The first idea of the feast of the Epiphany is the manifestation of Christ as the Son of God. “Begotten before the daystar and before all ages, the Lord our Savior is this day made manifest to the world.” The feast unites three events in the life of Christ when His divinity, as it were, shines through His humanity: the adoration of the Magi; the baptism of Christ in the Jordan; and the first miracle at the wedding feast of Cana. Moreover, at Epiphany the Church looks forward to the majestic coming of Christ on the “youngest day” when His manifestation as God will be complete. We also pray for his manifestation in our selves, our souls, and our bodies, that we may know the “fruition of thy glorious Godhead” as our perfect end. The Gospels of our Lord’s dialogue with the rabbis in the Temple and his baptism are appointed for the 1st and 2nd Sunday of the Epiphany. The marriage at Cana and Gospels that show the divine power of our Lord in some of His most striking miracles are appointed for the later Sundays of the Epiphany season.

+ The Holy Communion is celebrated Monday through Saturday at 12:15 p.m.

October 31, 2016 By Fr. Spencer

This Week at All Saints

Mass Schedule – Trinity XXIII (Oct. 30, 2016)

31, Vigil  of All Saints
01, All Saints’ Day
02, All Souls’ Day
03, Of the Octave
04, Of the Octave
05, S. Elizabeth, Mother of John Baptist

+ All Saints’ Day, also known as All Hallows’ Day, Feast of All Saints, or Solemnity of All Saints, is a Christian Feast Day celebrated in honour of all the saints, known and unknown. It occurs on different dates in different Christian traditions. Western Catholic jurisdictions of the Church celebrate All Saints’ Day on 1 November, including the Roman Catholic Church, the Anglo Catholic churches. Meanwhile, the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Eastern Catholic churches celebrate it on the first Sunday after Pentecost as “The Sunday of All Saints.”

+ According to the Gospel of Luke, Elizabeth was “of the daughters of Aaron.” She and her husband Zacharias were childless, but while he was in the Temple of the Lord (Luke 1:8-12), Zacharias was visited by the angel Gabriel: “But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born.” (Luke 1:13–15) Zacharias doubted the message since he and his wife were very old. The angel identified himself as Gabriel and told Zacharias that he would be “dumb, and not able to speak” until the words were fulfilled, because he did not believe. When the days of his ministry were complete, he returned to his house: “After this his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion. “The Lord has done this for me,” she said. “In these days he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people.” (Luke 1:24–25) According to the account, the angel Gabriel was then sent to Nazareth in Galilee to her relative Mary, a virgin, espoused to a man called Joseph, and informed her that she would conceive by the Holy Ghost and bring forth a son to be called Jesus. After she was also informed that her “relative Elizabeth” had begun her sixth month of pregnancy, she travelled to “Hebron, in the hill country of Judah”, to visit Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!” Luke 1:41–45

+ All Saints Men’s Group will meets next on Tuesday, November 8, at 7:00 a.m. in undercroft.

+ Our Monday Morning Bible Study will meet next on Monday, November 7, 10:00 a.m.

+ The Holy Communion is celebrated Monday through Saturday at 12:15 p.m.

+ All Saints parishioner may obtain a Mass card from the Church office. A Mass card is a greeting card given to someone to inform him or her that a deceased loved one or friend was remembered and prayed for at a weekly Mass. It is a specifically Christian way to express one’s love. Call Julie McDermott at the Church office (434-979-2842) and she will help you fill out the form. The celebrant will sign the card and we will mail it from the Church to the family of the loved one.