Christian Formation

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.

Mass Schedule – Trinity XXII (Oct. 23, 2016)

24, Feria
25, St. Raphael, Archangel
26, Alfred the Great, King
27, Feria
28, St. Simon & St Jude
29, Martyrs of Uganda

+ When the Gospel was first preached in Britain, the island was inhabited by Celtic peoples. In the 500’s, pagan Germanic tribes, the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes, invaded Britain and drove the Christian Celts out of what is now England into Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. The new arrivals (called collectively the Anglo-Saxons) were then converted by Celtic missionaries moving in from the one side and Roman missionaries moving in from the other. (They then sent missionaries of their own, such as Boniface, to their pagan relatives on the Continent.) In the 800’s the cycle partly repeated itself, as the Christian Anglo-Saxons were invaded by the Danes, pagan raiders, who rapidly conquered the northeast portion of England. They seemed about to conquer the entire country and eliminate all resistance when they were turned back by Alfred, King of the West Saxons. Alfred was born in 849 at Wantage, Berkshire, youngest of five sons of King Aethelwulf. He wished to become a monk, but after the deaths (all in battle, I think) of his father and his four older brothers, he was made king in 871. He proved to be skilled at military tactics, and devised a defensive formation which the Danish charge was unable to break. After a decisive victory at Edington in 878, he reached an agreement with the Danish leader Guthrum, by which the Danes would retain a portion of northeastern England and be given other concessions in return for their agreement to accept baptism and Christian instruction. From a later point of view, it seems obvious that such a promise could not involve a genuine change of heart, and was therefore meaningless (and indeed, one Dane complained that the white robe that he was given after his baptism was not nearly so fine as the two that he had received after the two previous times that he had been defeated and baptized). However, Alfred’s judgement proved sound. Guthrum, from his point of view, agreed to become a vassal of Christ. His nobles and chief warriors, being his vassals, were thereby obligated to give their feudal allegiance to Christ as well. They accepted baptism and the presence among them of Christian priests and missionaries to insruct them. The door was opened for conversions on a more personal level in that and succeeding generations.

+ Among the new nations of Africa, Uganda is the most predominantly Christian. Mission work began there in the 1870’s with the favor of King Mutesa, who died in 1884. However, his son and successor, King Mwanga, opposed all foreign presence, including the missions. James Hannington, born 1847, was sent out from England in 1884 by the Anglican Church as missionary Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa. As he was travelling toward Uganda, he was apprehended by emissaries of King Mwanga. He and his companions were brutally treated and, a week later, 29 October 1885, most of them were put to death. Hannington’s last words were: “Go tell your master that I have purchased the road to Uganda with my blood.”The first native martyr was the Roman Catholic Joseph Mkasa Balikuddembe, who was beheaded after having rebuked the king for his debauchery and for the murder of Bishop Hannington. On 3 June 1886 (see Bio), a group of 32 men and boys, 22 Roman Catholic and 10 Anglican, were burned at the stake. Most of them were young pages in Mwanga’s household, from their head-man, Charles Lwanga, to the thirteen-year-old Kizito, who went to his death “laughing and chattering.” These and many other Ugandan Christians suffered for their faith then and in the next few years.In 1977, the Anglican Archbishop Janani Luwum and many other Christians suffered death for their faith under the tyrant Idi Amin. Thanks largely to their common heritage of suffering for their Master, Christians of various communions in Uganda have always been on excellent terms.

+ All Saints Men’s Group will meets next on Tuesday, November 1, at 7:00 a.m. in undercroft.

+ Our Monday Morning Bible Study will meet next on Monday, October 31, 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.

Mass Schedule – Trinity XXI (Oct. 16, 2016)

17, Feria
18, St. Luke
19, St. Frideswide
20, Feria
21, St. Hilarion
22, Martyrs of New Guinea

+ St. Frideswide, Virgin, patroness of Oxford, lived from about 650 to 735. According to the earliest accounts, she was the child of King Didan and Safrida, and was brought up to holiness by Algiva. She refused the proffered hand of King Algar, a Mercian, and fled from him to Oxford. It was in vain that he pursued her; a mysterious blindness fell on him, and he left her in her cell. From this eventually developed the monastery in which she died in 19 October (her principal feast), and was buried. The earliest written life now extant was not composed until four hundred years after her death, but it is generally admitted that the substance of the tradition has every appearance of verisimilitude. From the time of her translation in 1180 from her original tomb to the great shrine of her church, her fame spread far and wide; for the university was now visited by students from all parts, who went twice a year in solemn procession to her shrine and kept her feasts with great solemnity. Cardinal Wolsey transformed her monastery into Christ Church College, King Henry made her church into Oxford cathedral, but her shrine was dismantled, and her relics, which seem to have been preserved, were relegated to some out-of-the-way corner of the parish church.

+ All Saints Men’s Group will meets next on Tuesday, October 25, at 7:00 a.m. in undercroft.

+ Our Monday Morning Bible Study will meet next on Monday, October 24, 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.