From the Rector: 

       What is an Episcopalian?  What does it mean to be Episcopalian?  This is the question that I have tried to answer in the past few weeks.  Episcopalians are people of prayer.  This includes both private prayer and common prayer.  This is the key to Episcopal identity and it is the key to Episcopal unity in past, present, and future. 

       For me, the 1979 Book of Common Prayer has been a wonderful gift.  I also have great love and respect for our previous books of Common Prayer, but the 1979 Book of Common Prayer has led me to a new appreciation of liturgical worship and of the Eucharist.  I continue to find new resources in its pages.  The Baptismal Covenant is a document that continues to challenge me, call me to prayer, and call me to conversion.  I hear people saying that they are Rite 1 or Rite 2 people, but as a priest, I celebrate both.  I would be hard pressed if I had to choose one over the other.  I hope that we tear down that wall and come to appreciate both.  Both have strengths and weaknesses. 

       Every now and then, I will hear someone yearn for the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, but both books, 1928 and 1979, attracted great loyalty and ministered well in their own time.   The Zacchaeus Project reported an unbelievably high agreement on the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. 

       Bishop Stephen Sykes, of the Church of England, reminds us that Christian identity is rooted in particular experiences set in particular places.  In that sense Christianity and being Episcopal is a localized experience.  It is not an abstract set of doctrines.  We may like or disagree with what is done at Convention, either diocesan or national, but that is not the heart of our faith, our identity, or of our unity.  The heart of our identity and of our unity is found when the church gathers for Holy Eucharist.  It is in the sharing of the reading of the scriptures, in the reciting of the creeds, the offering of the prayers, and the celebration of the sacrament of bread and wine, the Body and Blood of Christ, that we find the heart of our faith, our identity and of our unity. 

       Can we still pray together and can we still pray for each other?  This is the central question that must be answered.  Our ability to do that has been the glue that has kept us together and given us a common identity in the past.  Steven Sykes argues that it is the “clearly Anglican way that the church’s identity has rightly been grounded in its worship.”  The consequence is that Episcopalians have been able to kneel to pray with each other even when they disagreed with each other over doctrine or other differences that threaten unity. 

       It is the agreement that the heart of the church is to be at prayer that is the heart of our unity.  Even though we disagree with each over some things, there is this common agreement on the mission of the Church.  We are a church at prayer and this common experience of Holy Eucharist in our local parish is the most important thing that we do and it is the key to Episcopal identity and Episcopal unity.  Jim+  September 8, 2004