Septuagesima 2021

CLICK HERE for the Ante-communion and Sermon

An Annual Meeting Report

I post this because many of you may identify, and need some encouragement. I will be reading it on Sunday, January 31, at the St. Benedict's Annual Meeting.

STATE OF THE PARISH

For the Annual Meeting of St. Benedict’s ACC in 2021.

Fr. Hart, Rector. 

To speak of the State of St. Benedict’s Parish during this ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is like firing a shot in the dark. No clergyman was ever trained for what we have been going through. No normal protocols are in place for it, and no handbook was ever written for it. I have no interest in every armchair quarterback’s expertise on masks or vaccines, or even on the disease itself. For understanding the virus as much as possible, this parish has a physician with Duke University Hospital, and it is my personal policy to listen to Dr. Karen St. Claire more than any other member of this parish when it comes to medical matters. It is my personal policy also to listen in the same way to Dr. Gordon Ibeanu on the subject of the vaccines.

          However, when it comes to the effect of the pandemic on the parish, we have to take into account perception. Perception affects us as much as reality. Therefore, whatever opinions individuals may hold, including the rather absurd conflation of scientific reality with politics (a very real indicator of how much some people revel in fantasy), the reaction to what is going on has come at a very annoying time. It is annoying to me personally. I have watched the ups and downs of both membership and attendance for almost twelve years here. I have seen many people join our parish, but usually just enough to replace those who have departed this mortal life, or have moved away. In 2019, and early in 2020, we saw growth in the ways that matter. Our active membership had been growing, and it was reflected not only in more predictable and regular attendance, but also in the parish income. People were joining us, in general, because they loved what they experienced at our services. This was not, as in times past, mostly disaffected Episcopalians, as a good percentage of new members expressed delight in finding traditional and liturgical worship for the first time.

          As things stand now, however, we must all hope and pray that people are not happy with staying home on Sunday morning. It is not that I want our people to be generally unhappy. But, for their spiritual health, I hope and pray that they are getting quite tired of missing church. Perhaps some of you think they are wrong to stay home, and others think they are doing what is right. Again, the perception prevails that being among several people in a church service is neither safe nor wise until the pandemic is over. I respect their decision, and I have made the repeated offer to visit them with the Reserve Sacrament (which some have responded to positively, and others by saying they will be back in church soon – something I prefer not to hear when I would rather go to them now). I continue to feed them as much as I can, with the help of James Lazenby, by making videos for every Sunday, and for special Feast Days.

          Due to the pandemic our ministry at the Startford Senior Care Facility has been suspended since March of last year. I am ready to resume it again when they allow us back in. Our hope to have a new Sunday School program has also been put on the back burner. We have a good number of children in the parish, but several of them are at a pre-school age (including our newest member, whom I baptized last month).

          A new ACC church is forming in Raleigh, and it has been because members of St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church approached the Rev. Dr. Michael Carreker to help them do so. As a result, our own membership will show that his extended family has relocated to another ACC church. I have mixed emotions, sorry not to see them here, but pleased to see that we have a sort of St. Benedict’s Plant.

          We have a Postulant in our parish, who is also studying at Duke Divinity School; so, pray for Nicholas Harrelson. He was wounded serving in Iraq, and has a family that includes a son, and another child on the way. The Archbishop and I are very pleased with what we see, and have hopes for his ministry.

          I had a dream back just before Easter, and I woke up laughing. It was a splendid Sunday morning, and people were suddenly attending in good number. We had just completed our Sunday Mass. But one thing, that made sense only during the dream, was what made me laugh upon waking up. As a postlude, James was playing “Let’s Go Fly a Kite” from Walt Disney’s Mary Poppins. I thought about it, and considered that I dreamed that, quite likely, because the song was featured during the very happy ending of the story in the movie. We know that, because of vaccines, people will soon feel safe gathering in church again. I will not expect our organist to play that selection. But we can expect a happy ending. Let us be ready to rebuild and restore, and go forward.

On Facebook

I just posted this comment to an angry person demanding that no man has a right to be pro-life.

“So, do you have two heads? Two hearts? Two distinct sets of fingerprints? Two distinct DNA sequences? 

It’s not YOUR body that is at issue. And no man on earth created us male and female. Address your complaints to God.”

THIRD SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY 2021

Click on the picture for the link

THE BAPTISM OF OUR LORD

THE SECOND SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY 2021. CLICK HERE.

Hear

Many of you trusted me in the past, especially when we were threatened by those who tried to bully Continuing Anglicans into the RCC. You were assured by my defense of our orders, the validity of our sacraments, and the truth of our doctrine and patrimony. I am still the same man. My reputation has been under assault because I have consistently refused to violate my conscience, formed by the Word of God, in order to give public allegiance to a political agenda of fear and hate, oppression of the poor, and hatred of the stranger who flees to us for Asylum. I refuse, also, to tolerate chaos, violence, and insurrection against the Rule of Law in the United States. Those of you who, in your hearts, have placed a very sinful man on the throne rightfully belonging only to the Lord Jesus Christ, must immediately cease from all further propagation of your political sympathy with the violent terrorists who threaten a violent revolution in the United States.

Anathama

In the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, fully God and come in the flesh, born of the Virgin Mary His mother, crucified dead and buried to take away the sins of the world, and risen from death and mortality to make us partakers of the divine nature: As a priest in God’s One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church: I condemn the attempted violent insurrection against lawful authority at the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021, incited by Donald J. Trump in an attempt to overthrow the lawful election of his opponent based on lies that his lawyers could not substantiate in sixty cases presented in courts of law, in a futile attempt to overthrow the Constitution of the United States, in which five persons died violently, in which he broke his promise to a crowd to take part with them as their President: And I condemn all sympathy and defense of the same, as directed by the Holy Ghost.

FIRST SUNDAY AFTER THE EPIPHANY 2021

CLICK HERE.

Mass of The Epiphany

12:00 Noon Mass of the Epiphany at St. Benedict's ACC, Wed. Jan. 6, 2021. CLICK HERE

SECOND SUNDAY AFTER CHRISTMAS 2021

Click here for the Ante-communion and Sermon video from St. Benedict's ACC.

ST. JOHN APOSTLE & EVANGELIST DECEMBER 27

CLICK HERE for the video.

CHRISTMAS 2020

Please click this link for the video.

FOURTH SUNDAY IN ADVENT 2020

For the ante-communion and sermon, CLICK HERE.

ARCHBISHOP HAVERLAND'S ADVENT III SERMON

CLICK HERE.

THIRD SUNDAY in ADVENT

Please CLICK HERE for the ante-communion and sermon. Check later for a second sermon, from Archbishop Haverland, that I plan to post after the 10:00 am Mass.

SECOND SUNDAY IN ADVENT

For the ante-communion and sermon CLICK HERE.

The Current St. Benedict's Newsletter

I want to share this newsletter with everyone, because we are all going through this year together.

T H E   B E N E D I C T I O N

Newsletter of St. Benedict’s Anglican Catholic Church

 

O  WORSHIP  THE  LORD  IN  THE  BEAUTY  OF  HOLINESS

Our parish (founded in 1979) has maintained the Liturgy of the traditional Book of Common Prayer. Our preaching and teaching draw on the Holy Scriptures in light of the Tradition of the Church from the earliest days.

 

Advent and Christmas 2020

From the Rector’s Desk

 Some call 2020 “The Year From Hell.” At times I have felt discouraged and put upon, only to quickly remember that it is not only we at St. Benedict’s, nor only we in North Carolina, nor even only the United States, but the whole world that has been stricken by the pandemic. Our country is among those suffering the worst of it, and the reason is obvious: Too many people here (unlike anywhere else on earth) have lied to themselves about the fact that the disease is very real. As a result they have put themselves and others at unnecessary risk. One sad lesson that this year has taught us is that too few have regard for the commandment, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” Beginning with the selfish hoarding of paper supplies in March, following on to attendance in large groups that have practiced no safe guards, a shocking number of modern Americans have proved themselves to be much too selfish.

          I am not among the modernist theologians who presume that there is no devil, no demons, and no genuine spiritual warfare. Too many people want the Church to be a vacation cruise, when it is a battle ship. Now, everyone is in the battle, whether or not they choose to be on the ship, because the war is everywhere, and certainly whether or not they man their battle stations. But someone looking for the shuffle board is in more danger than someone who knows what is really happening (read Ephesians 6:10-17).

          To discourage you to the point where you would give up on church is the work of the devil. To plant in your mind some notion that the Church is failing, or that it must be all over, is Satan’s voice in your head. Have the wisdom to reject such lies. It is true that we are yet enduring a difficult season. In it my work is harder because it is like a time of war or plague. So, I am ready to visit you with the sacrament (call me and I will come – my cell phone number is 480-760-5978), and also to make weekly videos on the church’s You Tube channel so that you can pray along on Sunday, and hear a sermon from me (and I hope all of you have been using these). I know why most of you will be avoiding crowds until the pandemic is over, and I respect that decision, so I have to add to my efforts.

But do not learn the wrong lesson. I spoke prophetically months ago (in a couple of the videos) that a vaccine would begin to turn things around about the middle of December. This is exactly what is beginning to happen. Certain select At Risk people will be first, vaccinated even during December, we are told. A few months from now the “All Clear” will sound. Each and every one of you will then be called, by Christ, back into the assembly of His Body. The wrong lesson from 2020 is that you do not need the Church. But you do. You need the fellowship of your spiritual family. You need corporate worship. You need the preaching of God’s word. You need the sacraments. If Satan has convinced you otherwise, banish him, with his lies, from your lives in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching (Hebrews 10:25).”

          “And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers (Acts 2:42).”

 The humility of God is a staggering fact that leaps off the pages of the Gospels. For we see the Son, equal with God, deem to be made human for the sake of a race of rebels; to take upon Himself our very nature, to be found in fashion as a man, to take upon Him the form of a servant, to be obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, as spoken of in Saint Paul’s famous passage to the Philippians. This obedience and service would be quite remarkable from someone who is a creature; but the Son is not a creature; He is begotten not made. He is equal with God, eternally one with the Father and the Holy Spirit. What great kindness shown to us, the race of rebels, that we see His sacred face the holy night of His birth. Into the eternity of His Divine Person He took time; into His Godhead eternally begotten not created, He took our created nature; into His omnipotence he took the weakness of a newborn infant; into His omnipresence He took the location of a human body; into His omniscience He took the mind of a man. Into His Divine life as the maker of created life, He took our mortal nature, indeed death itself and so swallowed up mortality in eternal life.

In all of this we see that God does not deal with us as our sins deserve. If we must cast aside our hope in the best idealism that fallen man can muster, it is for a greater hope, a love that exceeds the story of every romance ever written. It is the love of God for the undeserving children of men, benevolence extended where wrath is deserved, immortality where death is justly due, the joy of God’s kingdom where hell was earned. This hope for all who will believe and repent, purchased by our Redeemer’s shed blood, sealed by His resurrection and trampling of death, is peace with God. This is the song of the angels: This is “Peace on Earth, goodwill toward men.”

Pledge

Please send in your pledge for 2021 as soon as you can. If you cannot find the letter just contact me or Michael Murray. You can even email it to mail@saintbenedicts.net.

 

Christmas Offering

Enclosed please see the envelope for your Christmas Offering. This is for special thanks to God for everything this feast means to us.

 

Annual Meeting

Please take note: Every member of the congregation is hereby informed that the Annual Meeting for 2021, at which decisions are made by the voting members of the parish will be on Sunday January 31 following the 10:00 AM service of Holy Communion. Because the pandemic is expected not to end by then, we will forego the usual potluck luncheon and keep the meeting short. Wear a mask and practice social distancing please.

 

Food Basket

Please remember items for the Food Basket. It goes to help people in need of food.

 

Archbishop Haverland is scheduled to visit us on the Third Sunday in Advent, December 13. We will have to forego the usual potluck luncheon.

 

IF YOU COME TO SERVICES please practice the cautions appropriate to the pandemic. A mask and social distancing are simply good manners right now.

 Schedule for Christmas Services

Christmas Eve

11:00 PM Holy Communion (Traditional Midnight Mass)

Christmas Day

Holy Communion 10:00 AM

 

Feast of the Epiphany Wednesday January 6

Holy Communion 12:00 Noon and 7:00 PM

 

Regular weekly schedule

Sundays

8:30 AM Morning Prayer

9:30 AM Sunday School for children

10:00 AM Holy Communion 11:40 Bible Study

Wednesdays

Holy communion 12:00 noon

Evening Prayer 6:30 pm

 

 

St. Benedict’s Anglican Church is a parish of the Diocese of the South, Anglican Catholic Church, Original Province.

 

Most Rev. Dr. Mark D. Haverland, Archbishop Ordinary

 

Rev. Robert Hart, Rector

Mr. Michael Murray, Senior Warden

Mr. Terence Smith, Junior Warden

Mr. James Lazenby, Minister of Music

 

St. Benedict’s website: www.saintbenedicts.net.

Phone# 919-933-0956

FIRST SUNDAY IN ADVENT 2020

You may click here for the link to this week's video.

THE CONTINUUM AN ANGLICAN BLOG

FEAST OF CHRIST THE KING

CLICK HERE.

THANKSGIVING DAY

CLICK HERE