December 2019

Engaging All Disciples Day in Clinton. Photo: T. Petty

As their Engaging All Disciples Day hosted by Christ Church, Clinton, the congregations from the Clinton, Dubuque and Maquoketa revival cluster, focused on what it means to have a rule of life. Fr. Kevin Goodrich, a Dominican Friar himself and Rector of St. John’s Dubuque, offered various kinds of “rules”—from that of a religious order (and in particular its Third Order rule), to what his own congregation was working on as a congregational rule, to a more personal rule. The latter was more wholistic in its approach than I was expecting, seeking more to define the elements that make up the rhythm of one’s day, week, month and year. I was surprised to find that I am paying more attention than I thought to such things and can claim a positive rhythm to my inner life—which, nevertheless, is still better described as a “method to my madness.”

I was also surprised to hear from the gathered group that day that quite a number of the treasured saints attending acknowledged difficulty in personal prayer. It was one thing that made the idea of a congregational rule of life so significant. We suffer from inconsistency, and sometimes genuine blockage to spiritual practices, and thank God that we are not alone, but in community whose rhythm continues on—often made possible by the very ones having prayer difficulty at the personal level, and yet who consistently turn up to assist at the altar, to sing in the choir, or to furnish the altar. It is also a phenomenon that from time to time includes those who officiate and preach, and confirm and ordain. Many times God carries us through our willing participation, even when we feel that we are in the dark.

At no time in our calendar is this concept of being in the dark underscored more than during Advent. We often see Lent as the time for a spiritual Spring clean, and possibly that is a good way of seeing it—mending relationships, getting rid of unhelpful habits and lingering wastefulness—and Advent is about accepting how and where we sit in darkness and let the expectant light that begins to shine in the distance open up new things and have us attempt new practices. “Come, Lord Jesus” is not a bad prayer with which to start. Then I would direct you to the pages of the Book of Common Prayer that invite us to personal prayer—pages 137-140. Start there, and see how the light will grow. The key is the ten minutes in which you actually stop and let this sampling of our common devotional life take you forward.

One of the aids I use for the daily awakening of my being is The Celtic Prayer Book. It comes in two volumes and provides readings from spiritual writers and from Celtic spiritual lore, and is produced by the Northumbrian Community in Northern England. I admit that its reading comes after coffee, but it forms part of the morning awakening.

For today, George McDonald writes, “To believe in the wide-awake real, through all the stupefying, enervating, distorting dream; to will to wake, when the very being seems athirst for Godless repose: these are the broken steps up to the high fields where repose is but a form of strength, strength a form of joy, and joy but a form of love.”

As we enter a new Christian year, we have some significant actions before us – Lambeth, the Iowa leg of the Companions Young Adult pilgrimage, exploring what it means to walk our neighborhoods and see God’s Faithful Innovations, the Small Church Summit and, oh yes, the unfolding of the Bishop transition process, and the beginning of our own goodbyes as the visitations enter a final round. It is good to know that we have a community rhythm that carries us, and that it is our will to wake that carries us up the broken steps to the high fields where repose is strength, strength but joy and joy (that joy to the world) is love.  

In the peace and love of Christ,

+Alan

The Rt. Rev. Alan Scarfe, Bishop of Iowa