Holy Cross Day The Venerable Ralph Leavitt, Honorary Associate Priest In the book For All the Saints we read of the origin of Holy Cross Day. The emperor Constantine, who made Christianity the state religion, ordered that a grand church be built on the site of Christ’s death, on Gol’gotha, the hill outside Jerusalem. In […]

Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost Deuteronomy 30: 15-20; Ps 1; Phil 1-21; Luke 14: 25-33 Rev’d Dr Deborah Meister One hundred years ago, in 1925, John Scopes, a young math and science teacher in the state of Tennessee, volunteered for a hazardous undertaking. The state of Tennessee had just made it a crime to teach “any […]

Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost Isaiah 58:9b-14; Psalm 103.1-8; Hebrews 12.18-29; Luke 13.10-17 Very Rev’d Bertrand Olivier If you refrain from trampling the sabbath, from pursuing your own interests on my holy day; if you call the sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honourable; … then you shall take delight in the […]

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost Jer 23:23-29; Psalm 82; Hebrews 11:29-12:2; Luke 12:49-56 Rev’d Dr Deborah Meister Jesus said, “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled.”                                                                                                                       (Luke 12:49) This week, I was speaking with a friend who is a non-believer. She said to me, “It must […]

Ninth Sunday after Pentecost Genesis 15.1-6; Psalm 33.12-22; Hebrews 11.1-3, 8-16; Luke 12.32-40 The Very Rev’d Bertrand Oliver, Dean and Rector ‘For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also’ (Luke 12:34) In the Name of God, Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. Amen This week, the world’s contrasts feel almost unbearable. On one hand, […]

Fifth Sunday after Pentecost Deut 30: 9-14; Ps 25: 1-9; Col 1:1-14; Luke 10:35-37 Rev’d Dr. Deborah Meister, ODM The apartment in which I live is two blocks from a so-called “safer injection center,” a place where those who live in addiction can take their drugs with some confidence that if the drugs are contaminated, […]

Trinity Sunday Prov 8:1-4, 22-31; Ps 8; Romans 5: 1-5; John 16: 12-15 The Rev’d Dr. Deborah Meister, ODM Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. (Wm. Butler Yeats) It feels a bit like that […]

with baptisms, confirmations and reception into the Anglican Church of Canada Genesis 11.1-9 – Psalm 104: 25-35, 37b – Acts 2.1-21 – John 14: 8-17, 25-27 The Very Rev’d Bertrand Oliver, Dean and Rector I am sure that many of us have known the story of the Tower of Babel for a long time, and […]

Ascension Sunday Acts 1:1-11; Eph 1: 15-23; Luke 24:44-53 Rev’d Dr. Deborah Meister, ODM What do we do once those we love are gone? That is the paradox of Ascension Day. To the Church, it is a feast: the celebration that Christ has returned, victorious, to heaven, bearing our humanity back to the place of […]

Fourth Sunday in Easter Acts 9:36-43; Ps 23; Rev 7:9-17; John 10:22-30 The Rev’d Dr. Deborah Meister Have you ever been lost? As in, really lost? It happened to me when I was a little girl, traveling with my parents in Peru. One day, we went to a town market — one of those fabulous […]