Commemoration of Albrecht Dürer, artist, 1528, and Michelangelo Buonarrotti, artist, spiritual writer, 1564 Man cannot make a redemptive art, but he can make an art that communicates what he experiences of redemption as a man and what he knows of it as an artist. God in his infinite wisdom may use an art work as an instrument of redemption, but what serves or can serve that purpose is beyond the knowledge of man.
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Palm Sunday I bind my heart, this tide, to the Galilean's side, To the wounds of Calvary, to the read more
Palm Sunday I bind my heart, this tide, to the Galilean's side, To the wounds of Calvary, to the Christ who died for me. I bind my soul this day to the brother far away And the brother near at hand, in this town and in this land. I bind my heart in thrall to God, the Lord of all.-- To God, the poor man's friend, and the Christ whom He did send. I bind myself to peace, to make strife and envy cease. God, knit Thou sure the cord of my thralldom to my Lord!
Devotion is not a passing emotion: it is a fixed, enduring habit of mind permeating the whole life and shaping read more
Devotion is not a passing emotion: it is a fixed, enduring habit of mind permeating the whole life and shaping every action. It rests upon a conviction that God is the Sole Source of Holiness, and that our part is to lean upon Him and be absolutely guided and governed by Him; and it necessitates an abiding hold on Him, a perpetual habit of listening for His Voice within the heart, as of readiness to obey the dictates of that Voice.
Commemoration of Phillips Brooks, Bishop of Massachusetts, spiritual writer, 1893 If man is man and God is God, to read more
Commemoration of Phillips Brooks, Bishop of Massachusetts, spiritual writer, 1893 If man is man and God is God, to live without prayer is not merely an awful thing: it is an infinitely foolish thing.
Modern attempts to get away from the sheer historical facts of the Resurrection are, at best, based on a total read more
Modern attempts to get away from the sheer historical facts of the Resurrection are, at best, based on a total misunderstanding. The whole Bible proclaims the need for, and the achievement of, a salvation that will remake creation, and it is just such a salvation, at once supernatural and historical, that was won on Easter Day. If the Resurrection narratives are [merely] a subtle way of convincing us that God still loves us, or that there is a life beyond death, they must be reckoned among the oddest and most ill-conceived stories ever written.
Commemoration of Wilson Carlile, Priest, Founder of the Church Army, 1942 There is no longer any room in the read more
Commemoration of Wilson Carlile, Priest, Founder of the Church Army, 1942 There is no longer any room in the world for a merely external form of Christianity, based upon custom. The world is entering upon a period of catastrophe and crisis when we are being forced to take sides, and in which a higher and more intense spiritual life will be demanded of Christians.
Beginning a short series on topics of Christian apologetics: If we are prepared to admit, even as a possibility, read more
Beginning a short series on topics of Christian apologetics: If we are prepared to admit, even as a possibility, that Jesus was divine, or even that without being divine he was unique, then we must, as a matter of logic, discard any attempt to discredit the Gospel accounts on the ground that they record miracles.
With Thee, 'tis one to behold and to pity. Accordingly, Thy mercy followeth every man so long as he liveth, read more
With Thee, 'tis one to behold and to pity. Accordingly, Thy mercy followeth every man so long as he liveth, whithersoever he goeth, even as Thy glance never quitteth any.
This total and entire conversion of the inner man, this absolute doing away of the old and acceptance of the read more
This total and entire conversion of the inner man, this absolute doing away of the old and acceptance of the new life, being in its nature a real breach and not a formal one, necessarily involved a corresponding outward breach with the old form of life. Of this breach Baptism was the sacrament. In Baptism the change was effected and realized in fact. Baptism was not a mere formal external act, a symbol of a spiritual fact which was already complete without it. A Spiritual conversion which was not also a conversion of life was no conversion at all, but a delusion... With the heart man believes, with the mouth he confesses; but a mouth which does not confess disproves the existence of a heart that believes. The soul cannot be God's and the life not God's at the same time. The soul can not be recreated and the life remain unchanged. The spiritual breach is proved and realized and completed in the outward breach. Where there is no outward change, it is safe to deny an inward change. Faith without Baptism and all that Baptism involved was consequently no part of St. Paul's teaching.
We are living "between the times" -- the time of Christ's resurrection and the new age of the Spirit, and read more
We are living "between the times" -- the time of Christ's resurrection and the new age of the Spirit, and the time of fulfillment in Christ. Life in the Spirit is a pledge, a "down-payment", on the final kingdom of shalom. In the meantime, we are to be signs of the kingdom which is, and which is coming.
