Feast of Mary Magdalen, Apostle to the Apostles The more vigor you need, the more gentleness and kindness you read more

Feast of Mary Magdalen, Apostle to the Apostles The more vigor you need, the more gentleness and kindness you must combine with it. All stiff, harsh goodness is contrary to Jesus.

If Christians are ever to be united, they must be united in Christ, their living head and the source of read more

If Christians are ever to be united, they must be united in Christ, their living head and the source of their spiritual life.

Feast of All Souls The antithesis between death and life is not so stark for the Christian as it read more

Feast of All Souls The antithesis between death and life is not so stark for the Christian as it is for the atheist. Life is a process of becoming, and the moment of death is the transition from one life to another. Thus it is possible for a Christian to succumb to his own kind of death-wish, to seek that extreme of other-worldliness to which the faith has always been liable, especially in periods of stress and uncertainty. There may appear a marked preoccupation with death and a rejection of all temporal things. To say that this world is in a fallen state and that not too much value must be set upon it, is very far from the Manichaean error of supposing it to be evil throughout. The Christian hope finds ambivalence in death: that which destroys, also redeems.

Commemoration of Johann Sebastian Bach, musician, 1750 You, too, are called to be an open letter, as Paul puts read more

Commemoration of Johann Sebastian Bach, musician, 1750 You, too, are called to be an open letter, as Paul puts it, written by Christ's own hand, showing those round about you what things Christ can do. We are to go into the world and so to live our ordinary lives that, all unconsciously to us, those among whom we move will look at us again, and will begin to say, You know I used to doubt if there was much in Christianity save talk. But I have revised my opinion. There's So-and-so (that's you, you understand), that is a man in whom the thing is obviously working out. He used to be so touchy, so opinionative, so mean and shabby in his views, so dully ordinary. Yet now, undoubtedly, the man has won to self-control and a large generous mind, and -- yea, I know it's a queer thing to say -- but he has won to something more, something that somehow (though he never speaks about those things) makes you remember Jesus Christ!

Commemoration of Martin Luther, Teacher, Reformer, 1546 Here is the truly Christian life, here is faith really working by read more

Commemoration of Martin Luther, Teacher, Reformer, 1546 Here is the truly Christian life, here is faith really working by love: when a man applies himself with joy and love to the works of that freest servitude, in which he serves others voluntarily and for naught; himself abundantly satisfied in the fulness and richness of his own faith.

Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012 So long as we are full of self, we are shocked read more

Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012 So long as we are full of self, we are shocked at the faults of others. Let us think often of our own sin, and we shall be lenient to the sins of others.

Feast of Alfred the Great, King of the West Saxons, Scholar, 899 Commemoration of Cedd, Founding Abbot of Lastingham, Bishop read more

Feast of Alfred the Great, King of the West Saxons, Scholar, 899 Commemoration of Cedd, Founding Abbot of Lastingham, Bishop of the East Saxons, 664 A man may be haunted with doubts, and only grow thereby in faith. Doubts are the messengers of the Living One to the honest. They are the first knock at our door of things that are not yet, but have to be, understood... Doubt must precede every deeper assurance; for uncertainties are what we first see when we look into a region hitherto unknown, unexplored, unannexed.

At this day... the earth sustains on her bosom many monster minds, minds which are not afraid to employ the read more

At this day... the earth sustains on her bosom many monster minds, minds which are not afraid to employ the seed of Deity deposited in human nature as a means of suppressing the name of God. Can anything be more detestable than this madness in man, who, finding God a hundred times both in his body and his soul, makes his excellence in this respect a pretext for denying that there is a God? He will not say that chance has made him different from the brutes; ... but, substituting Nature as the architect of the universe, he suppresses the name of God.

Maundy Thursday There is joy and strength, of course, in this holy food and drink, but it is also read more

Maundy Thursday There is joy and strength, of course, in this holy food and drink, but it is also an inevitable joining forces with the vast Scheme of reconciliation and redemption. Now there is something in our natural selves that may well make us wary of such a contact. The man who in his heart intends to go on being selfish or proud, or who has already decided how far his Christian convictions should carry him, is probably obeying a sound instinct when he keeps away from this glorious but perilous Sacrament. For, if the truth be told, men are often willing to put their trust in a god who in the end must be triumphant, simply because they want to be on the winning side; but they are not nearly so ready to bear any part of the cost of that winning. Yet the fellowship of the broken bread and the poured-out wine can mean no less than that.