Commemoration of Wilson Carlile, Priest, Founder of the Church Army, 1942 There is [in these Wesleyan hymns] read more

Commemoration of Wilson Carlile, Priest, Founder of the Church Army, 1942 There is [in these Wesleyan hymns] the solid structure of historic dogma; there is the passionate thrill of present experience; but there is, too, the glory of a mystic sunlight coming directly from another world. This transfigures history and experience. This puts past and present into the timeless, eternal now. This brings together God and man until Wesley talks with God as a man talks with his friend. This gives to the hymnbook its divine audacity, those passages only to be understood by such as have sat in heavenly places in Christ Jesus and, being caught up into paradise, have heard unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to utter.

Commemoration of Allen Gardiner, founder of the South American Missionary Society, 1851 Commemoration of Albert Schweitzer, Teacher, Physician, Missionary, 1965 read more

Commemoration of Allen Gardiner, founder of the South American Missionary Society, 1851 Commemoration of Albert Schweitzer, Teacher, Physician, Missionary, 1965 As we look out upon history and the world, it is with the same vision of all things in Christ which dominates the perceptions of all believers, without distinction of age, or race, or Church. Not a saint, a thinker, a hero, or a martyr of the Church, but we claim a share in his character, influence and achievements, by confessing the debt we owe to the great tradition which he has enriched by saintly consecration, true thought, or noble conduct.

The smallest things become great when God requires them of us; they are small only in themselves; they are always read more

The smallest things become great when God requires them of us; they are small only in themselves; they are always great when they are done for God, and when they serve to unite us with Him eternally.

Commemoration of Peter Chanel, Religious, Missionary in the South Pacific, Martyr, 1841 The Gospel used to be presented as read more

Commemoration of Peter Chanel, Religious, Missionary in the South Pacific, Martyr, 1841 The Gospel used to be presented as an appeal to believe in the Saviour who "did it all for me long ago", and then retired to a remote heaven where He receives the homage of believers till He comes again to inaugurate the Millennium. The mind of our generation, having little comprehension or taste for such a message, is usually content to try to discover "the Jesus of history", conceived as a human example and teacher of a distant past. Meanwhile, there exists always alongside all forms of religious belief the great tradition of mystical experience. The mystic knows that, whatever be the truth about an historic act or person, there is a Spirit dwelling in man. In our time, even natural science abates its arrogant denials and admits the possibility of such immanence... The weak point of mysticism, as seen at least by a matter-of-fact person, is that it is apt to be so nebulous ethically. What the Immanent is, those who claim most traffic with It can often least tell us. Is It a power making for righteousness, or is It a higher synthesis of good and evil? Or is It not a moral -- that is to say, not a personal Being at all?... The raising of these questions is not intended to throw any doubt upon the validity of mystical experience as such; but we have a right to ask what content is given in the experience. Paul was a mystic, but all his mystical experience had a personal object. It was Jesus Christ, a real, living person --historic, yet not of the past alone; divine, yet not alien from humanity.

Here in His holy House of Prayer we may come on our day of rest, and be safe, if we read more

Here in His holy House of Prayer we may come on our day of rest, and be safe, if we will, from any thoughts but those of the world to come. Here we gather together for no earthly business, but for a purpose of one sort only; and that purpose is the same for which saints and angels are met together in that innumerable company before the throne of God. If there is a place on earth which, however faintly and dimly, shadows out the courts of God on high, surely it is where His people are met together, in all their weakness and ignorance and sin, in their poor and low estate, yet with humble and faithful hearts, in His House of Prayer.

Feast of John Keble, Priest, Poet, Tractarian, 1866 God gave the prophecies, not to gratify men's curiosity by enabling read more

Feast of John Keble, Priest, Poet, Tractarian, 1866 God gave the prophecies, not to gratify men's curiosity by enabling them to foreknow things, but that after they were fulfilled they might be interpreted by the event, and His own providence, not the interpreter's, be thereby manifested to the world.

Let no man think to kill sin with few, easy, or gentle strokes. He who hath once smitten a serpent, read more

Let no man think to kill sin with few, easy, or gentle strokes. He who hath once smitten a serpent, if he follow not on his blow until he be slain, may repent that ever he began the quarrel. And so will he who undertakes to deal with sin, and pursues it not constantly to the death.

The world will not be saved merely because people go to church, ours or any other's. If we seem to read more

The world will not be saved merely because people go to church, ours or any other's. If we seem to say [that the world will be so saved] to the tormented nations, this is only a measure of our failure to see that the Anglican Communion is not an end in itself. And what an impertinence it is when we fail to see that -- when we seem to say to the world that their only hope is in the tepid conventions of our club.

Going to church doesn't make you a Christian, any more than going to a garage makes you an automobile.

Going to church doesn't make you a Christian, any more than going to a garage makes you an automobile.