Thursday (St Thomas Becket)

  • Customary Thursday weights and treadmill workout.
  • Morning Prayer (memorized short form) in the car en route to the office. Devotions and intercessions in the cathedral.
  • Brief email volley with the Dean, working out the weekday Mass rota for the first quarter of 2017. Normally I cover Wednesdays, except when I'm traveling. Hit the mother lode this time, with lots of my favorite saints days falling on Wednesday. Entered these occasions into my task planning application.
  • Spoke by phone at some length with Fr Mark Evans about the (fairly brief) trip to Peru it now looks like we are both making in early February to check in with out companion diocese there, which is very much in flux.
  • Spent some mental energy and time building out the nugget of my homily for this Sunday (Feast of the Holy Name, at St Barnabas', Havana). This time I won't be showing my work, as it will be delivered extemporaneously.
  • Many times I have arrived at the office only to discover that I've left my key at home. (This is a function of driving a car that does not have an actual key that lives on a ring with others.) So I stopped by Ace Hardware on Wabash and had a couple of copies cut, which are now strategically hidden in undisclosed locations. You'll have to waterboard me. And then try to get past the alarm system still.
  • Lunch from Popeye's, eaten at home, and then extended  a good while helping Brenda run a medical errand.
  • The new canons require Eucharistic Communities to submit a Mission Strategy Report to the Mission Department annually. But we don't yet have a format or process in place for that. So I did some really careful thinking and made several broad stroke notes toward that end, which, in due course, I will share with the Mission Department for further development.
  • Evening Prayer in the cathedral, just slightly on the early side.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Spring 2018 House of Bishops, Day 3

Image
We have new stricter social media rules now in the HOB--no photos taken during a session without the permission of those in it. So ... I'm having to be more creative about finding pics for the blog, because I'm not going to take a panoramic group shot and then contact everyone whose balding head shows in the photo! Once again, the day began with Eucharist. This time, though, I took a pass, and opted for a vigorous walk on a brisk morning. Having looked at the liturgy sheet in advance, there were enough triggers that I knew the net spiritual effect for me would be negative. #selfcare  I will say, however, that HOB worship has gotten incrementally less problematic during the tenure of the current Presiding Bishop, and I give props for that. When we convened at 10:15, there were the usual announcements, then a whirlwind set of summary reports from bishop members of the Standing Committee on Liturgy and Music (SCLM) and the Task Force on the Study of Marriage. The full report
Read more

The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany

Image
Ten years ago, minus about six weeks, I served as the supply priest for Trinity, Lincoln six days before my consecration as Bishop of Springfield. Today I was there for the final regular scheduled canonical parish visitation of my episcopate. (I have a few more gigs on my calendar: March 7 in Mattoon, the Chrism Mass, the Triduum at the cathedral, May 30 in Cairo, and June 27 back at the cathedral--May 2 is available and not yet spoken for--but the every Sunday routine of my life for the past decade (in a larger sense, for the last 32 years) is at a major flex point.) As much as it could have been in the midst of a pandemic, this morning at Trinity was luminous. We confirmed eight adults, six of them qualifying as "young." My homily had to compete with the sounds of active young children. (I would much rather do that than have no kids in church.) Trinity is one of the exciting points of light in my ministry in the diocese. I took my time getting out of Lincoln because I wante
Read more

Saturday (St Charles, King & Martyr)

Substantive phone conversations with the rector of Lincoln, the President of the Standing Committee, and the Canon-to-the-Ordinary. Attended the live-streamed memorial service for a former clergy colleague, and continuing friend, with whom I was in serious conversation about coming to the diocese less than a year ago, who died quickly of COVID at age 66. Then, earlier than I actually needed to, but wanting to get out of town ahead of the snowstorm, I packed up and headed south to Lincoln, where I had time to do some significant reading before hitting the sack.
Read more