Always Reforming

Don't worry, guys.  I'm not becoming Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox. But, I do think we have much to learn from our more traditional, liturgical brethren.   The topic of worship, and how it relates to the Scriptures, has been swimming around my mind lately, so you should take this post as exploratory and not dogmatic.  At risk of sounding like a YRR  (which I am not), rethinking everything after reading a few of the Fathers, I am beginning to believe that worship as it is found in the average American Evangelical church has little to do with the historical practices of the Early Church, or really the Church at any point in Christian history before, let's say, the 19th Century.  Now, that doesn't necessarily invalidate modern worship a priori , but I think it is noteworthy and concerning. Let's talk about the Regulative Principle of Worship for a moment.  I was raised in a church that held strictly to this principle, which, to summarize it crudely,...

Originally written September 12th, 2016. In case you were wondering, This is what it looks like when you cross A paranoid mother and A zealous father. Here I am, The third son, The seventh child, Something between A gasp for air and A sigh of relief, The baby of the family Who never really had a childhood, Trapped in this middle ground between Who I thought I'd be and What was expected of me. I learned the hard way the danger Of underestimating the effects that Loss can have on a teenager, Plagued by a strange blend  Of fear and apathy, I failed at everything I never tried. I found my way, I guess, I hope, I found something resembling A trajectory, But for all my victories, I can't help but to wonder, Who I would have been, What I would have done, What lost opportunities I will Never know I missed. So here I am, Documenting my life the only way I know how, In case you were wondering.

I am currently plodding through  The Shape of the Liturgy by Dom Gregory Dix.  Having consumed about 100 pages, my initial reaction is that our modern conception (by which I mean that of American Evangelical Protestants) of the worship of the Early Church is highly skewed.  The study I have done over the past few years has convinced me that any attempt to become more Biblical or to imitate the Early Church requires one to become more, not less, liturgical.  American Protestants are often mystified and/or horrified by the smells and bells of the liturgical traditions (Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Lutheranism, Anglicanism, etc.), but the harsh truth is that those traditions are far closer to the worship of the Primitive Church than the concerts put on each Sunday at your local mega-church. But I digress... What I would like to do today is highlight one of Dix's emphases, which he in turn draws from the writings of the Pre-Nicene Fathers.  This emphasis ...

Somehow, no doubt thanks to generations of  American children being subjected to the propaganda of the government education system, a nation of former rebels has become wary of dissenters.  Anyone who dares to think independently (or, one might say, to think at all) is viewed with suspicion and is publicly ridiculed and ostracized. I've read the history books, and this doesn't end well. In the event that one chooses not to get the jab , he is generally labeled a conspiracy theorist, a nut, and a science denier.  I would know, because I am he , and while I don't expect people to agree with me, I will admit that it is frustrating to be misunderstood or misrepresented.  So my goal here today is not to convince anyone of anything, an aim I fully recognize as futile, but to provide something of a reasonable defense of my personal decision not to get vaccinated for COVID.  My goal is that people, namely, my disparate group of Facebook friends, might understand the tho...