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J.R.R. Tolkien offers an interesting thought on how the Church is to function.

The 'protestant' search backwards for 'simplicity' and directness - which, of course, though it contains some good or at least intelligible motives, is mistaken and indeed vain. Because 'primitive Christianity' is now and in spite of all 'research' will ever remain largely unknown; because 'primitiveness' is no guarantee of value, and is, and was in great a reflection of ignorance. Grave abuses were as much an element in Christian liturgical behaviour from the beginning as now. (St Paul's strictures on Eucharistic behaviour are sufficient to show this!) Still more because 'my church' was not intended by Our Lord to be static or remain in perpetual childhood; but to be a living organism (likened to a plant), which develops and changes in externals by the interaction of its bequeathed divine life and history - the particular circumstances of the world into which it is set. There is no resemblance between the 'mustard-seed' and the full-grown tree. ... more

The PC(USA) provides a weekly podcast of the lectionary readings read aloud in their Devotions & Readings area.

Subscribe with iTunes here, and with a any other device/tool here.

Each podcast includes four lectionary readings for one of the Sundays or festivals of the church year:  an Old Testament reading, a Psalm, an Epistle and a Gospel reading. Following each set of readings is a prayer for the day from the Book of Common Worship. May these scriptures be a source of challenge and hope as you prepare your heart and mind for Sunday worship, and may the Word of God guide and nourish you in the service of daily living.  (From the PC(USA) website) ... more

Sorry for the late post yesterday.  It gets worse.  The ICEL, the group that is in charge of English translations of the Latin Mass, thought that MusicaSacra put up the sheet music and translation too early.  It's not ready yet.  So all the links are down.  I'll keep you posted. ... more

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The New Liturgical Movement features some material on the new English translations of different parts of the Roman Catholic mass.  They include printable sheet music and audio of the new compositions.

Find them here: Mass Ordinary with New Text.  There are several versions of the Kyrie Simplex and the Agnus Dei Simplex, which I am sure Third Day fans will enjoy. ... more

On the EmergingUMC blog, which chronicles the intersection of Methodism and the emergent/missional church, there is a lengthy and intricate post discussing open source liturgy.

The premise is to model liturgical development after the LINUX model of Open Source.  LINUX uses a number of developers who work together to achieve goals and a level of quality that is much higher and more user friendly than companies like Microsoft, for instance.  This produces a product that "manages to be good as a desktop and nearly unparalleled as a server," as our webmaster Joshua Benner says.

Taking from a model that has produced the software that runs over 25% of new servers sold this year is a good idea.  ... more

"While English is Jamaica's official language, most Jamaicans speak patois. But it does not yet have a standard writing system. Those opposed to the translation project have argued in the country's newspapers and other media outlets that formalizing a written standard for patois would undercut efforts to promote Standard English." --"Translation Tiff," Christianity Today (Jocelyn Green).

This weekend while out shopping I stumbled upon some journals.  I needed some new journals to get the creative juices flowing again.  After my third semester of graduate school, when I had a class in the summer that took up a lot of time, my journal writing and creativity went into a downward spiral and I have been able to coax it out of hibernation for brief stints, but for the most part the grind of academic work and writing dwindled down an every day occurrence into a monthly occurrence.

When establishing a new church in an established space a group must re-create the architecture from the inside out.  The building looks same on the outside, but on the inside the room must take on the shape and purpose of the community inhabiting it, even if it is only for a few hours a day.

Architecture has been well explored as a function of liturgy and worship, even in evangelical churches, where the focus of most new buildings is to place every seat so it has an uninhibited view of the podium and the projector screen.  

Interior design has little significance for established churches, who have chosen a particular design, contemporary in its day, that is kept for the life of the church.  This stability is a good thing.  You can tell how old a church is by looking on the inside and seeing the design.  A church with orange carpet was made during the 1970s...that's a give in.

Art is needed weekly when setting up and taking down a church on a weekly basis.  Most church interiors are like one great painting: they are designed with great care and then preserved as best they can.  In the rental space my church plant uses, we have to recreate our group's space each week, and as we grow move things around and re-organize our space.  Our church is maleable, a new piece of clay that can be molded weekly. ... more

O God,
We open our eyes and we see Jesus,
the months of ministry transfigured to a beam of light,
the light of the world,
your light.
May your light shine upon us.

We open our eyes and we see Moses and Elijah,
your word restoring us, showing us the way,
telling a story,
your story, his story, our story.
May your word speak to us. ... more

Karl Giberson, a scientist at Eastern Nazerene College and director of the Forum on Faith and Science, wrote in his recent Salon article "What's wrong with science as religion" about the necessity (whether biological or not) of constructing narrative, consequently pulling the new athiests cat out of the bag: