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St Thomas

Holy, Holy, Holy! Lord God Almighty!

By Rector's Corner

Holy, Holy, Holy! Lord God Almighty! Early in the morning my song shall rise to thee: Holy, holy, holy! Merciful and mighty, God in three Persons, blessed Trinity. – Reginald Heber (1783 – 1826) Folks all over Christendom may cringe as I reveal a fundamental truth about myself: “Holy, Holy, Holy” IS my go-to hymn when I need to quickly find and express my relationship to God my Creator, God my Sustainer, and God my Life-giver. I can play it convincingly on the organ; I know the words by memory. The cadence of the tune rises in such a way that it lifts my heart, my mind and my spirit upward to God when I am in some pretty deep pits. It always has, it always will. So, if it doesn’t make your “favorites” list, I apologize now, but we’re singing it Sunday, because in addition to being the first…

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June 4, 2020

Recombobulating in Place

By Christian Formation

Have you ever visited General Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee, Wisconsin? It’s my hometown airport and so I pass through it often (although not lately, of course). If you visited our airport, you have likely had the opportunity to experience one of its kind “Recombobulation Area” The pride of having this unique place for people to gather themselves and their belongings after they pass through airport security is so famous that you can even buy a “Recombobulation T-Shirt,” at the airport gift shop. The photo at the top of the column is a close-up photo of one of those T-Shirts. I have thought about the airport sign several times this week-not because I have returned to a busy travel schedule (I am still fully sheltered in place and working from home). I thought about it because, in several conversations I’ve been a part of over the past few days, the…

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May 31, 2020

Sermon for Day of Pentecost

By Rector's Corner, Sermons

Christopher Thomas Sermon for Day of Pentecost, Year A – 5/31/20 Acts 2:1-21 Psalm 104:25-35, 37 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13 John 20:19-23 Breathe on me, Breath of God, fill me with life anew, that I may love as you have loved, and do as you would do. – Edwin Hatch (1835-1889) Spiration. Breathe in, breathe out. The root of life. The source of life. The wind-swept wave from above that shattered the dark, formless void in the moments even before light. Breathe in, breathe out. “…next the Creator formed humanity from the dirt and dust of the ground, and then spirated the breath of life.” Chronos, human time, is bounded, then, now, and always, by spiration. Breathe in, breathe out. Spirations, therefore, must be holy moments, right? Transitions in, and transitions out. From that very first spiration, when a babe is “inspired” to life with a slap on the rear, to…

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May 31, 2020

Doubters’ Happy Hour – June 2

By Upcoming Events

Please join the Doubter community for our next Happy Hour, June 2 at 6 pm, for an evening with performing and recording artist Marvin Matthews! Marvin has a storied career as an internationally distinguished Christian Gospel singer who has performed on concert stages, theaters, and recording studios around the world. Marvin has worked with many popular artists from Little Richard, Debby Boone, and Deniece Williams, to CeCe Winans. Marvin toured Romania at 18, was soloist with the world-famous Spurrlows, and has been a featured performer at four Summer Olympics. He has toured Asia, Africa, and every state in the US. In addition, Marvin has 12 recorded projects and two video presentations to his credit. Marvin was honored at The White House, sung at Lincoln Center, Kennedy Center, various nationwide network television shows, and at numerous houses of worship around the world. In the midst of all that, Marvin has a…

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May 29, 2020

A people of Pentecost

By Rector's Corner

Come, thou Holy Spirit bright; come with thy celestial light; pour on us thy love divine. Come, protector of the poor; come, thou source of blessings sure; come within our hearts to shine. – Latin, 12th cent. We are a people of Pentecost. There’s a secret fire that burns inside each and every Episcopalian that just longs for this day, the day we wear our red to Church, the day we process around and about, proclaiming, “Hail thee, festival day!”, the day we once again acknowledge the ever-abiding presence of our advocate and guide, God’s at-times blustering, and yet ever-blissful Holy Spirit! Why wouldn’t we long for that? After all, I never met an Episcopalian who didn’t relish a good procession! But there is something about that burning bright spirit, that celestial light, meeting us where we are, particularly where we are now, this year, in our places of isolation…

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May 29, 2020

Sermon for Seventh Sunday of Easter

By Rector's Corner, Sermons

Christopher Thomas Sermon for Seventh Sunday of Easter, Year A – 5/24/20 Acts 1:6-14 Psalm 68:1-10, 33-36 1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11 John 17:1-11 For anyone who knows me well, I’m just not a person who is big on “PDA’s,” Public Displays of Affection. You know what I’m talking about. Intimacy of any sort played out in a public setting. Now, who knows why that is. We could analyze my upbringing, maybe I didn’t see or experience many examples of PDA’s growing up, or maybe it’s all my time being inculcated to be a “Proper Southern Gentleman” who keeps his feelings and emotions private, to himself. Who knows? I’m sure I can and probably will spend lots of money trying to figure this out! And I didn’t grow up as a big “hugger” either. If you ever saw the movie “Dirty Dancing,” I’m sure you remember that iconic scene where Patrick…

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May 24, 2020

Being Quiet

By Christian Formation

“We need quiet time to examine our lives openly and honestly — spending quiet time alone gives your mind an opportunity to renew itself and create order.” Susan Taylor My soul was renewed this past week by the gift of spending time with our two grandsons. They are ages six and four, and the wonder and curiosity they express about virtually everything around them are infectious. I recently made up something I named the “quiet game” that we play together, one that builds on their innate sense of delight and curiosity. In this game, I set a timer for anywhere from thirty seconds to a minute, and the rules are that we all have to be completely quiet, listening to all the sounds that we hear in the silence. When the timer goes off, everyone takes turns naming the sounds they heard. The beauty of this game is that we…

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May 23, 2020

Unbelievers: An Emotional History of Doubt

By Christian Formation

Books of Note for St. Thomas the Apostle’s Readers and Their Friends. This month’s feature book is Unbelievers: An Emotional History of Doubt, by Alec Ryrie | Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2019 ISBN-13: 978-0-674-24182-4 Particularly pertinent for the Doubters of St. Thomas Church, Unbelievers is a refreshing, provocative take on the origins of unbelief. Ryrie, of Church of England extraction, is Professor of the History of Christianity at Durham University in the UK. Instead of falling into the old grooves of argument, Ryrie rejects the general opinion that atheism and unbelief arose in response to the 18th Century Enlightenment in Europe. Modern unbelief instead, he contends, is not so much a response to ideas big or small, but is instead emotional. Two main emotions, anger and anxiety, are at the roots of modern secular unbelief. These two strains of emotion spring up vividly much earlier than the Enlightenment,…

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May 21, 2020

Doubters’ Happy Hour – May 26

By Upcoming Events

Please join the Doubter community for our next Happy Hour, May 26 at 6 pm, as we welcome Dr. Joretta Marshall discussing Caring for God’s People in the Age of Corona. In the age of Corona, it is becoming evident that we must rethink the ways that we take care of each other and ourselves. Unprecedented times call for reimagined ways of actively managing our own mental, physical, and spiritual health and how we engage each other and the world around us. Social-distancing, isolation, and lack of shared space are all so antithetical to the message of Jesus Christ. Who better to help us think this through than Dr. Marshall! Joretta is Professor of Pastoral Theology and Care at Brite Divinity School, where she also served as Academic Dean. Additionally, she has served on faculty at Vanderbilt University Divinity School, Iliff School of Theology, and Eden Seminary. Joretta has served…

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May 21, 2020

Happy Feast of the Ascension!

By Rector's Corner

This is the day that Jesus Christ returns to heaven, 40 days after his miraculous resurrection on Easter, marking the end of his earthly journey through humanity and the beginning of his role as our chief Advocate and intercessor. Ascension neatly bookends God’s great incarnational act, God’s dwelling among us, Emmanuel, from birth, death, resurrection, and return to the Father. It really is the circle of life that we experience in so many, varied, mysterious and wonderful ways. Christ’s return to God hastens images of this great vacuum in time between his leaving and what will come. My New Testament professor, Dr. Warren Carter describes this time as “the time between the now and the not yet.” Jesus has left, with promises of return in power and great glory; but when? He neglects to say when. A seemingly critical detail! And that “time between the now and the not yet”…

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May 21, 2020