Daily Prayer on One’s Daily Road
Daily Office Online:
I am going to downtown LA four days a week this year because of my new project with the City and I am having to adjust to a long commute after decades of living near my job. I am also old enough to know I have to work on reducing the stress in my life and finding a daily pattern that keeps the demands of an impossible job from displacing the other important parts of life.
The pattern I have created is a commute on the Gold Line and the use of www.dailyoffice.org to keep prayer in my life. I walk to and from the train and get the exercise I need. During the half hour train ride in the morning, I read the Morning Prayer office on dailyoffice.org. As a lifelong Episcopalian, the prayers of Morning and Evening Prayer are pretty deeply wired in my psyche, so it is a ritual that can help me enter prayer more easily. With all the pieces in one place (each day they post the complete office with readings, psalms, and prayers), I can do this as I sit on the train with my smart phone. No way I could carry a prayer book and bible with me, but even the distraction of moving between websites to get the readings has been enough to get me to continue with other sites. I usually have viola da gamba music on headphones which helps cut out the distractions of the train.
I find this an incredible stabilizing way to start the day. It reminds me before I face the meetings of the day that I am in City Hall to make people safer and do my corner of God's work. That is remarkably helpful for maintaining perspective in such a political environment. But perhaps even more helpful is the perspective that all of life's work is a way of responding to God's call to love Him and what matters in the end is the love.
Music with the Angels
Sunday May 18: 4:00 p.m. Red Car Trolley
This vocal quartet performs an eclectic blend of music ranging from sacred to secular, classical to contemporary, and featuring original compositions by Southern Californian composers (including Church of the Angels' Music Director, Jim Stanley).
Hands of the Angels May 24,
The Hands of the Angels Knitting group meets on the 2nd and 4th Saturdays 10:00 a.m. in the Parish Hall Living Room. Everyone is welcome to join and if you’d like, learn how to knit. The next meeting will be Saturday May 24, 10:00 a.m. Parish Hall Living Room
Emmaus Road
Emmaus Road has begun a new book, Jesus, by Fr. James Martin SJ. We’ve read two other books by Fr. Martin, The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything, and My Life with the Saints. Fr. Martin is an engaging writer and we look forward to a good time with his book. Here’s a brief description. James Martin, SJ, gifted storyteller, editor at large of America magazine, popular media commentator, and New York Times bestselling author of The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything, brings the Gospels to life in Jesus: A Pilgrimage, and invites believers and seekers alike to experience Jesus through Scripture, prayer and travel.
Emmaus Road will read Chapters 6 & 7 for Monday, May 19.
Coffee Hour Sign Up: May and June
We need people to volunteer for Coffee Hour for both services on Sundays in May and June. See the calendar for dates. You are welcome to email your sign up to the office or sign up after Church.
Catechesis of the Good Shepherd
May 18, 2014
CGS Level I
The Gesture of Epiclesis
Sources: 1 Corinthians 11:23-6; Matt 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-3; Luke 22:14-20
Today, we look at the gesture of the Epiclesis. The Epiclesis is the initiation of the new covenant by God, through his Son, Jesus who desires to fulfill his Father’s will and share his life with the sheep of his flock. Jesus initiates this giving of this gift in the established Jewish memorial of the Passover meal, a liturgical celebration of remembering. Jesus tells his disciples to, “Do this to remember me.” At mass, God sends the power of the Holy Spirit down to upon the gifts to change them into the Body and Blood of Jesus which we take and eat, remembering Jesus’ words, benefiting from the life of the Good Shepherd given for all humankind of all ages.
We review the words and gestures (visual prayer) of the Epiclesis to make the connection with Jesus’ desire to give himself fully to all of his sheep for all times which he institutionalized during the Last Supper celebration. This aids in the development of the child’s prayer life, helps the child enter more fully into the celebration of the liturgy, to recognize the gesture of the Epiclesis in other sacraments, and broadens the child’s understanding of the Trinity.
The presentation begins with the explanation that a gesture is a visual language or prayer that uses movement to convey a message. We ask, “Where does it begin? (Heaven) and where does it end? (Earth, over the bread and wine)” “What is happening in this gesture?” God is giving us a gift in the bread and the wine. They are changed by the power of the Holy Spirit. They are gifts for us. They become the Body and Blood of Jesus.
Meditation questions we ask:
I invite you to wonder with your child what the gesture looks like and think about
What does this tell us of the Good Shepherd’s love for us?
Music with the Angels
Thursday and Friday May 22 & 23, 7:00 p.m. Salastina Music Society: Mozart Masterpieces
In a rare presentation, Salastina Music Society performs the complete cycle of the 6 string quintets composed by W.A. Mozart, which are generally considered to be some of his most beautiful works. The six masterpieces will be performed over two consecutive evenings. KUSC's Brian Lauritzen will host, providing illuminating details about each of the works to establish historical and artistic context. Tickets available at the Salastina Society website: $40/both nights or $28/one concert when purchased online; $35/concert at the door; $10/students and church members.
Saturday, May 31: 3:00 p.m. Wessex Consort:
Alta Cappella Music from Germany and the Low Countries
The Wessex Consort presents a program of Renaissance wind-band music from Germany and les Pays-Bas. Featuring works by Franco-Flemish masters, quirky character pieces and even a few tenorlieden, the Alta Cappella (rauschpfeife, shawm, dulcian, and sackbut) will be complemented by recorder quartet (featuring an astonishing consort built by Charles Collier), broken consorts with crumhorns and bagpipes, and voice. Freewill offering. More info at www.wessexconsort.com
Further Out
Barbecue for Parents and Children: Sunday June 8, 4:00 p.m.
Fr. Bob and Tracy will host their “beginning of summer barbecue” for parents and children. This is a chance for parents and children to have fun fellowship with one another or one of life’s most amazing journeys. There are not only the school aged children that we see coming into Church at the Offertory, but now a large number of new parents with new young children. We hope that all of you can attend.
125th Anniversary Activity: Renewal of Wedding Vows
On June 21 we will be celebrating one hundred and twenty five years of marriages at Church of the Angels by renewing the vows of every couple in attendance who was married here. The ceremony will begin at 2:00, reception to follow. If you know someone who was married here and we might not have their contact information please send their home or email address tochurchoftheangels125th@gmail.com. Questions may be sent there as well or you may send them to Rebecca Woods atcoaweddings@gmail.com. Wedding dresses and pictures welcome."