Saturday, November 29, 2014

The Book of Common Prayer

I recently posted the following video on my Facebook profile page.  It comes from St. Peter's Anglican Church in Evans, Georgia.  Their descriptor reads, "The Anglican Book of Common Prayer that guides our worship and forms our belief."

This, too, is our heritage as Wesleyan Christians.  We are reminded that John Wesley gave to us a conservative version of the Book of Common Prayer to guide our worship and form our beliefs, as well.  He called it "The Sunday Service of the Methodists in North America." 

For those Wesleyan/Methodist Christians who are unfamiliar with our Prayer Book heritage, I comment "The Sunday Service" to you.  -  May God truly shape our faith and life.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The only problem I have with the BCP is that it took out the baptismal exorcisms. It essentially undermined the act of God in the baptism by doing this. I was baptized in the Anglican Church in America but I would have preferred an exorcism to go along with that. Eastern Christians (Catholics and Orthodox) still are quite heavy with the baptismal exorcisms--I've even witnessed one.

Todd A. Stepp said...

Thank you for your comment.

Could you explain how not including the exorcisms undermines the act of God in baptism? God is the One who is at work in the actual baptism giving new life. - I understand that you like the exorcisms, but I cannot see how not having those pre-baptismal acts has undermined the act of God in baptism. Are you trying to indicate that God is not acting IN BAPTISM, but only in the exorcisms?

Anonymous said...

The exorcisms seem to me be God's way of enabling (at least the adult convert) to make the decision he needs to convert to Christ.