Notes in the margins of the prayer book.
Intent
This is technically a blog, but it’s really more of a notebook that I left sitting out in public. There’s no comments section (this is a static web site, the only good kind of web site.). Nothing personal, but I don’t think I world is particularly lacking places to anonymously fire off an ill-considered comment at someone you’ve never met.
I’ve been praying the liturgy of the hours (commonly called the Daily Office among Anglicans) with varying degrees of consistency and completeness for around 25 years now. It’s been central to my life as a Christian. But this site is not primarily intended to commend this practice or instruct others in it (although there will be a bit of that from time to time, I suppose). It’s just…marginal notes, snippets from the readings and prayers, the stuff I think about when my mind wanders while I pray. I mostly pray the Daily Office of the Episcopal Church’s 1979 Book of Common Prayer, and frequently dip into the Catholic Church’s Liturgy of the Hours (mostly the version authorized for the US and published in 1975), especially the Office of Readings.
I am not a priest, or a monk, or even an especially ‘spiritual’ man. I am a layman in the Episcopal Church. To borrow a phrase, by grace I have been saved through faith, and this was not my own doing. It was the gift of God, who has refused to let me alone ever since, Deo gracias. As a congenitally obstinate spiritual simpleton, I have been well-served by the Daily Office as a set of guard-rails, habitual practices, and words to pray when my heart feels mute.
And now I find myself in an unexpected season of my life: feeling called into deeper discipleship and a much more active involvement in (and service to) the church. All this against a backdrop of less certainty and stability than has existed in the US at any point in my lifetime – in politics, culture, the church, the economy, the natural world, on and on and on. World without end? I guess we’ll see. The news is pretty much all bad, but I’m still praying.
If you really need to talk to me, you can come find me on BlueSky.