Indeed. The worship service was originally in Greek. In the Latin mass, the Kyrie (Lord have mercy, etc.) is actually Greek, a remnant from that time. And singing the Psalms goes back to Old Testament times and continues to the present.
Do you have a favorite prayer/liturgy/musical setting?
I enjoyed the Anglican prayers for the sick, but honestly the Book of Common Prayer as a whole is helpful for meditating. I need to dig out my copy again
"<moral therapeutic deists"
Michael Horton addresses this topic best in his book entitled: âChristless Christianityâ
"Is it possible that we have left Christ out of Christianity? Is the faith and practice of American Christians today more American than Christian? These are the provocative questions Michael Horton addresses in this thoughtful, insightful book. He argues that while we invoke the name of Christ, too often Christ and the Christ-centered gospel are pushed aside. The result is a message and a faith that are, in Hortonâs words, âtrivial, sentimental, affirming, and irrelevant.â This alternative âgospelâ is a message of moralism, personal comfort, self-help, self-improvement, and individualistic religion. It trivializes God, making him a means to our selfish ends. Horton skillfully diagnoses the problem and points to the solution: a return to the unadulterated gospel of salvation.: MH
We usually use the 1928 bcp. One time we had a class on the Tudor prayer books.
Indeed!
While invoking the name of Christ, pushing aside the gospel of grace taught by Jesus and Paul, we see a theological concoction for entitlement. It trivializes God, making Him nothing but a tool of rhetoric for power, politics, intolerance, and pushing a myopic delusion in place of reality. It seems to have reversed the coming of Jesus to recreate the religion of the Pharisees, worshiping a self absorbed, power obsessed, soul killing monster that is far more like the god of this world than Jesus
â<political entitlement Pharisees>â
I frankly havenât noticed any Christianity like what Horton is claiming and wonder if it is a fabrication to hide this other gospel which I see dominating so much of American Christianity.
Amen. May more American Christians speak up just as forcibly every time some manipulative soul looks to steal your brand and use it for evil.
I think there is just such a noticeable phenomenon - though what Iâm thinking of might be more a kind of âcivil religionâ; the kind designed not to offend anyone. Such cultural trappings are probably useful and good ⌠they just shouldnât be confused with Christianity. Such civil religion has a habit of absorbing whatever contemporary cultural flavors it happens to be steeped in - and if one of the dominant influences was Christianity, then some Christian language will have seeped into that civil religion making it easier to confuse it with some claimed form of Christianity. And indeed - why shouldnât it be? Mainly just people concerned with policing âthe tentâ and banishing anybody they deem to be an imposter would pre-occupy themselves with this. Because as far as âChristlessâ Christianity goes ⌠a good number of âdoctrinally-soundâ Christians may be guilty of the same as far as defacto practice / living goes. They (probably all of us on too many days) might be referred to as ânominal Christiansâ or such; but knowing how Jesus thinks about such people-sorting practices, it seems better to spend more time toward self-examination as opposed to other-evaluation. Iâm certainly not gathering any stones for casting.
Lost in the pigsty of Christianity is the Pearl of great Wisdom
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