Prayer is an essential part of our life together. It is not only gathering together for worship, and reciting formal prayers; it is also working for the spread of the Gospel, leading a life which is an example to others, being charitable, remembering Christ’s commandment to love one another, and simply taking time to remember and be with God.
As a Christian community, we at the Cathedral live to support and encourage one another in all kinds of prayer. We pray for one another in our daily life and work, we pray for those who are suffering and in any trouble, and we give thanks for the good things in one another’s lives. Prayer not only binds us together as a community, but it binds us together with the whole body of Christ’s Church throughout the world, and throughout history. Prayer enriches our lives also be offering us peace of mind, body, and spirit, grace, and the unfathomable riches of God’s presence among us.
We meet together for prayer every weekday at 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. People who cannot come to the Church to meet for prayer can participate by praying at home or at work. Forms for daily prayer are found in the Book of Common Prayer, and links are available from this page. People who participate in this prayer find it valuable because it offers some regular time of peace and quietness, an opportunity to connect with God, and an ‘antidote’ to the noise, cares, and concerns of daily life.
We invite people everywhere to join us in prayer and thanksgiving for members of our community, and for people everywhere, according to their need.
Our worship and our prayer lead us into a process of formation: of allowing ourselves to be re-created and renewed by our loving God. We engage with this process by deliberately studying all aspects of our faith, and of the world we live in. We engage with one another and with the community around us to deepen our call to seek and serve Christ in all persons. We challenge one another with our viewpoints and spur one another to greater charity and devotion. This is not a congregation where you are expected to ‘check your brain at the door’ but one where you will be given the chance to grow through this process of formation and enliven our conversations with your distinctive views and beliefs.
December 21, 2013 • The Feast of St. Thomas Here we are, on the shortest day of the year, in the darkness of night, on the feast of Thomas the Apostle, who doubted until he could see the Risen Lord for himself; and we are here to witness another turning point, another raising up, another…
December 15, 2012 • St. John of the Cross Today—well, yesterday, actually—the Church celebrates the memory of the sixteenth century Spanish saint, John of the Cross, Juan de Yepes – probably the greatest Christian mystical writer of the last thousand years, and one of the greatest poets in the Spanish language. He was a man…
January 6, 2012 • The Epiphany A few of us talked back and forth about having a Christmas Pageant tonight. And while I find them to be wonderful ways to get kids involved and to learn the fundamentals of the Christmas story, they also make me a little uncomfortable. No, I wasn’t traumatized too badly…
Finding Freedom in a Concentration Camp ~Fr. Michael In 1939, just as World War II was beginning to rage throughout Europe, the young German theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, was in New York, exploring whether he should stay there. He had offers to be a pastor to the German emigrants fleeing Europe. He had made himself deeply…
The Society of Ordained Scientists ~Fr. Michael This past month, I was admitted into a group which is at the vanguard of one of the most important conversations in the world: the Society of Ordained Scientists. The group was founded in the early 1970s in the UK by Professor Arthur Peacocke, a luminary in the…
What is a Sabbatical? ~Fr. Michael This year, after planning and preparing since my arrival at the Cathedral, the vestry has agreed to allow me to take three months of sabbatical time in 2018, my seventh year with the congregation. While this is a regular practice in every major denomination, and is encouraged practice throughout the…
A hundred deep breaths….. ~Fr. Michael Christmas is nearly here, and Advent is upon us. Every year we are challenged by the church’s call to keep a time of penitent, joyful expectation, especially as the world around us has no place for waiting or expectation. Perhaps it feels a little difficult to try to be…
How to Be an Evangelist Everyday ~Fr. Michael There’s a lot of talk these days about how the church needs to evangelize the world around us better if the church is going to survive. Books get written about it and we have conferences where we are told how badly its needed, and maybe get some…
Into Greater Silence ~Fr. Michael The Hebrew word “Selah” has no direct English translation. It is often completely omitted from English translations. It occurs mostly in our Bible in the Book of Psalms, which we know was a worship book used in the Jerusalem Temple and Jewish Synagogues of Jesus’ time and beyond. It is likely that it is…
6th Easter 2017 ~Fr. Michael May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be ever acceptable in thy sight oh Lord my strength & my redeemer. How many of us when we were children heard our parents say that if we were good kids and loved them, then we would…
