Month: November 2009

Sisters and Brothers,

Sunday services will be a little patchy between now and January, so I wanted to let you know what I’m planning, starting with this Sunday.

Sun 29 Nov
This Sunday I’m running a full day on Centering Prayer in Camperdown finishing with a Eucharist service.

If you’d like to come to this, there is still time to book at the event web page

As a consequence, there will be no service at Francis St on Sunday evening.

Sun 6 Dec
The following week, I will be attending the Parliament of the World’s Religions in Melbourne and so there will be no service that Sunday.

Sun 13 Dec
There will be a Sophianic Eucharist at 15 Francis St as usual.

Sun 20 Dec
We have been invited to join with the Unitarian Church for lunch and the Builders of the Adytum for a Christmas service and supper. I will not be celebrating a Eucharist on this day, but I will be at 15 Francis St all day and I encourage you to come and join in.

10.30am Unitarian Candle Service with music
11.30am Unitarian’s Xmas lunch – all welcome
1.30pm   Any St Uriel’s members welcome to join me for a beer and a chat or a wander through the parks.
6pm        Back to 15 Francis St to help BOTA set up for their service
7pm        BOTA Kabbalistic Summer Solstice Service
7.45pm   Supper with BOTA folks

All in all a fun day. If you’ve got time to come to any of that I’d love company and a chance to see you before you head off for the season.

Thu 24 Dec
Saint Uriel’s Xmas Eve
For any people still in Sydney, I’d like to hold an evening service around 7pm followed by a potluck supper. If you’ll been around and you’d like to come, please drop me an email.

This will be a home service somewhere in the Inner West.

And from then, we will be taking a break until mid-January when people are back from holidays. I’ll send an email to let you know when things are started up again.

I hope to see you over the next month, but if we don’t meet each other before the Festival of the Incarnation, may you have a blessed and safe Christmas and may you notice the Divine dropping you a sly wink from in amongst all the glittery tat of Xmas.

With love,

Tim+

The congregation at St Uriel’s meets on Sundays at 6pm at:
The Unitarian Centre
15 Francis St
Darlinghurst, NSW
Map

Rector: Father Tim Mansfield
email blog

Apostolic Johannite Church

This Sunday we remember Saint Gregory Palamas, that great Eastern contemplative and defender of experiential theology.

Certain saints after the Coming of Christ in the flesh see this light like an endless sea flowing miraculously from a single sun, which is the adored Body of Christ.

The Holy Name contains within itself that divine energy which penetrates and changes a man’s heart when it is diffused throughout his body.

Saint Greg defended the contemplatives of the Eastern church from Roman charges of heresy. He advocated the view that the experience of Divine Light the monks experienced in meditation (a style of meditation called “hesychasm” or “quietness”) was identical to the uncreated Light of God, the light which illuminated Jesus on Mount Tabor in the event known as the Transfiguration.

Though Palamas agreed that we cannot know God in His essence, His inmost being (and who can we know that way, after all?), we can know God in His energies – such as the Light experienced in Hesychasm.

His emphasis on direct experience, diligent spiritual practice and his constant return to the theme of Light as the wellspring of our original nature makes him a Saint beloved of Johannites everywhere.

We celebrate an Eastern Rite Eucharist in his honour this Sunday at the usual place and time.

Readings for the week

The congregation at St Uriel’s meets every Sunday at 6pm at:
The Unitarian Centre
15 Francis St
Darlinghurst, NSW
Map

Rector: Father Tim Mansfield
email blog

Apostolic Johannite Church

Just a quick note this week that the parish meets on Sunday for a Sophianic Eucharist.

We’re reviving Sophia Café this Sunday, using the time after the service to delve into some of the texts from the Nag Hammadi library that might be less familiar.

This week we’ll begin looking at Three Forms of the First Thought. I’ll bring along copies of a nice translation. We’ll take turns and read it slowly and perhaps dip into some of the passages via Lectio Divina.

It’s a beautiful, bewildering text, and it should be fun – so come along and join in.

Readings for the week

The congregation at St Uriel’s meets every Sunday at 6pm at:
The Unitarian Centre
15 Francis St
Darlinghurst, NSW
Map

Rector: Father Tim Mansfield
email blog

Apostolic Johannite Church