A New Ministry Project in a New Context: An Introduction

Well, about seven months old actually.

Several years ago, I had been approached by Fr. Steven Smith, a young African-American priest, now in one of the lesser-known, but older, Continuing Anglican jurisdictions, about assisting him in a Church plant here in Summerville, South Carolina.

Late in 2018, I finally got back to him, and after obtaining the necessary blessings from his bishop and mine, I began assisting him with Sunday Mass, alternating preaching every other Sunday with celebrating.  The liturgy used is from the 1928 Prayer Book\American Missal and often involves incense.  We are also learning to sing this liturgy, although I don't think we are as far along with that as either of us would like.  As far as I know, this Church plant, Christ Church Anglican, is the only place of worship in the Summerville SC area using the '28 Prayer Book on a regular basis.  The next closest place of which I am aware is St. Timothy's Anglican Catholic Church in the West Ashley area of Charleston, about 20 miles away.

So Christ Church Anglican, a start-up if there ever was one, worships in a rented chapel on the grounds of the Reformed Episcopal Cummins Theological Seminary.  The chapel, formerly "St. Barnabas Episcopal Church", was purchased by the REC and moved to the current location many years ago.  The edifice is now known as "Bishop Pengelley Memorial Chapel of the REC".  The seminary address is 705 S. Main Street, Summerville, and the freestanding chapel is located behind the main building on E. 6th Street South.  Mass is at 11 AM every Sunday morning.  We welcome you!  If we add additional service or activities, I will post them here on my blog.

Above, Fr. Steven gives the final blessing.  His son Jayden is the acolyte.  Below, I pronounce the "Ecce Agnus Dei" (in English).  For several Sundays, the air conditioning was not working, so I vested minimally.

And the chapel interior definitely grows on one.

The main reason I posted this was to serve as an introduction.  Over the past few months, I have accumulated several sermons based on readings from the single-year eucharistic lectionary of the 1928 American Anglican Prayer Book.  I have intended to post them for some time, but hadn't gotten to it.  They will not be in chronological order, and the first one will be from Trinity Sunday and Fathers' Day, June 16, 2019.

Watch this space!