ST. MARK’S NEWS • VOLUME 23 • ISSUE 2 • MARCH/APRIL 2019
From the Rector Mark your calendars for 8 p.m. Saturday, April 20, because St. Mark’s is having an Easter vigil this year! Let me tell you why I’m so excited about it. In the early church, it was traditional to do baptisms only once per year—at the Easter vigil. The season of Lent therefore was a time of preparation for this momentous occasion. All those people—hundreds of them, thousands even—who over the course of the previous year had become interested being followers of Jesus would all gather in the dark, the night before Easter morning, and by candlelight to listen to the leaders of the church tell the story of God from the very beginning, starting with readings from Genesis, through Israel’s deliverance from slavery in the Exodus, through exile in Babylon and return, all the way to the coming of Jesus. They read all through the night. Then, they would exit the church and gather at the nearby river, where a cross-shaped baptistry was built into the ground. The new converts would together look into the west (where the sky was the darkest) and renounce Satan and all forces of evil. Then they would turn around and look into the east, where the morning sun was just peaking over the horizon, and they would promise to trust in Jesus Christ as their Savior. Each candidate for baptism would then strip off their clothes, they would walk down one arm of the cross into the river, they would be baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Spirit, and they would be raised back up the other side, In this Issue and wrapped in a giant white cloak—a symbol of their new birth and From the Rector ......................... 1 new life in Christ. After all were baptized, they would go back into the Lent at St. Mark’s ...................... 2 church to participate in—for the first time ever—the sacred mysteries of Holy Week and Easter ............... 3 bread and wine. The spirit of this Easter vigil carries through to today. Ever since, it has been an occasion of welcoming new converts into the life of the church through baptism, and thereby an occasion for the rest of the church to renew their own baptismal covenant. Lent continues to be, for us, a season of preparation, looking ahead recommitting ourselves yet again to Christ.
Outreach .................................... 4 Parish Life .................................. 4 Music Notes ............................... 6 Parishioner Highlights ................ 8 Celebrations............................... 9 March ROTA ............................ 11
We have designed the formation opportunities for the season of Lent at St. Mark’s to fall in line with this logic of the early church. Our Sunday formation hour class, taught by Nathan Jennings and myself, will be mirroring the ancient catechism the early church used for baptism prep in the season of Lent. During our Wednesday night services, I will give a short (!) homily each week devoted to a different phrase of the Apostles’ Creed (the creed used for baptisms). Lastly, for your own individual formation, we invite the whole parish to read with us through an excellent little book by Ben Myers, called The Apostles Creed: A Guide to the Ancient Catechism, which is available on Amazon for $13, or in the Parish Hall for $15. I invite you each to the observance of a holy and life-giving Lent! And I invite you each with enthusiasm to our Easter vigil! - Fr. Zac
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