Second Sunday in Lent 2021

Collect

Almighty God, you show to those who are in error the light of your truth that they may return to the way of righteousness: Grant to all those who are admitted into the fellowship of Christ’s religion, that they may reject those things that are contrary to their profession, and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same; through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

First Reading: Romans 4:13-25

13 For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. ¹⁴If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. ¹⁵For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

16 For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, ¹⁷as it is written, ‘I have made you the father of many nations’)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. ¹⁸Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become ‘the father of many nations’, according to what was said, ‘So numerous shall your descendants be.’ ¹⁹He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already^* as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. ²⁰No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, ²¹being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. ²²Therefore his faith^* ‘was reckoned to him as righteousness.’ ²³Now the words, ‘it was reckoned to him’, were written not for his sake alone, ²⁴but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, ²⁵who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.

Gospel: Mark 8:31-38

31 Jesus began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. ³²He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ³³But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, ‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’

34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. ³⁵For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel,^* will save it. ³⁶For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? ³⁷Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? ³⁸Those who are ashamed of me and of my words^* in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’

Preface

Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who was in every way tempted as we are yet did not sin; by whose grace we are able to overcome all our temptations:

Post Communion

Creator of heaven and earth, we thank you for these holy mysteries given us by our Lord Jesus Christ, by which we receive your grace and are assured of your love, which is through him now and for ever. Amen.

Blessing

Christ give you grace to grow in holiness, to deny yourselves, and to take up your cross and follow him:

PRAYER II: PRAYING VICARIOUSLY

One of my colleagues in the Grammar School always greets me with “Good morning Vicar”, so I got a face-mask which reads “More tea, vicar?” It evokes the avuncular if ineffective English clergyman, straight out of Agatha Christie. But what is a vicar? It is, simply, a deputy – someone who stands in for someone else. Pre-Disestablishment this parish of Finglas belonged to the Chancellor of St Patrick’s, who took the tithe income and arranged for a vicar to do the parochial work. As he also had a vicar to do his cathedral duties, one might wonder what was left for the Chancellor himself to do!

Cathedrals are full of vicars, both clerical and lay – who provide the singing. More generally, such foundations were established to perform the Divine Service on behalf of the donors and of society in general. Whether or not a congregation attended was beside the point. The choir of canons and vicars, or of monks, in conventual churches, were there to pray and praise on behalf of the communities that supported them. During the early medieval period, abbeys were established as communities of experts, who could read the texts (when many were illiterate), perform the plainchant, and whose dedicated lives gave power and efficacy to their prayer. Just as the knights had the expertise and calling to defend the community in arms, so the monks had the expertise and calling to defend the community by their prayers. That efficacy did not depend on whether the lay community were personally present in church.

This is vicarious worship: specialists provided for who perform the rites on behalf of others. Those who have perhaps neither time or inclination to worship provide for others to do so in their stead. A particular form, which became very common, was the establishment of “chantries” where a priest was provided for to say Mass daily of behalf of the departed.

At the Reformation such vicarious praying was called into question. Any suggestion of buying one’s salvation, or of earning Heaven by one’s good works, let alone those of others, was rejected. In particular there was an emphasis on the Word of God, read and preached; and how can anyone hear and receive the word on behalf of someone else? Hearing and understanding is inescapably personal. Similarly the Eucharist was only to be available where there were communicants to receive: no point otherwise.

One can affirm the importance of personal faith; the individual opening of the heart and soul to God; the personal relationship with Christ initiated in baptism. One should also affirm the importance of the integration of prayer and life: if our prayer does not result in our doing social justice then it is worthless. Nonetheless our personal prayer and faith are in the context of community: we believe and pray as members of the Body of Christ. Whether in a crowd of thousands, or in the “two or three gathered”, or on our own, we pray as part of the whole Body, being upheld by the prayer of others, and upholding them in our turn.

The present lockdown reaffirms the place of vicarious praying. The individual priests, the socially distanced choirs, all providing a variety of acts of worship to be broadcast on social media, are offering worship on behalf of their communities, whether or not anyone watches or listens. And when we find ourselves unable or unwilling to pray, sometimes it is enough to let ourselves be carried along and lifted up by the prayers of others.