Seeks to identify and describe the continuing Christian vision, to trace its modes of transmission, and to permit it to illuminate the human context. The result is a systematic theology in the perspective of worship.

At a time when there are often as many adults as young people preparing for confirmation, the concept of notes written in adult language, which the younger candidate can grow into, is particularly appropriate for today's needs. The growing number of adult study groups, working through mutual questioning within group discussions, will find it helpful to have these clear succinct notes about the content of Christian belief and practice. Few books have been more influential in confirmation preparation than Hugh Montefiore's 'Confirmation Notebook', written while he was vicar of the University Church in Cambridge. After five editions, with nineteen printings of the fifth edition alone, the notebook is now in a handy pocket-sized format that includes space at the end of each chapter for notes. Existing chapters have been updated and, in most cases, enlarged, while new chapters have been added on 'Common Worship', Christian festivals and fasts, Christian responsibilities, Christian behaviour, and the Christian view on sex and marriage.

The "All Night Vigil" held in parish churches on a Saturday evening, is one of the best-known features of the Russian Orthodox Church. This English translation is intended both to help the worshipper to follow the service at the Vigil for Sunday held on Saturday night and to assist the choir in chanting the service. It contains the unvarying texts and rubrics regarding the insertion of the variable parts. The parts of the priest, deacon, reader and choir are clearly indicated.

A guide to liturgy and worship in the Church of England within the framework of 'Common Worship', which combines theory, theology and history with a strong sense of the realities of parish life and pastoral practice. It explores the way in which liturgy can reflect the life of the church and the wider world, and the new opportunities for churches at a local level to own and shape the liturgy they use. This book is essential reading for anyone involved in worship in the Church of England, and who wants the worship of their church to be the best they can offer, based on clear liturgical principles. It is also practical and detailed - Michael Perham covers clothing and colours, children's role in worship, the cycle of the Christian year, the timing of services, the use of church space and other elements that go to make up the feel of an individual church. The book has its roots in two of Michael Perham's earlier works, 'Liturgy Pastoral and Parochial' and 'Lively Sacrifice', though much of the material is quite new, and fills its role as key texts for anyone interested in the liturgy of the Church of England.

The ancient Dormition and Assumption traditions are a collection of over sixty different narratives, preserved in nine ancient languages, that commemorate the end of the Virgin Mary's life. These traditions have long been overlooked by scholars of early Christianity, no doubt largely because this complicated corpus was insufficiently well known. The present study aims to remedy this situation with a detailed analysis of the earliest traditions of Mary's death, including liturgical and archaeological evidence as well as the numerous narrative sources. Several of the most important narratives are translated in appendices, many appearing in English for the first time. The book will be of interest to all scholars of early Christian literature.

What Would Jesus Do? Ask the questions and live the answers, every day of the year

This one-of-a-kind collection of devotional readings will help you nourish and deepen your faith through the simple yet powerful daily practice of answering the question, "What would Jesus do?"

A jewel of wisdom for every day of the year, each entry is drawn from Scripture with practical reflections on how we can live the WWJD? life as well as inspiring words from notable Christian writers, such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Richard J. Foster, Charles H. Spurgeon, Billy Graham, Elisabeth Elliott, Martin Luther King Jr., C.S. Lewis, Eugene Peterson, and many others.

Here, author Nick Harrison invites us to accept this same challenge. It is "a pledge that the Apostle John says is a surefire test of our Christian faith....One year from now, may our lives be richer for having taken the time to learn the lessons gained by answering 'What would Jesus do?'"

365 WWJD? offers people of all ages daily food for thought, warmly reminding us of the many ways we can model our everyday actions after the life of Jesus.

Spurgeon, the Prince of Preachers, was also a man of prayer. His sermons on prayer contained within this Pure Gold Classic will lead you to the very throne of grace where you will obtain mercy and find grace to help in times of need.

Spurgeon said:

"One night alone in prayer might make us new men, changed from poverty of soul to spiritual wealth, from trembling to triumphing."

"Sometimes we think we are too busy to pray. That is a great mistake, for praying is a saving of time."

"We cannot all argue, but we can all pray; we cannot all be leaders, but we can all be pleaders; we cannot all be mighty in rhetoric, but we can all be prevalent in prayer."

"Whether we like it or not, asking is the rule of the Kingdom."

"Saints of the early church reaped great harvests in the field of prayer and found the mercy seat to be a mine of untold treasures."

Spurgeon's words will change the way you think about prayer and the way you pray.

In the Anglican churches of North America, and sometimes elsewhere, there are two complaints about deacons in the liturgy: Bishops and priests complain that deacons don t know how to do liturgy. Deacons complain that bishops and priests won t let them do liturgy. The solution lies in liturgical formation, both theological and practical. This book is designed to help provide that formation for bishops, priests, deacons, and indeed for all the people of God.

The introduction provides a brief history of the use of deacons in Anglican liturgies, from 1549 to the present, including characteristics and statement of purposes. "

"Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner." These words from the Eastern Christian tradition have strengthened and comforted believers for centuries. In these pages, John Michael Talbot explores the roots of this Jesus Prayer along with the theological and practical meaning of each word for believers today. He ends each chapter with a brief practice using the prayer. Come discover how the Jesus Prayer can renew and enrich your spiritual life.

“A welcome remedy for the increasing number of lay Christians who have rediscovered the daily offices. Tickle puts each day’s prayers, psalms, readings, and refrains–everything you need–in one place. The rhythm that Tickle’s book establishes gives one a stronger sense of participating in an ancient, worldwide but very personal liturgy.”
–Nora Gallagher, beliefnet.com, and author of Things Seen and Unseen: A Year Lived in Faith

The third and final volume in a trilogy of prayer manuals compiled by Publishers Weekly religion editor Phyllis Tickle as a contemporary Book of Hours to guide Christians gently yet authoritatively through the daily offices.

The Divine Hours is the first major literary and liturgical reworking of the sixth-century Benedictine Rule of fixed-hour prayer. This beautifully conceived and thoroughly modern three-volume guide will appeal to the theological novice as well as to the ecclesiastical sophisticate. Making primary use of the Book of Common Prayer and the writings of the Church Fathers, The Divine Hours is also a companion to the New Jerusalem Bible, from which it draws its Scripture readings. The trilogy blends prayer and praise in a way that, while extraordinarily fresh, respects and builds upon the ancient wisdom of Christianity.

The third and final book in the set, Prayers for Springtime, provides prayers, psalms, and readings for this season associated with rebirth. Compact, with deluxe endpapers, it is perfect for those seeking greater spiritual depth. As a contemporary Book of Hours, The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime heralds a renewal of the tradition of disciplined daily prayer, and gives those already using the first two volumes the completion they are seeking. With this volume, the series culminates with three prayer manuals encompassing the liturgical and calendar year with the offices for every day.


From the Hardcover edition.

ncludes general hymns; hymns for feasts, seasons and saints' days; office hymns for the liturgical year; an enlarged eucharistic section; responsorial psalms; a new English folk mass setting.

This is the melody-only edition. A full music edition is also available.

A wide-ranging collection of resources for Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter, Pentecost, Transfiguration, Harvest, Holocaust Memorial Day, Mothering Sunday, and other special days, and on areas of concern, like refugees and peacemaking. Worship rooted in city and country, in work and in schools, in peacemaking and the eradication of poverty, in churches and the Iona Community resident group ... So - as always with the Iona Community - worship which is contextual, prophetic, with a strong justice and peace edge.

This set of three organ improvisations, each based on a liturgical text, is written in a quintessentially English style: largely diatonic but not unremittingly consonant, flowingly melodic, texturally rich, and steered away from predictability by constantly varying bar- and phrase-lengths. Organists will find this a usefully versatile set of voluntaries, or an unusual and rewarding recital piece.

Glimpses of Glory is the second in a three-volume collection of prayers and other resources based on the New Common Worship Lectionary used widely around the world. Written in the Celtic style for which the author is well-known, and linked to the Sunday readings, these prayers and intercessions may be used by congregations for the Prayers of the People, as well as by individuals seeking to supplement their personal devotions.

How does the universal experience of suffering relate to the experience of worship? Questioning how Anglican liturgy welcomes people who are suffering, Suffering in Worship uniquely applies a narrative-ritual model for the analysis of both the liturgical text and worship services themselves. In this book, van Ommen draws on interviews with participants in worship as well as clergy. Highlighting several elements in the liturgy which address suffering, including the Eucharist, songs, sermons and prayers of intercession, he shows the significance of a warm and safe liturgical community as a necessary context for suffering people to find consolation. This book also uses the concept of remembrance to plead for liturgy that attends to the suffering of both God and people. As such, it will be of interest to scholars of pastoral theology as well as clergy.

This is an anthology of the writings of Charles Wesley. Best known for his hymns, such as `Hark! the Herald Angels Sing', and `Jesus, Lover of My Soul', Charles was the younger brother of John Wesley and the co-founder of Methodism. Despite his importance in the history of Protestantism, there is no collection of his writings in print, and indeed, little work has been done specifically on Charles in the last two generations. Tyson presents a chronologically arranged selection of the journals, sermons, letters, hymns, and poems in such a way as to both outline Wesley's life and illuminate the leading elements of his thought.

Events from the history of redemption as reflected in baptism and the Lorda (TM)s Supper in the early church. A systematic investigation of the Traditio Apostolica, the Euchologion of Serapion of Thmuis, the catecheses of Cyrill and John of Jerusalem, Ambrosius, John Chrysostom, Theodor of Mopsuestia and others.

This book considers the doctrinal and ecclesiological trends that were present during the construction of the revised Book of Common Prayer of 1927. Through the use of the records of both Convocations and of the National/Church Assembly, it examines the debates that led to the revised Book and the doctrinal shifts that were present in these debates. It challenges the idea that the revision process stalled in the First World War by showing how the birth of the National Assembly that took place during the war was born out of the revision process. Through the Assembly records it shows the integral role the laity played in the revision process. It examines the attempts to get the revised Books through Parliament, the difference between pro and anti-revision speakers, and the radical ecclesiological thinking that followed the rejections.

Why do people sing hymns? Are hymns poetry? What makes a good hymn? The author discusses the nature of hymns and their particular appeal, examines the English hymn as a literary form, and systematically describes its development through four centuries, from the Reformation to the mid-twentieth century.

Traces of Glory is the first in a three-volume collection of prayers and other resources based on the new Common Worship Lectionary used in many parts of the Anglican Communion, and very similar to lectionaries in use in the United States. Written in the Celtic style for which the author is known, and linked to the Sunday readings, these prayers and intercessions may be used by congregations for the Prayers of the People, as well as by individuals seeking to supplement their own devotions.