Journals

This is the address given to the Annual Meeting of the Society in May 1977 by the Revd Canon Gianfranco Tellini, Vice-Principal of (the Scottish Episcopal Church) Edinburgh Theological College. The paper finds wanting both Protestant and Catholic understandings of worship in its twin focus on the subjective and the dynamic of human towards divine, with the priesthood of Christ being lost. Its object was ‘to keep the faithful devout’. The paper finds two emphases in the Old Testament: cultic priestly action or a royal priesthood expressed in obedience in everyday life. The New Testament favoured the second: Christ himself is the sacrifice, it is the offering of his life in obedience to God, the Temple to be replaced with people, the sacrifice of their lives, Christ is the prototype of this Temple and its keystone. The teachings of Peter Brunner, Von Allmen and Luther are critiqued. Salvation has three ‘moments’: prophecy and announcement, the ‘fullness of time’, the time of Christ becomes the time of the people of God. When we worship, God reveals self through transformative signs, announcing but bringing individual and humankind to fulfilment. In worship we encounter not propositions but God. The paper proposes that ‘worship is fundamentally transforming encounter with the power of the Word in the power of the Spirit … directed towards making of us … an alter Christus: a concrete sacrifice of praise which is at one and the same time both mission and evangelism’.

P G Cobb of Oxford relates the origin of this Church (1870) and its relationship to Anglicanism. He introduces the new service and discusses where it departs from the first Swiss order of 1880 by Bishop Herzog.

Hugh Bain, minister at Dunning.

Any understanding of this subject must begin with Baptism. The matter is developed against the acceptance of the centrality of Holy Communion, which involved faith and understanding. The practice of catechising, seeming to emphasize knowledge, left understanding out. Hearing the Word is not exclusively an intellectual exercise; Communion is a means of grace not an educational instrument. Church requires a profession of faith and knowledge of doctrines and ordinances, but should this be identified with the point of admission to Communion for the first time? No defence of infant Baptism based on the assumption that faith is irrelevant to it, but this is the faith of the Church and of the parents; this should be applied to Communion also. The article concludes that children have a legitimate place in Communion.

The history of St. Columba’s Episcopal Church is outlined, and the origins of its liturgical practice. The uniqueness of the Scottish Episcopal Church, and of the second order of 1973 is noted. The article offers a full account of the ways by which members of this local congregation took their part in the review of and the revision of the Scottish Liturgy. The writer, Sir Ronald Johnson, had been the organist of St. Columba’s since 1952.

Public prayers are harder to prepare than they used to be. Fresh analogies and images are needed. People are also more ignorant of what is in the Bible. Other aspects of life in society today are also surveyed. Nevertheless, public prayer is a point of opportunity. A number of prayers follow: morning service including Baptism, evening service with young adults present, intercessory prayer for evening, concluding prayer and benediction, a Christmas blessing, grace for a public occasion, a Remembrance Day prayer for use in secondary schools, and a commemoration.

Details of 53 volumes or articles by George W Sprott or which reflect his work.