The annual journal of the Society for 2024 is now available. Addresses given at the 2024 annual meeting, and at the study day on pilgrimage in October 2024, together with other articles on pilgrimage, are included. Worship in St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, is featured. There are two explorations into the arts: one exploring how faith is enlivened by the arts, the second reviews references to worship in Scottish literature. An online version is in preparation.
The theme is Pilgrimage and the date Thursday 24th October, from approx 10.30/11am until 4pm. A medieval pilgrim lunch and tours of the 900-year-old St Drostan’s Church will be provided. £10 on the day (lunch and speaker expenses). Read more details here.
Please register by w/e of 20th October by emailing dgalbraith@churchofscotland.org.uk
Volume 58 of the annual Record has now been published. The complete edition has been uploaded to the Journals pages on the website here.
Study Day 2023, which will be in the autumn, takes as its theme the growing phenomenon of Pilgrimage, dropped by the Reformed churches, but experiencing a home-coming in the secularized world of the twenty-first century. Further details will be posted here as they emerge.
Annual Meeting and Supper 2024
Greyfriars Kirk May 21 5.30p Greyfriars Kirk
John L Bell will give his Presidential Address on ‘The Life in Liturgy’. He explores how worship shapes not only belief but discipleship, how far symbol and symbolic actions can aid or impede devotion, and what is the effect of hymn texts whose dominant images celebrate the birth and death of Jesus rather than his ministry. For the Supper, book by Monday May 13 at dgalbraith@churchofscotland.org.uk (£27.50 pay on the day).
The Society's Annual Meeting for 2023 is on Tuesday May 23 during the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, beginning at 5.30pm.
The speaker is the Revd Dr Liam Jerrold Fraser, minister of St Michael's Linlithgow and Convener of the Assembly's Theological Forum. His topic is
THE END OF WORSHIP? THE PURPOSE OF CONGREGATIONS AND THE SUNDAY SERVICE IN AN AGE OF MISSION PLANNING.
Stay for supper afterwards, cost £25.
Book with the Secretary Scott McKenna smckenna@churchofscotland.org.uk.
The Church Service Society is sponsoring a Study Day on Friday 24 February at Holy Trinity Church, Stirling.
The purpose of the day is to reflect both theologically and in terms of practice on the lockdown experience of the streaming of Sunday worship and where there are plans to continue.
Speakers will be the Revd Dr Tom Shields (writing in the current Theology in Scotland) and the Revd Fraser Penny, minister of Dunkeld Cathedral, whose Sunday broadcasts have attracted special mention.
The event will run from around 10.15am until 4.00pm.
Now on this site:
a bank of simpler hymn arrangements
a course on improvisation for organists
Both may be downloaded free of charge. They accompany the book Assist our Song: Music Ministries in the Local Church by Douglas Galbraith (St Andrew Press) just published, ISBN 9781800830103.
It is proposed to hold the AGM this year on
Thursday 26th August at 4pm
Greyfriars Kirk, in person and by Zoom
Presidential Address by Revd Dr Alison Jack
Poetry, prayer, and praise
Prayers in a PandemicTwo prayers originating from both Anglican and Methodist sources for this challenging time, as well as two prayers by Lezley Stewart who is the Church of Scotland’s Recruitment and Support Secretary, within the new Faith Nurture Forum.
Annual Meeting 2020 Cancelled
The Annual Meeting of the Society will no longer take place on 23rd September 2020.