TSPC Newsletter Summer 2025
The St. Paul Center for Theology and Prayer exists to form disciples of Jesus in every congregation. It seeks to do this by equipping and resourcing local congregations for the tasks and joys of faith formation, teaching and learning, catechesis, and the life of prayer.
Through the hot, bright days of Summer we are continuing our year-long consideration of Wilderness: what it can mean in our lives, and where/how we may meet God there. Please join us on August 23rd to ponder the Big Question: ‘Where is God?’ Full details below!
Don’t forget, you can find our previous newsletters online. If you’re reading this because someone shared it with you, and you’re not yet on our newsletter mailing list, please do sign up here, so you’ll be sure to receive all future news from TSPC!
A THOUGHT FROM TSPC
O Lord, arise, help us;
And deliver us for thy Name's sake.
O God, we have heard with our ears, and our fathers have
declared unto us, the noble works that thou didst in their
days, and in the old time before them.
O Lord, arise, help us;
and deliver us for thy Name's sake.
Thus begins “The Supplication,” an optional addendum to “The Great Litany” in the BCP, appointed “especially in times of war, or of national anxiety, or of disaster.”
I’m guessing few, if any, Episcopal Churches are praying the Great Litany every Sunday, let alone praying it with the Supplication appended. But I know that this is the true prayer right now of most people in the cathedral congregation, most people I chat with at Ministry of the Steps on the front plaza of the cathedral, and the college friends I gather with on Zoom for a monthly reality-check. And it is my true prayer.
So much is so awful right now. Some name it as “evil.” Some name it as “devastating.” Regardless of how we name it, it is pressing on our souls.
God is good, all the time. But starving children are being shot trying to collect food aid in Gaza.
God is good, all the time. But our federal government is deporting people in droves and holding many more in detention centers under cruel conditions.
God is good, all the time. But floodwaters and forest fires are sweeping away communities due to climate change.
Where is this good God in the midst of all we are seeing, holding, enduring? Is God present “in” our enemies and those who wish us harm? Is God “in” the forest fires? How shall we pray and what shall we say if our prayers for justice do not appear to be answered?
These are questions of “theodicy” (from the Greek theos – -god – and dikē - justice). They are not new questions, of course. People have been asking and debating them for thousands of years. And our scriptures are full of both the questions (“My God, why have you forsaken me?” - Ps. 22:1) and an array of answers – “To everything there is a season.” – Eccl. 3:1, “If you had been here, my brother would not have died .”– Jn. 11:21, “All things work together for those who love God.” - Rom. 8:28.
TSPC invites you to join us to sit with the question “Where is God?” for a day on August 23rd. To ponder, pray, revisit our assumptions, and hear what our tradition has to offer in answer to the question. We won’t figure it all out in one day, of course. But we’ll support one another in acknowledging how important the question is, share wisdom, sharpen our sense of how to pray in these times, and prepare one another to host conversation with others in our congregations. I hope to see you there.
The Very Rev. Amy McCreath
WHAT’S ON AT TSPC - and beyond!
SUMMER/FALL 2025
BIG QUESTION DAY - ‘Where is God?’ Saturday August 23, 10am - 2.30pm, in Newburyport, Cohasset and Boston
Each Summer The St. Paul Center for Theology and Prayer hosts an in-person day to tackle a ‘Big Question’. This year we’re asking ‘Where is God?’
Please join TSPC to explore this important question together, in honest and open conversation. All are welcome - clergy and lay, Episcopalians, seekers, and ecumenical friends, those who feel they know God well, and those who are still searching. Our day will include teaching, conversation, reflection and prayer. All participants will leave with materials to bring back to their congregation, to continue the conversation and exploration.
‘Where is God?’ days will be hosted at St. Paul’s Newburyport, St. Stephen’s Cohasset, and the Cathedral Church of St. Paul Boston, August 23rd, 10am to 2.30pm. You are warmly invited to join us at whichever location works for you! Tea and coffee will be served at the start of the day, and you are invited to bring a packed lunch.
You can find all details, enjoy our ‘vox populi’ video asking folks for their thoughts on this ‘big question’, and sign up to attend, here. Please join us for fellowship and discussion!
Ministry Discernment Day - Saturday September 27th, 9am to 3pm
TSPC is delighted to be co-convening another discernment day with the Commission on Ministry. The event is for both lay and ordained vocations - Ministry Discernment Day is for anyone discerning God’s call in their life. This gathering will feature panel discussions with people serving in a variety of Christian vocations, and an introduction to resources for individual reflection, communal discernment in congregations, and churchwide discernment programs. Find all details, and register to attend, here.
SAVE THE DATE - Saturday November 8th at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul: Sarah Augustine and Joe Hubbard will be this year’s TSPC guest speakers.
Please note this date in your diaries; you will be able to join us in person at the Cathedral, and the main presentation of the day will also be live-streamed. We are excited to welcome distinguished guests Sarah Augustine, author of ‘The Land is Not Empty’ and cofounder and executive director of the Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery Coalition, and Joe Hubbard, Convener of the Episcopal Indigenous Justice Roundtable, to offer another perspective on the theme of Wilderness. More details to follow soon!
Recent Events
Finding A Way ‘Walk it Back’ Weekend - June 20-22 Church of the Holy Spirit, Orleans
In Collaboration with the Rev. Dan Smith (UCC Chaplain, Harvard University), Peggy Jablonski (Creator of the Cape Cod Camino Way), and the Rev. Patrick Ward (Rector, Church of the Holy Spirit, Orleans).
This past June TSPC sponsored an immersive learning weekend to explore practices of walking and contemplation with land and water, to reckon with complex legacies of slavery and colonization in our midst. Over 25 people, from every diocese in Province I, came together in the care and spiritual hospitality of the parish of Holy Spirit, Orleans, MA.
Together we learned from members of the parish, from Wampanoag teacher Waban Webquish, and local historian Peggy Jablonski about the place where we gathered. Rita Powell and Dan Smith framed the weekend with insight from their work co-creating (with Alden Fossett) the Landscape of Slavery at Harvard tour. The weekend began with a recognition of the beginning of the 350th anniversary of what is known as King Philip's War, or Metacom's Resistance.
The weekend was a powerful way to launch a 3 year cycle of using these practices to reckon with that legacy, as well as the enduring presence of native people in New England. The second night was the summer solstice, and having turned our attention to the land, it felt good to be gathered in prayer at that turning point in the year. The weekend concluded with church on Sunday, where the rector, the Rev. Patrick Ward, delivered a powerful homily connecting the work to scripture and tradition. You can read his words here.
Mark your calendars for October 10-13, as there will be an opportunity to attend another Finding A Way pilgrimage to Deer Island this Fall, as part of the 3 year cycle.
Considering Creation and Wilderness
The Season of Creation starts September 1st
As we navigate the wilderness of climate crisis, it is more important than ever for us to live into, pray into, and communicate publicly our faith in God the creator and the sanctity of all of creation.
Here is a long, curated list of resources for doing that in worship: Season of Creation and St. Francis Day Resources – The Episcopal Church
Here is an opportunity to bring our faith into the public, joining with other Boston-area churches on a public procession to lament our waste of creation, and affirm our commitment to moving away from a fossil-fuel based economy: SUN WAY Pilgrimage
Learn more about the international, ecumenical movement to add a Feast of God the Creator to the Western liturgical calendar here: The Assisi Process – Advancing Toward an Ecumenical Feast of Creation. – Green Anglicans
Reflection: Where is God?
One of my favorite series of books since childhood is ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ by C.S. Lewis. At the end of the series, the children run through heaven and are surprised to learn that it looks exactly like Narnia, but more real. As I've deepened in my relationship with God since first reading those books, the power of that image has intensified for me. God, and the untarnished, unstoppable, unimaginable glory of the cosmos, is not elsewhere, but here. The promise of scriptures and of Christianity is not to get out to some place of glory, but to finally and completely get *in.* To use imagery from ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’, the world is a copy of Aslan's own country, God's home. The implications for this understanding are vast and comprehensive. Wherever we go in this world, whomever we meet, every creature, plant, human, and sunset, are all reflections of their true grounding, which is God. Those we interact with, whether humans or more than humans, all flow out from the Source of life itself. The earth itself, the waterfalls, seashore, forests, deserts, and glaciers, are in themselves also images of heaven.
This imagery feels shocking, and yet, Jesus himself spoke of the layering of reality throughout his imagery. He says "The time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand." (Mark 1:15) He is adamant that the Kingdom of Heaven is here and now. And yet, through our consumption, violence, commodification, and lack of honoring ourselves, each other, and our more-than-human siblings, it is hard to imagine that we as a species have taken Jesus' words as fact. Imagine a world in which we treated not only ourselves and each other as outflowings of the incarnate God, but imagine if we treated sunrises, vernal pools, porcupines, and blood root as mantled in Christ.
This year, for the Season of Creation, as a practice of reminding myself that God is here, now, I am engaging in a daily meditation. This meditation is a collaboration from over a dozen faithful Christians in Province One of the Episcopal Church, who have taken time to reflect and pray with a more-than-human relative. From five-lined skinks to purple green sweat bees, these creatures reflect the glory of God and hint at the Kingdom of Heaven. As I engage in this practice, (please join me and dozens of others! Register here), I will be thinking of that imagery from the closing of Narnia; letting my eyes, and the eyes of my heart, rest in companionship with these incredible creatures as they offer glimpses into Aslan's country, that world at the heart of our world, from which all things derive.
Many thanks to our guest contributor, the Rev. Rachel Field, Project Manager for An Episcopal Path to Creation Justice.
CLOSING WITH … A THOUGHT ON FINDING GOD IN WILDERNESS
In the heat of summer, or as the days start to cool as we head into Fall, you may find yourself looking for some space and quiet, a place to which to retreat. Did you know? - there are various retreat centers within the diocese. Here are some suggestions:
Society of St Margaret, Duxbury
Bethany House of Prayer, Arlington
William Cullen Bryant’s poem ‘A Forest Hymn’ reflects on encountering God in nature; it opens thus:
The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned
To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,
And spread the roof above them,---ere he framed
The lofty vault, to gather and roll back
The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood,
Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down,
And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks
And supplication.
You can enjoy the entire poem here.
Please share your thoughts - or your questions! - with us. Our email inbox is always open! tspc@diomass.org
