Let us begin

King of Peace's first public event. 16 people attended Questioning Your Faith at the Rec Center in September of 2000, when it ended 8 weeks later, more than twice as many were present.

On his death bed, Saint Francis of Assisi told the gathered members of his Orders of Friars Minor,

Let us begin, brothers, to serve the Lord our God for up to now we have made little or no progress.

I quoted this before in a sermon Let Us Begin as King of Peace entered its fourth year. We had just completed reading through the lectionary and so in three years of worship we had read through most of the Bible. We read that day from Paul's Letter to the Thessalonians, the earliest Christian writing. On this, my final day after a decade at King of Peace, those words come back to me. I finished that sermon referring to Francis and Paul,

Even though they had made much progress, there was room for improvement. The same is true for us. Each of us, no matter where we are on our own spiritual journey, has room to grow. If you don’t think you have much room to grow in your knowledge and love of God, that is the surest sign that you do have progress to be made. Francis understood this. That’s why he could look back and say that they had made little progress by the ends of his days. But, rather than being filled with despair by this, I can imagine the Francis who could write so eloquently about joy, could feel joy at the challenge of room for growth.

King of Peace has seen a lot of growth in the three years since we first started the lectionary cycle of readings. We have grown from 30 that first Sunday to have had as many as 107 in worship. We have grown in awareness in our community as King of Peace has become well known, especially considering the size and age of us as a church. A 7,900-sq. ft. building has taken shape out back and will soon be home to us, the church. We have seen lives transformed by the power of the Gospel we preach and the sacraments we celebrate. We have rejoiced together over births, in more than 20 baptisms at weddings and numerous meals. We have mourned together in the wake of the tragedy of 9-11 and more personal tragedies of deaths within our families.

Yet, with all the things God has done and is doing in our midst, it is not the time to get a big head or to rest on our laurels. Compared to all that God has done for us. Compared to all God has in store for us, we have but just begun.

There is so much more room to increase and abound in love for one another. There is vast room for change as God strengthens our hearts through our common worship and in our daily lives. Now is not the time to feel that we have arrived. Now is the time to feel that we have so far to go, and to see the joy in that realization.

Let us begin, sisters and brothers, to serve the Lord our God for up to now we have made little or no progress.

The full text of that sermon is online here: Let Us Begin.

We have progressed much in this decade, but God will always have more for us. One day, King of Peace will look back on this past decade and it will be not of the congregation's best time, but of its beginnings, which enabled even greater things later. I give thanks to have been used by God for this time. I also give thanks that greater days lie ahead.

Closing Out Irenic Thoughts
This blog (which also posts to Facebook) is nearly finished. I have shared Irenic Thoughts for more than six years and am thankful for the ministry. I will close it out with my religion column for this Friday's Tribune & Georgian. Thanks for reading. It's been a great journey together!

peace,
Frank+
The Rev. Frank Logue, Founding Rector
King of Peace Episcopal Church


King of Peace on Easter 2010 with more than 200 in a single worship service and more than 300 total for Easter.

Follow in the Footsteps

God Almighty, Eternal, Righteous, and Merciful, give to us poor sinners to do for thy sake all that we know of thy will, and to will always what pleases thee, so that inwardly purified, enlightened, and kindled by the fire of the Holy Spirit, we may follow in the footprints of thy well-beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

—St. Francis of Assisi.

Tomorrow at 9:30 a.m., King of Peace will take part (as we have for years) in an annual Blessing of the Animals in St. Marys. We will meet at the gazebo in the Waterfront Park for a brief service of blessing for the pets who bless us every day.

I will be blessing animals together with Fr. Gabe Cummings of Our Lady Star of the Sea and the Rev. Verdell Griffin of Wheeler Street Church of God. Come and bring your pets. I will bless the dogs and cats and leave the iguanas and snakes to the others. :-)

Frank+
The Rev. Frank Logue, Pastor

Saint Francis of Assisi

Today is the day the church celebrates the life of Saint Francis of Assisi. According to the historical record, Francis was downhill from Assisi in the ruined church of San Damiano in January of 1206, when while praying before a large icon cross heard Jesus tell him, Francis, go and rebuild My Church, which as you can see, is falling into ruin." Francis composed the following prayer, which he wrote down soon afterwards:

Most High, glorious God, enlighten the shadows of my heart, and grant unto me right faith, certain hope and perfect charity, sense and understanding, Lord, so that I may accomplish Thy holy and true mandate.

Francis went on to physically rebuild the ruined church in San Damiano and then to spiritually rebuild the Body of Christ through his own example of a life lived in radical conformity to the Gospel. A religion column in our archives on Francis is The one guy who followed Jesus. Thoughts from our recent trip to Assisi are online as well.

Blessing of the Animals
Our local celebration in honor of the Italian Saint will be this Saturday at 1 p.m. at the gazebo in the waterfront park in St. Mary's, there Father Gabe Cummings, Brother Verdell Griffin and myself will officiate at a Blessing of the Animals being sponsored by the Humane Society of Camden County in conjunction with the Rock Shrimp Festival. So please bring your pets to the festival and be at the gazebo where our short service of blessing will start promptly at 1 p.m.

peace,
Frank+
The Rev. Frank Logue, Pastor

Life Vows

During the 10 a.m. worship service, Victoria Logue professed life vows in the Third Order Society of Saint Francis. In his lifetime, Francis of Assisi's radical call to following Jesus resulted in a group of friars (the First Order) and group of Nuns (the second order) and a group for lay persons who wanted to keep a rule of life appropriate for married persons and other lay people (the third order). For more information on TSSF, you can visit their website, TSSF.org.



Her actual vows were:

I, Victoria, give myself to our Lord Jesus Christ, to serve him for the rest of my life in company with my brothers and sisters in the Third Order of the Society of Saint Francis, according to the Principles of the Order, seeking to spread the knowledge and love of Christ, to promote the spirit of love and harmony as the family of God, and to live joyfully a life of simplicity and humble service after the example of Saint Francis.