Theological Conference

This is a little bit outside the day-to-day life of St. Bartholomew's, but I think I would be remiss if I failed to note that last week three of us attended Yesterday’s Formulation And Today’s Truth: The Pastoral Dynamics Of The Classic Anglican Formularies, a theological conference in Seattle featuring the Rev. Dr. Peter Toon, president of The Prayer Book Society of the U.S.A.. (Their journal, The Mandate, recently featured St. Bartholomew's and is publishing a six-part article by Fr. McGrath on the 1940 Hymnal.)

In the course of the conference Dr. Toon delivered four lectures. Although I am familiar with his writings (I recognized a number of his key points from them), these lectures assembled them into something of a much larger unified whole. The experience for this member of the laity was somewhat akin to drinking from a firehose: I know I absorbed only a bit of what was said and my efforts at note-taking became a semi-futile exercise because there was so much coming so fast... but... it was worth it.

Through it I came to a new appreciation for our 1928 Book of Common Prayer: the careful construction of its services, the lectionaries, the Ordinal, and of course the 39 Articles. There was much not taught in my Confirmation Class, so many years ago, and much that probably a lot of Anglicans don't know. (Perhaps any attendees with better notes can add to this?)

His lectures were recorded and a DVD will be made this week. We have ordered a copy for the church library and if/when it becomes available on the Society's website, I recommend it.

(Update: The Rev. Dr. Toon has apparently published a booklet from his notes for the four lectures: Doctrine as Doxology, a 44-page booklet in PDF format.)