Bishop Donald Harvey

Today I drove with some friends to the Church of the Holy Trinity in Marlborough to watch some friends of mine be confirmed. Afterward I had the pleasure of having lunch with Bishop Donald Harvey who is the retired Bishop of Eastern Newfoundland and Labrador, which as you know is in Canada. I highly admire the passion of this man and his depth as a minister of the gospel.

C.S. Lewis

I was given the opportunity to preach today at Christ Church for two of the services. Below is my sermon.

According to the church calendar, today as you know, is the feast day of C.S. Lewis. When I first discovered the Anglican Church and learned of feast days I thought, "What a great church! We get to eat and have all of these grand feasts throughout the year!" However, I quickly learned that feast days simply refer to the days of the year that we remember those saints who have come before us and today we do so for Lewis. Clives Staples Lewis or "Jack" to his friends was ruddy apologist with baggy tweeds, a booming voice, bald head, and horne-rimmed spectacles. Many view him as the most well read Christian author of the 20th century. However his journey to Christianity took the first thirty-one years of his life. It is this story that I would like to share with you today as he recorded in his autobiography, Surprised By Joy.

As a child Lewis was rather withdrawn from what he viewed as a repressive life-a worldview that would quickly lead to atheism. He was not a popular boy. "I was big for my age," he wrote, "a great lout of a boy, and that sets one’s seniors against one. I was also useless at games. Worst of all, there was my face. I am the kind of person who gets told, ‘And take that look off your face too’"1 even though I was not trying to reveal any certain emotion. He did not really have any friends apart from his brother and he could often be found thumbing through the various stacks of books which his father and mother left scattered throughout the house and creating a written world he called animal land. After the death of his mother his father never really recovered. He was gone most of the time, thus leaving Lewis and his brother home alone and when his father was at home, he was quite absent minded, very emotional and had a horrible temper. Lewis and his brother were always looking forward to the next day when he would again leave for work. Lewis hated school and vividly remembered his first day when his mother dressed him in an outfit of stiff irritable clothes and sent him off. The teachers were cruel and beat him. Through these experiences he learned to hate the world in which he lived and God for creating such a place. He wrote, "I was at this time living, like so many Atheists or Antitheists, in a whirl of contradictions. I maintained that God did not exist. I was also very angry with God for not existing. I was equally angry with Him for creating a world"2. He would go on to study under a man who he called the Great Knock, who would open up his intellectual world and allow him to fully and mindfully enter into atheism.

However as he grew and learning he began to discover difficulties in the beliefs which grounded his atheism. As a college students he began to lose his chronological snobbery, his belief in realism and he realized of the depth Christian authors. First, to go was his chronological snobbery-the belief that the latest and greatest scholarly work was correct and ancient works such as the Bible were outdated. It seems that here in the west many of us have this same view. The lastest and the greatest is the best of all. Just this week people were standing in lines for up to thirty six hours to obtain the latest Playstation 3 video game system. In the quest of the latest and greatest some were trampled, others shot and one person was even stabbled over in Manchester, Connecticut! We worship youth and revile old age by making jokes about older folks in our birthday cards. In the scholarly world, many scholars from the two most recent century have proposed that the Gospels and Epistles were not written by those who claimed to write them, such as Mathew, Mark, Luke, John and Paul, and therefore are not credible. Yet over 1,800 years of careful study has shown the very opposite. All of a sudden it is as if we are smarter than all of those who have come before us. When Lewis was forced to think about past wisdom he had to ask himself, had that information been refuted and by whom and how conclusively or did it simply die away in the scholarly world as often fashions do? Second, Lewis lost his trust in realism-the belief that only that which can be touched and which can show forth evidence is to be believed. In our culture is seems that imperical science carries this great prestige above and beyond theology and philosophy and all of the other sciences. It seems that people automatically assume that that which we can touch and physically prove must be the truth and all else is false--completely forgetting that even imperical evidence has to be interpreted. Lewis realized that there were all kinds of things which he held to that had no physical evidence: he trusted his own thoughts, he trusted his moral judgements as valid, and his aesthetic experience as valuable. Third, Lewis discovered that some of the smartest people he knewindividual believed in God. At Oxford clearly one of the most intelligent and best informed men in his class was a Christian-a thoroughgoing supernaturalist. He would go on to discover that all the books were turning against him--his favorite authors which had had a great effect upon him: George MacDonald, Johnson, Spenser and Milton, Plato, Aeschylus. And those others which held to his theories of atheism, Shaw and Wells, Mill and Gibbon and Voltaire all seemed thin and lacking in depth. As his intellectual base for atheism began to crumble so also did his journey begin to the belief which would change his life forever.

He would go on to write these words: "In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England. I did not then see what is now the most shining and obvious thing; the Divine humility which will accept a convert even on such terms. The Prodigal Son at least walked home on his own feet. But who can duly adore that Love which will open the high gates to a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful, and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape? The words compelle intrare, compel them to come in, have been so abused by wicked men that we shudder at them; but, properly understood, they plumb the depth of the Divine mercy. The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation"3. This was the begining of his move to truth. And so after 31 years during a motorcycle ride to the zoo with his brother he would come to believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and from there become the most well known Christian author of the 20th century. Amen.

1. C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955), 95.
2. Ibid, 113.
3. Ibid, 215.

After a long day of studies at the seminary, my lonely car awaits to carry me home while silently and patiently enjoying the incredible brushstrokes of creation in the distance.

Dinner at the Lemons

We had an excellent meal of Thai food and even better company at the home of Cameron and Jenelle Lemons along with their two young boys.

This picture just does not capture the essence

The rainy day should have stifled my spirit and disengaged my enthusiasm. However the rain had not yet started and a thick fog was lifting all around creating a visibility of but a few hundred feet. I wanted to simply give up my studies and walk amongst the trees and absorb the beauty forever like that of a childhood memory immediately recalled upon a wafting smell. I felt as though there were an entirely new world seeping through the mist that I had yet to discover. Adventure, mystery, excitement, splendor.

A Few Pictures from Youth Group

Every Sunday evening I have the pleasure of working with the youth ministry at Christ Church. The evening is always full of energy and crazy games as well as music and teaching.

Chasing after the Books

I woke up at 5:30 today to join Joe, a fellow seminarian and Jeff, an engineering student to alight, along with hundreds of others upon the semi-annual CBD (Christian Book Distributors) sale. The company is predominately an online retailer, but every so often they have a sale to pass on their damaged books and such to the locals, so us poor seminarians love the opportunity. We stood in line outside the building and then entered into this massive warehouse with thousands of books laid out across table after table after table. Here we are below with our boxes full of “finds.”

Beauty in the Garden

Another day in the garden. Hour after hour. Though the work is tiring, the sights are often full of delights for the eyes.














I could not help but post once more the beautiful view that engulfs me each day I arrive at work.














Cameron Lemons, a fellow seminarian, husband and the father of two young boys. I highly respect him as a thoughtful and passionate friend and enjoy working with him in the garden. Though he will be graduating soon and leaving with his family to return to California, it is my hope that this short time God has given us as friends will not be the last and that perhaps we will once again walk the same path.










Fall colors, this late into the season? Do not the colors simply mesmerize you?

Working in the Garden

A couple of days a week I motor up this winding drive and work alongside the birds, the grasses, trees and flowers at Spike and Libby Thorne's--a well to do couple who have been a rich blessing in my life by allowing me a secure place of employment working in their garden and on their property.









Here I am (with Alex in the background) hard at work attempting to pick up the seemingly endless leaves that I spent nine hours picking up today. Where do I work? I work for Spike and Libby Thorne, an older couple who value a well taken care of lawn and garden.










This is my friend Alex, hauling our "leaf vacuum." He and I often work together and I thoroughly enjoy his company. He is a great conversationalist and extremely intelligent. The man amazes me: as a husband and father of three young boys, one of whom is autistic, he still finds time to take classes at the seminary and work an incredibly amount of hours to support his family.

Fortunately, the place comes equipped with a beautiful view of which the sun often compliments late into the evening--one of the pleasures of life.

Credibility of the Gospels

The Meaning of Jesus, a chapter by chapter dialog between two well respected scholars. Borg understands a majority of the gospels to be taken metaphorically, unlike Wright who holds to the orthodox conservative position of understanding the gospels as historical narratives. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, much more than the one above. If you would like to read from some of the best and yet easily followed debates concerning the Jesus Christ, the Son of God and whether or not what is written about in the gospels can be trusted as truth, this is your book.

Friend's for Dinner

We had a lot of fun with Brian and Jackie Barry, who joined us for dinner at our place. Brian is finishing his first year at the seminary and would like to become an Anglican priest, though he is currently working in a CMA (Christian Missionary Alliance) Church as the youth pastor. His wife works at Starbucks and as an assistant kindergarten teacher.

October - A Month in the Life of a Seminarian

Greetings from quickly cooling Massachusetts. This past weekend was one of tempestuous winds and driving rains, otherwise known to the good folks in New England as a Nor’easter. You should have seen the look on Melissa's face when the wind mangled into a creation of modern art the umbrella she had purchased within the last hour. It was a sorrowful experience.

This month has been an array of ancient language exams, sermons and papers, but somehow I am still alive. I preached at Christ Church a couple of times, the first of which was on proper 22, Jesus teaching on divorce (Mark 10:2-9). I thought the gospel reading looked challenging and was a subject toward which I feel strongly and an issue which touches the lives of so many, both those who are directly involved as well as family members and friends. However, as I further prepared the sermon I began to feel somewhat fearful with the thought of preaching the conviction of biblical truth yet communicating love to those in the pews who have been or are currently in the midst of divorce. When the day arrived, I sat in the pew as the service drew closer to the sermon and felt terrified—not nervous but terrified. Like the time when I was on a mission trip to the country of Panama and we went swimming with naked Indian kids who were jumping off of thirty, forty and fifty foot cliffs into the water. I remember thinking to myself, if these seven and eight year old kids can do this surely I who am triple their age can take this challenge. I remember feeling a rush of terror as I looked over the cliff and backed away and then suddenly, in a surge wild foolishness ran over the edge and was sucked down through the air and swallowed by the water below. So it was with this preaching engagement. Though I had preached multiple times in the past, never before had I preached on a subject that could seemingly be this controversial or even hurtful. After all, who am I, this young kid who has been married not even two years, to speak on such a great and ancient truth as the sacrament of marriage? However I made it through (go hear to read the sermon: http://philipmayer.blogspot.com/2006/10/divorce.html) and Father Jürgen actually said I did well. Two weeks later I preached again, but this time with no notes whatsoever. In the days before I had written out my sermon and practiced multiple times until I felt I could complete the talk without notes. I felt much better when I stood to preach this time and by the second service I was even able to think on my feet and was beginning to feel a hint of confidence in my speaking ability. After the service I felt that I had conquered. The road to note-less speaking was no longer wobbling like a rope bridge on a child’s playground, but has begun to steady as I progress to the other side.

Youth ministry has been moving steadily forward. Our fall retreat took place without any problems and this past Sunday we went to St. Peters Episcopal Church in Beverly to assist with their weekly soup kitchen and it was a great time with the students.

One of the biggest things that I miss at the seminary is being in a tight-knit group of men who challenge one another and are there for one another during difficult times. I spoke with an acquaintance about this longing and he agreed and then went on to tell of a group that he was involved with at his undergraduate college. Each week they would meet for lunch and then go off and climb up into this old abandoned tunnel. There they would sit in silence until everyone arrived at which point they would pray for one another and through this bonding they became very close. I thought it sounded like an excellent idea and said that we should go for it. We prayed together for God’s leading and then agreed to meet every Tuesday for lunch and prayer. I began talking to some of my other friends on campus and on Tuesday six of us got together for lunch and then we went outside and using the form for Noonday Prayer, prayed for one another. It was great! I am very excited about continuing this group.

Life at the “Mill Street House” is also going well. For those of you who did not know, a few months ago Melissa and I moved into a neo monastic community a few months ago. Mother Beth, one of our former priests at Christ Church and her husband spent a year traveling the globe and visiting intentional Christian communities, both para-church organizations and monasteries here in the states, in Europe and Africa. In following God’s leading they returned to the states and purchased a triple decker house in the worst neighborhood in the city with the intention of building relationships and reaching out to the many poor and rejected people living in the neighborhood. Melissa and I were completely sold on the vision for the house and after much prayer and seeking counsel, we moved into the third floor of the house. Now every morning at seven we gather together in the chapel with the other folks that life here for Morning Prayer and then again then night at ten for Compline. Once a week we have a meal together as a house. We are thoroughly enjoying the experience.