“Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it.”

You will all have noticed by now that we have changed our worship bulletins quite a bit this past month. Whereas previously our bulletins simply provided page numbers to help worshipers follow along in the Book of Common Prayer and the Hymnal, virtually the entire service is now in our bulletins, aside from hymns. This change was done  heartily, for one primary reason; the Book of Common Prayer, while one of the most beautiful worship resources ever compiled, is not terribly user friendly. Visitors to our church often have a difficult time appreciating the beauty of our liturgy, because they are having so much difficulty juggling books, and trying to figure out what page we are on. When I was growing up, it was an assumption that most people worshiping in our churches had been raised as Episcopalians. It was assumed that everyone could follow along with the service just fine; most of us, in fact, had everything memorized. Those days, in my opinion, are long gone. For good or ill, a great number of people in our country today have little or no experience with any faith tradition at all, let alone the rather formal way in which we Episcopalians worship. It is our goal to reach as many of these people as we can, people who have no church, yet have that deep thirst for God that is planted in each of us by our creator. When these pilgrims visit our church, I believe it is vital that we facilitate their worship as much as we are able. To me, this is a very important hospitality issue.  I pray that they will help to render our beautiful liturgy just a little more accessible to those who are unfamiliar with our church. Now that we have made our service a little easier for visitors to follow, the next step is up to you—invite a friend to come worship with us one Sunday! I‟m sure they will agree that, no matter what the format, we Episcopalians have some of the most beautiful worship there is.   Full Text Click Here