Morning Prayer will be held on Zoom at 9:00 AM and at 10:45 AM on Facebook Live beginning this Sunday, June 7!
The 9:00 AM service will continue its focus on connection and pastoral relationship. Anyone can log on to Zoom as we have been these past weeks to share in the worship. Readers will rotate through, signing on from their homes. The clergy who officiates the service will do so from the chapel, to connect with this historic space of prayer.
The 10:45 AM service will add one additional hymn and be streamed entirely from the nave. Viewers will be able to watch on Facebook Live or on the Grace@Home page of our website.
All are welcome, please join us!
The Heart of Things, a weekly online Zoom class for practicing prayer in times of pandemic, is meeting on Tuesdays at 10:00 AM this summer. These pandemic days of heightened anxiety and confusion-even anger and fear-call for a more intentional practice of our faith. How can we think theologically and respond prayerfully to the pressures we face as a spiritual community-even as the global community? How can we lean in, as it were, to the heart of the matter, to the core of things, so we can truly experience that “peace that passes all understanding?”
We bring our Spotify playlists to a conclusion this week with the observance of Trinity Sunday. I am so glad that some of you have delved into this new tool for listening to music. It is such a fabulous resource! I encourage you to start exploring all it has to offer on your own this summer. For example, if you heard a recording you particularly enjoyed, scroll over and click on the album it came from and give that whole album a listen! A great album on this week’s playlist is King’s College’s Bernstein and Britten album, find “Britten: Festival Te Deum, Op. 32” on the playlist, scroll over and click on the album title. “Bernstein: Chichester Psalms – Britten: Rejoice the Lamb & Festival Te Deum.” You’ve heard a couple things on this album, but it includes some more great Bernstein and Britten too. From there, you can go even further by exploring more by the artist “Choir of King’s College, Cambridge,” found in smaller text underneath the album name at the top of the page. This brings you to the Choir of King’s College, Cambridge page. There are dozens of albums to peruse along with a “Fans Also Like” section. Keep clicking and listening!
Like last week for Pentecost, our list this week is somewhat self-guided with lots of references to the Trinity. Our tradition has so much good choral music and hymnody to go with this day! Our appointed Old Testament reading today is the creation story from Genesis 1, so I have included “The Heavens are Telling,” “He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands,” and “Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise” to help us reflect on that passage. All three pieces bring a smile to my face…especially Margaret Bonds arrangement of “He’s Got the Whole World” with Jessye Norman singing!
Possibly my absolute favorite piece of English choral music ends the list this week, a setting of the Te Deum by Herbert Howells. This piece is typically heard with just choir and organ, but this recording came out a year ago to include a fantastic version of an orchestrated accompaniment and I just love it. If you want to put your Spotify skills to the test, you can search for more recordings of this piece to hear it with choir and organ, or click here to watch an amazing performance of the piece at the Cathedral of St. Philip!
Will Gotmer
Director of Music/Organist
This post highlights some events and news pertinent to the upcoming week.