A Second Bishop for Canada
By the time this Newsletter will be read by the parish, our Archdiocesan Assembly will have given to Bishop Seraphim a name which he is invited to put forward as an auxiliary bishop to the Holy Synod (that is, to the other bishops of the O.C.A.). It is the Holy Synod which ultimately makes the final choice.
After the consecration of his new bishop, Bishop Seraphim will still be the ruling bishop of our Archdiocese. Nothing will change in this respect—he will still be our archpastor, and all final decisions regarding the archdiocese will still be his to make. The election of an auxiliary bishop as his assistant is not meant to limit access to Bishop Seraphim. We are not losing a bishop; we are gaining an auxiliary!
Bishop Seraphim has requested the election of another bishop to help him with his schedule of episcopal visitation. The archdiocese of Canada is the largest diocese in the world, geographically-speaking. It is not rich in numbers (or money), but vast in its spread, and in order to take pastoral care of his far-flung flock, Bishop Seraphim has had to travel from one end of the country to the other. This has inevitably exacted a cost from him in terms of health. It is hoped that the presence of an auxiliary bishop will help him in this regard.
We are invited to pray for the new bishop (whoever he may be; this is being written prior to his election), to love him, commending him daily to God that he may fulfill his episcopate for God’s glory. The episcopate is a great responsibility, and we who benefit from his episcopal labours must support the bishop by our prayers.
All my love in the Lord,
Fr. Lawrence.
Community Anouncements
- Saturday Vespers, 7.00 pm on August 7, 14 (Dormition Vigil), 21, and 28. Sunday Liturgy, at 10.00 am on August 1, 8, 15, 22, and 29.
- Home Bible Studies at 7:00 pm on Wednesdays, August 4, 11, 18, 25; at the home of Matthew and Cheryl.
- Vesperal Liturgy for Feast of Transfiguration, on Thursday, Aug. 5, at 7.00 pm. Bring fruit to be blessed on this day. Vespers and Litya for St. Herman, on Monday, August 9, 7.00 pm. Divine Liturgy for Dormition of the Theotokos, with blessing of flowers, Sunday, August 15, 10.00 am.
- Farewell B-B-Q for the Rigden-Briscalls, after Liturgy Sunday, August 15.
- Dormition Fast from August 1 to 14: On weekdays of the Fast, we abstain from meat, fish, dairy, wine and oil. On Saturdays and Sundays of the Fast, we abstain from meat, fish and dairy, but are allowed wine and oil. Fish is also allowed on Aug. 6 (for the Feast of the Transfiguration), on Aug. 9 (for the Feast of St. Herman of Alaska), and on August 13 (for the Feast of St. Tikhon of Zadonsk). Also, make sure that you go to confession during this time.
- Beheading of St. John the Baptist – Strict Fast Day on Sunday, August 29. On this day, wine and oil are allowed, but meat, fish, and dairy are not.
BOOK REVIEW: Looking for God in Harry Potter by John Granger, Tyndale House
Reviewed by Donna Farley
(Editor’s Note: The following article will be printed in the next ‘Canadian Orthodox Messenger’. The book being reviewed is available in the parish library.)
Why would Christian readers even consider "looking for God" in Harry Potter -- the phenomenally successful and controversial series of books about witches and wizards? That must be somebody's wishful thinking—or worse yet, a plot hatched by C.S. Lewis's craftily deceptive demon, Screwtape….
Orthodox Christian author John Granger certainly thought so when he first set out to read the books so that he could say why he didn't want his seven children reading them. But Granger got a surprise: from the very first book, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling's themes, symbols, and character names rang bells—you might say church bells—with Granger's classical and literary training.
After reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Granger quickly devoured the rest of the series then in print in big gulps, read them aloud with his family, and began discussing them with friends at local gatherings of the C.S. Lewis Society. Those friends, fascinated and enlightened by his take on the controversial books, urged him to compile his material and present it more formally. Before long, Granger's enthusiasm for Harry and the world of Hogwarts became something of a vocation, turning him into a featured speaker at numerous venues, including Nimbus 2003, a large convention of Harry Potter fans. He gathered his material into a self-published book, which sold out and was then picked up by Tyndale, a major Christian publishing house.
In the Introduction to his book, Granger writes: "My thesis is essentially this: As images of God designed for life in Christ, all humans naturally resonate with stories that reflect the greatest story ever told—the story of God who became man. The Harry Potter novels, the best-selling books in publishing history, touch our hearts because they contain themes, imagery, and engaging stories that echo the Great Story we are wired to receive and respond to."
How can stories about the training of a boy wizard possibly relate to Christianity? Far from attempting to impose some sort of Christian moral on worldly or possibly demonic stories, Granger demonstrates in profuse detail that J.K. Rowling has structured her series around the alchemical purification of the soul— a system of Christian imagery used by writers in the tradition of great literature stretching back to Shakespeare and beyond. The overarching themes of love and death bring Harry to a scene of momentous battle with evil and death at the conclusion of each volume. In each of those scenes, Granger points out, "Harry never saves himself, but is always saved by a symbol of Christ or by love."
Some of those symbols of Christ are apparent to anyone familiar with C.S. Lewis's Narnia Chronicles or with the medieval bestiary. Before the Reformation turned Christendom upside-down, resulting finally in the post-Christian world we have today, Christian writers delighted to find signs of Christ everywhere they looked. Among the traditional symbols adopted by Rowling from ancient and medieval sources are the unicorn (purest of all creatures, whose blood gives life); the phoenix (who dies and rises again); the stag (in which form Christ appeared to several different medieval saints); and the lion (whom the Apocalypse 5:5 identifies with Christ).
But what about the magic? Before reading the Harry Potter books, Granger was highly protective of his children's minds and souls. He did not own a television, and would have no truck with anything occult. None of that changed after his discovery of Rowling's books as Christian literature. Unplugged from so much of popular culture, Granger did not know of the anti-Harry attitudes in some Christian circles until after he had read the books, and was somewhat taken aback to learn of what he calls the "sound and fury in the popular media and coming from many pulpits." To bring a little sanity amid that sound and fury, the opening chapter of his book deals with the fictional use of magic as a symbol for a spiritual worldview, opposed to the materialism that surrounds us daily, and with the difference between "invocational" and "incantational" magic.
"Invocational" magic is that practiced by real pagans, wiccans, Satanists and others in the world even today, in which spiritual powers—i.e. demons—are called upon. The magic in Harry Potter, however, Granger demonstrates, is not invocational, but (like that in the Narnia Chronicles and Lord of the Rings) incantational: magic in a literary medium that symbolically "sings along" with the universe of which God is the all-wise and all-loving Creator.
As Granger's introduction puts it, his book is a "step-by-step walk through …images, themes, and stories to reveal the core of the Harry Potter books and why they are so popular: they address the need (really an innate need akin to our need for physical nourishment) that we have for spiritual nourishment in the form of edifying, imaginative experience of life in Christ." Granger's book is a must-read for parents, educators and clergy. Harry Potter is a cultural phenomenon that will touch your children, your students, your parishoners, your mission field; Looking For God in Harry Potter unlocks the Christian theology smuggled into the heart of Rowling's books.
Choir Corner
August will be busy musically with three feasts in the first half of the month (Transfiguration, St. Herman’s Day and Dormition). On Saturday, August 14th, we will be having a Vigil service (which is Great Vespers and abbreviated Matins) to celebrate the Eve of Dormition. It will be great to sing some of the matins music again such as the Magnificat and the Great Doxology.
On August 15th, the Feast of the Dormition, the choir will continue to practise our “regular” Liturgy and Vespers music. We are currently learning a Byzantine setting of “Of Your Mystical Supper” to sing during the Clergy Communion. We have also learned a new setting of “One is Holy . . .”, the introduction to the Communion Hymn Verse that we will begin to use in September. This will be easy for everyone in the congregation to learn because it is a short piece and very melodic.
Advance notice of a music workshop to be held here at the Church on Saturday, November 6th. This will be an all day workshop for the choir with a session on musical phrasing and a session about singing Byzantine music. These first two sessions will be led by “guest speakers”. Everyone in the congregation is welcome to attend and are especially invited to attend the last session of the day, starting at 4:00pm. This workshop will be geared to choir members and congregation together. It will discuss the form and function of Church music and what congregational singing is (and even why we need a choir when everyone is supposed to sing). You’ll even learn to sing some new music.
After this workshop we will have dinner together and then we can all attend Vespers. It will be a fun and educational afternoon and I hope to see everyone there. More information will be coming in future “Choir Corner” columns.
If you have any question or comments regarding choir, please feel free to speak to me at coffee hour or phone me at 604 – 591 – 6326 or e-mail me at
davidcolin{at}telus.net (replace "{at}" with "@").
Andrea Folster;
Choir Director.
St. Herman of Alaska Orthodox Church
