The most important service of the church year, the Great Vigil of Easter opens with an invocation of the Paschal miracle and scripture readings and prayers retelling the great story, beginning with creation. The Resurrection is signified with hallelujahs, bell ringing, singing, and shouts of joy.
No one does the Great Virgil more magnificently than St. Thomas the Apostle in West Hollywood and its corps of carefully trained lay ministers, under the leadership of its rector, the Very Rev. Canon Ian Elliott Davies. This year’s 150-minute service included two baptisms and six confirmations and reaffirmations.
Once again, and for my last time as bishop, I was along to preside and use the homily time to read out the stirring Easter sermon of St. John Chrysostom, namesake of my old hang in Orange County: “Hell took a body, and discovered God. It took earth, and encountered Heaven. It took what it saw, and was overcome by what it did not see.”
St. Thomas’s, know for its Anglo-Catholic worship, always exhibits a deep spirit of welcome and kindness. Members of the diverse congregation of 130 had driven in from as far as Riverside and Ojai. People who move away can’t quit St. Thomas’s, and a healthy number I met last night were newcomers. Almost everyone came through the receiving line with a kind word, en route a reception in the parish hall. It was still going strong at 11 p.m.
Beautiful, transcendent worship, exhibiting the church’s best traditions without compromise or indulgence of short attention spans, and a prophetic and always gracious proclamation of God’s justice and love. This is what Ian and St. Thomas’s do. Last night the candles shown, incense swirled, and choir soared, heralding the Risen Christ come alive in a darkening world to save us all
