Monday, January 13, 2025

*** This is a rough transcript of today’s show ***

It is the 13th of January 2025. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

A very happy Monday to everyone, even Notre Dame fans.

An email from North Carolina, Fayetteville, to be exact, and from Debbie. Fayetteville looks fascinating- home of the Single A Woodpeckers and… get this- we had a mailbag from Chisholm, Minnesota- I mentioned that was the final resting place of Archibald “Moonlight” Graham- well, Fayetteville, North Carolina is where he was born. Who is “Moonlight Graham”? Please watch Field of Dreams before you do anything else.

Debbie asked about the “number of sacraments” in different churches- she grew up in a church that didn’t emphasize them and now has a friend who was telling her that his church had 3. Ok, Debbie, I’m almost certain your friend is a Lutheran or perhaps an Anglican, but you would know better.

Ok- we’ve dealt with the “7 Sacraments” before- this is the official delineation by the Roman Catholic Church by the year 1215. They are Baptism, Confirmation, Communion, Penance, anointing the sick, marriage, and Holy Orders- it would be rare for someone to take all seven because Holy Orders generally negate marriage and vice versa (but not always).

The Eastern church doesn’t have a set number, and at the Reformation, there was a debate as to what to “keep” or at least keep at the level of “sacrament.” Most churches of the Reformation numbered the sacraments at 2- baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Some Lutherans and a smattering of Anglicans hold to 3- they include confession and absolution. Some will see the spoken word “I forgive you” as the “physical” thing usually necessary for a sacrament (they need both spiritual and physical elements). Others see it as an extension of baptism where they believe sins were forgiven and confession and absolution as an extension of that.

Some Protestant churches have renamed the sacraments “ordinances”- things “ordained” by God, such as baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Others have also taken the command to wash one another’s feet as something “ordained” by God with both a physical and spiritual component.

There have been other bodies that have done away with the sacraments or ordinances altogether- these include some Quakers and Friends who see the “physical” things as having been superseded by their spiritual realities- so, no baptism with Water because by faith we are baptized in the Holy Spirit. These groups tend to come from those more radical groups that ruled themselves independently, and so we see differences in practice.

The Salvation Army is one prominent group that does not celebrate the Sacraments or ordinances and there are various theories as to why- initially, it seems to come out of their movement being a mission and not a church- they wanted to get people into churches and thus were not concerned with the ins-and-outs of what should happen in a service. Over time, they have become a denomination in and of themselves, and while they don’t practice formal sacraments, they permit their members to partake in them elsewhere if they so wish.

I can tell a lot about a church by which sacraments they observe and how they observe them- not in a judgmental way but as a diagnostic to see what tradition they came out of. If you let me ponder for a second, the sacraments: 2, 3, 7, or not numbered are physical things that bring people together- one of them is literally called “communion,”  but we have been separated more by our differing views of the machination of how we believe we should number them or how they work… I’m not proposing anything- just saying…

We are embodied people worshipping an embodied God who came in the flesh and used things like spit and mud to heal- he’s interested in physical things- how that plays out with everything from anointing the sick to washing feet to communions and Baptism, say a lot about our traditions- thanks for the question Debbie in Fayetteville North Carolina (and here’s hoping you are more Tar Heel than Blue Devil but we have room for all)

 

The last word for today from the daily lectionary and Psalm 106- a nice confession of sin and praise for God’s faithfulness.

We have sinned, even as our ancestors did;
    we have done wrong and acted wickedly.

When our ancestors were in Egypt,

    they gave no thought to your miracles;


they did not remember your many kindnesses,

    and they rebelled by the sea, the Red Sea.

Yet he saved them for his name’s sake,

    to make his mighty power known.

He rebuked the Red Sea, and it dried up;

    he led them through the depths as through a desert.

He saved them from the hand of the foe;

    from the hand of the enemy he redeemed them.

The waters covered their adversaries;

    not one of them survived.

Then they believed his promises

    and sang his praise.

 

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 13th of January 2025, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man more Boilermaker than Fighting Irish, and we appreciate that- he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a Buckeye fan until next Monday night- I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.