An Important Early Step in "the Process"
Just a bit of personal news: Last night the vestry at St. Vincent's Cathedral, my home parish, endorsed my application for admission to postulancy. I was honored by their confidence in my meager abilities and by their kind words of support. My sincere thanks to any vestry members who may stop by to read my humble blog.
As some of you may know, I first began to sense a call to ordained ministry more than eight years ago. But my long sojourn in a doctoral program and temporary residence in the doctrinally unsound diocese of Chicago meant waiting until I returned home to Texas before formally beginning to "discern" whether or not I am called to the priestly office. I rejoice that the formal process is now underway. Thanks to all my friends for the prayers and support.
Next up--the diocesan Commission on Ministry!!
As some of you may know, I first began to sense a call to ordained ministry more than eight years ago. But my long sojourn in a doctoral program and temporary residence in the doctrinally unsound diocese of Chicago meant waiting until I returned home to Texas before formally beginning to "discern" whether or not I am called to the priestly office. I rejoice that the formal process is now underway. Thanks to all my friends for the prayers and support.
Next up--the diocesan Commission on Ministry!!
posted by Texanglican (R.W. Foster+) | 6:43 AM
13 Comments:
Congratulations and good luck! I look forward to reading about your process, as I will most likely be going through the same in November.
With prayers...
-j
Best wishes on a smooth process Randall. Hope to see you in Wisconsin next fall.
Chad
Ah, yes. This is the point where I recently dropped the process. Congratulations and good luck to you. ECUSA needs all the Randall Fosters and J. J. O'Sullivans and Lee Nelsons it can get if I wants to survive.
Hi Randall, Jay here.
My heartfelt congratulations on your success, although that's quite enough about your "meager" abilities. There's nothing meager about them. And if anybody from the vestry is reading, you can quote me on that.
over and out,
Jay
Yeah Randall, I agree with Jay. Don't let us hear you use the word "meager" about your abilities unless you mean your abilities in chemical engineering, parachuting, or glass blowing.
Thanks very much, my friends. But glass blowing, mmmm ... that sounds interesting!
Yes, Congratulations indeed! Praise God from whom all blessings flow!
Congratulations. Good luck and wise choosing for the rest of your journey.
Thanks for the nice comment about our diocese.
Thanks for dropping by, Scott. I am sorry if you found my comment on Chicago to be hurtful. "Unsound doctrine" was,however, typical of my own experience of the diocese of Chicago. The Church of the Ascension was the only parish I visited in the city of Chicago where I felt comfortable that I would never hear overt heresy or a direct challenge to the traditional ethics of the Church taught from the pulpit. (St. John's Naperville was also fine, but it was too far away.) St Paul and the Redeemer and Brent House in Hyde Park seem quite symptomatic of much that goes on in the diocese of Chicago to me. (I have heard key articles of the Nicene creed--such as the divinity of Christ--expressly denied during sermons at both of these institutions.) Hence my comment about a "doctrinally unsound" diocese. Obviously there are "sound" parishoners and priests remaining the diocese, but as a whole I did not find it a bastion of orthodoxy. There is, of course, no need to even touch on the glaring differences in teachings on sexual ethics between my own diocese (which I consider "doctrinally sound")and those of the leadership of the diocese of Chicago. I hope this clarifies my remark. God bless, sir.
I just thought it was a bit general to characterize the diocese as doctrinally unsound. Best wishes on your Process!
Congratulations, prayers and best wishes, Randall.
Thanks again, Francesco. May it please God to help Pope Benedict and the leaders of classical Anglicanism to heal the breach between our traditions. I would very much like to be a brother priest with you in a reunited Church, sir. (If it should please God to call both of us to that office, of course.) Pax.
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