I mentioned the other day that for several centuries, Morning Prayer became the normal form of Sunday morning worship in much of the Anglican world. Trying to go back to the more traditional, Eucharistically-focused model of worship, sparked an inevitable backlash — though an ironic one, since the move towards the more traditional model was … Continue reading Like Lost Sheep: General Confession, Morning Prayer
It’s safe to say that we live in a hedonistic society. Our culture values ease, comfort, and pleasure above all else. What makes this interesting to me is that we may be the first society to actually try this. Most ancient societies rejected hedonism as a viable option, and it wasn’t because they valued discomfort … Continue reading What Satisfies: A Reflection on John 4:5-42
Today we shift gears from the evening and nighttime prayers to start morning prayers, and specifically the Anglican Morning Prayer tradition, which combined elements of different morning-time prayers of the Hours. One of the strange peculiarities of Anglican worship was that for several centuries, its Sunday morning liturgical life was dominated by Morning Prayer, with … Continue reading The Sheep of His Hand: The Venite
Roundup Music At the risk of jumping the gun, I low-key think 2026 is shaping up to be a great year in music. After a slow start, we've suddenly already had good to brilliant albums from Baby Nova, Ratboy, Jill Scott, Charli xcx, Mumford and Sons, and Claire Rozencranz. Then last week saw the triumphant … Continue reading Culture Roundup (March 7, 2026): Trusting the Reader… or not
Christian monasticism has always grounded its life and its days in prayer. Its whole day, from the lighting of lamps in the evening, through to bed time, to the middle of the night, to waking, to morning and to noon, was punctuated by prayer services. Today I’d like to look at a prayer that is … Continue reading In Every Season and Every Hour: The Prayer of the Hours
Matthew Root 