Christian Formation
2023-2024 offerings

Please speak with a member of the clergy if you are interested in preparing for the sacrament of baptism or confirmation.

Sunday Morning Adult Formation

Sundays at 9:45 - 10:40 AM
Saint Joseph’s Hall (i.e., the parish hall where coffee hour is held)

• Conversion, Transformation and Life in Christ:
  September 17 & 24; All Sundays in October
  January 21 & 28; February 4 & 11; April 14, 21, 28
  May 5, 12, 19, 26

  In the fall and winter, we will discuss the Confessions of Saint Augustine and the Rule of Saint Benedict. We will be asking how faith is born, how we choose to move—and are moved by God’s grace—from one thing to another, one place to another, one way of life to another. We will ask what is really happening when we are “converted” and then “transformed.” We will ask if conversion and transformation work differently in the modern and postmodern world than they did in earlier centuries. We will also ask how a new way of life is sustained after the first glow of conversion dims and fades. Led by Father Jay Smith.

  On the three Sundays in April, we will focus on theosis (θέωσις), a theological concept also sometimes referred to as deification or divinization. Norman Russell, summarizing the work of Vladimir Lossky, defines theosis as “the final end of humankind, the fullness of mystical union with God, seen in terms of a participation in the divine and uncreated energies which can begin even in this life.”[1] It is the last part of the definition, the aspects that “can begin even in this life,” on which we will primarily concentrate. The thematic focus of the year is conversion and transformation and theosis is one of the more robust ways that Christianity has found to describe our transformation. During these weeks, we will explore how this teaching developed over time, with guides such as Athanasius, Cyril, and Maximus the Confessor, and we will use this survey to reflect upon transformation in our own lives. Led by Father Matt Jacobson

  The last set of classes will take place on Sunday mornings in when Father Jay Smith will lead the class in a series entitled Living in Hope: Following Jesus in the Second Half of Life. We’ll consider the work and thought of writers such as Richard Rohr, OFM, and Joan Chittister, OSB, as well as others who have talked about regret, forgiveness, managing retirement, the “missed life,” the spirituality of aging, and living, thriving, and growing after fifty. This is a class for one and all, and we will benefit from the presence of both the young and those who have entered into the “second half of life.”

• Isaiah 1–12: All Sundays in November; December 3 and 10; Sundays in Lent, including Palm Sunday

  We will be studying a portion of the Old Testament that is all around you in worship but in ways you may not have noticed. The portion we use the most is the Sanctus, lifted entirely from Isaiah 6:5. It reminds us that we pray with the Heavenly Host. Canticle 9 in Morning Prayer draws from Isaiah 12:2-6. We encounter Isaiah in the libretto of Handel’s Messiah written by Charles Jennen. From First Isaiah he draws upon Isaiah 7:14, the prediction of a Virgin Birth. He also uses Isaiah 9:2 and 9:6. We will be looking at how these passages, and all of so-called First Isaiah, function in their original context and then apply them to the world we live in today. Led by Father Pete Powell.

Wednesday Brown Bag Bible Study

Wednesdays 12:45 - 1:30 PM
Saint Joseph’s Hall

• Gospel of Mark: Most Wednesdays at 12:45 PM, January 10 until the end of May

  Following the Noonday Mass, interested friends and members of the parish will gather in Saint Joseph’s Hall for Bible Study. We are reading the Gospel of Mark. Father Smith will speak about the appointed passage for no more than ten minutes and then the members of the class will discuss the passage for another thirty minutes or so. We’ve chosen Mark in part because it has much to say about discipleship. Those attending are invited to bring a brown-bag lunch, and we will eat while studying. Led by Father Jay Smith.

Wednesday Evening Formation

Wednesdays after Evening Prayer at 5:30 PM and Mass at 6:00 PM
October 11 through the end of May

• Catechumenate: Anglicanism 101

  This Fall, Saint Mary’s offers a new formation program called Catechumenate: Anglicanism 101 as a step in that process of transformation. Since the third century, inquirers have been invited into a process called “the catechumenate,” a time for training in Christian thought about God, relationships, and the meaning of life. Designed to cover Christian basics, the Catechumenate serves as preparation for Baptism and/or Confirmation, so it’s a great way to investigate the Episcopal Church and decide whether Saint Mary’s is the place to make your home. Looking to learn more about the fundamentals of Christianity? Searching for a refresher course on the Christian faith? Got a friend you’d like to invite to consider the claims of Christ? Join the Catechumenate on Wednesday nights from October 11 until the end of May! Class is preceded by Evening Prayer at 5:30 PM and Mass at 6:00 PM. For more information and to register for the class, contact Father Sammy Wood at swood@stmvnyc.org. Led by Father Wood.

Retreat and Quiet Days

• Advent Quiet Day on Saturday, December 2, 10:00 AM–3:00 PM 
  Led by Ruth Cunningham and the Reverend Tuesday Rupp

  In our hemisphere, Advent takes place in the darkest season of the year, anticipating the light of God-with-us. What are the gifts the darkness brings, and how do these gifts help us welcome the light of Christ?

  As Advent begins, we invite you to join master musician Ruth Cunningham and the Reverend Tuesday Rupp for a day of quiet, of healing sounds, and of meditation as together we explore the gifts of this holy season in the beauty of the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin. The Quiet Day will include Mass at 12:10 PM, followed by lunch. Please RSVP to Father Jay Smith so we can plan for the lunch.

  Tuesday Rupp is an Episcopal priest and a classically trained singer and music director. She is the co-founder of two women’s vocal ensembles, In Mulieribus and The Julians, both in her hometown of Portland, Oregon. Tuesday is blessed to bring her love of music, literature, art, and performance to her role as Rector at Saint Paul’s Church in Woodbury, CT. She has an M. Div. from Yale Divinity School, with certificates from the Institute of Sacred Music and Berkeley Divinity School, an M. Mus. from Portland State University, and a B. Mus. from Boston University.

  Ruth Cunningham is a classically trained musician, a sound healing practitioner, and a founding member of Anonymous 4. She combines these skills to improvise music that connects people to the healing and spiritual power of music. She specializes in early-music performance as well as improvisational sacred music from varied spiritual traditions in both liturgical and concert settings. With Anonymous 4, Ruth performed in concerts and festivals throughout the United States, Europe, and the Far East and made thirteen recordings including David Lang’s Love Fail and Richard Einhorn’s Voices of Light.  Ruth’s own CD releases are Light and Shadow: Chants, Prayers and Improvisations and Harpmodes: Journey for Voice and Harp. She has released two CDs of multi-faith chants with colleague Ana Hernandez: Blessed by Light and HARC: Inside Chants. She has also performed and recorded renaissance music with Pomerium and sings regularly with church choirs—including the Choir of Saint Mary’s—around Manhattan. Ruth received a B. Mus. in Performance of Early Music from the New England Conservatory of Music and taught recorder and renaissance flute at the Amherst Early Music Workshops for sixteen years. She is certified as a cross cultural-music healing practitioner (CCMHP) by the Open Ear Center where she studied with Pat Moffitt Cook. She has also studied vocal improvisation with Rhiannon. For more information: www.ruthcunningham.com.

• Parish Retreat: Life, the Universe, and Everything: Finding Holiness through Anglican Prayer
  Click here to watch a recording of the retreat.
  Saturday, January 13

  The post-Covid American context offers a host of ways to make meaning and form communities -- what does the church offer now that the secular marketplace does not? Join biblical and liturgical scholar Dr. Derek Olsen in exploring how classical Anglican spirituality speaks to our deepest desires and forms a framework for engaging life's biggest questions. And what does this mean specifically for the church of Saint Mary the Virgin, an Anglo-Catholic parish in the heart of New York City, and for other faith communities like it at the crossroads of the modern world?

  Derek Olsen is a biblical scholar and engaged layman in the Episcopal Church. He earned an M.Div. from Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, an S.T.M. from Trinity Lutheran Seminary, and served as pastoral vicar of a large Lutheran (ELCA) church in the Atlanta suburbs before beginning doctoral work (and being received into the Episcopal Church). He completed a Ph.D. in New Testament in 2011 from Emory University under the direction of Luke Timothy Johnson. His chief areas of interest are in the intersection between Scripture and liturgy, the history of biblical interpretation—particularly in the Church Fathers and the Early Medieval West—and liturgical spirituality. He has served on the Episcopal Church’s Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music. He is the author of Inwardly Digest: The Prayer Book as Guide to a Spiritual Life (Forward Movement, 2016). Derek will show us how the resources that are very close to home—as close as the Book of Common Prayer in the pew or on the bookshelf—can be used in the ongoing work of conversion and transformation.

• Lent Quiet Day on Saturday, February 24
  Led by Sister Monica Clare, CSJB

[1] Norman Russell, The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 4, emphasis added.