Drew Downs

Make a New Normal

Book of Common Prayer

  • Common

    Episode 73 of the Make Saints podcast

  • Our focus on being together can get in the way of making it happen–and doing the very thing we’re called to do.

  • Pray

    Making your beautiful prayer common. Prompt 5: Let’s hear what you’ve got! Read: Read over your notes and prayers from last week. Assignment: Pick an opening and closing that you like. And practice praying with the basic outline. Practice in a mirror, in the shower, or in your car–wherever you are.Take notes on what works for you…

  • Did The Episcopal Church vote to revise its Prayer Book? Yes and No. The one thing missing from the 79th General Convention coverage is how we chose confusion over clarity. Prayer Book Revision On Hold. Sort of. But Not Really? Depending on where you got your General Convention coverage, the headlines declared the House of…

  • For many, the Book of Common Prayer is a source of continuity and comfort. What they rarely recognize is that it is a radical, world-changing document. Written and updated by Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury (1533-1556), the Book of Common Prayer, or BCP was a radical invention formed of a radical time. England, thoroughly enmeshed in another of…

  • I went to seminary to find the answers. All of them. To be smart and do the right things. It took longer than it should’ve to see how wrong I was. I had swallowed that ridiculousness whole. Liturgy was uniform and precise. Beliefs were specific and certain. There was a common understanding that went all…