CHURCH OF THE ASCENSION
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CHURCH OF THE ASCENSION |
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Find Us Using MapQuest (please note that this map is for directions only and not the church's mailing address)
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Wednesday Noon Service of Healing
Welcome to the Church of the Ascension web site. We are an Episcopal Church located in the historic district of the village of Wakefield (on the corner of Main Street and Kenyon Avenue) in southern Rhode Island.
What it means to be an Anglican/Episcopalian
A Pastoral Letter from + Catherine Waynick the Episcopal Bishop of Indianapolis
ONE - The Campaign to Make Hunger History ONE Episcopalian ™ is a grassroots partnership between The Episcopal Church and the ONE Campaign to rally Episcopalians – ONE by ONE – to the cause of ending extreme poverty in our world and achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). More information from: Episcopal Relief and Development - "One sixth of the world’s population lives on less than $1.00 every day. One person dies from hunger every 3.5 seconds. Each one of them is a child of God. The aim of Goal One is to cut in half the number of people who are hungry." We are asking you to commit to giving 0.7% of your annual income on the Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation website. Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation is keeping track of individuals, congregations, and dioceses who have pledged 0.7%.
Our MissionWe are a community of Christian people who gather to celebrate the grace of God through worship, learning, sharing and caring, while offering thanks. In our faith journey, we strive to respond to the needs of the parish, local community and the world by sharing the Good New of Jesus Christ. [back to top]
If you join us for worship...you will find that we are a warm and inviting community which will make room for your participation in the life of the parish at whatever level you find comfortable. Our worship services are somewhat traditional in form yet somewhat informal, and always spirit filled, in its celebration. Children are welcome at all services, though child care and Sunday school are only available at the later services. Upon entering the church, you will notice that the appropriate dress is whatever you feel comfortable in. You will be greeted by ushers who will hand you a bulletin and, if you desire, help you find a seat. If you will require the use of a headset, bathroom, or if you need communion brought to you in the pew, the usher will assist you. The bulletin you will be handed has the page numbers in the Book of Common Prayer (red book) for you to follow as well as the hymn numbers (in the blue hymnal or Lift Every Voice and Sing (LEVAS). Any parishioner will be eager to help, if you get lost. Though the bulletin gives instructions regarding when to sit, stand and kneel, you are welcome to use whatever posture suits your own tradition or devotion. The offering that is collected during the service is for the support of the church staff, facilities and mission. We are completely dependent upon parishioners voluntarily sharing with us a portion of the treasure God has given to them. Everyone (regardless of age) is invited to receive Communion. Please sign our guest book in the entrance way of the church and here on our web site. Except during the summer, please join us after the later services for fellowship and refreshments in the parish hall across the walkway from the church. You are invited to join us for worship or any parish event. [back to top]
What it means to be and Anglican/Episcopalian If you’re looking for a church that has Morality but not moralism, the Bible but not bibliolatry, Law but not legalism, Emotion but not emotionalism, Piety but not pietism, Tradition but not sentimentalism, then you’re probably in the right place. If you’re looking for a church where diversity is celebrated and not condemned, where thinking is stimulated and not discouraged, where righteous living is of greater value than right talking, where being loving is more important than being right, you’re in the right place. If you’re looking for a church where Jesus is central, a church that is not afraid to ask difficult questions of Him and of itself, then you’re in the right place. But one word of caution. In such a church open to the ongoing revelations of God, people will constantly be required to look at old things in new ways. Having our thoughts stimulated, asking the difficult questions about belief and doubt, examining old forms, language and customs, and casting them in new and more lively ways, are hallmarks of the Episcopal and Anglican Tradition. (from a description of what it means to be Anglican by Father Dennis Maynard, La Jolla, California)
A Pastoral Letter from +Catherine Waynick Bishop of Indianapolis Understanding our Anglican Heritage
Background, which may be helpful….. From the time of Elizabeth I, the Anglican Churches have not taken the path of either confessionalism (Lutheran or Calvinist) or anathema (Roman Catholic).
We have not claimed that scripture is our only source of wisdom and authority, nor have we invested any one person with papal authority.
We have articulated our teachings and beliefs in the words of our prayers, and have balanced our confidence in scripture with the witness of the traditions and experience of the Church and with the reason, which is one of God’s primary gifts to humanity.
During the turmoil in England following the Reformation, the Anglican Via Media emerged, providing a way to define and live out the faith in broad terms – making it possible for people on different points of the devotional, political and theological spectrum to find themselves included in the teachings and life of the Church. It was a stance of political expediency, but it also had the spiritual humility of granting that no one group of people at one point in history can grasp all the truth for all time. It allowed us to be gracious and accepting of each other even in disagreements, granting one another the assumption that we are all trying our best to be faithful.
One Archbishop has written that Anglicanism is not broad for the sake of inclusion, but rather is comprehensive for the sake of the truth.
The Anglican Communion evolved in much the same way as the British Empire spread and the Church of England took roots in all sorts of new soil. The Provinces of the Communion have never been intertwined in authority or polity. Our liturgical and decision-making structures have evolved in compatibility with our contexts, and until the late 19th century we had little to do with each other. Only since that time have the bishops of the Communion been gathering – at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury – to share their thoughts and information about their various ministries. The records of the first gatherings of bishops makes it clear that there was no intention to style those meetings of bishops as legislative, and that the Conference had no synodical authority to mandate the inner life of the various Provinces.
The Provinces of the Anglican Communion have always been auto-cephalous – or, self-headed – and even the Archbishop of Canterbury was not deemed to have anything like “primatial authority” within the Communion. In fact he does not have it in England! Even so, assumptions were made that we were all very much alike. It has only been over the past forty years that we have begun to appreciate the range of differences that exist in the Provinces of the Communion.
When The Episcopal Church in the United States made it known in the 1960’s that we would begin allowing for the remarriage of some divorced persons in the Church, the furor around the Communion was deafening. A similar uproar occurred when The Episcopal Church resolved that artificial birth control was an acceptable way for married persons to manage the size of their families.
Over the past twenty years we have become aware of the many ways in which the Provinces of the Communion have always been different, most especially in approaches to biblical scholarship, polity, and the exercise of authority – and who could be ordered priests and bishops.
Until the Lambeth Conference of 1998, new bishops in the Provinces of Africa assumed that the Bible was read and interpreted in exactly the same way all over the Communion, and were distressed to discover that some Provinces had taken on practices which they considered to be forbidden in the Bible.
In some Provinces a rather fundamentalist and literalist approach to Scripture is favored. This approach often attributes equal weight to all the writings – giving what is read in Leviticus equal status with what is read in the Gospels. This seems curious, since it disregards the fact that even within the Judaism of Jesus’ day there were disputes over interpretation, and centuries of both written and oral traditions which made it impossible for one group to claim complete inerrancy in its interpretations. This does not seem to deter our brothers and sisters from their insistence that there is no room for interpretation – even given that Our Lord engaged in such thinking and teaching on a regular basis. They assert that the “plain sense” of Scripture is obvious and that interpretations, which do not match their own, are unfaithful and wicked.
In many Provinces the bishops exercise their authority in unilateral ways, speaking for the dioceses they lead in conformity to their own tribal or paternalistic contexts. In some places the bishops regard themselves as the living embodiment of Church order – one Nigerian bishop even boasted to a gathering I attended that he tore up the Constitution of the diocese because “I am the Constitution!” The Archbishop of Nigeria, who was present during this gathering, merely rolled his eyes! Clergy from Africa who have visited this diocese have sought me out to ask for funds, assuming that as bishop I control our funds. When I try to explain that I am not a corporation sole and that the funds are allocated by the budget, they respond with frustration and anger. At home, the bishop controls the purse strings absolutely, so they consider me unwilling to help them and lacking in generosity.
We need also to consider what we hear about the numbers of members in other Provinces of the Communion. First, in many places there is no ability to keep records. Imagine trying to keep careful records of baptisms and confirmations in Sudan - a country torn by war for more than twenty years! It simply doesn’t happen. The bishop of Iran explained to me that he dare not keep such records, since the government might seize them at any moment, and use the information to oppress members. Any figures coming out of that country would be guesswork. It is also a part of African culture not to be clear about numbers. It is impolite to ask an African how many children he has, because if an enemy knows the number of children he can determine what force he needs to defeat you.
Remember that Samuel railed against the people when they demanded a king, telling them a king would count them, make them pay taxes, and conscript them into labor. When our dear friend Bishop Garang visited here in 2003 he told the story over and over of how he traveled from place to place preaching and baptizing. Every time he told the story the numbers grew larger! His own culture would not accuse him of being deceitful – he was emphasizing the great need of people to hear the Good News and their fervent response to it. Large numbers make the story more effective, even though there is no way to be certain what the numbers really are. The reaction to inflated membership figures here, however, would be scorn.
What we are facing just now is the clash between very different cultures and the desire of some to take advantage of that clash to press their own agendas. The church of the Southern Cone of America comprises the Dioceses of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay. The Primate is the Most Rev. Gregory James Venables. The Bishop of Bolivia is the Rt. Rev Frank Lyons. In 1974 the Archbishop of Canterbury gave over his metropolitical authority for the dioceses of the Southern Cone and the new province was formed in 1981
Contact us: Church of the Ascension, 370 Main Street P.O. Box 5248 Wakefield, Rhode Island 02880 Phone: 401-783-2911 Fax: 401-789-0792 E-Mail: AscensionW@Juno.com Parish Office Hours: (in order to accommodate our Parish Administrator's quest for higher education, our office hours may change each semester) Monday-Wednesday-Friday -- 8 AM - 2 PM Tuesday and Thursday - office closed Rector's Office Hours: Wednesday mornings, schedule permitting and other times by appointment.
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