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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 23h

If they do not have a rectory that is what they usually do - be very clear on it when discussing the package!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

"the corgis were delicious, thanks"

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

He drives her to the ren faire and cosplay cons but does not dress up with her

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Carmela dated a girl once in college

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

there are always old parishioners who wistfully remember the '28 prayer book but dutifully come every Sunday to attend a Rite II or EOW service. that's the rupture I feel the worst about.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

i think this is ultimately the problem with it. the project of liturgical expansion is haphazard and politically fraught. so the "supplements," even authorized, fracture the common prayer of the church. in turn that pits the pro-expansion crowd agains the pro-old school crowd.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I think a major problem with so-called progressive liturgies is that it centers our contemporary anxieties and shibboleths in ways that become outdated quickly. Not calling God "Lord" also doesn't mean he's not.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

we make a lotttttt of assumptions about what is "appropriate" for church.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

he decided to do a traditional Rite I service (surplice, tippet, NORTH END) once per month to change things up. After the first service some members came up and said "we loved this. this is what we wanted all along. The drums and the dancing is what the previous priest thought we did in Liberia"

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

just this week a retired priest told me a story of a time he took over as a rotating priest for a Liberian congregation in the US; the parish was using drums and guitars and dancing processions, which he continued feeling like that was their practice. he was an old white man, didn't want to impose

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I think both camps often confuse preference and custom for liturgical appropriateness. A priest told me verbatim he liked ERIV & EOW in the summer "because that's the time for kooky liturgies" and... man you're really missing the point of 1. liturgy and 2. worship if "kooky" is your 1st choice

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

true enough on prferences - this isn't the place for an expansive (pun intended) discussion about what is appropriate in the liturgy but I am definitely in the small-c conservative camp on aligning things are closely as possible with tradition (what do you expect from an anglo-catholic)

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I think the default "Rite 1 only at 8am, no singing" is just as dismissive of the traditional idiom of the church as some of the anti-EOW partisans are

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

i'm not about to head to ACNA but as an LGBT episcopalian who really does not like the "inclusive language" stuff I am very suspicious of the whole project BUT don't really vocalize that because I don't want to be painted as some weird trad.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

also helps the problem of many parishes being totally different from one another; variety is good and local practices do not have to be lockstep but it can be head-snapping to see how churches just a few miles from each can can do LEM practice so differently (and in some cases so badly...)

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

well quite and that's a different problem but I meant more "there should be similar systems in each diocese instead of each bishop reinventing the wheel each time." It should not be the case that some dioceses have lay preaching and others don't just because one bishop has strong feelings, e.g.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

TEC should have a unified system for licensed lay ministers like the CoE and they should be allowed to wear a blue tippet.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

In the church this morning I passed two younger women waiting for the elevators. One says "you know, once in college I gave up elevators for Lent." The friend says, "Oh, yeah?" to which she replies, "Yeah. I'm not even Catholic but everyone was giving up something so I did too."

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Served the chalice at a wedding today with many non-Episcopalian who came for communion and I only had to ask people to actually eat the Eucharist twice, very good

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

gettin out the S&M gear to touch his books, totally normal

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I double-checked the '78 Green Book and it specifies the ministers receive first. Interesting that this changed in 2006.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

ELW 2006 gives the ministers the choice of receiving first or last. Pfatteicher's book on the '78 liturgy specifies the celebrant receives first, though, and the '58 book doesn't specify any rubric - same as the 1888 Common Service Book. But of course my qualification was "almost all rites."

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

There’s a priest in NYC who has used the pre-conciliar Good Friday prayers referencing the “perfidious Jews” before!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I think broad BCP conformity is the guiding star and suspect that the popularity of Evensong and “traditional language” services is because of a craving for stability. BUT I recognize I think some A/C changes are more valid than 70s/80s style liberal changes so maybe that’s just my priors

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

guiding principle of liturgy ought to be consistency. A few changes here and there don’t hurt, but when you’re adding whole paraliturgical litanies… common prayer is also as much about priests enforcing orthodoxy worship and it is protecting laity from high-handed clergy.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

in this case it’s C of E, which has broad latitude with Common Worship for adaptations and local uses. But lots of TEC Anglo-Catholics deal with this by putting the Angelus after the dismissal. Rubrically correct - the service is over. Or making heavy use of “a hymn, psalm, or anthem may be sung”

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

there are lots of reasons to criticise the Diocese of Fulham but liturgy isn't one of them for me

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

it's the Diocese of Fulham, so yes, of course

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

All Saints, Margaret Street in London says the Hail Mary after the sermon every Sunday, and sings the Angelus after the dismissal!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

but also as a pretty committed Anglo-Catholic I have to recognize that our wing of the church does this sort of thing too, from adding the Oratre Fratres from the Roman Rite or the Ecce Agnus Dei at the invitation to communion. Lots of folks hate that kind of thing!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

I've had moments where, visiting other churches, I ask "why do you do it this way?" and the befuddled response is "I thought everyone did that." Most people have no idea what the prayer book says OR has no understanding of the liturgical and ceremonial history of the church

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

in general I think most Episcopalians assume that what the custom is at their church is universal everywhere! Except for rigid BCP trads and committed Anglo-Catholics most churches are a hodge-podge of inexplicable liturgical custom or the whims of the clergy.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

or concluding the service with the supposed "Prayer of St. Theresa" that goes "Christ has no body but yours..." which in my view is almost heretical. (also, Teresa of Avila didn't write it - a 19th century Methodist did)

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

this thread got me thinking about all the weird things I see in TEC churches that are not rubrical, running the gamut from the celebrant adding "this is God's table, not ours, and all are welcome at his feast" instead of the usual invitation to communion and explicitly inviting the unbaptized

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

but also: the ancient practice of the church is always for the celebrant to receive first! It is a point of unity across almost all rites, in all churches, and is part of the Catholic heritage of the Prayer Book!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Few know the secret to fencing is actually a jaunty little hat.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

stopped in at Pusey House on Sunday for some praise and thanksgiving

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

As far as I can see there are no such rubrics in any of the American prayer books - but it gets interesting because I don't think one appears in the 1764 Scottish Prayer Book (the "Wee Bookie"), even though it does appear in the 1637 Scottish BCP. There might have been a canon for it, though!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

He said “I thought Namibia was a German colony” and his companion had to gently remind him they lost World War I

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

I’m overhearing a conversation in Lincoln’s Inn Fields where a Namibian man is explaining African colonial history to a German who keeps exclaiming “really? Oh, wow.”

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Spot the difference: two difference author portraits for the same book by the same author, published in the same year in the same place. Giacomo di Grassi's "Ragione adoprar sicuramente l'Arme," printed in Venice in 1570 by Giorgio di'Cavalli... or is it Giordano Ziletti?

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

Cohen also used Archie Corble’s collection in Leuven for his book - Corble was a generation after Hutton but had similar collecting interests!

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

Can one order a bumper of port these days or did that go out with the Ancien Regime? 😆

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

Also super funny how the plates of fencers are classed by Bluesky as “adult content”

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

Fascinating. Are there places in London that sell it by the glass? There's a place in New York's Tribeca that specializes in ports and sherries but it's been ages since I've been there.

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Christopher Walsh @deflatermaus.bsky.social · 05/08/2026

6 should be "Catholic AND Reformed"

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