Almighty God,
give us grace to cast away the works of darkness
and to put on the armour of light,
now in the time of this mortal life,
in which your Son Jesus Christ came to us in great humility;
that on the last day,
when he shall come again in his glorious majesty
to judge the living and the dead,
we may rise to the life immortal;
through him who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

On this first day of Advent, the beginning of a new liturgical year, a detail of Margaret Edith Rope's remarkable east window, 'The Redemption of Creation', at Far Headingley, Leeds, installed in 1922, her first major commission. pic.twitter.com/mvIjf4zFcV

— Simon Knott (@SimoninSuffolk) December 1, 2024

The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzzi′ah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezeki′ah, kings of Judah.

Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth;
for the Lord has spoken:
“Sons have I reared and brought up,
but they have rebelled against me.
The ox knows its owner,
and the ass its master’s crib;
but Israel does not know,
my people does not understand.”

Ah, sinful nation,
a people laden with iniquity,
offspring of evildoers,
sons who deal corruptly!
They have forsaken the Lord,
they have despised the Holy One of Israel,
they are utterly estranged.

Why will you still be smitten,
that you continue to rebel?
The whole head is sick,
and the whole heart faint.
From the sole of the foot even to the head,
there is no soundness in it,
but bruises and sores
and bleeding wounds;
they are not pressed out, or bound up,
or softened with oil.

Your country lies desolate,
your cities are burned with fire;
in your very presence
aliens devour your land;
it is desolate, as overthrown by aliens.
And the daughter of Zion is left
like a booth in a vineyard,
like a lodge in a cucumber field,
like a besieged city.

If the Lord of hosts
had not left us a few survivors,
we should have been like Sodom,
and become like Gomor′rah.

–Isaiah 1:1-9

En zo vliegen we #december al weer in. Fijne zondag😀 #natuur #landschap #herfst #Rhenen #ElstUt #Elsterbuitenwaard #Nederrijn #zonsopkomst #mooieluchten pic.twitter.com/PL0Zp8AmTg

— Tjark Dieterman (@DietermanTjark) December 1, 2024

Almighty God, who didst give such grace to thine apostle Andrew that he readily obeyed the call of thy Son Jesus Christ, and brought his brother with him: Give unto us, who are called by thy Word, grace to follow him without delay, and to bring those near to us into his gracious presence; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

"As first of the Apostles to be called, O Andrew, brother of him who was foremost, beseech the Master of all to grant the world peace and our souls great mercy." – Apolytikion of St Andrew.
Stained glass from Kilianskirche in Heilbronn, Germany.https://t.co/DI8JQbwBjn pic.twitter.com/2ZdMoE3N1k

— Fr Lawrence Lew, O.P. (@LawrenceOP) November 30, 2024

O God, so rule and govern our hearts and minds by thy Holy Spirit, that being ever mindful of the end of all things, and the day of thy just judgment, we may be stirred up to holiness of living here, and dwell with thee forever hereafter; through Jesus Christ, thy Son, our Lord.

Good #Saturday morning
from beautiful #Donegal 💚💛

Today's #GoodMorning photograph is of the view from the historic #Inishkeel Island across to #Narin #beaches #islands #Ireland . @ThePhotoHour pic.twitter.com/72h97MyaZK

— WeLoveDonegal (@welovedonegal) November 30, 2024

And when he drew near and saw the city he wept over it, saying, “Would that even today you knew the things that make for peace! But now they are hid from your eyes. For the days shall come upon you, when your enemies will cast up a bank about you and surround you, and hem you in on every side, and dash you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another in you; because you did not know the time of your visitation.”

And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer’; but you have made it a den of robbers.”

And he was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people sought to destroy him; but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people hung upon his words.

–Luke 19:41-48

First light is often the best to light up your path – Happy weekend, friends #ScotlandisNow #StormHour #photography #photooftheday #landscape #OutAndAboutScotland #landscapephotography @VisitScotland @ScotsMagazine #friend0s #ThePhotoHour #stvsnaps #beautiful #weekend pic.twitter.com/or2f3Ya9d1

— Mike Wood (@MikeMikwd) November 30, 2024

Thanks be unto thee, O Christ, because thou hast broken for us the bonds of sin and brought us into fellowship with God the Father.

Thanks be unto thee, O Christ, because thou hast overcome death and opened to us the gates of eternal life.

Thanks be unto thee, O Christ, because where two or three are gathered together in thy Name there art thou in the midst of them.

Thanks be unto thee, O Christ, because thou ever livest to make intercession for us.

For these and all other benefits of thy mighty work, thanks be unto thee O Christ, Who livest and reignest with God the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, ever one God, world without end, Amen.

—New Every Morning (The Prayer Book Of The Daily Broadcast Service) [BBC, 1900]

This morning's nice colourful sky before sunrise in Stockingford Warwickshire. @StormHour @ThePhotoHour #loveukweather pic.twitter.com/I8D5YemVXN

— Jack March Photography📸 (@Jacksweatherch1) November 29, 2024

Surely the righteous shall give thanks to thy name; the upright shall dwell in thy presence.

–Psalm 140:13

Happy Friday 🩷
A wonderful Fen Sky this morning in Ely. #Sunrise #goodmorning #LovEly pic.twitter.com/2ueugP31b1

— Veronica in the Fens 🧚🏼‍♀️ My Heart in Nature (@VeronicaJoPo) November 29, 2024

“Lord, behold our family here assembled. We thank Thee for this place in which we dwell; for the love that unites us; for the peace accorded us this day; for the hope with which we expect the morrow; for the health, the work, the food, and the bright skies, that make our lives delightful; for our friends in all parts of the earth, and our friendly helpers in this foreign isle. Let peace abound in our small company. Purge out of every heart the lurking grudge. Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Offenders, give us the grace to accept and to forgive offenders. Forgetful ourselves, help us to bear cheerfully the forgetfulness of others. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent endeavours. If it may not, give us the strength to encounter that which is to come, that we be brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temperate in wrath, and in all changes of fortune, and, down to the gates of death, loyal and loving one to another. As the clay to the potter, as the windmill to the wind, as children of their sire, we beseech of Thee this help and mercy for Christ’s sake.”

Happy Thanksgiving to Americans celebrating in the United States, Canada, and everywhere else! 🦃🍁 pic.twitter.com/jdlFZ5i3BE

— U.S. Embassy Ottawa (@usembassyottawa) November 28, 2024

Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward,
Secretary of State

#AbrahamLincoln helped establish #Thanksgiving as a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Thursday of November. #AbeSays

We hope you have a healthy, happy holiday!

Source: https://t.co/nGWvipD9Q5 pic.twitter.com/Ao0gOHRcew

— Lincoln Presidential Library (@ALPLM) November 28, 2024

🦃 #verseoftheday
1 Chronicles 16:34 NIV
[34] Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever.https://t.co/oKyjMFB1Rx

— Find Alpha (@MicrocapTrader) November 28, 2024

Blessing and honour, and thanksgiving and praise,
more than we can utter,
more than we can conceive,
be unto thee, O holy and glorious Trinity,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
by all angels, all men, all creatures,
for ever and ever.

🇺🇸 To the American community in Northern Ireland and to our families, friends and colleagues at home and overseas, Happy Thanksgiving. (Photo: Blue Ridge Parkway, NC) pic.twitter.com/CrCCi8Cnw0

— US Consulate Belfast (@USAinNI) November 28, 2024

[New York, 3 October 1789]

By the President of the United States of America. a Proclamation.

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor — and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be — That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks — for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation — for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war — for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed — for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted — for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions — to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually — to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed — to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness onto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord — To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us — and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New-York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.

Go: Washington

In 1789, President George Washington, on behalf of Congress, issued a Thanksgiving Proclamation designating Thursday, November 26, as a national day of "public thanksgiving and prayer." ⁣

Learn more: https://t.co/j84NeR2rPH pic.twitter.com/U8R1YqjYDX

— Mount Vernon (@MountVernon) November 28, 2024

Almighty and gracious Father, we give you thanks for the fruits of the earth in their season and for the labors of those who harvest them. Make us, we pray, faithful stewards of your great bounty, for the provision of our necessities and the relief of all who are in need, to the glory of your Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

#Thanksgiving pic.twitter.com/Y6WkWncOHa

— Sandra Boynton (@SandyBoynton) November 28, 2024

A Song of Ascents. Of David. O LORD, my heart is not lifted up, my eyes are not raised too high; I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me. But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a child quieted at its mother’s breast; like a child that is quieted is my soul. O Israel, hope in the LORD from this time forth and for evermore.

–Psalm 131

Happy Thanksgiving to the Town of Summerville! 🦃🍁

We’re grateful for our wonderful community and wish you all a joyful day filled with love, gratitude and family! #HappyThanksgiving #SummervilleSC #Thankful pic.twitter.com/np0jsukvii

— Town of Summerville (@SummervilleSC) November 28, 2024

Roboticists increasingly believe that their field is approaching its ChatGPT moment. (Robotics researcher) Tony Zhao told me that when he ran one of his latest creations he immediately thought of GPT-3. “It feels like something that I’ve never seen before,” he said. In the top labs, devices that once seemed crude and mechanical—robotic—are moving in a way that suggests intelligence. A.I.’s hands are coming online. “The last two years have been a dramatically steeper progress curve,” Carolina Parada, who runs the robotics team at Google DeepMind, told me. Parada’s group has been behind many of the most impressive recent robotics breakthroughs, particularly in dexterity. “This is the year that people really realized that you can build general-purpose robots,” she said. What is striking about these achievements is that they involve very little explicit programming. The robots’ behavior is learned.

Read it all.

A future generation of robots will not be programmed to complete specific tasks. Instead, they will use A.I. to teach themselves, James Somers reports. https://t.co/U7euwIw6mW

— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) November 27, 2024

Some time ago, I found myself sitting at a dinner opposite a Labour peer. We chatted over various things as the evening proceeded. Just before we were getting up to leave a new topic came up. “I am a convinced campaigner for assisted dying,” she said. “As a bishop, I suspect you’re not. Why don’t you think we should do it?” Put on the spot, struggling to know what to say, and knowing I probably had one line to deliver as we stood up to leave, I said something like this: “Life is a gift from God. It’s not up to us to decide when it ends.” She looked across at me with a pitying look and walked away, clearly unconvinced.

I’ve often wondered what I should have said. Lord Falconer suggests that only secular people like him are ‘objective’ and religious people like me or Shabana Mahmood are biased and therefore our views are to be discounted. The idea that his secular perspective is not colouring his views, but that our religious ones are, or that he is not imposing his beliefs on others whereas we are, is of course, as Isabel Hardman has argued, philosophical nonsense.

Our religious beliefs shape our views, as his secular views shape his. The question is which perspective gives us a better, healthier and more coherent way of living together. I spoke recently to a key figure in the Church of England’s response to Assisted Dying who told me in no uncertain terms that religious arguments simply don’t wash in this debate. We have to use pragmatic and political ones that appeal to a wide audience. And so, the main arguments we have heard from church leaders and others against assisted suicide refer to the slippery slope argument: that legislation will inevitably in time become looser to include more candidates; care for the vulnerable, such as the elderly or the disabled who will feel pressurised into taking their own life, or, as the Health Secretary Wes Streeting has argued, the fact that palliative care is not yet robust enough in our health system to enable a proper choice.

Read it all.

My thoughts on why religion matters in the assisted dying debate https://t.co/SJBK4fUI3B

— Graham Tomlin (@gtomlin) November 27, 2024

Two new area bishops in the diocese of Oxford are to be Canons Dave Bull and Mary Gregory, it was announced on Wednesday morning.

Canon Bull, Team Rector in the Marlow Area Team Ministry, and Area Dean of Wycombe, will be the next Area Bishop of Buckingham.

Canon Gregory, who is a residentiary canon of Coventry Cathedral with responsibility for arts and reconciliation, will be the Area Bishop of Reading.

The Bishop of Oxford, Dr Steven Croft, said that he was delighted with the two appointments. Of Canon Gregory, he said: “She brings great warmth, humanity, and a profound understanding of the healing power of reconciliation in God’s world.

Read it all.

Big great news, Mary Gregory bishop designate Reading and Dave Bull Buckingham @oxforddiocese pic.twitter.com/JNeQJ914JP

— Paul Cowan (@PaulHCowan) November 27, 2024

Scott Bessent spent the past 40 years studying economic history. Now, as Donald Trump’s choice to lead the Treasury Department, he has the chance to make his mark on it.

As a hedge-fund manager, first at George Soros’s firm and later at his own, Bessent specialized in macroinvesting, or analyzing geopolitical situations and economic data to wager on big-picture market moves. He generated billions of dollars in profits betting on and against currencies, interest rates, stocks and other asset classes around the world.

He was motivated to step out from behind his desk and get involved with Trump’s campaign in part because of a view that time is running out for the U.S. economy to grow its way out of excessive budget deficits and indebtedness.

Read it all.

Scott Bessent Sees a Coming ‘Global Economic Reordering.’ He Wants to Be Part of It. ⁦@WSJ⁩ https://t.co/qkvP5PVnVG

— Jennifer Ablan (@jennablan) November 25, 2024

O Everliving God, let this mind be in us which was also in Christ Jesus; that as he from his loftiness stooped to the death of the cross, so we in our lowliness may humble ourselves, believing, obeying, living, and dying to the glory of the Father; for the same Jesus Christ’s sake.

Zodra het zonnetje boven de wolken komt is het genieten. Fijne woensdag😀 #natuur #landschap #herfst #Rhenen #ElstUt #Elsterbuitenwaard #zonsopkomst #mooieluchten pic.twitter.com/zR8HqgDeaR

— Tjark Dieterman (@DietermanTjark) November 27, 2024

We learn, lastly, from these verses, that converted sinners will always give evidence of their conversion. We are told that Zaccheus “stood, and said unto the Lord, the half of my goods I give unto the poor; and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.” There was reality in that speech. There was unmistakable proof that Zaccheus was a new creature. When a wealthy Christian begins to distribute his riches, and an extortioner begins to make restitution, we may well believe that old things have passed away, and all things become new. (2 Cor. 5:17.) There was decision in that speech. “I give,” says Zaccheus–“I restore.” He does not speak of future intentions. He does not say, “I will,” but “I do.” Freely pardoned, and raised from death to life, Zaccheus felt that he could not begin too soon to show whose he was and whom he served.

—Expository Thoughts on the Gospels

James Tissot, Zacchaeus in the Sycamore Awaiting the Passage of Jesus https://t.co/t9ToFF4sFP pic.twitter.com/g5LylEtFpO

— Ben (@lectionaryart) November 27, 2024

He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man named Zacchae′us; he was a chief tax collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchae′us, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, “He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.” And Zacchae′us stood and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold.” And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost.”

–Luke 19:1-10

Holy Island sunrises.#Northumberland #landscapephotography pic.twitter.com/ZwHKjTt6SP

— Jim Scott (@jimscottphoto) November 27, 2024

A FUNERAL is sometimes misunderstood as drawing a line under a bereavement: that it represents a closure. This is not the case. An important ritual in the process of mourning, a funeral is more of a start than an end point. The bereaved now face a life without their loved one, and this could involve significant change, particularly if the loved one played a central part, such as that of a spouse.

Elsie, 75, described how she had never slept alone in a house until her husband died. To have nobody under the same roof made her nervous every night, until she started getting used to it.

Kathy, widowed unexpectedly, explained: “I had a lovely priest who was incredibly sympathetic to the whole situation surrounding my husband’s death, but there was no further bereavement support [after the funeral] provided by the church.

“This lack of support left me really struggling, especially with my feelings about God and what had happened. I really needed to be able to talk through everything from a religious aspect, which I couldn’t get with conventional bereavement counselling.”

Read it all.

A funeral is not the end of the road, says Abi May, but many mourners feel isolated afterwardshttps://t.co/od0Q0JSMuh

— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) November 27, 2024

As if lawmakers needed any other reasons to take America’s fiscal health seriously, the gross national debt of the United States has now officially reached $36 trillion. We started 2024 by crossing the $34 trillion threshold, added another trillion during the summer, and now we’re heading into the holidays with yet another trillion. Government borrowing is becoming as certain as the changing of the seasons these days.

It’s often said that the more times you say a word over and over, the more it starts to lose its meaning. With so many trillion-dollar debt milestones in recent years, it’s easy to forget that each of them has real-world consequences.

But rising debt poses serious domestic and geopolitical risks: it slows our economy, threatens higher inflation and interest rates, and squeezes our budget through higher interest rates. And it hampers our ability to be flexible in responding to recessions and disasters at home and foreign crises abroad.

And the future trajectory looks bleak as well.

Read it all.

🚨Federal debt has officially breached $36 trillion, as projected 4 days ago, w/ Treasury borrowing $61 billion yesterday; we're in serious trouble and our nation's finances are falling apart… https://t.co/iekNG1US1W pic.twitter.com/zPzJJlBYGC

— E.J. Antoni, Ph.D. (@RealEJAntoni) November 22, 2024

Shortly after conception, a fertilized egg divides, becoming two. Then each of those cells splits, becoming four, and on and on. Over time, those lineages of cells grow distinct, giving rise to all the different organs and tissues in the human body and comprising as many as 36 trillion cells.

Scientists would love to understand the trajectory of each of those cells over time. “It’s something that developmental biologists like me have dreamed of for over 100 years,” said Alex Schier of the University of Basel in Switzerland. But the best they have managed has been taking snapshots of cells at different stages.

Lacking that complete history, scientists still have much to learn about how, exactly, cells produce our organs, or how they heal wounds later in life. “We really only understand bits and pieces,” said Tanja Stadler, a computational biologist at ETH in Zurich.

Dr. Stadler’s lab and others around the world are trying to turn cells into their own historians, as she and her colleagues described in the journal Nature Reviews Genetics on Monday. 

Read it all.

Amazing—A paradigm for #biology is emerging in which cells can be genetically programmed to write their histories into their own genomes. These records can subsequently be read https://t.co/TeJfCld0jj #science #21stc #cellrecording

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) November 26, 2024

Am I a soldier of the cross,
A follower of the Lamb,
And shall I fear to own His cause,
Or blush to speak His Name?
Must I be carried to the skies
On flowery beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize,
And sailed through bloody seas?

Are there no foes for me to face*?
Must I not stem the flood?
Is this vile world a friend to grace,
To help me on to God?

Sure I must fight, if I would reign;
Increase my courage, Lord.
I’ll bear the toil, endure the pain,
Supported by Thy Word.

Thy saints in all this glorious war
Shall conquer, though they die;
They see the triumph from afar,
By faith they bring it nigh.**

When that illustrious day shall rise,
And all Thy armies shine
In robes of victory through skies,
The glory shall be Thine.

2024 is the 350th anniversary of the birth of Isaac Watts, an Independent minister and writer. His hymns were said to ‘illustrate every truth of revelation, [and] throw light upon every secret movement of the human heart'.

Read more on #ODNB20: https://t.co/8PdCJkDfaN pic.twitter.com/SpZCRn6sB4

— National Biography (@odnb) September 29, 2024

God of truth and grace, who didst give Isaac Watts singular gifts to present thy praise in verse, that he might write psalms, hymns and spiritual songs for thy Church: Give us grace joyfully to sing thy praises now and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who livest and reignest with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.God of truth and grace, who didst give Isaac Watts singular gifts to present thy praise in verse, that he might write psalms, hymns and spiritual songs for thy Church: Give us grace joyfully to sing thy praises now and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who livest and reignest with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Isaac Watts, minister, hymn writer, theologian, and logician, died Nov. 25, 1748.
“Must I be carried to the skies
On flow’ry beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize
And sailed through bloody seas?” pic.twitter.com/FIBq9RmYPu

— Judson I Stone (@JudsonIStone) November 25, 2024

O Lord Jesus, with whom we have passed another Christian year, following thee from thy birth in our flesh to thy sufferings and triumph, and listening to the utterances and counsels of thy Spirit: Even thus would we also end this year of grace, and stand complete in thee our Righteousness; humbly beseeching thee that we may evermore continue in thy faith and abide in thy love; who liveth and reigneth with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.

Today, I'm grateful for the trees that clean the air, give shade, and provide homes for the creatures of the forests. #Grattitude #Thanksgiving #Thanksgiving2024 #nature #NaturePhotography #ThickTrunkTuesday #naturelovers #landscapephotography #landscape pic.twitter.com/MbMjDZXV3w

— Joe Blow (@Piper_doown) November 26, 2024

I lift up my eyes to the hills. From whence does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved, he who keeps you will not slumber.

–Psalm 121:1-3

Beautiful snowy Edinburgh 📷c.o. Paul Watt Photography pic.twitter.com/8xW6vgnOfX

— freddie barss (@BarssFreddie) November 26, 2024

More Church of England leaders were aware of the John Smyth scandal and should follow the Archbishop of Canterbury’s decision to resign, according to the head of the official inquiry into child abuse.

Professor Alexis Jay said that abuse continued in the church and the cover-up of Smyth’s decades of wrongdoing could not be “down to one person”.

The Most Rev Justin Welby, 68, will stand down in January and pass his duties to the Archbishop of York, the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell, who will act in a “caretaker” role.

Alexis Jay, who conducted the inquiry into child sex abuse, says more people must have known about John Smyth and that abuse is continuing in Church of Englandhttps://t.co/fgX70ALtCG

— The Times and The Sunday Times (@thetimes) November 25, 2024