The chart…[in my essay] is from a new book by Robert Putnam, The Upswing. The basic pattern it reports for membership in houses of worship also holds with respect to the share of Americans belonging to labor unions, national chapter-based organizations, and even family formation. Moreover, the same ‘inverted u’ pattern observed with respect to these social bonds also plays out for trends in civic engagement, trust in institutions, political participation, cross-partisan engagement, economic equality, social mobility and more. Overall, Putnam argues, the trends observed in America today closely approximate conditions during the ‘Gilded Age’ (i.e. the 1870s through around 1900).

The book highlights how the decline of organized religion is not incidental to the other trends. The rise of the ‘social gospel’ in the late 19^th century played an important role in building momentum in the formative years of the ‘upswing’ across the social, cultural, political and economic dimensions Putnam explores. Religious participation predicts increased likelihood to donate and volunteer for both religious and secular causes and organizations. It predicts higher voting and other forms of civic participation. And the erosion of organized religion in America seems to have exacerbated declines across many measures of social solidarity, equality, and engagement. However, these declines need not persist indefinitely.

In a sense it is encouraging to recognize that the United States has experienced similar levels of social anomie in the past as we are living through today, and successfully built institutions, practices and norms to pull ourselves together. This is a feat that contemporary Americans or our successors could conceivably repeat.

Therefore, America is not necessarily headed towards godlessness, on a one-way trip to secularism. If it seems that way looking at charts like the ones that opened this essay, this is because most such graphics begin near the WWII era, which was an unusual period of flourishing for organized religion in the United States. Again, it does not represent our historical norm.

Indeed, although America has returned to roughly the same level of affiliation with religious institutions as we had in 1900, even this was a significant increase over earlier periods.

Read it all.

Post-Religious America? Don’t Hold Your Breath. by @Musa_alGharbi

for #InterfaithAmerica https://t.co/wXeaS7ThQq pic.twitter.com/b3OBXPpkAH

— Paul Brandeis Raushenbush (@raushenbush) April 27, 2021

Although nowhere close to India’s population or flare-up in scope, the reported spikes in these handful of nations have been far steeper, signaling the potential dangers of an uncontrolled spread. The resurgence — and first-time outbreaks in some places that largely avoided the scourge last year — heightens the urgency of delivering vaccine supplies to poorer, less influential countries and averting a protracted pandemic.

“It’s very important to realize that the situation in India can happen anywhere,” said Hans Kluge, the regional director at the World Health Organization for Europe, during a briefing last week. “This is still a huge challenge.”

Ranked by the change in newly recorded infections in the past month over the previous month, Laos came first with a 22,000% increase, followed by Nepal and Thailand, both of which saw fresh caseload skyrocketing more than 1,000% on a month-over-month basis.

Also on top of the list are Bhutan, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname, Cambodia and Fiji, as they witnessed the epidemic erupt at a high triple-digit pace.

“All countries are at risk,” said David Heymann, a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. “The disease appears to be becoming endemic and will therefore likely remain a risk to all countries for the foreseeable future.”

Read it all.

“It’s very important to realize that the situation in India can happen anywhere. This is still a huge challenge,” said Hans Kluge, the regional director at the WHO for Europe. https://t.co/xY7Eof2iju

— The Japan Times (@japantimes) May 4, 2021

O Lord Jesus Christ, who hast gone to the Father to prepare a place for us: Grant us so to live in communion with thee here on earth, that hereafter we may enjoy the fullness of thy presence; who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, ever one God, world without end.

Misty sunrise on the Thurne

📷davepsemmens pic.twitter.com/iKdBkFTfb6

— Maria Zoe (@mariazoe_maria) May 4, 2021

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore he who resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of him who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain; he is the servant of God to execute his wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore one must be subject, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. Pay all of them their dues, taxes to whom taxes are due, revenue to whom revenue is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due.

–Romans 13:1-7

This mornings walk was entertaining. I got soaked through before sunrise, caught a rainbow over the tower and then this sunrise. All in about 10 minutes on Glastonbury Tor. pic.twitter.com/bTSoh62VFp

— Michelle (@Glastomichelle) May 5, 2021

Fujimura believes that the Crucifixion reveals this theological vision in powerful ways. As he writes, “Christ’s redemptive work on the cross, Christ’s bloodshed, becomes an entry point of faith for all of us.” Artists, he argues, are uniquely able to witness to the hope of redemption amid brokenness by letting their artistry emerge from the traumas and tragedies of living in a fallen world:

Art literally feeds us through beauty in the hardest, darkest hours. … Through this wine of New Creation we can be given the eyes to see the vistas of the New, ears to hear the footsteps of the New, even through works by non-Christians in the wider culture.

Metaphors like “new wine” are among the key ways Fujimura expresses his vision. He draws heavily on the image of soil as a regenerative space where even our brokenness can testify, over time, to new creation. And he attests to the invaluable gift of tears as expressions of sanctification and consecration.

This theme of suffering is central to the book, as it is to Fujimura’s work as a fine artist. Art and Faith gives particular focus to the Japanese art form of Kintsugi, in which broken pottery is reformed using precious metals. The result, writes Fujimura, is a work of newly created beauty, “which now becomes more beautiful and more valuable than the original, unbroken vessel.”

In many insightful moments, Fujimura relates this redemptive vision of Kintsugi to experiences of suffering in his own life.

Read it all.

What acclaimed painter and writer Makoto Fujimura wants you to know about creativity and faith. https://t.co/Nd7VuQE3mH

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) May 2, 2021

In Barna’s ranking of the most post-Christian cities in America, New England and the West Coast predictably dominate the top of the list. But keep scrolling, and you’ll begin to spot some Southern states. Texas, Florida, and North Carolina all have cities in the top 50.

Perhaps more telling is the change that’s taken place since the list was first published in 2017. At least 20 cities in the Southeast have grown more post-Christian, some of them dramatically.

In Charleston, S.C., Barna’s research showed 22% of the population was considered post-Christian in 2017. Two years later, the number rose to 34%.

The Waco-Temple-Bryan region of Texas jumped from 32% post-Christian in 2017 to 43% in 2019.

To qualify as “post-Christian,” individuals must meet at least nine criteria such as not believing in God, not attending church in the past six months, and disagreeing that the Bible is accurate.

Dallas, Texas; Jacksonville, Fla.; Raleigh, N.C.; Atlanta, Ga.; Norfolk, Va.; Knoxville, Tenn.; Baton Rouge, La; and Charleston, W.Va. are among the other Bible Belt cities that saw an increase in post-Christian culture.

Read it all.

If the current trajectories continue, the religious demographics of the South in 10 years will look similar to the current West and Northeast. https://t.co/sR4jg4poe4

— Lifeway Research (@LifewayResearch) May 4, 2021

Black churches are among the oldest and most influential institutions dedicated to supporting Black Americans. When they were first founded, denominations like the African Methodist Episcopal Church gave Black Americans a place to worship freely.

Over the years, Black congregations have not only offered a place of prayer for many Black worshippers, but also played a role in the advancement of Black Americans more generally – from supporting colleges to taking the lead in many civil rights causes.

Yet, when it comes to choosing a house of worship, most Black Americans don’t prioritize denominational labels. A welcoming congregation and inspiring sermons are far more important to them, according to a recent Pew Research Center report.

Only 30% of Black adults say that it would be “very important” to find a congregation in their current denomination if they were looking for a new house of worship, according to the survey, conducted Nov. 19, 2019-June 3, 2020. Far larger shares say it is very important to find a congregation that is welcoming (80%) or that has inspiring sermons (77%).

Read it all.

NEW: When it comes to choosing a house of worship, most Black Americans don’t prioritize denominational labels. A welcoming congregation and inspiring sermons are far more important to them https://t.co/lGwOAktRhK pic.twitter.com/QIQ8FqFcRr

— Pew Research Religion (@PewReligion) April 29, 2021

A gray American transport plane taxied down the runway, carrying munitions, a giant flat screen television from a C.I.A. base, pallets of equipment and departing troops. It was one of several aircraft that night removing what remained of the American war from this sprawling military base in the country’s south.

President Biden has said that the United States will withdraw from Afghanistan by Sept. 11, ending the country’s longest war on foreign soil — but the pullout has already begun.

The United States and its NATO allies spent decades building Kandahar Airfield into a wartime city, filled with tents, operations centers, barracks, basketball courts, ammunition storage sites, aircraft hangars and at least one post office.

Once the base is stripped of everything deemed sensitive by its American and NATO landlords, its skeleton will be handed over to the Afghan security forces.

And the message will be clear: They are on their own in the fight against the Taliban.

Read it all.

The end of the war looked nothing like the beginning of it >> a fabulous, slightly surreal report from Afghanistan by @Tmgneff https://t.co/xF2A97hfZM

— david pilling (@davidpilling) May 4, 2021

The key to understanding and addressing these existential threats lies in both the practical and the profound: in science and engineering, but also the idea, found in the Christian faith, that each person is precious, worth caring for and has potential.

For a long time, scientific truths about climate change were treated as opinion, something which you might or might not believe depending on your personal point of view. We have come a long way since then. But resolving the crisis still requires commitment to the truth – we owe that to those who will suffer the most if we fail to act.

This journey from opinion to truth is a crucial first step, but the journey that really matters is from truth to sustainable action.

That will require every one of us to play our part. It cannot just be done by governments or companies, by NGOs or faith groups, and it cannot be done in isolation. We will have to work with people with whom we disagree, sometimes profoundly. Indeed, the two of us writing do not agree on everything, but we recognise that we are united by a common cause: that in facing the threat of climate change, there is more that unites us than divides us.

Individual responses need to be guided by hope rather than fear, and the certainty that huge change is made up of small things. We are both realists when it comes to human behaviour: sustainable change rarely comes from asking people to make unrealistically ambitious sacrifice. Instead, we must give people the engineered tools and the economic incentives to make choices that work for them and for the planet. The combined power of engineering, economics and leadership through example makes a profound difference.

Read it all.

This will be a vital year for tackling climate change. Every one of us has to be part of the solution. @LordJohnBrowne and I have written for The Times on the urgency of facing the climate crisis together: https://t.co/bycxxfiO4Q

— Archbishop of Canterbury (@JustinWelby) May 1, 2021

O Lord, who through spiritual discipline didst strengthen thy servant Monnica to persevere in offering her love and prayers and tears for the conversion of her husband and of Augustine their son: Deepen our devotion, we beseech thee, and use us in accordance with thy will to bring others, even our own kindred, to acknowledge Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever.

Today is the feast day of St Monica. Below is a prayer I’ve come to use. I first encountered it in @james_ka_smith’s book On the Road with Saint Augustine. pic.twitter.com/iKaN6VfWj0

— Joel J Miller (@joeljmiller) May 3, 2021

O Lord, we most humbly beseech thee to give us grace not only to be hearers of the Word, but also doers of the same; not only to love, but also to live thy gospel; not only to profess, but also to practise thy blessed commandments, unto the honour of thy holy name.

Woah! Mōrena from The Otago Peninsula! What a sunrise! pic.twitter.com/3Qktcji87l

— Ian Griffin (@iangriffin) May 3, 2021

Hear my cry, O God, listen to my prayer; from the end of the earth I call to thee, when my heart is faint. Lead thou me to the rock that is higher than I; for thou art my refuge, a strong tower against the enemy. Let me dwell in thy tent for ever! Oh to be safe under the shelter of thy wings!

–Psalm 61:1-4

Thanks to our lovely porter Andy Wilson for sharing this shot of a beautifully misty Addison’s Walk. Glorious! pic.twitter.com/hNvVmoHYhG

— Magdalen College (@magdalenoxford) May 4, 2021

The “great awokening” sweeping some of our elite institutions hints at an opening. Showing younger Americans that our country’s religious traditions stand for social justice, too, as they surely do, might help clear the path to such an awakening.

But this logic mistakes the character of the crisis American religion now confronts. It is not exactly a crisis of belief in the teachings of traditional religion, but rather a crisis of confidence in the institutions that claim to embody them. In other words, Americans aren’t losing their faith in God. Eighty-seven percent of the public expressed belief in God last year in Gallup’s figures, which is roughly the level pollsters have found for many decades. What Americans do have trouble believing, however, is that our institutions — our churches, seminaries, religious schools and charities — remain capable of forming trustworthy people who actually exhibit the integrity they preach.

To overcome such doubts, and to appeal to persuadable younger Americans, our religious institutions need to show not that they are continuous with the larger culture but that they are capable of addressing its deficiencies — that they can speak with legitimate authority and be counted on to do the work of molding souls and shaping character. The problem, in other words, may be that our pews have grown too soft, not too hard.

Read it all (from the long line of should-have-already-been-posted material).

The case for wooden pews: Why hard religion is more important than ever – Yuval Levin at @DeseretNews https://t.co/WDT9tCJiRP

— Glynn Young (@gyoung9751) April 4, 2021

4) Young people flock to Snapchat, Instagram, and TikTok.
Summarizing the data from the report, Brook Auxier and Monica Anderson write:

Majorities of 18- to 29-year-olds say they use Instagram or Snapchat and about half say they use TikTok, with those on the younger end of this cohort – ages 18 to 24 – being especially likely to report using Instagram (76%), Snapchat (75%) or TikTok (55%).

These shares stand in stark contrast to those in older age groups. For instance, while 65% of adults ages 18 to 29 say they use Snapchat, just 2% of those 65 and older report using the app – a difference of 63 percentage points.

This is probably the least surprising data of the whole study, if I’m being honest, but the stark contrast in age usages of these apps is notable.

5) About 95% of Americans ages 18-29 use YouTube, the highest usage rate of any social media platform by any demographic.
The greatest affinity between any demographic and any social media platform is 18-29-year-olds and YouTube. Check out this table (I’ve circled the stat for you). The darker the boxes on the table, the greater the affinity/usage.

YouTube is television for the youngest American adults, and I hesitate to say that 95% number could ever reach 100%, but it very well could.

Read it all.

Earlier this month, @pewresearch came out with some new social media usage data via @pewinternet. Here are 10 of the most interesting facts I've mined from it: https://t.co/cXNbCRmP8y

— Chris Martin (@ChrisMartin17) April 30, 2021

Since about Easter, attendance numbers at Christ Central have been on an upward trajectory, said Senior Pastor Owen Lee — which is part of a national trend. Pew reported that the percentage of people who said they went to a religious service in the past month went from 33 percent in July 2020 to 42 percent in March.

Pre-pandemic, the large Centreville church had to have two services to fit in 700 or 800 people on Sundays. When the shutdown began, many tuned in to a live stream. In September, when the church began offering limited, socially distanced in-person worship, it got about 20 or 30 people at one service, Lee said. That number stayed about the same until around Easter.

Since then, the numbers have risen. Last Sunday, 140 people attended. This Sunday, 76 people spread out among the wooden pews, facing toward the high-ceilinged stage, where Lee and other clergy stood below two large screens across which words, song lyrics and scripture bits pass. Musicians and singers were spread to their right and left.

Easter, he said, was the first time the room began to look populated.

“To see faces, to hear people singing together, greeting each other awkwardly — it was so good to be together, like family,” Lee said. “Some people were weeping. It was one of the sweetest days.”

Read it all.

“We can’t hug, but seeing people in person, worshiping in person, it’s so different from singing at a television in the living room." https://t.co/qkSuB0x8Cw

— Ruth Graham (@publicroad) May 3, 2021

From there:

News from the Bishop Coadjutor Search Committee
April 29, 2021

The committee selected to search for the next Bishop of The Anglican Diocese of South Carolina met in an overnight retreat at St. Christopher Camp and Conference Center Sunday evening, April 18 and Monday April 19.

We began and ended our overnight steeped in prayer and all had a truly blessed time watching in awe as the power of the Holy Spirit moved, molded and shaped our thoughts and directed our hearts. This committee remains convinced that our Lord has already chosen our next bishop and that we, on the committee, are merely affirming God’s choice.

You may remember that according to our timeline we offered a very long inquiry period in which the entire Anglican Diocese of South Carolina was invited to suggest a priest for consideration by the committee. We received a large number of suggested names during this first phase which concluded on April 1.

The majority of those suggestions ended in the suggested priest deciding themselves not to go any further in the process. For those remaining, we divided the names amongst us and are now checking references and setting up appointments for interviews via Zoom. All of the remaining nominees will be interviewed by the committee as a whole on Zoom and also every remaining nominee will be visited in their ministries by small teams of committee members. This phase of the search process is scheduled to end June 24 when the Search Committee meets as a whole to hear reports from the teams who visited the nominees.

Here’s a timeline of remaining tasks to be completed by the Bishop’s Search Committee:

April 23 –May 23 – Zoom meetings by entire search committee with every remaining suggested person.

May 24 – the Bishop’s Search Committee meets as a whole to consider a list of nominees who will move on in the process.

May 25 through June 23 – the final list of nominees will be visited in their ministry context.

June 25 – Search Committee meets to approve final list to be presented to the Standing Committee.

July 6 – The Standing Committee makes their choices as to whom will continue in the process, pending extensive background checks.

August 1 – an official list of Candidates for Bishop Coadjutor will be published with a suggested date or dates for a walkabout or for several walkabouts for diocesan delegates to meet the candidates.

Around September 11– Walkabout (or walkabouts) to be held for the diocesan delegates to meet the candidates. The Walkabout or walkabouts will be hosted by the Search Committee.

October 16 – Ballots to be cast for Bishop Coadjutor at a special Diocesan Electing Convention.

After October 16 – ACNA College of Bishops meets to approve Diocesan selection of new Bishop.

March 12, 2022 (God willing) – Consecration of new Bishop at Diocesan Convention

Thank you so very much for your faithful prayer for this search committee. We can honestly feel your participation and the undergirding that you provide through your prayers. Please continue!

Respectfully Submitted ,

John Burwell,
Communications member of the Bishop’s Search Committee

Early in the pandemic, when vaccines for the coronavirus were still just a glimmer on the horizon, the term “herd immunity” came to signify the endgame: the point when enough Americans would be protected from the virus so we could be rid of the pathogen and reclaim our lives.

Now, more than half of adults in the United States have been inoculated with at least one dose of a vaccine. But daily vaccination rates are slipping, and there is widespread consensus among scientists and public health experts that the herd immunity threshold is not attainable — at least not in the foreseeable future, and perhaps not ever.

Instead, they are coming to the conclusion that rather than making a long-promised exit, the virus will most likely become a manageable threat that will continue to circulate in the United States for years to come, still causing hospitalizations and deaths but in much smaller numbers.

How much smaller is uncertain and depends in part on how much of the nation, and the world, becomes vaccinated and how the coronavirus evolves. It is already clear, however, that the virus is changing too quickly, new variants are spreading too easily and vaccination is proceeding too slowly for herd immunity to be within reach anytime soon.

Read it all.

Reaching ‘Herd Immunity’ Is Unlikely in the US

Widely circulating coronavirus variants & persistent hesitancy about vaccines will keep the goal out of reach. The virus is here to stay, but vaccinating the most vulnerable may be enough to restore normalcy https://t.co/CTBCsBBxn6

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) May 3, 2021

Pour out thy Spirit upon all of thy sons and daughters, Almighty God, that like thy servant Elisabeth Cruciger our lips may praise thee, our lives may bless thee, and our worship may give thee glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Olympia Morata of Elisabeth Cruciger? https://t.co/w3sDOoT7ZR pic.twitter.com/TYJskJZQN9

— Margriet Gosker (@margrietgosker) May 5, 2017

O God our Father, whose law is a law of liberty: Grant us wisdom to use aright the freedom which thou hast given us, by surrendering ourselves to thy service; knowing that, when we are thy willing bondsmen, then only are we truly free; for Jesus Christ’s sake.

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

🎨Robert Julian Onderdonk,
"Bluebonnets at Sunrise", 1917 pic.twitter.com/56aX2Pm1Xx

— An💫Na (@AnNa85032297) May 2, 2021

Conduct yourselves wisely toward outsiders, making the most of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer every one.

–Colossians 4:5-6

This morning's sunrise on the East River Promenade #NYC pic.twitter.com/wpW6jKVHSR

— Max Guliani (@maximusupinNYc) May 3, 2021

“Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.”
Whenever i think of these wonderful words of Shakespeare from Sonnet 116 I always think of Sam and Frodo going up the slopes of Mount Doom–KSH.
———————–

‘[The] dim light of the last day of their quest found them side by side. The wind had fallen the day before…, and now it came from the North and began to rise; and slowly the light of the unseen Sun filtered down into the shadows where the hobbits lay….
‘Now for the last gasp!’ said Sam as he struggled to his feet. He bent over Frodo, rousing him gently. Frodo groaned; but with a great effort of will he staggered up; and then he fell upon his knees again. He raised his eyes… to the dark slopes of Mount Doom towering above him, and then pitifully he began to crawl forward on his hands.
Sam looked at him and wept in his heart, but no tears came to his dry and stinging eyes….
‘Come, Mr. Frodo!’ he cried. ‘I can’t carry it for you, but I can carry you and it as well. So up you get!…. Sam will give you a ride. Just tell him where to go, and he’ll go.’
As Frodo clung upon his back, arms loosely about his neck, legs clasped firmly under his arms, Sam staggered to his feet; and then to his amazement he felt the burden light. He had feared that he would have barely strength to lift his master… and… the dreadful dragging weight of the accursed Ring. But it was not so. Whether because Frodo was so worn by his long pains…, or because some gift of final strength was given to him, Sam lifted Frodo with no more difficulty than if he were carrying a hobbit-child pig-a-back…. He took a deep breath and started off.
They had reached the Mountain’s foot on its northern side, and a little to the westward; there its long grey slopes… were not sheer…. Sam struggled on as best he could, having no guidance but the will to climb as high as might be before his strength gave out…. On he toiled…, turning… to lessen the slope, often stumbling forward, and at the last crawling…. When his will could drive him no further…, he stopped and laid his master gently down….
It was easier to breathe… above the reeks…. ‘Thank you, Sam,’ [Frodo] said in a cracked whisper. ‘How far is there to go?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Sam, ‘because I don’t know where we’re going.’
He looked back, and then he looked up; and he was amazed to see how far his last effort had brought him. The Mountain… had looked taller than it was…. The… tumbled shoulders of its great base rose for maybe three thousand feet above the plain, and above them was reared half as high again its tall central cone…. But already Sam was more than half way up the base, and the plain of Gorgoroth was dim below him…. As he looked up he would have given a shout, if his parched throat had allowed him; for… above him he saw plainly a path…. It climbed like a rising girdle from the west and wound snakelike about the Mountain, until before it went round out of view it reached the foot of the cone upon its eastern side.
Sam… guessed that if he could only struggle on just a little way further up, they would strike this path. A gleam of hope returned to him….’

—The Return of the King, LoTR Book 6, Ch iii

¡¡ FOTOS ESPECTACULARES !!

Monte del destino
"Igual que el ‘Mount Doom’ en la película El señor de los anillos, también está en erupción Klyuchevskaya Sopka, el volcán más alto de la península Kamchatka, en Rusia". pic.twitter.com/pShd8xTXeE

— j.l. cuerasolatorre (@2b10julio_l) April 27, 2021

Listen to it all.

Lyrics:

Most glorious Lord of life, that on this day
Didst make thy triumph over death and sin,
And having harrow’d hell, didst bring away
Captivity thence captive, us to win.
This joyous day, dear Lord, with joy begin,
And grant that we may for whom thou diddest die,
Being with thy dear blood clean wash’d from sin,
May live for ever in felicity.
And that thy love we weighing worthily,
May likewise love thee for the same again;
And for Thy sake, that all like dear didst buy,
With love may one another entertain.
So let us love, dear love, like as we ought;
Love is the lesson which the Lord us taught.
The day of resurrection! Earth, tell it out abroad;
The Passover of gladness, the Passover of God.
From death to life eternal, from earth unto the sky,
Our Christ hath brought us over, with hymns of victory. Amen.

Almighty God,
who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ
have overcome death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life:
grant that, as by your grace going before us
you put into our minds good desires,
so by your continual help
we may bring them to good effect;
through Jesus Christ our risen Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

✨Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed! ✨#WCC #OrthodoxEaster pic.twitter.com/kDyPMoa7BZ

— World Council of Churches (WCC) (@Oikoumene) May 2, 2021

Lift up your heads, O gates! and be lifted up, O ancient doors! that the King of glory may come in.
Who is the King of glory? The LORD, strong and mighty, the LORD, mighty in battle!
Lift up your heads, O gates! and be lifted up, O ancient doors! that the King of glory may come in.
Who is this King of glory? The LORD of hosts, he is the King of glory!

–Psalm 24:7-10

Morning light pic.twitter.com/JUMIj0Mk5e

— Kathryn Jean Lopez (@kathrynlopez) May 2, 2021

The words are from Psalm 47. Listen to it all–KSH.

Discernment in Scripture is the skill that enables us to differentiate. It is the ability to see issues clearly. We desperately need to cultivate this spiritual skill that will enable us to know right from wrong. We must be prepared to distinguish light from darkness, truth from error, best from better, righteousness from unrighteousness, purity from defilement, and principles from pragmatics.

–Jay Stowell, Fan the Flame: Living Out Your First Love for Christ (Chicago: Moody, 1986), p.44

Almighty God, who didst give to thine apostles Philip and James grace and strength to bear witness to the truth: Grant that we, being mindful of their victory of faith, may glorify in life and death the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Loving God, as we seek to follow the examples of St Philip and St James in faithfulness, hear and answer our prayers as you see best for each of us. #Prayer #Easter #Saints pic.twitter.com/UaCoXDRplD

— Andrew Zihni (@andrew_zihni) May 1, 2021

O thou who sendest forth the light, createst the morning, and makest the sun to rise on the good and the evil: Enlighten the blindness of our minds with the knowledge of the truth; lift up the light of thy countenance upon us, that in thy light we may see light, and, at the last, in the light of grace the light of glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Androscoggin River Sunrise, Maine. pic.twitter.com/ospvce9cca

— Tracy Hogan (@HoganSOG) April 30, 2021

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and patience, forbearing one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

–Colossians 3:12-17

Last Sunrise of April 2021 pic.twitter.com/wku6EP03Pj

— Dee McCarthy (@stokerslodge) April 30, 2021