The Right Reverend Nigel Shaw will be retiring as Anglican Bishop Ordinary later this year after a decade of faithful serving as the spiritual head and pastor to members of the Anglican Church of Canada serving in the Canadian Armed Forces.  It is my duty as Primate to preside over the electoral process of the Anglican Military Ordinariate of Canada (AMO), and I write now to call for nominations. The election of a new Anglican Bishop Ordinary will be held on June 23, 2026.

Military chaplaincy is dynamic and demanding. AMO chaplains work in challenging environments, at home and abroad, serving Canadian Armed Forces members wherever Canada requires them to go. Clergy who offer themselves as chaplains have extraordinary demands placed on them and their families. This is why the Bishop Ordinary is so vitally important. As a bishop of the Anglican Church of Canada, the Bishop Ordinary is the principal bond between the Church and the chaplains.

The AMO is seeking a bishop who is grounded in Christian faith, has spiritual depth and breadth, and is called to guide and support clergy; one who will be proactive in providing pastoral care, worship, and connection opportunities to chaplains; who will actively seek innovative ways to develop the Bishop Ordinary Trust held by the Anglican Foundation of Canada in order to safeguard and sustain this ministry into the future.

The position of Anglican Bishop Ordinary of the Canadian Armed Forces is a half-time position, with a stipend of $75,000.00 and expenses. With the permission of the Primate, the Bishop Ordinary may engage in other employment. The enclosed profile provides detailed information on the role of the Bishop Ordinary and the structure of the AMO.

Please direct all enquiries and nomination forms (also enclosed) to the Chair of the Search Committee, Lieutenant-Colonel the Reverend Mike Gibbons mike.gibbons@forces.gc.ca no later than May 15, 2026.

Please join with the AMO as we pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit in this election.

Yours Faithfully,

The Most Reverend Shane A.D. Parker
Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada

Enclosures: Anglican Military Ordinariate Profile June 2026; Nomination Form

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After eight ballots with no material change in the last four, no election was achieved. The Primate, as chair of the election, suspended the process as per the canons of the Anglican Military Ordinariate. In the coming weeks, a new election process will begin, with more information to follow.

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As you know by now and as you will see elsewhere in this newsletter, my successor Padre Nigel Shaw was chosen by members of the Anglican Military Ordinariate on March 5th and ratified by the Primate and the four Metropolitans (Regional Archbishops). This is good news indeed and we wish Nigel, Janet and their family every blessing in this new and blessed ministry.

I would like to thank those who brought us to this point and those who brought the choice of a new bishop to fruition. Padre Gordon Mintz headed up the Search Committee and four nominees were gracious enough to let their names stand for discernment. I am particularly grateful to Gordon for keeping in touch with these worthy people throughout the process. I am also grateful to Padres Michelle Staples (Archdeacon Pro Tem) and Jennifer Gosse (Canon Secretary) and to our Chancellor, Ann Bourke, for managing the process. I particularly thank our Primate for his usual gracious support and enthusiasm throughout. His address to the Electoral College is on the Anglican Military Ordinariate (AMO) website and is worth a visit. I am grateful to a whole host of other people who are acknowledged in Padre Staple’s article further on in this edition. I am grateful to The Very Reverend Shane Parker and the staff and people of our Ordinariate Cathedral, Christ Church Cathedral, Ottawa. For all of these and for our new bishop we give thanks to God the giver of all good gifts!

This is my last Newsletter and I would like to give thanks for so much and for so many. I have had the privilege of serving with a great number of wonderful people some of whom have retired ahead of me. Amongst these are members of The Chapter, the Canons and Archdeacons who take counsel for the affairs of the AMO community. There are also people that do particular ‘bits’ of the ministry: Cynthia Greenwood who keeps our list of chaplains; Padre Michael Peterson our newsletter editor; Padre Shawn Samson who keeps our Canons (rules which govern us) in good order and our new Chancellor, Ann Bourke; Padre Gordon Mintz who set up our website and Padre John Hounsell-Drover who is our webmaster and Facebook page person now. I give thanks for members of the Interfaith Committee on Military Chaplaincy (ICCMC) with whom I have served these many years and for all that they have taught me about ecumenical and multi-faith expressions of “doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God”. (Micah 6:8) And there are so many more who stand ready to serve and with whom I have had the privilege to work.

Above all I give thanks for our chaplains – all of them- our Anglicans and those with whom they serve! I have always been particularly proud of the place that Anglicans have taken in the chaplaincy in numbers far beyond our percentage of the Canadian faith community demographics. I am proud of the way that our Primate, our bishops and indeed the whole Anglican Church of Canada support our chaplains, our military members and their families. And I am so proud of the Canadian Armed Forces – members past and present and their families who also serve. May God continue to hold them all in the palm of His hand!

I have had the privilege of serving as the Bishop Ordinary for twelve years, three of which were contiguous with being Bishop of Ottawa. I have always been blessed with every appointment that I have ever had and if someone were to ask me what my favourite appointment was I would have to quote a former Chaplain General, Padre John Fletcher: “Whatever I was doing at the time”. This time with you has been a particular blessing. When I came on board in 2005 I was close to retirement age but not yet ready to fade into that good night. Not at all! Being with you has been life giving to me personally and Deborah feels the same. We both came from military families and when we were back with you it felt familiar. It was a time of high operational tempo with stresses and strains on military members and those who also served on the home front, the rear party people and the families, and still, as always, you have stood ready. I am so proud to have been a part of your life. I am so grateful for the graciousness that you have shown to us.

We now are in the midst of that for which we must be truly grateful for it gives us our ultimate meaning and indeed, abundant life! It is the very core of our faith and our eternal joy! This is the season of our Lord’s Passion as he goes to the cross and suffers and to win a victory which we will share. Though the darkness closes in and evil seems to predominate it will not have the final word. These things will never go away until the Kingdom comes in its fullness but they will be redeemed, overcome and transcended. The barriers to life here and in the future are down and on the third day He rises and the women race from the tomb to tell the story. In that we live and move and have our being and for this we need to be eternally grateful and in response live grateful lives. He rose again and lives in each and every one of us! Alleluia!

May you all have a blessed Eastertide and Thank You so very Much!

+Peter

Anglican Bishop Ordinary
(The Right Reverend Peter Coffin was appointed by the Primate to the position of Bishop Ordinary (Anglican) to the Canadian Forces in November 2004.)

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I received the message at 0700 in the morning 14, Jan 2010.  The Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) was to be deployed to Port au Prince, Haiti and I was to be their Chaplain.  By 1900 I had packed my kit (which was, previously, carefully packed for winter exercises), said goodbye to my family and was aboard a bus to Trenton.  Just over 200 of us flew out first thing the next day to ground zero of the disaster zone.

Chaplaincy on a DART mission is an intense deployment ministry on steroids.  Helping medical teams as a spare set of hands (doing one’s best impression of Father Mulcahy), providing pastoral care to Canadian’s waiting at the embassy for evacuation, walking alongside search and rescue personnel, liaising with local religious leaders and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), accompanying Army personnel on rescue missions to gather stranded Canadian nationals in order to provide pastoral care, and much more; all the while keeping one’s primary mission of Moral, Ethical and Spiritual support to the troops as the priority.  A DART mission takes its toll on Forces personnel as it is a highly intense, no-notice deployment without a firm end-date.  Chaplain support to these Canadian heroes is a no-fail task, and an honour for anyone chosen to walk along-side them as their Padre.

The DART mission on OP Hestia included 2 phases.  The first weeks were spent providing emergency response in the capitol of Port au Prince.  This was the most intense time of operations.  Every day brought a different challenge for DART personnel.  As Chaplain there is no ‘regular daily schedule’, one simply endeavours to keep up and walk with the Forces personnel however possible.

The latter phase of the DART mission followed a move to the southern city of Jacmel.  During this time the DART Chain of Command set up 3 locations: the main ‘Camp Jacmel’ from which operations deployed, a local medical clinic in the city and a water purification site.  As Chaplain, the ministry consisted of regular visits to all these locations, as well as ministry of presence and operational involvement with Mobile Medical Teams, the World Food Programme’s food distribution, supporting local orphanages and search and rescue.  An average day’s ‘battle rhythm’ included up 20 mins before reveille (wake up), breakfast with HQ staff and then out with selected section to ministry of presence, involvement in operations or local Religious and NGO Engagement, dinner with troops, Commander’s Update Brief and an evening of circulating with soldiers where it didn’t take long for someone to seek the Padre out for a discussion.

Aside from the lifelong friends made on the deployment, the ministry highlight involved the Sunday practice of providing Communion services at all three locations.  Bringing the presence of Christ as He is found in the bread and wine into the midst of our soldier’s daily routine was an honour and privilege.  It became known as the Padre’s ‘travelling road show’.

This is Chaplaincy to the Canadian Armed Forces.  The convergence of physical challenge, emotional stress, vocational ministry and God’s grace create, for me, an amazing experience of constant ministry and growth.  There is no life like it.

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Sacred Circle heard a presentation on Indigenous Peoples in the military by Major the Rev. Catherine Askew and Vice President Victor C. Flett C.O., Canadian Aboriginal Veterans and Serving Members Association of Canada.

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1. Why doesn’t the military fund the Anglican Bishop Ordinary?

Each of the major faith groups in Canada that provides chaplains for the CF, has a representative who serves on the Interfaith Committee on Canadian Military Chaplaincy, (ICCMC). This Committee, which represents the various different faith groups of Canada , not only provides faith group oversight of the ministry of CF chaplains, but also serves as an advisory body to the Minister of National Defence concerning all matters relating to military chaplaincy.

The ICCMC is not only responsible, as sort of a credentialing body, for endorsing perspective applicants for military chaplaincy, but even more importantly, it is responsible for helping ensure, and maintain, the vital link between individual chaplains and the civilian faith groups to which they belong.

Although the CF does understandably compensate ICCMC members for travel and other expenses associated with the committee’s work, in direct support of Chaplaincy, the ICCMC members (as representatives of their respective civilian faith groups) do not receive any salary or stipend from the Canadian Forces. If they remunerated at all for their roles on behalf of their respective faith group, that remuneration would come for the faith group to which they belong. For some faith traditions, membership on the ICCMC is a voluntary and part-time endeavour.  The Anglican Church of Canada would like to see the Bishop ordinary’s position as a paid (by the church) position. The Silent Night Project is an effort to raise funds in the church to help make this possible.

2. Does “ordinary” mean “ordained”  or something else?

In order for any our military chaplains to be truly effective within the ecumenical and multi-faith ministry context of the CF Chaplaincy, it is absolutely essential, to both their personal and professional well-being, that they remain thoroughly grounded in, and well connected to, their own religious traditions and faith communities. Key to this for those who are Anglican Chaplains is, of course, the ministry of the Anglican Bishop Ordinary.

The term “Ordinary” is an ecclesiastical term, denoting a person exercising ordinary jurisdiction connected with the office they hold office.

3. What does a Bishop Ordinary do, and why is this Silent Night project important/helpful?

The Anglican Bishop Ordinary is the civilian church leader who serves as the Anglican Church of Canada’s representative on the ICCMC.  As Bishop Ordinary, he/she also has governance responsibilities within the Anglican Military Ordinariate of Canada, which is the non-territorial ecclesiastical jurisdiction that includes all of the Anglican Chaplains serving in the CF, as well as all of the Anglican military members and their families.

On behalf of the Anglican Church of Canada, the Bishop Ordinary functions as a chief pastor to all of the Anglican service men and women in the CF, and their families, and is also kind of like a ‘chaplain to our chaplains’. The Bishop prays for us, and visits us, and cares for us pastorally and spiritually, and keeps us well grounded within, and sustained by, our Anglican tradition. He or she represents the wider church to us, but of equal importance, also represents us and our stories, within the life and the witness of the wider church.

In addition to this, the Bishop Ordinary also represents the Anglican Church of Canada in the important ecumenical role it has to play on ICCMC, a committee, which endorses and oversees the ministry of all CF chaplains, and advises the Government of Canada on all matters pertaining to CF Chaplaincy. As military chaplaincy continues to become more diverse and more demanding, it’s clear that the role of the Bishop Ordinary will, similarly, become more demanding.

4. Is it as much about awareness as about raising the funds to support the Bishop Ordinariate?

Absolutely. The funds contributed to the Silent Night Project are not as important as is participating in the project, or as is learning more about this important ministry of our military chaplains and our Anglican Bishop Ordinary. Just as the Silent Night Project is a project of the whole Anglican church, so is the ministry of the Anglican Bishop Ordinary and the Anglican military chaplains he cares for.

It was the Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, Archbishop Fred Hiltz, who requested that the Silent Night Project donations be channelled to the Bishop Ordinary Trust, which is a trust that was established by the former Primate, Archbishop Andrew Hutchison (who was himself a former Bishop Ordinary). It is our hope that with time, and with the support of Anglicans right across the Church, that we will eventually be able to build an endowment sufficient enough to provide the Bishop Ordinary with a stipend commensurate with the important and demanding ministry that he/she exercises on behalf of the whole church as well as provide some funding for lay staff support and for required travel not immediately related to support for the whole CF Chaplaincy, and so not funded publicly.

5. The web info touched on how the role affects all military personnel, not just Anglicans, but perhaps you could explain a bit.

Except in very specific ecclesiastical matters, members of the ICCMC speak with one voice. The advice and participation of every member, therefore, affects the ministry of all Chaplains. Likewise, the manner in which the various Faith Groups of Canada work together on the ICCMC, serves as a model for ministry in a multicultural environment such as the CF. While an individual chaplain will be a member of a particular faith group and will bear particular relevance to members sharing that faith, Chaplain Services must be relevant to all. Canadian Forces Chaplains, Anglicans and all others, “minister to their own, facilitate the worship of others and care for all.”

6. Can you compare the role of the clergy in the military to civilian work?

Military service, both for those in uniform, and for their families, all too often forces the individual to explore the deep cost of sacrifice. Fear and loneliness, death of a loved one, and life-changing injury, are just a few of the experiences  that can threaten a person’s ability to function effectively, unless he or she is willing to explore the deeper spiritual questions that lie at the root of the understanding of self.  For this reason, the military community recognizes that chaplains — who are experienced in addressing spiritual issues — are a critical component in the care and support of our sailors, soldiers, airmen and women and their families.

Although not all our service men and women and their families attend churches, temples, mosques or synagogues, they all do know that they can turn to their ‘Padre’ as someone who cares, and can help. Through their ministry of presence within our units, and on our bases and wings,.. both at home and overseas,.. our chaplains are a powerful sign of meaning and encouragement, and an ever-present source of comfort and hope.

For our Anglican Chaplains: the role and support of the Anglican Bishop Ordinary is important to their effectiveness, and health. Accordingly, as the Silent Night Project website states, it is hoped that they and their ministry, will be greatly enhanced because, “funds from the Silent Night Project will bolster chaplains’ ministry by supporting the work of their pastoral head, the Bishop Ordinary.”

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By Maj the Rev. Lisa Pacarynuk

I looked out of the cockpit window of the C-17 and saw nothing but blue and brown. It was breathtaking. We were somewhere over Egypt, I was told, and beneath us was a vast expanse of mountains, desert, sea and sky. Blue and brown. I was trying in vain to recall those maps at the end of my Bible, suddenly not an image on paper anymore, but a real place, a real desert, a living and breathing place, far from snow and ice of Canada.  Was I seeing where Moses walked?St. Augustine? Saints and followers of God throughout the ages? I couldn’t say for certain. All I knew was that I was on an adventure, a Lenten journey like none other I had experienced.

I left Canada at the end of January on a short deployment, a TAV, to replace the two chaplains deployed to OP ATTENTION in Afghanistan as they each took their holiday.  I was slated to be there until the end of March, a period of time which would frame the 40 days of Lent nearly perfectly.  I had never been to Afghanistan before, just heard the stories of the dust, the heat (and the cold), the danger, the brokenness and the hope. I was excited and afraid, armed with prayer and prayerbooks to minister to the troops in their workplaces and make sense of that wilderness journey given us every year to change our hearts and return to God.

I have spent my days with our dedicated and generous troops, and have been able to do a little work with the Afghan army and see how we are mentoring those of another culture and world-view.  I burned last year’s palms in a fire pit in a corner of the camp, and celebrated Ash Wednesday with Christians of different denominations, in English and French, in a chapel in a camp surrounded by those who profess another faith. With a few other souls, I began that wilderness journey, accompanied, like Jesus, by the Holy Spirit and the Word of God.  I listen to the excitement and struggles of our soldiers passing through their own wilderness of loneliness and learning. The psalms of this Lent echo in my heart – psalm 91 from the 1^st Sunday of Lent: “Under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day…Psalm 27 from the 2^nd: The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 63 from the 3^rd:  O God, you are my God, I seek you, my soul thirsts for you/my flesh faints for you as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.  Suddenly, they are real, the real prayers of real believers walking through the wilderness, seeking courage and strength and walking towards the new life that comes from resurrection, new birth, and homecoming.

As I write this, Lent has reached its half-way point.  I have changed camps, met new people and felt the growing heat of the impending Afghan springtime.  The Holy Week journey of suffering and death are still ahead, with the promise of resurrection peeking in behind it. When the Easter season begins, I will be back in the Canadian springtime, through the wilderness into the season of new beginnings, grateful for the adventure and forever changed.

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I was recently looking to attend a healing retreat at the Christ the King Spiritual Life Center (the Center) in Greenwich,NY. Upon visiting their website, I noticed a link to the Community of St. Mary, an order of Anglican/Episcopalian sisters. As it turned out, they were co-located with the Center in Greenwich, NY on the other side of the same valley. This afforded for a perfect opportunity to go be a student of the healing ministry at the Center and then to cross the valley to the Community of St. Mary for a time of personal retreat.

After the healing retreat training ended, I took a day of leave and remained at the Center as the Sisters were at the end of a week of silence in which they did not receive visitors in their retreat house. At last, with the breaking of the silence, I packed my bags and got a ride across the valley. It was a strange feeling to go from one side of the valley to the other. During the 5 days at the Center, I looked each day across the valley in anticipation of the coming retreat on the other side. Then when I reached the other side of the valley, each day I looked back across this same valley to a recent past of a few days and then beyond to the life I’d left to come to this place, a life to which I would soon return.

Life at the Convent began with Matins at 630 am followed by Holy Eucharist at 700 am.  Then there was breakfast shared in silence after which the Great Silence ended. The next prayer, Terce, was at 930 am.  At noon we gathered for the next prayer, Sext, which was followed at 1230 pm with lunch in silence. The next event was Tea at 330 pm which was frequented regularly by visitors. Some people simply chatted while others knit, sewed, or in Mother Miriam’s case, spun wool. Vespers was the next prayer at 530 pm followed by supper in silence. The last communal prayer after which Great Silence started was Compline at 730 pm leading to sleep and the cycle repeated the next day with minor variation on the weekend. The weekend included the one meal at which talking was permitted, supper on Sunday.

Beyond communal prayer times, I had a good deal of time for personal prayer, reading in the Convent’s library and roaming about the grounds beholding the rolling countryside and admiring the free roaming deer. I also took great enjoyment in visiting the cashmere goats the sisters are raising while being cautious of potential trouble from the two dogs who were their faithful guardians. The sisters had three steers this past fall, but my enjoyment of them was now left to the supper table.  There were also numerous flowerbeds and a food garden, all of which were in the throes of winter hibernation so there was little there to encounter with excitement beyond what was and what will be again in the spring.

In the Convent itself, there was a lovely little store in which I bought numerous things that included local honey, a hand-made stuffed dragon named Eustace, some beautifully drawn and coloured cards, and my favourite, a goatskin pelt. Mother Miriam tells me she’ll likely get the rest of the skins made into hats which would be nice for some, but for me, I am content with the skin. It rests at this time on the chair in my office in which I sit and pray each day. My imagination dreams of it as something like what John the Baptist would have worn.

At the end of the four days, my wish was that I could have stayed longer. I felt like I was on the verge of settling into an even deeper restfulness in the rhythm of the daily life. I took away with me a renewed sense of the beauty of resting in God in monastic community and a renewed confidence in God’s calling me into the world to find this restfulness there. At my last prayer service with the sisters, during the open prayer time, prayers were offered for me; and I in kind offered prayers of thankfulness and that more people would respond to the call to vocations to the order. I do hope their order grows and continues to be a witness to the world of the rich faithful life of the Benedictine way of prayer and work. Not all are called to this life of service, and yet who among us is not called to its heart, to resting in God’s heart? Like the sisters, we are all called to be in the world, yet not of it. Their unique way of doing this, centered in the richness of communal prayer, work, and silence, has something to offer us all.

If you ever happen to be in Upper State New York(4 hours drive south of Montreal) and are looking for a place to stay and enjoy the quiet prayerful life, the Community of St. Mary is a five-star spiritual destination. More about the Community and contact information for Mother Miriam can be found at www.stmaryseast.org.

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In the midst of the busy sea-training and transit by HMCS REGINA to Op ARTEMIS, the Ship’s Company had an opportunity to provide aid to a large group of excited orphans at the Jamiyah Children’s Home during our replenishment port visit in Singapore.  With the full support of our Captain, Commander Boyd, and Canada’s High Commission in Singapore, a contingent of sailors and members of the High Commission visited the orphanage.  They presented fundraising cheques and much needed appliances to the total of $ 12880.00, for the orphanage.  It was a memorable experience for HMCS REGINA and the High Commission staff as they went on a tour of the new orphanage.  Just completed, it has a desperate need for more accommodation for the growing number of children placed in the Home’s care!

“As the number of underprivileged children continues to grow in Singapore, there is a great need for more facilities like this,” states the Home’s Administrator Mr. Kayat.  “Jamiyah Children’s home which actually means ‘House of Bliss’ receives the full support of the National Singapore Council of Social Services, but we depend mostly on donations from organizations like Canada’s Navy.”

As we enjoyed the tour we met a myriad of children from 2 to 19 years and learned that Jamiyah Children’s home is part of a voluntary welfare organization which was established in 1993.  This venture was part of a response to a developing concern by Singapore’s Social Services around the growing numbers of neglected children, many of whom had been abused, or have special needs.  Mr. Kayat, in his presentation, was able to articulate that many of the 89 orphans currently at the home come here feeling lonely, abandoned and uncertain about their future. The home with its caring staff and volunteers comprised of educators, mentors, previous graduates and counsellors provide a climate of protection, support, stability and family.

“Some of these children have experienced trauma and saw their dreams crushed because of abuse and rejection.  We, here at the home, provide a holistic approach which offers shelter, care, and development for the children.  That is why we are truly glad to have you all here during our observance of the Muslim celebration of Ramadan to share in this vision of caring for them,” smiles Mr. Kayat.

As the tour continued, we had a chance to meet graduates of the orphanage who had gone on to become doctors, teachers, engineers and media and business officials.  We could see they really celebrated the accomplishments of the children and greatly appreciation our visit.  As a way of showing our support we had an opportunity to finish up some minor renovations to the home and later had some significant interaction time with the children doing arts and crafts projects.  It was exciting for the crew of HMCS REGINA to have an opportunity to support the important work done at the home and many of the sailors had thoughts of their own children back in Canada who await their return.

“I’m so glad I participated in this outreach,” comments one of the young Leading Seaman.  “It’s being involved in humanitarian projects like this when we sail around the world that makes me feel really proud to be a Canadian,” He adds with a smile.

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When I first came to the Anglican Church, I encountered this odd animal named “Lessons and Carols”.  Growing up in the Roman Catholic Church, this was not a service that I was familiar with.  Moreover, I thought that the readings we took time with at the Easter Vigil were sufficient in length for a once-a-year event and didn’t feel the need for a lengthy service in the middle of Advent when things were so busy.  Over time, I have come to feel differently about the service of Lessons and Carols but just when I thought I was getting used to things, I found myself out of the Parish and in a Canadian Forces Chapel.  Now, if we wanted to have a service of Lessons and Carols, there needed to be an explanation; a reason to move off the pattern of Divine Worship or Communion services and hope that members would see as much value and richness of this worship service as in their weekly worship.  The approach I took was to do some research with regard to the purpose, meaning and history of the service and then to find a service style that would work within the CF Chapel.   What follows is some of that research and a service idea that I have used over the years.

The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols, as it is formally called, is traditionally used at Christmas.  The story of the fall of humanity, the promise of the Messiah, and the birth of Jesus is told in nine Bible readings selected from Book of Genesis, the prophetic books and the four Gospels, interspersed with the singing of Christmas carols, hymns and choir music.  The format was based on an Order drawn up by the Bishop of Truro inCornwall, Edward White Benson, who later became the Archbishop of Canterbury.  Lessons and Carols were first celebrated on Christmas Eve 1880.  Tradition says that the bishop organized the service in a small wooden chapel on Christmas Eve with the goal of giving men something to do other than go to the pubs before the midnight service.  The service has since become a tradition as a pre-Christmas liturgy with the most famous version being broadcast from King’s College inCambridgeon Christmas Eve.

So, what is a lonely CF chapel to do about putting on a Service of Lessons and Carols with those standards? Some chapels, such as ours in Petawawa, have an active choir that is a great asset, but others do not have a full choir.  And how do you keep people engaged and involved during nine readings and songs – not to mention the sermon!  A service I developed a few years ago addresses some of these concerns and works with CF congregations of all sizes.  I approach the service from the point of view of a story.  We place a large arm chair at the centre of the sanctuary and it is from there that the readers ‘read’ their story – the Lessons.  The service starts with an introduction by the celebrant about the service of Lessons and Carols.  It proceeds with the youngest members ‘telling’ the oldest story – imagine a four year old asking God’s question found in Genesis — “How did you know you were naked?”  We then move through readers of more maturity, a youth, a teen, middle aged members until the most senior member of the congregation reads the final Gospel.  In between each reading we sing a Carol; not the whole thing, just selected verses.  The choir also offers an Anthem.  Woven through the readings and the singing are short reflections on the part of the celebrant in lieu of a full-fledged sermon.  The whole idea is to have the service flow, through Biblical teaching, musical selections and theological reflections — all to unfold as a story.  It has been very well received.

In my heart, the service of Lessons and Carols will never replace the Holy Thursday’s Institution of the Lord’s Supper as my service of choice, but it has moved up on my list of favourites.

Padre Carol Bateman is the CFB / Area Support Unit Chaplain at Canadian Forces Base Petewawa.  

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