Date: March 6, 2025
Many different types of services could have worked for Shrove Tuesday. Perhaps the Praise Band would have been a fitting climax to the season of Epiphany and the preparation for a holy lent. But as it happens it was the Traditional Worship Team. The service was taken from the American Missal, which was published in 1931. For a service, we were taken to a place where we were being fed by the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, the English Missal, and the Sarum Rite. The service featured the Gregorian (Tridentine) Canon and some secret prayers said only by the priest.
I appreciated this Shrove Tuesday with a difference. I focused in a way that I rarely do. And I appreciated the rich theology of saints that was embedded in the liturgy.
I also want to congratulate the Traditional Worship Team. Such a liturgy requires careful rehearsal. There are many parts that need to be handled appropriately. And I especially want to congratulate our Associate Dean of Chapel, the Rev. Dr. Shawn Strout. I marveled afresh at how he is comfortable in a prayer and praise service and equally comfortable in this High Church liturgy. It was all very impressive. Thank you Shawn.
The Very Rev. Ian S. Markham, Ph.D.
Dean and President of Virginia Theological Seminary and the President of The General Theological Seminary