January 3, 2024

Beloved in Christ:

In ancient times, before most people owned a calendar, The Epiphany Proclamation was read in churches to the faithful. While the calendar need for this is gone now, the proclamation still exists. I rediscovered it this year and am intrigued with the community and theological gifts it offers. This year’s proclamation reads:

Epiphany Proclamation 2024

Dear friends, the glory of the Lord has shone upon us, and shall ever be manifest among us, until the day of his return. Through the rhythms of times and seasons let us celebrate the mysteries of salvation.

Let us recall the year’s culmination, the Easter Triduum of the Lord: his last supper, his crucifixion, his burial, and his rising celebrated between the evening of the twenty-eighth day of March and the evening of the thirtieth day of March, Easter Day being on the thirty-first day of March.

Each Easter — as on each Sunday — the Holy Church makes present the great and saving deed by which Christ has for ever conquered sin and death. From Easter are reckoned all the days we keep holy.

Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, will occur on the fourteenth day of February.

The Ascension of the Lord will be commemorated on the ninth day of May.

Pentecost, joyful conclusion of the season of Easter, will be celebrated on the nineteenth day of May.

And, this year the First Sunday of Advent will be on the first day of December.

Likewise the pilgrim Church proclaims the Passover of Christ in the feasts of the holy Mother of God, in the feasts of the Apostles and Saints, and in the commemoration of the faithful departed.

To Jesus Christ, who was, who is, and who is to come, Lord of time and history, be endless praise, for ever and ever. Amen.

The proclamation would be read each year, on Epiphany, to set all of the feast days of the year ahead, everything moving around the date of Easter. The clergy would update all of the dates, but keep the proclamation the same. I offer this to you for your own calendars as you start 2024, but also to ponder on the truth of how we keep the rhythms of life together – we move, in the church, in an arc that swings around the Triduum – Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter – and continues all year, bringing us together at inflection points in Jesus’ life, and in our own. We are connected in so many ways to one another, to the community of faith all over the world, and always to God, who holds the whole of the arc of time in the greatest of love and care. It is so very easy to be focused on the details of the day-to-day of life, to be anxious and worried about many things, and to lose sight of the greatness of creation and our place in it. This Epiphany, we are invited to remember who we are and whose we are – all year, 366 days of it (it’s a leap year), and to, especially in moments of loneliness or sadness, know that we are truly never alone; we are connected in the love of God.

Happy new year!

Beth+