29 March 2017

King's Chapel, Boston: "O Lord and heavenly Father"

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King's Chapel (est. 1686) in Boston, Massachusetts is a most unique congregation.  The Church is Unitarian Christian theologically, Congregational in polity, and its style of worship is self-described as Anglican. The congregation publishes an extremely handsome edition of their prayer book i.e., The Book of Common Prayer 1986 According to the Use in King's Chapel, Boston. And one would be very hard pressed to characterise their prayer book as anything outside of the Anglican norms for liturgy of course excepting the unitarian christian theological position. After being out of print for a number of years, the book is now in print again and is available via the King's Chapel website  for US$52.50. 

The following prayer is taken from the First Order for Holy Communion on Page 79 of the King's Chapel Book of Common Prayer 1986:


O Lord and heavenly Father, we thy humble servants earnestly desire thy fatherly goodness, mercifully to accept this our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, beseeching thee to grant that looking unto Christ and entering into the fellowship of his suffering, we may be changed into his likeness and with him pass from death into life. And here we offer and present unto thee, O Lord, ourselves, our souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice, humbly beseeching thee, that all we who are partakers of this holy communion may be filled with thy grace and heavenly benediction, according to thine abundant mercies in Christ Jesus our Lord; through whom all honor and glory be unto thee, O Father almighty, world without end. Amen.

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