446 N Seguin Ave, New Braunfels, Texas 78130

(830) 310-0647

(830) 310-0647

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    • Home
    • About Us
    • Visit Us
    • Contact Us
    • Weekly Scribblings
    • Photos
    • Facebook Page
    • Around St. Joseph's
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  • Visit Us
  • Contact Us
  • Weekly Scribblings
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St Joseph’s Anglican Church

St Joseph’s Anglican ChurchSt Joseph’s Anglican ChurchSt Joseph’s Anglican Church

Catholic in Tradition, Biblical in Faith, Sacramental in Worship

Catholic in Tradition, Biblical in Faith, Sacramental in Worship Catholic in Tradition, Biblical in Faith, Sacramental in Worship

About Us

Anglican, Catholic or Protestant??

 “What’s the difference between your Church and the Catholic Church? Are you Catholics or Protestants?"


In our everyday speech here in America, when most of us say the word “Catholic," we mean by it Roman Catholic .  The use is more sociological than religious; it comes from a time when  we used to divide people up into categories such as Protestants,  Catholics, and Jews. A little investigation reveals to us, though, that  the word “Catholic" is much more than a sociological term. It comes from  two Greek words: kath holon, which means “according to the whole." In other words, Catholic means “complete" or “full." The Catholic Faith, then, is the whole Faith, undiminished, unaltered, undiluted. The Catholic Church is the  whole Church, teaching and practicing the whole Faith. In the Creeds of  the ancient Church, she defines herself as One, Holy, Catholic and  Apostolic.


Through  the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance more and more ecclesiastical  power came to be centered in Rome; with the centralization of power, as  often happens, abuses arose. While these abuses are often exaggerated,  some were quite real and they provoked a crisis. People began to lose  faith in the Church as an institution, and the result was the convulsion  we know as the Reformation. The Reformers, men like Martin Luther and  John Calvin, protested against abuses in the Church. Each of them soon  developed a vision of his own of what the Church should be, and soon the  Reformers could find little unity among themselves except that they  disagreed with the Church in Rome. Individually they came to be called  after their founders, Lutherans, or Calvinists, or after their more  particular doctrines, Anabaptists, Adventists and so on. Collectively  they came to be called Protestants, that is, those protesting against  Rome. 


The  Reformation affected all Europe in the 16th century, and England was no  exception. King Henry VIII, a lecherous and ambitious man, severed the  ties that bound the Church of England to Rome. But for all his  self-centeredness, Henry was a conservative. He didn’t like unnecessary  change. As a result, aside from breaking the connections between the  English Church and the Roman Church, he insisted that the Faith and  practice of the Church of England remain what it had been before. Henry  got his way. He burned up those who disagreed with him, loyal Romans on  the one side, dedicated Protestants on the other.


Not  long after King Henry died and went to whatever awaits him eternally,  his daughter Elizabeth succeeded to the English throne. Under Elizabeth,  the Church of England understood itself as both Catholic and  Protestant: Catholic in holding the fullness of the ancient Faith,  Protestant in rejecting the abuses and growing power (worldly and  religious) of the Renaissance Popes. Elizabeth referred to the religion  of the English Church as “Reformed Catholicism."

As  we’ve seen, the main notion “Protestants" have in common is their  rejection of Roman Catholicism. This is hardly a good way to define  anything; it’s like a farmer giving his vocation as “not a banker."  Anglicans don’t refer to themselves as Protestants because our  understanding of Catholicism is not sociological but religious.


Anglicans  hold the Holy Bible, the unbroken succession of Bishops from the  Apostles till now (called Apostolic Succession), the Sacraments, and the  Creeds as essential signs of the Catholic Faith. We disagree with our  Roman Catholic friends who are supposed to believe, according to the  official teaching of the Roman Church, that “it is absolutely necessary  for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman  Pontiff,” but we are glad to share with them the essentials of the  Catholic Faith. We differ with our Protestant friends in that we believe  Jesus Himself founded the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, with  its Scriptures, Sacraments, Creeds and Succession as essential to the  salvation of mankind. The Church is not a human institution. We didn’t  make it. Jesus Christ Himself founded it and we believe His Holy Spirit  lives within it. As it belongs to Him, we are not free to change it in  any essential way. We receive it as a precious gift and as such, God  willing, we pass it on to others. For this reason Tradition (which comes  from the Latin word meaning “to hand over") is very important to us.  The Holy Spirit works through the Church’s Tradition to ensure that the  Faith is passed on it all its power, the power to make men and women  fresh and new and alive in Christ. We want to be sure we hand on that  same Faith to those who come after us in all its fullness, all its  Catholicity.


The  Creed teaches us the Lord Jesus founded One Church. That Church is not  the Anglican Church or the Roman Catholic Church or any of the  Protestant bodies coming out of the Reformation. The Creed teaches us  that the Church is the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church. The Book  of Common Prayer (echoing Scripture and Tradition) teaches us that the  Church is “the Body of which Jesus Christ is the Head, and all baptized  people are members." Sadly these baptized people have fragmented  themselves into all sorts of groups with all sorts of names. But, thank  God, we cannot destroy what God has created. The Church is one, as our  Lord Himself said, because God is One. We must continue to pray that the  Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost will hasten the day that the  visible unity of His Church will be restored: the day there will be no  more Protestants, or Roman Catholics, or Anglicans, but only Catholics  united in unbreakable bonds of faith and charity. 

by the Rev Canon Gregory Lee Wilcox

What Is St Joseph's?

 "Who is St Joseph's" is probably a better question.

We're Larry , the parish treasurer, head usher and New Braunfels' most prominent Democrat. We're Middy , a retired nurse who's always there to help anybody with anything...we’re Robert with his wry smile and Angie, his wife with her gentle smile, trying to corral their younger daughters in the pews and teach them how to pray...we're Jack sporting his American flag shirt with the NRA patch carrying the flag in procession on national days ...we're Mary Catherine making sure the priest does what he's supposed to and Toya whose goodness keeps the heart of our parish charities beating and we're Carole and Harry and Sylvia and Bill and Kay and all the others who kneel together at the Altar of God and receive the Blessed Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood, "that He may dwell in us, and we in Him."

St Joseph's Church isn’t merely a building. We’re Christ's people at this building, just as Christ’s people exist in thousands of other churches in thousands other places. Here, like there, we come together to pray and support each other; we eat and drink and laugh and sometimes we cry. We’re learning how to love God by learning how to love each other. And what has come out of all of this is a people who are friendly and open, inviting and loving and, speaking as a priest who’s old enough to appreciate it – just plain sweet – the kinda folks I’m delighted to share my life with and to go with, Sunday after Sunday, to the Altar of God. - Fr Gregory Lee Wilcox

Archbishop Fisher on Anglican Doctrine

   

“Anglicanism has no peculiar thought, practice, creed or confession of its own. It has only the Catholic Faith of the ancient Catholic Church, as preserved in Holy Scripture and the Catholic Creeds and maintained in the Catholic and Apostolic constitution of Christ’s Church from the beginning.”  – The Most Rev Geoffrey Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1952 

Liturgy

 



Service Schedule

On Sundays and Holy Days, Morning Prayer will be read at 9.00 AM, the Holy Eucharist offered at 9.30, and Evening Prayer will be read at 1.00 PM.  


Our Sunday morning  Liturgy (Morning Prayer followed by the Holy Eucharist)  is live streamed on  our parish Facebook page beginning at 9.00 AM each Sunday morning.  www.facebook.com/stjosephsnewbraunfels     


December 18 - Sunday: the Fourth Sunday in Advent 

9.00 AM - Morning Prayer

9.30 AM - the Holy Eucharist (Fr Wilcox, celebrant & preacher)

4.00 PM - The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols   

  

December 21 – Wednesday: St Thomas the Apostle (“O Oriens”)

6.00 AM – the Rorate Mass of St John the Baptist

11.45 AM – Morning Prayer & the Holy Eucharist

1.00 PM – Lunch & Parish Staff Meeting

7.00 PM – Evening Prayer


December 22 – Thursday: Feria in Advent (“O Rex Genitum”)

6.00 AM – the Rorate Mass of the Annunciation of St Mary the Virgin

11.45 AM – Morning Prayer & the Holy Eucharist

7.00 PM – Evening Prayer


December 23 – Friday: St Thorlak Thorhallsson, Bishop of Skálholt and Patron of Iceland, 1193 (“O Emmanuel”)

6.00 AM – the Rorate Mass of the Visitation of the Virgin to St Elizabeth

11.45 AM – Morning Prayer & the Holy Eucharist

7.00 PM – Evening Prayer 


December 24 – Saturday: Vigil of the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ

10.00 AM – Morning Prayer

7.00 PM – Evening Prayer

10.30 PM – Carol Service

11.00 PM – Midnight Mass with sermon


December 25 – Sunday: Feast of the Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ

8.00 AM – the First Mass of Christmas

9.00 AM – Morning Prayer

9.30 AM – the Holy Eucharist (sung)

11.15 AM – Christmas Breakfast

2.00 PM -Evening Prayer


This Friday is a day of abstinence.


On Wednesdays, Thursday, and Fridays, Morning Prayer is read at 11.45 AM, the Holy Eucharist is offered at noon, and Evening Prayer is at 7.00 PM 


Clergy, Server & Epistoller's Schedule

    Clergy, Server & Epistoller’s Schedule for August & September 2022

  

August 21 – Sunday in the Octave of the Dormition/Tenth Sunday after Trinity

Bp Ng’ang’a – preacher; Fr Wilcox – celebrant; Deacon Lee - deacon, Bill Hull – acolyte; Jan Bates - epistoller


August 28 – Eleventh Sunday after Trinity

Fr Wilcox – celebrant & preacher; Deacon Lee - deacon, Greg Essington – acolyte; Bill Hull – epistoller


September 4 – Twelfth Sunday after Trinity

Bp Ng’ang’a – celebrant; Fr Wilcox – preacher; Deacon Lee - deacon, Bill Hull – acolyte; Jan Baertl – epistoller (Deacon: Gospel procession);


September 11 – Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity

Fr Wilcox – celebrant & preacher; Deacon Lee - deacon, Greg Essington – acolyte; Lindsey Schaub – epistoller


September 18 – Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity

Bp Ng'ang'a - preacher, Fr Wilcox – celebrant; Deacon Lee, deacon, Bill Hull – acolyte; Jan Bates –epistoller


September 25 – Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity

Fr Wilcox – celebrant & preacher; Deacon Lee - deacon, Greg Essington – acolyte; Tanya Wilcox – epistoller

                   

Bowing the Head at the Mention of Jesus Name

“…when in time of Divine Service the Lord Jesus shall be mentioned, due and lowly reverence shall be done by all persons present, as it hath been accustomed; testifying, by these outward ceremonies and gestures, their inward humility, Christian resolution, and due acknowledgment that the Lord Jesus Christ, the true and eternal Son of God, is the only Saviour of the world…” – from the 1604 Canons of the Church of England issued by order of King James I (of King James’ Bible fame)

The Bell of St Joseph's and Other Fun & Fascinating Facts About Our Church

 (No, we don't have the Liberty Bell. That's not actually a picture of our bell.) When you come by the church, take a look at our "new" old bell, a bronze 100 -year-old beauty with a rich tone that carries all the way down to the river when it rings!


The stained glass windows in the church are less than 20 years old, but are closely-patterned after stained glass seen throughout the South from about 1870-1920 (St Joseph's boasts the only Men's Room in central Texas with its own stained-glass window). 


St Joseph’s chalice and paten were originally given as a gift to the first Episcopal Bishop of Quincy, Illinois, the Rt Rev Thomas Burgess, in 1878. As the hallmark under the base of the chalice shows, it was made by the Gorham Manufacturing Company, the leading silversmiths of 19th century America. How St Joseph’s came into the possession of a chalice & paten owned by a former Yankee chaplain in the War Between the States is a tale worth hearing (but at another time and in another place). 


Copyright © 2018 St Joseph's Anglican Church - All Rights Reserved.


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