Introduction

Sermonets, Sermons, and Homilies

It seems to me that my main blog, William Craig's Magazine is starting to get cluttered, and that it would be a good idea to have another site for posting the texts of sermons that people have said kind things about. The notes on readings, Tales from the Slippery Slope, and other items will continue to appear in that blog.

The title comes from a remark I heard many years ago, at Saint Matthew's in Ottawa, I think. It was said that an elderly priest had commented on the trend towards shorter sermons, "Sermonets make Christianets". Some decades later, when sermons tend to be even shorter, I cannot get that phrase out of my mind.

Why not call these shorter addresses homilies? That seems to be the current usage. When asked the difference between a sermon and a homily, however, the only real difference I can suggest is that sermon is Latin and homily is Greek. Both words mean "speech" or "discourse". In practice homily now seems to mean a shorter, less formal (an perhaps less structured) address meant to comment on the day's readings, or, in other words, a sermon. I will only note that the rubrics in both the Book of Common Prayer and the Book of Alternative Services call the thing that follows the Gospel a Sermon, suggest that if there is any real difference between a sermon and a homily we might all be breaking the rules, and say nothing more on the subject.

I am afraid that the printed text of any discourse, whether sermon or homily, is a pale shadow of what the people found interesting or moving on a particular Sunday morning. It is my practice to preach from a fully-written text rather than from outline or memory. I admire preachers who can deliver a coherent and interesting sermon from outline notes or even off the cuff; but the I admire all sorts of things I cannot myself do. However, when I have the text in front of me I am free to adjust the delivery when thoughts and corrections come to me - or cut when it seems to be a bit dull.

So here I offer a selection of the texts of my sermons, or sermonets, or homilies, as you like it, but not the sermons themselves, which were events of a moment, in which I and the people and God all had a part. It is dedicated to Fr Jeffry Kennedy and the people of Saint Matthias', Bellwoods, who are in no way "christianets", but people of such great good humour and understanding that they have made happy church home for me in Toronto.