Our parish life centers around the Mass, where each Sunday we join ourselves to the perfect and eternal worship of the divine Son, Jesus Christ, to God the Father. In that celebration, we are united sacramentally to Christ and one another in our communion. We kneel beside each other at the altar rail to eat together the body and blood of Christ. We unite our voices in the theologically rich and beloved melodies of generational hymn writers like Charles Wesley and St. Thomas Aquinas. We bow and kneel before the presence of God as united members of Christ's body. We praise, beseech, repent, pronounce, and glorify God in the communal prayers of the Mass. Holy communion is the cause of our unity, and from it, the rest of parish life flows.

Immediately following Holy Communion each Sunday, our parish hosts a coffee hour for fellowship and feasting. We have just been joined sacramentally as the united body of Christ — now, we get to enjoy the interpersonal relationships that must flow from that unity. Over homemade family delicacies, store-bought treats, and a fresh cup of coffee, our parishioners enjoy each other's company and unite their lives together in the simple and wonderful vicissitudes of community.

As Anglicans, we affirm that "Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation, so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith" (Article VI, The Book of Common Prayer, 1928). The Bible is the Church's sacred text and must be understood within her interpretive tradition. This is why a parish Bible study is of the utmost importance! Many Monday evenings, we gather in the parish vestibule after a low mass for dinner and an in-depth study of the scriptures with the clergy. In these meetings, we deepen our knowledge of the living Word as he has revealed Himself to His Church, and prepare ourselves morally to live out what, by baptism, we have been made ontologically: new creatures in Christ.

One of the greatest contributions of Anglicanism to the Church has been the Book of Common Prayer, which took the traditional, daily prayers of religious orders and clergy and designed an office (or duty) of prayer for the laity. Morning and Evening Prayer bring the beautiful liturgies, prayers, and seasonal collects of the Church into the home — the domestic church. Common prayer unites our parishioners even when we are not physically together, and it connects our secular lives to our spiritual, and reminds us each day of our true calling: to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our mind.