In the closest battle of Lent Madness 2019 to date, Nicodemus edged James the Greater 51% to 49% yesterday to advance to the Saintly Sixteen where he'll face Martha of Bethany for a shot at the Elate Eight. See? Every (single) vote counts! But be aware that multiple voting will get you cast out into the outer darkness of Lent Madness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Remember, Big Lent is watching...
Today, we head up to the Great White North of Canada to meet Hannah Grier Coome and back down to Philadelphia to encounter the pioneering ministry of Richard Allen.
Yesterday, in addition to the nail biting Biblical matchup, we offered everyone a rare glimpse behind the Purple Curtain that is the Supreme Executive Committee. In case you missed it, you can catch up here.
Hannah Grier Coome
Hannah Grier Coome was born October 28, 1837, to the Rev. John Grier and Eliza Geddes in Carrying Place, Upper Canada, and is known as the founder of the Sisterhood of St. John the Divine in the Anglican Church of Canada.
With her father serving as rector of an Anglican congregation, Hannah had ties to the church from the beginning of her life. On July 23, 1859, Hannah married Charles Horace Coome, a civil engineer working on the railroad. When his contract was complete, he took Hannah back to his native country of England. There, Hannah was influenced by the Oxford Movement and the local Community of St. Mary the Virgin. Hannah was immediately drawn to their works of service and their strong commitment to the mission of Christ’s church in the world.
While living in England, Hannah became pregnant but lost what would be her only child after a dangerous fall. Following a lengthy convalescence, Hannah and Charles left England and ended up in Chicago, Illinois, where her husband died a year later. Hannah returned to Toronto and connected with a group of devout Christians who felt the need to establish a monastic community for women. This group of men and women began working together to raise funds and find a permanent location to establish the sisterhood. Hannah left for upstate New York to train at the Community of Saint Mary in order to gain the education she needed to lead the order.
Sister Hannah returned to Toronto in 1884 to lead the newly founded Sisters of St. John the Divine (SSJD). The sisters were called to serve as nurses to soldiers in the Northwest Rebellion and returned to Toronto to grow the ministry; the Sisters of St. John the Divine continues to this day as a thriving monastic community.
Mother Hannah died on February 9, 1921, on an Ash Wednesday surrounded by her family of sisters. The order she founded lays claim to sister houses (past and present) in Quebec, Nova Scotia, Saskatchewan, Toronto, British Columbia, and Alberta. The sisterhood is known for training nurses, providing rehabilitative care, opening hospitals, providing education and shelter, and care for the elderly. SSJD serves both urban and rural areas of Canada and founded St. John’s Rehabilitation Hospital in Toronto.
Collect for Hannah Grier Coome
Almighty God, you have surrounded us with a great cloud of witnesses: Grant that we, encouraged by the good example of your servant Hannah, may persevere in running the race that is set before us, until at last we may with her attain to your eternal joy; through Jesus Christ, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Richard Allen
Many Episcopalians have heard the name Absalom Jones; however, few know of Richard Allen, Jones’s Methodist counterpart and co-conspirator for racial justice.
Born as an enslaved man, Allen and his family were sold to a man who owned a plantation in Delaware. The plantation owner was convinced by a Methodist preacher that slavery was sinful and eventually offered his slaves the opportunity to buy their freedom, which Allen did in 1780, changing his name from “Negro Richard” to “Richard Allen.”
Credentialed as a Methodist minister in 1784, Allen eventually moved to Philadelphia to minister to the burgeoning population of free blacks. He became a minister at St. George’s Methodist Episcopal Church but was relegated to early morning services for black congregants. This segregation was a constant source of tension between the white and black congregations of the church. While at St. George’s, Allen met Absalom Jones, another minister at the church, and the two founded the Free African Society.
In 1787, Allen, Jones, and other black worshipers were pulled from their knees during prayer, and the entire black congregation walked out, vowing never to return. While Jones went on to become an Episcopal priest and lead the Free African Society toward affiliation with the Episcopal Church, Allen founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church for those who wanted to continue in the Methodist tradition. Originally, the church operated out of a blacksmith shop and had to rely on white pastors for oversight and sacramental functions, but Allen was eventually ordained as a Methodist minister in 1799; in 1816, four other churches joined with what was then Bethel AME Church to establish the African Methodist Episcopal Church as the first independent black Christian denomination. Allen was elected as the first bishop, a ministry he served until his death in 1831.
In addition to making history as a religious protestor and founder and first bishop of the first independent black Christian denomination, Allen and his wife Sarah also operated a station on the Underground Railroad.
Collect for Richard Allen
Loving God, who makes us all your children by adoption in Jesus Christ: May we, following the example of your servant Richard Allen, proclaim liberty to all who are enslaved and captive in this world; through Jesus Christ, Savior of all, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
-Marcus Halley
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203 comments on “Hannah Grier Coome vs. Richard Allen”
Nurse to Nurse - Hannah Grier Coome!
It was too difficult to chose today. They are both wonderful in there own way.
I was born and raised a Methodist in Lewes, Delaware. Many people, places, jobs and spiritual experiences connect me to both Mother Hannah and Richard Allen. I was confirmed in the Episcopal Church in 1976 as an adult. I wrote them here and deleted them for I had sinned and name dropped. I voted for Richard Allen.
I need some buttons too. Like. Edit. Delete.
I truly wish that the word "like" could e removed from the English language!
I must respectfully disagree with St Celia, Susan and others who advocate for "like" buttons, for the following reasons:
First, what makes Lent Madness special (to me, anyway) is not the voting. It's the heartfelt and often deeply personal discernment that takes place both before the voting starts, and when we (sometimes) choose to share that with others here.
I believe that to add "like" buttons and other social media widgets would not add anything meaningful to our Lenten meditation as we engage in this discourse with each other; rather, it would act against such discourse, by removing an essential threshold of engagement: stating we like or dislike a comment.
It takes no intellectual or spiritual effort to issue a quasi-anonymous "like". It is, to be honest, a short cut, a desire to be part of a group. As such, it is contrary both to our chosen path as Christians (a stony path in this world of mental, physical and spiritual shortcuts), and to our personal walk through Lent.
Likewise I see no added value in auto-populating fields, alert systems and other ways to "streamline" our participation. That's not what Lent's about! It's about taking our time, thinking it through, learning from others and from ourselves.
St Celia, I concur that the small font size is sometimes hard on my aging eyesight. On my Mac, I just zoom in on the page; I assume that's possible on Windows as well. On phones and tablets, one can choose to increase text magnification; WordPress will respect that setting.
One improvement I can join you in supporting, however: the "comments feed" link referenced at the beginning of each post's comments section does not seem to work (at least for me). I believe it is meant to point to a chronological (rather that threaded) list of comments, making it easier to catch up with the last hour's posts. For now, I just search for "3:" to find all posts made from 3:00 to 3:59 PM, etc. It works just as fast, to be honest -- and it gives me the context as well.
Please feel free to reply to me with your comments, suggestions, improvements, rebuttals, etc. Over the last week I have come to value your thoughts, as well as those of the other participants here. But please: no "likes", dittos" "dislikes", etc: they won't tell me .
Thank you so much for saying what I've thinking and trying to say in far less gracious terms. We do not need a "like" button. We do need thoughtful comments.
For some reason, WordPress stripped out some key words from my comment above.
The last part of the third paragraph should read "rather, it would act against such discourse, by removing an essential threshold of engagement: stating _why_ we like or dislike a comment."
The final paragraph should read:
"Please feel free to reply to me with your comments, suggestions, improvements, rebuttals, etc. Over the last week I have come to value your thoughts, as well as those of the other participants here. But please: no “likes”, dittos” “dislikes”, etc: they won’t tell me _why_."
John, I think you make a good point about the "like" button. I can live without that, and I can try your search strategy. I don't mind spending time on LM at all, but there's time and there's TIME. I would truly like not to have to type in my name and email every time I comment on someone else's comment. I really like to converse about things, but I wish I didn't have to sift through all the comments from beginning to end to find new responses to my comments. Capiche? The comments section is far and away the best part of LM for me. I learn so much, and I love the community that is built--even if for a short time.
Have enjoyed the wonderful sisters for many years!
Blessings,
Jane Morton Brandon, MB
Another hard choice, but it is so much better to agonize over which of two attractive saints I will vote for than the recent matchup in which only the dog appealed to me. I recently re-connected with an old friend who is the son of an AME minister and the grandson of an AME bishop, and I am impressed by Richard Allen. But somehow Mother Hannah is the one who speaks to me heart right now. Besides, I am happy to be able to vote for a Canadian! I'm an American who lived in Canada for 25 years. (We came back because our children live in the USA; people often wonder why anyone would do so.) I fervently pray that we never get "Like" buttons on Lent Madness.
This was a tough one for me. I really admire Richard Alan and his ministry yet I would like to be Hannah.
As a Canadian and a visitor to the wonderful SSJD in Toronto, my vote is for Hanna.
I was born, and raised Methodist then became Episcopal as an adult after college graduation. With that in mind in some ways was kind of torn but in the end my choice had to be Hannah. She was a nurse serving soldiers in the military, plus founded the SSJD which I thought was very admirable. Also, an aside- the marriage to civil engineer with the railroad was something I identified with a little in that I had an uncle who was an engineer for many years until his retirement for Union Pacific in its early years until the early 60's. The same gentleman also helped in the building of Sun Valley ID ski resort which Union Pacific had large part in and helped build, and put in the first chair-lift on Bald Mountain, which is a very well-known peak at the resort. One very lucky aunt who had also had known many years of living in the caboose of the early steamers like many couples with the railroad did, got to take the first ride up it.
Richard Allen is an old friend of mine; I learned about him in seminary, and revere him as part of the Methodist story. I am and always will be United Methodist, and grieve the current disagreements and hurtful things being said and done. In retirement, my husband and I returned to the congregation that is our church home, Christ Church United Methodist at 60th St. and Park Avenue in New York City. This is a church with people from all over the world, with every imaginable opinion, but all are welcome and loved. Nobody is excluded. We will remain so, with God helping us.
Gotta vote for the nurse. Besides, who are we as Episcopalians doing, trying to vote for a Methodist? C'mon.
Lent Madness: it can drive all denominations crazy with tough choices! (Go, SEC!)
I did want to vote for Richard Allen, but Sister Hannah got my vote not just for the work she did, but in remembrance of the Roman Catholic sisters who schooled me for 12 years in Salem, MA and who also served in Canada. They are the Sisters of Ste Chrétienne, with missions to the Cree in Alberta, as well as missions in Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Tanzania. In this country they are in New England and in Florida.
I was blessed with a great education, and was delighted in more recent years when they accepted me with joy and understanding when I told them that I was now an Episcopalian.
I admire his stamina. He never gave up and his life was not easy. God showed him what he designed for.
I support Mother Hannah whose gift of herself in the founding of an Anglican order of sisters has given the Anglican Church and Canada itself the gift of healing, education, and spiritual care up to this day. Like Hannah, I too am married to a civil engineer.
I forgot to vote last week, but after reading I definitely would have voted for Richard Allen. My hometown was a stop on the Underground Railroad and I did a lot of research about my town's involvement and the people behind it. Richard is my kind of guy!