Newly-installed Bishop Nick Bundock will be the celebrant at a special Ascension Day Eucharist at All Saints at 7 pm on Thursday May 29. The service is at the behest of the North West Regional Council. Rev Sydney Maitland will preach while Jordanhill Liturgical Choir and choristers from other churches in the North West Regional…
Commentary: The ministry of the church was to be Christ-centred
It is interesting how the great festivals of the church follow the rhythm of the seasons, writes Rev Sydney Maitland. Christmas is our midwinter celebration, while Easter is the start of the lambing season and the Harvest Festival speaks for itself: the final ingathering. But Pentecost is also important, in being the celebration of the…
Easter 6: Pull down the barriers
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 25 May 2025. ‘And so day by day, event by event, meeting by meeting we are called to allow Him to draw closer to us.’
General Synod 2025 agenda published
The General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church will meet at St Paul’s & St George’s Episcopal Church in Edinburgh, from Thursday 5 June to Saturday 7 June. The agenda and papers have now been sent to members and published here on the Scottish Episcopal Church website, detailing the business scheduled. Proceedings will begin on the…
Easter 5: Jesus’ New Commandment to His disciples
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 18 May 2025. ‘He sees us in terms of wiping every tear from the eyes of His people. Death, mourning, crying and pain have no meaning or significance. The Lord is seeing to that one, personally.’
Anglican church leader urged to resign as bullying scandal drags on
The most senior figure within Scotland’s Anglican church is facing calls to resign over claims he “misled” clergy about a safeguarding scandal. The Scottish Episcopal Church (SEC) is mired in crisis over the future of the Right Rev Anne Dyer, Scotland’s first woman bishop, who was suspended in 2022 amid accusations of bullying. She was…
Easter 4: ‘I know My sheep and they know Me’
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 11 May 2025. ‘They know His Name and rejoice in it; they hear His word and they follow it; they honour one another who are also His sheep. They have that instinctive sense of being in His presence when they are with others who also seek His face.’
Easter 3: Called into the service of His gospel
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 4 May 2025. ‘He was there so that we also might be part of that great company of praise in heaven: animated not by our sins and memories but empowered by His mercy.’
Consecration of Bishop Nicholas Bundock: full report
A new Bishop has been consecrated in the Diocese of Glasgow & Galloway at a service held in the Cathedral Church of St Mary the Virgin in Glasgow. The consecration of the Right Reverend Doctor Nicholas Bundock took place on Saturday evening following his election earlier this year. The service was live-streamed and can…
Consecration of Bishop Nicholas Bundock
The consecration took place today of the Most Rev Nicholas Bundock as Bishop of Glasgow & Galloway. Here is the order of service:
Easter 2: The faith that comes through in small things
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 27 April 2025. ‘Do we hesitate? Maybe it is also time for us to let the Lord meet us in our own hesitations, as we receive His commission as well.’
Easter Day: The air that we breathe
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 20 April 2025. ‘It is life everlasting, joy in its fulness, peace beyond understanding, the portion poured out: overflowing and spilling onto the ground.’
Commentary: New experiences of love
I suspect that none of us expected the western world to change as it has following the inauguration of the new administration in the USA in January, writes Rev Sydney Maitland. As weeks went by however, more and more of our easy assumptions were challenged and some were swept away. One newspaper columnist thought that…
Lent 5: I am doing a new thing!
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 6 April 2025. ‘God would be known and worshipped in a different way, and all the human impulses to dominate and oppress others would have to be set aside in favour of the total victory over sin and death that Jesus would accomplish. A new life, aims and values.’
Commentary: Our readiness to receive
Crime, instability, uncertainty, confusion: the list goes on, writes Rev Sydney Maitland. For some, it is the system, so change the system and the rest will follow. Of course, we need to say what we mean by ‘The System’ and then how it should be reformed or replaced. But then we must ask, ‘What with?’…
Lent 4, Mothering Sunday: The comforts of God
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 30 March 2025. ‘Always there, always on the look-out, always ready to draw us close with His strength and reassurance.’
Lent 3: All should repent from self-serving agendas
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 23 March 2025. ‘And yes, the holiness and purity of God is not the length of a measuring rod: it is the width of the universe. In this none may assume that there are aspects of their own lives that do not demand to be assessed and amended’
Lent 2: In it but not of it
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 16 March 2025. ‘And so they are urged to stand firm. To stand in their faith, their confidence in Jesus Christ, in the glory of the scriptures and the sacraments.’
Lent 1: The atoning sacrifice of Jesus
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 9 March 2025. ‘And so Paul stresses that if we believe in our hearts that God raised Jesus from the dead, and confess with our mouths that this is so then we shall be saved.’
Ash Wednesday: It is His agenda that matters
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Wednesday 5 March 2025. ‘For us the starting point is not our own perception or convenience. It is the total and utter purity of God, without any suggestion of compromise.’
Lent Prose: a haunting hymn with its roots in 10th century Spain
‘Hear us, O Lord, have mercy upon us: for we have sinn’d against thee.’ This moving piece derives from a hymn composed in the 10th century by Mozarabs, Iberian Christians living under Islamic rule in Andalusia.
Diocesan Synod 2025
Reports plus video message from Bishop-Elect Nicholas Bundock in Uganda.
Epiphany 8 / Quinquagesima: The salvation of all people
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 2 March 2025. ‘So there could never be any kind of substitute for that personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. No amount of right thinking or fashionably up-to-date demonstrating on current issues was ever going to substitute for that faith.’
Epiphany 7 / Sexagesima: Perhaps there are things that we can let go of
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 23 February 2025. ‘The more space we can make for Him, then the more space we dedicate to Him for His use and glory. The more we can offer Him then the more He can use us to bless others – and that includes those who turned us against ourselves and against God.’
Commentary: He has torn, but He will heal us
These reflections are being put together in the light of recent events covering relations across the Atlantic, writes Rev Sydney Maitland. My point is emphatically not political: it is for the politicians to determine whether and how to defend our way of life and thinking. But there is another aspect which dates back to Jeremiah….
Epiphany 6 / Septuagesima: Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 16 February 2025. ‘But the personal faith of the church was in Jesus as a resurrected being and not as a memory or a historical figure. Either Jesus is alive or He is not. There are no alternatives.’
Aberdeenshire priest resigns her cure over ‘bullying bishop’
The Times of London reports a priest has resigned her cure in the Diocese of Aberdeen and Orkney as she cannot in good conscience serve under a “bullying” bishop. On 14 Feb 2025 the newspaper reported the Rev. Canon Vittoria Hancock will step down in April as rector of St Thomas’ Episcopal Church in Aboyne and St Kentigern’s in…
Epiphany 5: The blame culture on steroids
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 9 February 2025. ‘If we think our years are too advanced, then think of Moses, called to serve God as a youngster of 80.’
Patronal Festival at St Bride’s, Hyndland
St Brigit of Kildare, died 1500 years ago and this milestone has inspired an extended Patronal Festival at St Bride’s. Special choral services on Sunday 9 February will be preceded by a series of events on the previous day. Saturday 8th February 2025 12 noon – Ecumenical Service with participation from local churches Music from…
Epiphany 4, Presentation of Christ: Watching and praying
Sermon by Rev Sydney Maitland for Sunday 3 February 2025. ‘Maybe the church is also intended to come into its own, like the football stadium, when the game is on and the stands are full and there is that excitement and exuberance in the air.’
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