The Feast of the Dedication

Church of the Atonement Fr. Charles Everson October 5, 2025

It all began in a butcher shop.

On June 17th, 1888, a small group of faithful Episcopalians gathered in

a rented butcher shop on Bryn Mawr Avenue to hear the Word of God, to

offer prayer, and to give thanks for the presence of Christ in their

midst. We don’t know much about the details of that first service, but

we do know this: God was there. Just as Jacob discovered in his sleep

that the place where he lay his head was none other than the house of

God and the gate of heaven, so too those early worshipers discovered

that even the scent of sawdust and fresh blood could not overpower the

fragrance of holiness. God was there. God has always been here.

Two years later, on June 21st, 1890, this present building was opened

for worship. A lawyer named Frederick Keator led Morning Prayer and was

ordained a priest a year later in 1891, serving as the congregation’s

first priest-in-charge, and later being elected Bishop of Olympia in

northwestern Washington state. On June 19th, 1899, the parish was

formally organized and called its first rector. From the beginning,

Atonement was never simply a neighborhood church. This parish has always

had a wider reach, a broader vocation. When Atonement parishioner

Charles Stewart served as co-chair of the search committee that brought

me here, he told me that during the process, he learned something he

hadn’t known before: that this parish is known across the country as a

center of Anglo-Catholic faith and worship. That national impact didn’t

begin yesterday. It has been true since the beginning.And yet our story isn’t just about ecclesiastical titles or national reputations. It’s about catholic faithfulness. The earliest church bulletin we have, from Christmas Day 1896, notes that it was a full

choral Mass, with the choir singing the ordinary parts of the liturgy as

it does today at the 11:00 Mass. We also have a photograph of our vested

men and boys' choir from 1901—and in those days, being a choir vested in

cassock and surplice was itself a visible sign of Anglo-Catholic

identity. By the late 1910s and 1920s, Atonement had begun to grow into

a clear sense of its theological and liturgical identity. Under the

leadership of Fr. Fleming, who later served as rector of Trinity Church,

Wall Street for 19 years, Atonement’s primary Sunday service moved from

Morning Prayer to the Holy Eucharist in 1915. By 1919, the Holy

Eucharist was being offered daily. And the first time we see the word

"Mass" in our service register is on January 1, 1938, under the tenure

of Fr. Calvert Buck. This growth wasn’t a change in style. It was

deepening of our roots. Atonement was becoming a place where the

Eucharist was truly the beating heart of our common life. We were

becoming what we are now: a people gathered around the altar, day after

day, offering ourselves to God in union with Christ.

In the Gospel appointed for this morning, Jesus walks into the Temple

and finds that it has lost its way. He overturns the tables of the money

changers. He drives out those who have made the House of God into a

place of commerce. But he doesn’t do this to destroy it. He does it to

restore it. “My house shall be called a house of prayer,” he says,

quoting the prophet Isaiah, “but you are making it a den of robbers.”

And what happens next? The blind and the lame come to him in the Temple,

and he heals them. The children cry out in praise. The place that had

become distorted is restored.Jesus doesn’t just cleanse the Temple. He reclaims and rededicates it.

And that’s what we’re doing this morning.

Not because we think the building has been corrupted. But because we

know how easily sacred things can become stale. How quickly we can slip

into habits of comfort or familiarity and fail to notice the radical

beauty of this place and the call to holiness it represents. We are here

today not to congratulate ourselves for preserving a lovely building,

but to rededicate this place to the purpose for which it exists: to be

the house of God, and the gate of heaven.

These stones that have echoed their praises are holy, and dear is the

ground where their feet have once trod. That’s the third verse of our

offertory hymn today, and it captures something profound. The holiness

of this place is not just architectural. It’s human. This church is a

temple of living memory. It is holy because of the generations who have

sung and wept and whispered prayers in these pews; because of the

thousands baptized at this font; because of the candles lit at this

altar; because of the faithful who, day after day, came to receive the

Body and Blood of Christ and then went back out into the world to live

as strangers and pilgrims here on earth, yearning for their heavenly

home, the city of God.Among those faithful servants we remember especially today is Fr. Dean

Rice, who served as rector of this parish for 47 years with quiet

faithfulness and deep love. Alongside him, we give thanks for Fr.

William Johnson and Deacon Tom Harris, who shared with him in that same

steady labor. In 1996, their friends and family here at Atonement

presented them with a gift that we are using at this Mass: the St. Remy

Chalice and Paten. This chalice and paten are a glorious masterpiece—a

replica of twelfth-century vessels housed at the Cathedral of Reims in

France, the coronation site of French kings. Made of sterling silver and

gold plate, adorned with amethysts (AM-uh-thists), lapis lazuli (LAP-iss

LAZ-uh-lee), aventurine (uh-VEN-chur-een), and garnets (GAR-nets), it is

set with cloisonné (cloy-zuh-NAY) fire enamel and radiates the beauty of

holiness. Donors for the St. Remy Chalice and Paten included Paul and

Reta Kikutani, Bishop Jim Montgomery, and Fr. Thomas Rosa, who served as

interim rector after Fr. Rice's death. And yet its true glory lies not

in its stones or enamel, but in the sacrifice it holds: the offering of

Jesus Christ, made present on this altar.

This chalice and paten are a testimony that bears witness to a

generation of clergy and laity alike who understood that the purpose of

the church is not to preserve a museum but to be a house of prayer. And

it reminds us that the things of beauty we use in worship only matter

when they point beyond themselves to the glory of God.

And so today we lift that chalice again. We sing the old hymns again. We

gather around the altar again. Not to look backward in nostalgia, but to

walk forward with hope. The story of the Episcopal Church of the Atonement is not finished. There are more chapters yet to be written. The saints we have loved and

lost are here with us today as we worship, singing alongside us the

praise of the one who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous

light. Our song today is not a closing hymn. It is a processional hymn.

It is a call to keep walking, to keep building, to keep offering

ourselves day by day as living stones, built into a spiritual house.

And so we rededicate this place today. But more importantly, we

rededicate ourselves to presenting our bodies and souls as living

sacrifices to the praise and glory of God’s name and the benefit of all

his holy church.

How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and

this is the gate of heaven. Amen.