On Sacred Time

Sr Maria Theotokos Adams
— “Sanctified Time”: Myth or Reality? —

The Scottish mystic George MacDonald (1824 – 1905) famously noted: “Every day is Christmas, Good Friday, and Easter.” Yet, Christians have liturgical calendars and universally acknowledge Sunday as the sacred dies Domini. Early Christian laity and various ascetic movements invested heavily in structured times for prayer according to the natural rhythms of the earth.

Today the advent of uninterrupted electricity and expansive cyberspace has expanded the time for work, leisure, and human activity beyond the limits of the rising and setting of the sun. So does it matter when we pray? Is the flow of time really marked by the sacred? How might we participate in the sanctification of time – personal and ecclesial? What new insights could we gain from ancient and medieval Christian understandings of sacred time?

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Sr. Maria Theotókos Adams, SSVM, a native of Washington, grew up near Charlottesville, Virginia, before attending Columbia University in New York. While pursuing her BA in Ancient Studies, she spent a semester at Hebrew University in Jerusalem also attending courses at the École Biblique.

Sr. Theotókos entered religious life in 2001, and professed her perpetual vows in 2008. She is a member of the Catholic missionary community the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará (SSVM) —female branch of the Religious Family of the Incarnate Word (IVE).

Sr. Theotókos completed her Master’s in Church History at The Catholic University of America in 2016 with a focus on Bede’s reception of The City of God and his role in transmitting the legacy of Augustine. Venturing back to the earliest systematic Christian historiography, she is now pursuing her doctorate in Church History on Eusebius of Caesarea and liturgical time.

Her father, Rev. Thomas E. Adams, can be found at Church of the Advent as presider of the Tuesday midday liturgies and chaplain to the Tuesday-night suppers for the homeless.

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7 p.m.
Jan 7, 2020
Silvertone Bar & Grill
The Chez Freddie Room
69 Bromfield St, Boston
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Join us for Evening Prayer before the talk at 5:30 p.m.
The Church of the Advent
30 Brimmer Street, Boston, Mass.
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