Commontide
Liturgical Color: White/Gold
The 4th Sunday of Epiphany
O God, you know that we are set in the midst of many grave dangers, and because of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright: Grant that your strength and protection may support us in all dangers and carry us through every temptation; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Epiphany
Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who took on our mortal flesh to reveal his glory; that he might bring us out of darkness and into his own glorious light.
Most liturgical texts are from the Book of Common Prayer (2019) of the Anglican Church in North America.
The New Coverdale Psalter, © 2019 by the Anglican Church in North America. Used by permission.
Psalms 144, 145, 146
Psalms 147, 148, 149, 150
Priest and Renewer of Society
Anglican Commemoration
Samuel Moor Shoemaker III (1893-1963) was an American Episcopal priest, rector of Calvary Church in New York and later of Calvary Church in Pittsburgh. He led the American work of the Oxford Group until he broke with its founder in 1941, founded Faith at Work and the Pittsburgh Experiment, and gave to Alcoholics Anonymous, through Bill Wilson, much of the language its Twelve Steps were built from. He is commemorated on January 31.
Samuel Moore Shoemaker Jr. (1893–1963) was an Episcopal priest whose ministry profoundly shaped modern American spirituality and recovery movements. Ordained in 1921, he became rector of Calvary Church in New York City in 1925, where he developed a radical theology of lay witness and personal spiritual transformation. In the early 1930s, Shoemaker met Bill Wilson, founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, and provided both spiritual direction and theological frameworks that became foundational to AA's Twelve Steps. Wilson explicitly credited Shoemaker as his primary spiritual influence, and Shoemaker's emphases on confession, surrender, making amends, and reliance on a Power greater than oneself are directly reflected in AA spirituality. Shoemaker himself pioneered recovery ministry in the church decades before institutional recognition. In 1940, he co-founded the Faith at Work movement (originally the Layman's Movement for a Christian World), which sought to integrate deep spirituality with professional and public life. His prolific literary output includes I Stand by the Door, Realizing Religion, Extraordinary Living for Ordinary Men, and many others. He taught that ordinary Christians could be agents of radical spiritual transformation. He served also as rector of Calvary Church in Pittsburgh from 1952 onwards. His legacy extends through AA, Christian recovery ministries, workplace spirituality movements, and ongoing emphasis on lay empowerment.
Samuel Shoemaker exemplifies lay spirituality and the radical notion that ordinary believers are channels of redemptive grace. His integration of confession, surrender, and service became DNA for modern recovery spirituality. He demonstrates that church leadership can pioneer social healing movements and that clergy can empower laypeople for transformative witness. His vision of faith at work in secular contexts prefigures contemporary missiology.