In this city so crowded with religious symbols, where houses of worship vie with one another to render the religious past visible, no synagogue bears more symbolic weight than the one called the Hurva, in the heart of the Jewish Quarter.
Just days ahead of its March 15 rededication ceremony, finishing touches still were being applied to the synagogue, once Jerusalem's grandest, which had remained in ruins for six decades. The rebuilt Hurva, made of the white stone that is Jerusalem's vernacular material, had already assumed its former prominence in the city's crowded skyline. Only interior details remained to be done.
Early this month, as the Israeli architect Nahum Meltzer looked on, a whorled woodwork crown covered in gold leaf was hoisted to its perch atop a two-story holy ark. The ark, which stands beneath the building's gleaming 82-feet-high dome, is a nearly exact replica of the original that stood on the spot more than 150 years earlier, encapsulating the basic principle that guided Mr. Meltzer's reconstruction: not innovation, but historical accuracy.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Liturgy, Music, Worship • * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • Middle East • Israel • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Judaism
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
When they heard I was going to report in Haiti after the massive earthquake, fifth-graders from Amylynn Robinson's class asked if I could deliver some messages to any children I'd meet. Their letters included drawings of flowers, hearts and rainbows. And they began simply:
"Hello Haiti, nice to meet you."
"Dear Buddy ... "
"Hi there, I'm a child as well."
"Dear friend, I am your friend. I wrote this letter to tell you I care about you."
The children wrote about their school, Balboa Magnet Elementary, a public school in Northridge, Calif., in Northern Los Angeles County, which was the epicenter of a magnitude 6.7 earthquake in 1994. Although these 10-year-olds were not alive then, many say they've heard stories about the damage in California. So they were sympathetic to kids coping with the magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Haiti.....
This is just a fantastic piece that I caught on the morning run. You really need to do the audio as it is far superior when you hear the children's voices (about 7 1/3 minutes). And check out which song one of the Haitian children chose to send back to the children in California! Listen to it all--KSH.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Children • Education • * International News & Commentary • Caribbean • Haiti
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
...often the wicked so devote themselves to the practice of sin that they succeed in doing more wickedness than they would have been able to learn from the bad example of reprobate sinners. For this reason the torment of greater punishment is inflicted on them, in that they, by their own initiative, sought out greater ways of sinning, for which they are to be punished. Consequently it is well said: "According to the multitude of his devices, so shall he suffer [a citation from Job 20:18]. For he would not find out new ways of sinning unless he sought them out, and he would not seek out such things unless he were anxious to do them deliberately. Therefore, in his punishment, this excess in devising wickedness is taken into account, and he receives proportionate punishment and retribution. And even though the suffering of the damned is infinite, nevertheless they receive greater punishments who, by their own desires, sought out many new ways of sinning.
--Gregory the Great (540-604), Book of Morals 15.18.22
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • * Theology • Eschatology
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For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
According to the U.S. Census Bureau's figures, Montana has grown in population from 902,195 in 2000 to 974,989 in 2009. This represents a population growth of approximately 8.07%.
According to Episcopal Church statistics, the Diocese of Montana went from Average Sunday Attendance (or ASA) of 2,273 in 1998 to 1,827 in 2008. This represents an ASA decline of about 20% over this ten year period.
In order to generate a pictorial chart of some Montana diocesan statistics, please go here and enter "Montana" in the second line down under "Diocese" and then click on "View Diocese Chart" under the third line to the left.
The Diocese of Montana's website may be found here.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Data
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For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
A panel of educators convened by the nation’s governors and state school superintendents proposed a uniform set of academic standards on Wednesday, laying out their vision for what all the nation’s public school children should learn in math and English, year by year, from kindergarten to high school graduation.
The new proposals could transform American education, replacing the patchwork of standards ranging from mediocre to world-class that have been written by local educators in every state.
Under the proposed standards for English, for example, fifth graders would be expected to explain the differences between drama and prose, and to identify elements of drama like characters, dialogue and stage directions. Seventh graders would study, among other math concepts, proportional relationships, operations with rational numbers and solutions for linear equations.
The new standards are likely to touch off a vast effort to rewrite textbooks, train teachers and produce appropriate tests, if a critical mass of states adopts them in coming months, as seems likely. But there could be opposition in some states, like Massachusetts, which already has high standards that advocates may want to keep.
“I’d say this is one of the most important events of the last several years in American education,” said Chester E. Finn Jr., a former assistant secretary of education who has been an advocate for national standards for nearly two decades. “Now we have the possibility that for the first time, states could come together around new standards and high school graduation requirements that are ambitious and coherent. This is a big deal.”
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Education • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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Watch it all. Caught this one yesterday on the morning run. That Alaskan water looks really cold--KSH!.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Military / Armed Forces
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A majority of dioceses in the Episcopal Church have confirmed the election of an open lesbian as a bishop in Los Angeles, bringing Bishop-elect Mary Glasspool one step closer to consecration.
The Diocese of Los Angeles, where Glasspool was elected as an assistant bishop last December, announced confirmations from 61 of the denomination’s 110 dioceses on Wednesday (March 10).
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: Los Angeles • Sexuality Debate (in Anglican Communion) • Same-sex blessings
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Anglican parish communities in Chile, hit by a serious earthquake — the fifth-largest on record — that devastated the city of Concepción last Saturday, are sheltering together in tents for safety and to share food and water, says their Bishop, the Rt Revd Héctor Zavala.
Bishop Zavala was expected to arrive in Concepción on Wednesday after travelling for at least ten hours across broken roads. On Tuesday, he asked his colleague Ricardo Tucas to send the following report:
“[The Bishop] is now travelling to the devastated region of Concepción, which holds three of his urban churches, and was near three other rural congregations in the High Mountains of Bio-Bio. Four days following the massive earthquake in Chile, many towns are still completely isolated . . .
“Andy Bowman, until recently a USPG Mission Companion in Concepción, said: ‘From the communications we have had with people in Santiago in the north, the situation in Concepción seems desperate. Half a million people in Concepción are isolated, without water, electricity, shelter, and food. Shops have been looted and civil unrest appears to be widespread. Seven thousand Chilean troops have been sent to the area to maintain order.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • - Anglican: Latest News • Anglican Provinces • Southern Cone • * International News & Commentary • South America • Chile
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South Carolina's unemployment rate hit another record high in January as the level of jobless residents rose in all 46 counties.
Employers cut 27,700 positions throughout the month, including seasonal jobs in tourism and retail, as the jobless rate reached 12.6 percent, the state Employment Security Commission said Wednesday.
South Carolina's unemployed population -- a total of 273,455 residents -- is the biggest on record.
Compare that number with the data recorded several years ago and a grim picture emerges. That figure, for example, never topped 100,000 people in 2000. Throughout 2005, the number averaged 140,000.
"It gives us a sense of how many jobs the economy needs to create in order
to put a majority of people back to work," said economist Don Schunk of Coastal Carolina University. "More so than the unemployment rate, (that number) tells us how far we have to go before we return to some sense of normalcy."
Read it all from the front page of yesterday's local paper.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market • * South Carolina
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Sunday’s killings were an especially vicious expression of long-running hostilities between Christians and Muslims in this divided nation. Jos and the region around it are on the fault line where the volatile and poor Muslim north and the Christian south meet. In the past decade, some 3,000 people have been killed in interethnic, interreligious violence in this fraught zone. The pattern is familiar and was seen as recently as January: uneasy coexistence suddenly explodes into killing, amplified for days by retaliation.
Mr. Adamu, a Muslim herder, said he went to Dogo Na Hawa, a village of Christians living in mud-brick houses on dirt streets, to avenge the killings of Muslims and their cattle in January.
The operation had been planned at least several days before by a local group called Thank Allah, said one of Mr. Adamu’s fellow detainees, Ibrahim Harouna, who was shackled on the floor next to him. The men spoke in Hausa through an interpreter.
“They killed a lot of our Fulanis in January,” Mr. Adamu said, referring to his ethnic group. “So I knew that this time, we would take revenge.”
His victims were sleeping when he arrived, he said, and he set their house on fire. Sure enough, they ran out.
“I killed three people,” Mr. Adamu said calmly.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Violence • * International News & Commentary • Africa • Nigeria • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations
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Bishops in the nation's largest Lutheran denomination have approved preliminary steps to welcome a group of openly gay and lesbian ministers as official clergy with new liturgical rites.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Conference of Bishops approved a draft proposal on Monday (March 8) for the new rites, which include prayers and the laying on of hands by the local bishop, according to the denomination's news service.
The proposal only applies to 17 pastors who had followed normal ELCA procedures for education and ordination, but remained barred from the denomination's official clergy roster because of their sexuality. The clergy are all members of Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries, a group devoted to gay rights in the ELCA.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Parish Ministry • Ministry of the Ordained • * Culture-Watch • Sexuality • Civil Unions & Partnerships • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Lutheran • Sexuality Debate (Other denominations and faiths)
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
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Liberal Judaism, Quakers in Britain and the Unitarians are the only religious denominations to have voiced support for the Equality Bill amendment but only the Quakers, in calling for full marriage equality, have done what is right. All religious faiths should follow their lead and ask the Government to finally introduce full equality.
It isn't very complicated. We're all human beings. Our needs are very simple: somewhere to live, something to eat, someone to love. There's no gay conspiracy. In asking for full equality we are not asking for much. It's beyond me how my joy in love can diminish anyone else's, and even less how it can bring them pain. I wonder how many lives those who oppose equality imagine they have, that they are prepared to lose both sleep and integrity obsessing over who is loving whom and how.
Read it all.
I will take comments on this submitted by email only to at KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • Psychology • Religion & Culture • Sexuality • Civil Unions & Partnerships • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • * Theology • Pastoral Theology
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Check it out--there are many subsections to examine via the links.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops
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Almighty and merciful God, who didst raise up Gregory of Rome to be a servant of the servants of God, and didst inspire him to send missionaries to preach the Gospel to the English people: Preserve in thy Church the catholic and apostolic faith they taught, that thy people, being fruitful in every good work, may receive the crown of glory that fadeth not away; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • Spirituality/Prayer
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O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. O that today you would hearken to his voice!
--Psalm 95:6,7
Filed under: * Theology • Theology: Scripture
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
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The sour economy is producing a bumper crop of cash-strapped consumers, business owners and shady agents who're fueling a wave of insurance fraud that's keeping regulators and law enforcement officials busy from coast to coast.
Whether it's worthless health plans peddled by fax, staged auto accidents, arson or slip-and-fall accidents at the local mall, insurance fraud of all kinds is booming in the recession and consumers are paying the price in higher premiums.
To keep it in perspective, roughly 48 million insurance claims are made each year in the U.S. and less than one-quarter of 1 percent are referred to the nonprofit National Insurance Crime Bureau for investigation of possible fraud.
Last year, that amounted to just more than 85,000 questionable claims. That was up 14 percent from nearly 75,000 in 2008, however.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Consumer/consumer spending • Corporations/Corporate Life • Personal Finance • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • * Theology • Ethics / Moral Theology
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For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
Machines that decode your thoughts aren't limited to the realm of science fiction anymore.
A computer program that analyzes brain scans was able to tell which of three short films people were thinking about, according to a study in the journal Current Biology.
"We were able to predict just from their brain activity which of those memories they were recalling," says Eleanor A. Maguire, one of the study's authors and a professor of cognitive neuroscience at University College London.
This is a major step forward, Maguire says. But it falls short of what most people would call mind reading. "We can't put somebody in a brain scanner and immediately know what thoughts they are having," she says.
Read or listen to it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Psychology • Science & Technology • * Theology • Anthropology
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In the latest sign of the nation’s shifting racial and ethnic composition, births to Asian, black and Hispanic women in the United States are on the verge of surpassing births to non-Hispanic whites.
Minorities accounted for 48 percent of all births in the nation in the 12 months that ended in July 2008. While it will most likely take years for health statisticians to confirm precisely when the 50 percent benchmark will have been reached, demographers said it could occur this year. Depending on variables like the recession, which has depressed birth rates, it will almost certainly happen within a year or two, they said.
“It looks like ‘majority’ births would drop below 50 percent around 2012,” said Carl Haub, senior demographer for the Population Reference Bureau.
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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Many governments have used the internet to curtail freedom of expression at home, the US state department says in its latest annual human rights report.
In many cases new forms of electronic communications are restricted to control domestic dissent, it says.
The wide-ranging report also highlights continuing human rights violations in China against the Uighurs and extra-judicial killings in North Korea.
Iran, Sri Lanka, Burma and Switzerland also come in for criticism.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Blogging & the Internet • Globalization • Law & Legal Issues • Science & Technology • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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The Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin today filed a lawsuit against St. Columba’s, a Fresno parish that in 2007 joined Bishop John-David Schofield and 39 other churches in seceding from the national Episcopal Church.
Already, the Episcopal diocese has filed similar lawsuits against St. Francis Anglican Church in Turlock and St. Michael’s Anglican Church in Ridgecrest, a high-desert community in far eastern Kern County. Those parishes also were part of the secession.
The lawsuits against the individual parishes are part of a larger legal battle pitting the Episcopal Church against the breakaway Diocese of San Joaquin, which joined the Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of South America, and now also the newly formed Anglican Church in North America.
Read the whole thing.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: San Joaquin • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues
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The Federal Reserve's Flow of Funds report reveals more deleveraging, with U.S. debt growing at the slowest pace on record and nearly offsetting the huge rise in federal debt. Nonfinancial debt increased at just 1.6% annually, to $34.7Trillion.
Moneyquote:
Household debt contracted at an annual rate of 1¼ percent in the fourth quarter, its seventh consecutivequarter of decline.
You can check the full document out here (pdf and a long one).
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Consumer/consumer spending • The September 2008 Proposed Henry Paulson 700 Billion Bailout Package
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For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
For a little over a year, five Canadian and six African dioceses have engaged in diocese-to-diocese theological dialogue on matters relating to human sexuality and to mission. With one exception, each diocese has established a theological working group to prepare papers and responses which were shared with their partner diocese on the opposite continent (see below for list of participants). Ontario and Botswana exchanged documents related to sustainability in the context of mission. These dialogues have emerged from, and are a deepening of, relationships established during the Indaba and Bible Study processes at the Lambeth Conference of 2008.
From February 24 to 26, the bishops of these dioceses met at the Anglican Communion Office, St. Andrew's House in London, England. In a context grounded by common prayer and eucharistic celebration we reflected together on our local experiences of mission and the challenges facing the Church in our diverse contexts. Though the initial exchange of papers had been related in most cases to matters of human sexuality and homosexuality in particular, our face to face theological conversation necessarily deepened to explore the relationships between the Gospel and the many particular cultural realities in which the Church is called to mission.
Read it all
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • - Anglican: Primary Source • -- Reports & Communiques • Anglican Provinces • Anglican Church of Canada • * International News & Commentary • Africa
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In the era of apartheid, Archbishop Desmond Tutu railed against the injustice and inhumanity of South Africa's government, and his passionate advocacy helped make the change that came to that country in the 1990s.
Now 78, in a magenta habit with a crucifix around his neck, he is the picture of a holy man. But looking back on his boyhood in one of South Africa's black townships, Tutu remembers an urchin with a fondness for marbles and comic books. And even in church, "we had fun," the archbishop tells NPR's Renee Montagne.
The memories linger even now. There's joy in Tutu's voice as he recalls a song he sang as a child: "If God be for us, who can be against us?" the verse asked.
"It was a fantastic thing to have much, much later," Tutu says — "to remember, 'Yes, if God be for us in our struggle against injustice and oppression, who can be against us?' "
Read or listen to it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of South Africa • * Culture-Watch • History • Race/Race Relations • * Theology • Pastoral Theology • Theology: Scripture
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
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China's government considers public corruption a serious problem because it could threaten Communist Party rule if left unchecked.
"We will give high priority to fighting corruption and encouraging integrity," China Premier Wen Jiabao said Friday in his annual State of the Union-style address. "This has a direct bearing on the firmness of our grip on political power."
Li Tangtang joins at least 14 other ministerial- or provincial-level officials sacked for corruption last year, a record high for the past 30 years, according to the Global Times newspaper. In 2009, the number of officials caught embezzling more than 1 million Chinese yuan ($146,000) soared by 19% over 2008, the discipline committee said.
China ranked 79 out of 180 countries in 2009 on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, which bases its findings on 13 independent surveys. That's worse than the previous year (72) and below bribe-infested Cuba. New Zealand is No. 1 in transparency, the United States No. 19.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • * International News & Commentary • Asia • China • * Theology • Ethics / Moral Theology
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
According to the U.S. Census Bureau's figures, Rhode Island has grown in population from 1,048,319 in 2000 to 1,053,209 in 2009. This represents a population growth of approximately 0.47%.
According to Episcopal Church statistics, the Diocese of Rhode Island went from Average Sunday Attendance (or ASA) of 8,174 in 1998 to 6,078 in 2008. This represents an ASA decline of about 26% over this ten year period.
In order to generate a pictorial chart of some Rhode Island diocesan statistics, please go here and enter "Rhode Island" in the second line down under "Diocese" and then click on "View Diocese Chart" under the third line to the left.
The Diocese of Rhode Island's website may be found here.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Data • TEC Parishes • * Christian Life / Church Life • Parish Ministry
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The case of Colleen R. LaRose – also known as “Jihad Jane” and “Fatima Rose” – raises troubling questions about the ability of Al Qaeda to attract US-born women to terrorism....
US counterterrorism officials long have been concerned about the possibility of Islamic radicalization of US natives. But generally speaking, they have focused on potential terrorist recruits that are males.
“The issue of US converts [to radical Islam] is not new,” says Juan Carlos Zarate, senior adviser in the Transnational Threats Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “What is new is that in this case, the convert may be a middle-aged female.”
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Women • * Economics, Politics • Terrorism • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam
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In support of Bishop Lawrence, members of the West Charleston Deanery have issued “A Call to Prayer,” inviting members of their Deanery to join in a time of fasting and prayer for Bishop Lawrence March 16-18 prior to the House of Bishop’s Meeting (March 19-24). The Deanery has scheduled a gathering of prayer and worship for Thursday, March 18 at 7:00 p.m. at Saint James, James Island. Following that gathering, churches from the deanery have signed up to pray for the Bishop every day of the House of Bishops’ meeting through and including our Diocesan Convention, March 26. As Craige Borrett, Dean of the West Charleston Deanery noted, “We need to remember that, ‘Prayer isn’t preparation for the battle. It is the battle.’” View the related Bulletin Insert.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • * Christian Life / Church Life • Spirituality/Prayer • * South Carolina
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Another resolution proposed by the standing committee would add a diocesan canon that says the bishop — or, in a bishop’s absence, the standing committee — is “the sole and final authority with respect to any dispute concerning the interpretation of the Constitution and Canons of this Diocese.”
A canonical revision, also proposed by the standing committee, grants the diocese’s bishop (or standing committee) the authority to “provide a generous pastoral response to parishes in conflict with the Diocese or Province, as the Ecclesiastical Authority judges necessary, to preserve the unity and integrity of the Diocese.”
An explanatory note on that resolution says: “We’ve experienced now as a diocese, in the All Saints, Pawleys Island litigation, the destructive force of such litigation; how it has created animosities and divisions that are not easily healed. It has failed as a positive cohesive force for maintaining the unity of the church and has in fact had precisely the opposite effect. Christians are suing Christians (1 Cor. 6:1-8); the reputation of the church is marred, and vital resources are diverted from essential Kingdom work. None of this is honoring to our Savior.”
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • TEC Diocesan Conventions • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • * South Carolina
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Religious freedom advocates were encouraged by the President's stated views and allowed themselves to hope that America's international religious freedom policy, long isolated at the State Department, would be strengthened under the new administration.
Their hopes are fading.
Almost 14 months into the Obama presidency, the ambassador at large for international religious freedom -- a position mandated by the International Religious Freedom Act -- has not been named, even though other positions of less weight and importance to our national interests have long been filled.
The leading candidate for the religious freedom job is said to be a highly intelligent and charismatic pastor, an author and a thoroughly good person who has the friendship of Secretary Hillary Clinton. Those are important attributes. Indeed, having the trust of the Secretary is vital. But more is needed. To be successful, this ambassador at large needs foreign policy experience. Without it, it will be extremely difficult to succeed within Foggy Bottom's notoriously thorny bureaucracy, let alone deal with foreign officials who believe (as many do) that U.S. international religious freedom policy is a vehicle of cultural imperialism.
Worse, it appears that the new ambassador will be demoted before she is even nominated. Like her predecessors under Presidents Clinton and Bush, she will not be treated as an ambassador at large at all, but will report to a lower ranking official - the assistant secretary for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. Her placement alone will signal to American diplomats and foreign governments that they need not take U.S. religious freedom policy seriously.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Globalization • Law & Legal Issues • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Foreign Relations • Politics in General • Office of the President • President Barack Obama
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When the “American Idol” judge Simon Cowell recently predicted the departure of the contestant Jermaine Sellers, the young singer shook his head in disagreement. “I know God,’’ he replied, pointing upward.
Two days later, when Mr. Sellers failed to make the cut, he still had faith. “What God has for me is for me,’’ he said. “In God there is no failure.’’
Mr. Sellers is not alone in his belief that God pays attention to reality television contests. New research shows that most Americans believe God is directly involved in their personal affairs, and that the good or bad things that happen are “part of God’s plan,’’ according to a report in the March issue of the journal Sociology of Religion.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Movies & Television • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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The Dalai Lama lashed out at China on Wednesday, accusing it of trying to "annihilate Buddhism" in Tibet and rebuffing all his efforts to reach a compromise over the disputed Himalayan region.
China shot back, accusing the Tibetan spiritual leader of using deceptions and lies to distort its policy in the region. The passionate back-and-forth highlighted the distrust, anger and frustration that separates the two sides and leaves little hope for success in recently resumed talks.
Beijing has demonized the Dalai Lama and accused him of wanting independence for Tibet, which China says is part of its territory. The Dalai Lama says he only wants some form of autonomy for Tibet within China that would allow Tibetan culture, language and religion to thrive.
The Dalai Lama spoke Wednesday in an address marking the anniversaries of two failed uprisings against China, one 51 years ago that sent him into exile in India and the other two years ago that was quashed by a government crackdown that is still continuing.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • Asia • China • India • Tibet • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Buddhism
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A civil rights film, “Blood Done Sign My Name,” is one of 14 winners of the 2010 Wilbur Award that recognize excellence in coverage of religion in the secular media.
The Wilburs are awarded annually by the Religion Communicators Council; winners receive a trophy and $250. This year’s awards will be presented April 9 at the Religion Communication Congress in Chicago.
Read it all and see how many of the articles you have seen.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Media • Religion & Culture
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Churches have joined together to protest against plans for a mosque that would tower over the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, with one minister describing it as a “supremacist statement” for Islam.
A collective comprising every church in Camberley, Surrey, has lambasted plans for the giant mosque, warning that will create only “division and discord” in the town.
The proposal has already caused security concerns in military circles as the mosque includes 30m (100ft) minarets that would overlook Sandhurst.
The planned mosque lies just 360m from the academy, where hundreds of newly commissioned Army officers take to the parade ground each year for their passing out ceremony. The event attracts senior members of the Royal Family as well as important military figures.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • * Christian Life / Church Life • Parish Ministry • * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations
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The experience reinforced for me the reality of terror in the sky. Sitting in an aircraft, 37,000ft over the Atlantic, there is nowhere to go, no escape and, confronted by passengers behaving suspiciously, a total sense of helplessness.
The nonchalant manner with which the male passenger was allowed to walk through the plane and enter the toilet during the landing approach, and to remain out of sight and control for around five minutes, was simply incredible and extraordinarily alarming.
Afterwards, I complained to the United Airlines desk. I was informed that an armed air marshal was probably on board the flight, as is most likely the case on high-risk routes between the United States and the UK.
However, I wondered what difference the marshal's presence would have made had the passenger beside me turned out to be a suicide-bomber. Would he - could he - have shot the suspect through the toilet door and saved our lives?
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Travel • * Economics, Politics • Terrorism • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • --Ireland
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The second meeting of the Anglican-Methodist International Commission for Unity in Mission (AMICUM) has taken place near Bath, England, 19-26 February 2010, hosted by the World Methodist Council, at the Ammerdown Centre. The Commission benefited greatly from the opportunity to visit and celebrate Holy Communion in the New Room in Bristol, and to see some of the historical memorabilia held in Wesley College, Bristol.
The Commission is pursuing the common purpose of both world communions to be united according to the will of God, for the glory of God, and the well-being of God’s church, and for the effectiveness of God’s mission in the world.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • - Anglican: Primary Source • -- Reports & Communiques • Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • * Religion News & Commentary • Ecumenical Relations • Other Churches • Methodist
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The diocese of British Columbia may be the next in Canada to ask its bishop to allow the blessing of married gay or lesbian couples.
A motion asking that priests be allowed to conduct blessings of gay of lesbian couples has been submitted to the biennial synod meeting Mar. 6-7 by the parish of St. John the Divine, Victoria.
The synod, primarily concerned with a restructuring of the diocese, failed to finish its business but will resume at the call of the Bishop James Cowan later this spring when the motion regarding same sex blessings may come to the floor.
Bishop Cowan will make the final decision as to whether same sex blessings should take place in parishes of the diocese, which covers Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands. At General Synod 2007, the bishop voted against extension of the blessing.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Anglican Church of Canada • Sexuality Debate (in Anglican Communion) • Same-sex blessings
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As a hart longs for flowing streams, so longs my soul for thee, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God?
--Psalm 42:1-2
Filed under: * Theology • Theology: Scripture
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Lord Christ, almighty Saviour, we cry to thee for aid against our strong enemy. O thou who art the Stronger than the strong, deliver us, we pray thee, from the evil one, and take sole possession of our hearts and minds; that filled with thy Spirit we may henceforth devote our lives to thy service, and therein find our perfect freedom; for the honour of thy great name.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church Year / Liturgical Seasons • Lent • Spirituality/Prayer
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Sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church are proof that that "the Devil is at work inside the Vatican", according to the Holy See's chief exorcist.
Father Gabriele Amorth, 85, who has been the Vatican's chief exorcist for 25 years and says he has dealt with 70,000 cases of demonic possession, said that the consequences of satanic infiltration included power struggles at the Vatican as well as "cardinals who do not believe in Jesus, and bishops who are linked to the Demon".
He added: "When one speaks of 'the smoke of Satan' [a phrase coined by Pope Paul VI in 1972] in the holy rooms, it is all true – including these latest stories of violence and paedophilia."
In lieu of comments, I am asking you to pray for those involved. Read it all--KSH.
Filed under: * International News & Commentary • Europe • Italy • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Roman Catholic • Pope Benedict XVI
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While President Obama's push to raise federal income taxes for the wealthy gets lots of attention, the continuing upward creep in the sales tax rates imposed by state and local governments has gotten less notice.
But Vertex Inc., which calculates sales tax for Internet sellers, reports that the average general sales tax rate nationwide reached 8.629% at the end of 2009, the highest since the Berwyn, Pa., company started tracking data in 1982. That was up a nickel on a taxable $100 purchase from a year earlier and up nearly 40 cents for the decade. The highest sales tax rate in the country now stands at 12%.
During 2009 seven states and the District of Columbia raised sales tax rates, with one jurisdiction -- North Carolina -- actually doing it twice. Only four states hiked rates in 2008 and only one in 2007. Given state budget problems, the 2009 state sales tax increases aren't surprising. States have also been raising income tax rates on the wealthy and on corporations and boosting excise taxes on alcohol and tobacco. With states now facing record budget shortfalls, more tax increases seem likely.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Taxes • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • Politics in General • City Government • State Government
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See what you make of it.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Identity • Episcopal Church (TEC) • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Conflicts • TEC Diocesan Conventions • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • * South Carolina
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Diocese of Los Angeles Bishop-elect Mary Douglas Glasspool has received the required number of consents from diocesan standing committees to her ordination and consecration, pending verification by the presiding bishop's office.
The Diocese of Los Angeles announced March 10 that Glasspool had received 61 standing committee consents, in an unofficial tally. A majority of consents, or 56, were required from standing committees in the Episcopal Church's 109 dioceses.
"I give thanks for the standing commitees' prompt action, and for the consents to the elections of my sisters," Los Angeles Bishop Diocesan J. Jon Bruno said on March 10, referring to both Glasspool and Bishop-elect Diane Jardine Bruce.
"I look forward to the final few consents to come in from the bishops in the next few days, and I give thanks for the fact that we as a church have taken a bold step for just action."
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori's office has yet to verify the official number of bishops with jurisdiction who have consented to Glasspool's ordination and consecration.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: Los Angeles • Instruments of Unity • Sexuality Debate (in Anglican Communion) • Same-sex blessings • Windsor Report / Process
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However, unlike the case in San Joaquin, there is now a date that has been set for oral argument in the Court of Appeal -- and it will occur in the same week that oral arguments have been set in the Supreme Court of Virginia on the litigation between ECUSA, the Diocese of Virginia, and the Anglican District of Virginia. (The latter Court has not yet published a specific date and time for argument, but has announced only that arguments will occur sometime during its session meeting from April 12 to 16.)
The Court of Appeals for the Second District of Texas, which hears appeals from Fort Worth, has announced that it will hear oral argument on the writ sought by the Episcopal Diocese and Bishop Jack Iker on Wednesday, April 14, beginning at 1:30 p.m.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: Fort Worth • TEC Conflicts: San Joaquin • TEC Conflicts: Virginia • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues
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James Gray once saw himself as a drug warrior, a former federal prosecutor and county judge who sent people to prison for dealing pot and other drug offenses. Gradually, though, he became convinced that the ban on marijuana was making it more accessible to young people, not less.
"I ask kids all the time, and they'll tell you it is easier to get marijuana than a six-pack of beer because that is controlled by the government," he said, noting that drug dealers don't ask for IDs or honor minimum age requirements.
So Gray — who spent two decades as a superior court judge in Orange County, Calif., and once ran for Congress as a Republican — switched sides in the war on drugs, becoming an advocate for legalizing marijuana.
"Let's face reality," he says. "Taxing and regulating marijuana will make it less available to children than it is today."
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Drugs/Drug Addiction • Law & Legal Issues • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • State Government
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The Democrats have not been completely irresponsible. It’s just that as the health fight has gone on, their passion for coverage has swamped their less visceral commitment to reducing debt. The result is a bill that is fundamentally imbalanced.
This past year, we’ve seen how hard it is to even pass legislation that expands benefits. To actually reduce benefits and raise taxes, we’re going to need legislators who wake up in the morning passionate about fiscal sanity. The ones we have now are just making things worse.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Health & Medicine • --The 2009 American Health Care Reform Debate • Psychology • * Economics, Politics • Economy • Taxes • The U.S. Government • Budget • The National Deficit • Politics in General • House of Representatives • Office of the President • President Barack Obama • Senate
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Faced with declining enrolment and revenue that will force it to shutter churches on Vancouver Island, the Anglican Church is turning to the social medium where millions of followers already flock: Twitter.
The Anglican Diocese of British Columbia last weekend voted to close seven churches outright and move those congregations to "hub churches." The meeting, during which several members tweeted updates to followers, came on the heels of an ominous recent report that predicted that the once powerful church was headed for extinction unless dramatic changes occur.
In addition to recommending that churches close, the report described Canada as a post-Christian society and urged a change in attitude to attract new members, including embracing modern forms of evangelism.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Anglican Church of Canada • * Christian Life / Church Life • Parish Ministry • Evangelism and Church Growth • * Culture-Watch • Blogging & the Internet • --Social Networking
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According to the U.S. Census Bureau's figures, New Jersey has grown in population from 8,414,350 in 2000 to 8,707,739 in 2009. This represents a population growth of approximately 3.48%.
According to Episcopal Church statistics, the Diocese of New Jersey went from Average Sunday Attendance (or ASA) of 19,221 in 1998 to 15,412 in 2008. This represents an ASA decline of about 20% over this ten year period.
In order to generate a pictorial chart of some New Jersey diocesan statistics, please go here and enter "New Jersey" in the second line down under "Diocese" and then click on "View Diocese Chart" under the third line to the left.
The Diocese of New Jersey's website may be found here.
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Fascinating food for thought here--follow the entires and the links.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Books • Religion & Culture
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The euro is under attack like never before, as the promises on which it was based turn out to be lies. Hedge funds are speculating against Greek debt, while euro-zone politicians work behind the scenes to cobble together rescue packages. But fundamental flaws in the monetary union need to be fixed if Europe's common currency is to survive.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Credit Markets • The Banking System/Sector • Politics in General • * International News & Commentary • Europe • France • Germany • Greece • Spain
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Ehrenreich is most effective when she writes journalistically with an eye for the telling detail, such as in this description of Joel Osteen and his wife, Victoria: "In one way, the two of them seem perfectly matched, or at least symmetrical: his mouth is locked into the inverted triangle of his trademark smile, while her heavy dark brows stamp her face with angry tension, even when the mouth is smiling."
Pastors who serve in quite different settings from the Osteens' and who interpret the gospel differently than they do may take some delight in seeing them skewered so skillfully. But pastors might not want Ehrenreich to train her eye on their own churches. Increasingly, I encounter churches that have done away with corporate prayers of confession in worship because they are "too negative." Funerals are now often approached as "celebrations of life," where death is spoken of only in euphemisms. I have heard far too many sermons recently that substitute a glib positive message for the gospel.
Ehrenreich insists that the alternative to positive thinking is not despair; it is realism. Although she does not make this a theological argument, I think she would appreciate the distinction between positive thinking and the gospel. Positive thinking can be a lulling mixture of illusion and denial. By contrast, the gospel is based on hard realities, like sin and death, but can remain ultimately hopeful because it is also based on the reality of a God who triumphs over both. It seems to me, then, that any attempt to dismantle the shallow optimism that Ehrenreich critiques relentlessly—and, at times, effectively—is in service to the gospel.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Books • Health & Medicine • Psychology • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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The decisions of the recent Synod of the Church of England to permit the ordination of women bishops and the refusal to authorize continued episcopal oversight have made the problem for this minority of Anglicans even more acute. For its part, the Catholic Church has clearly articulated its position on the ordination of women. In 1975, Pope Paul VI issued a formal appeal to the then-Archbishop of Canterbury, Fredrick Donald Coggan, to avoid taking a step which would have a serious negative impact on ecumenical relations. Just to say, parenthetically, that an appeal to the Archbishop of Canterbury, though, is probably frustrating for him, because unlike the Catholic Church, there is no central authority in the Anglican Communion and, thus, the various provinces—some 39, I believe—have made their own decisions about such questions of practice and even doctrine.
In 1976, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued its declaration Inter insigniores, stating that the Church does not consider herself authorized to ordain women, not on account of socio-cultural reasons, but rather because of the “unbroken tradition throughout the history of the Church, universal in the East and in the West”, which must be “considered to conform to God’s plan for his Church.” (I’m quoting there from the document.) This position was reiterated in 1992 in the Catechism of the Catholic Church and again in 1994 with the Apostolic Letter of Pope John Paul II, Ordinatio sacerdotalis. In October of 1995, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a response affirming that the doctrine stating that the Church has no power to confer sacred orders on women is definitive tenenda—it must be held definitively and is to be considered part of the infallible, ordinary and universal Magisterium of the Church. For Catholics, the issue of the reservation of priestly ordination to men is not merely a matter of praxis, or discipline, but is, rather, doctrinal in nature and touches the heart of the doctrine of the Eucharist itself and the sacramental nature, or constitution, of the Church. It is therefore a question which cannot be relegated to the periphery of ecumenical conversations, but needs to be engaged directly in honesty and charity by dialogue partners who desire Christian unity, which, by its very nature, is Eucharistic.
Cardinal Walter Kasper, current President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, addressed this point in an intervention given in June 2006 to the House of Bishops of the Church of England during its discussions on the ordination of women to the episcopate. In his talk he said this: “Because the Episcopal office is a ministry of unity, the decision you face would immediately impact on the question of the unity of the Church and with it the goal of ecumenical dialogue. It would be a decision against the common goal we have until now pursued in our dialogue: full ecclesial communion, which cannot exist without full communion in the episcopal office.”
Read it all and read it carefully.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • * Religion News & Commentary • Ecumenical Relations • Other Churches • Roman Catholic • Pope Benedict XVI
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States and companies have started investing very differently when it comes to the billions of dollars they are safeguarding for workers’ retirement.
Companies are quietly and gradually moving their pension funds out of stocks. They want to reduce their investment risk and are buying more long-term bonds.
But states and other bodies of government are seeking higher returns for their pension funds, to make up for ground lost in the last couple of years and to pay all the benefits promised to present and future retirees. Higher returns come with more risk.
“In effect, they’re going to Las Vegas,” said Frederick E. Rowe, a Dallas investor and the former chairman of the Texas Pension Review Board, which oversees public plans in that state. “Double up to catch up.”
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Aging / the Elderly • * Economics, Politics • Economy • Corporations/Corporate Life • Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market • Stock Market • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • Politics in General • State Government
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Anglican Mainstream, whilst acknowledging that Bishop Jones reflects a way of thinking which is gaining ground amongst some English evangelicals, considers it deeply flawed in terms of both teaching and practice. In terms of practice, such teaching fails to recognise that the deep logic of the gay/lesbian movement is the abolition of the Judaeo-Christian understanding of human identity, towards which acceptance of gay ‘marriage’ is a key step. Faced with the uncomfortable prospect of having constantly to challenge quietly established ‘facts on the ground’ which gay activists have been openly following for years, the temptation to re-frame the question as a pastoral problem – one of ‘go along and get along’ -becomes almost overwhelming. That is a fundamental error, the second deep flaw in this way of thinking. As the GAFCON Jerusalem Statement has said, and the comments attached to this Statement indicate, the issue here is one of false teaching. False teaching is not to be colluded with, but to be challenged - and overcome by patient and thorough exposition of biblical truth. The unity to which the Church is called is oneness in Christ, faithful to the Scriptures which authoritatively reveal Him. That is the unity which must underpin our calling to share the Good News of Jesus Christ with a needy and broken world.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • CoE Bishops • Sexuality Debate (in Anglican Communion) • Same-sex blessings
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The Supreme Court agreed to decide whether the father of a fallen Marine can collect damages from a religious sect that picketed his son's funeral with vulgar placards celebrating the death of American soldiers.
The court also accepted two other cases on Monday, one testing whether vaccine makers are immune from lawsuits under state law and another that challenges government background checks on federal contractors as an invasion of privacy. The cases are likely to be heard in the fall.
The funeral case, Snyder v. Phelps, tests the limits of First Amendment protection for demonstrators who aim obnoxious and hurtful speech at the most sympathetic of victims. It centers on the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., founded in 1955. Most of the church's 70-odd members are children, grandchildren or in-laws of its founder and sole pastor, Fred W. Phelps Sr., according to a lower court opinion.
The Westboro Church searches the Internet for notices of military funerals it can picket to get attention for its message of hostility to homosexuality and the Roman Catholic Church, and its claim that battlefield casualties represent divine retribution for what it views as America's sins.
Read it all.
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Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Parish Ministry • Death / Burial / Funerals • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • Religion & Culture
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One of the more effective evangelical tools right now does just that — it goes into the places where people spend time, at work and at leisure, and it gathers people who want to ask significant spiritual questions. Asking questions is actually something that sets Episcopalians apart from a lot of other traditions, particularly the ones who say there’s only one right answer and doubt is a sin. Remember that bumper sticker, "Question Authority"? I’ve never been sure whether it’s a description of somebody who’s good at asking questions or a challenge to keep asking difficult questions of the powers that be. But asking questions is a central part of our tradition. We don’t insist that doubt is a sin; we see doubt as necessary to growth.
Young people are hard-wired to ask questions — why? is the most characteristic word out of the mouth of a healthy developing child. ‘Why should I do that, why is the stove hot, why aren’t girls and boys always treated the same, why are some people poor, why has your generation left the world in such a mess, how can we bring peace to the world?’ When we stop asking questions like that we begin to die — spiritually, intellectually, emotionally, and probably physically.
Building communities where young people can ask the really big questions is one of the most important kinds of evangelism we can do — and the other important kinds of evangelism are about building communities where others can do the same thing. Theology on tap is a prime example — it offers welcome and hospitality, including a brew (caffeinated or spirited), conversation, and community. It is happening in bars. It is happening in coffeehouses. It is happening where people gather. There are ways to gather questioners, a number of them focused on faith in the workplace. We have always gathered to ask questions. The women’s guilds and men’s guilds in the church did similar work, but they expected people to show up in the church building to gather. We need to leave home and go out there to provide hospitable places for questioners!
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Diocesan Conventions
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Oh, how I love thy law! It is my meditation all the day....Thy word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
--Psalm 119:97, 105
Filed under: * Theology • Theology: Scripture
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The Anglican Church announced it would close seven churches on Vancouver Island due to declining attendance and revenues, but one reverend says there's still a light at the end of the tunnel.
Over the next 18 months, the churches will be sold or leased and their parishioners relocated to four newly created "hub" churches designed to serve a wider community. The dramatic decision was made using a set of recommendations put forward by the Diocese of British Columbia earlier this year.
Rev. Christopher Parsons is the rector for two of the parishes being closed, St. Columba and St. Martin, but the 34-year-old said he is nothing but pleased with the church's decision.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Anglican Church of Canada
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In her new book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System, Ravitch blasts No Child Left Behind, which she says promotes "a cramped, mechanistic, profoundly anti-intellectual definition of education" — as well as virtually every other recent reform effort that has sought to inject more free-market competition and accountability into education. She finds much to dislike: charter schools, high-stakes tests, corporate-style school management teams and the rising influence of foundation-funded reforms.
Over several decades, Ravitch says, American schools have essentially lost their way, forgetting to focus on giving students a solid curriculum and strong teachers. Instead, she says, we've bumbled through a series of crises that have left us with "vague and meaningless standards," an odd, antagonistic public-private competition and an "obsession" with test scores.
Read it all.
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Here is one:
Proposed Resolution R-2 2010 Convention
Offered by: The Standing Committee
Subject: Response to Ecclesiastical Intrusions by the Presiding Bishop
RESOLVED, That this 219th Convention of the Diocese of South Carolina affirms its legal and ecclesiastical authority as a sovereign diocese within the Episcopal Church, and be it further
RESOLVED, That this Convention declares the Presiding Bishop has no authority to retain attorneys in this Diocese that present themselves as the legal counsel for the Episcopal Church in South Carolina, and be it finally
RESOLVED, That the Diocese of South Carolina demands that the Presiding Bishop drop the retainer of all such legal counsel in South Carolina as has been obtained contrary to the express will of this Diocese, which is The Episcopal Church within its borders.
Read them carefully and read them all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Conflicts • TEC Diocesan Conventions • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • * South Carolina
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Warning--the content is very difficult to listen to in terms of the description of what happened. Watch and listen to it all (a little over 12 minutes)--KSH.
Update--There is a great deal more here.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of Nigeria • * Culture-Watch • Violence • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations
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I found this very interesting--see what you make of it.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • History • * Economics, Politics • Economy • Labor/Labor Unions/Labor Market
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America is the exemplification of what I call the project of modernity. That project is the attempt to produce a people who believe that they should have no story except the story that they choose when they had no story. That is what Americans mean by freedom. The institutions that constitute the disciplinary forms of that project are liberal democracy and capitalism. Thus the presumption that if you get to choose between a Sony or Panasonic television you have had a “free choice.” The same presumption works for choosing a President. Once you have made your choice you have to learn to live with it. So there is a kind of resignation that freedom requires.
I try to help Americans see that the story that they should have no story except the story they choose when they had no story is their story by asking them this question — “Do they think they ought to be held accountable for decisions they made when they did not know what they were doing?” They do not think they should be held accountable for decisions they made when they did not know what they were doing. They do not believe they should be held accountable because it is assumed that you should only be held accountable when you acted freely, and that means you had to know what you were doing.
I then point out the only difficulty with such an account of responsibility is it makes marriage unintelligible. How could you ever know what you were doing when you promised lifelong monogamous fidelity? I then observe that is why the church insists that your vows be witnessed by the church: because the church believes it has the duty to hold you responsible to promises you made when you did not know what you were doing. And if the story that you should have no story but the story you choose when you had no story makes marriage unintelligible, try having children. You never get the ones you want. Of course Americans try to get the ones they want by only having children when they are “ready” — a utopian desire that wreaks havoc on children so born, to the extent they come to believe they can only be loved if they fulfill their parents’ desires.
Of course the problem with the story that you should have no story except the story you choose when you had no story is that story is a story that you have not chosen. But Americans do not have the ability to acknowledge that they have not chosen the story that they should have no story except the story they choose when they had no story.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • * Culture-Watch • History • Psychology • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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They see themselves as crusaders for human rights--protectors of the innocent, the voiceless, and the powerless. After years of enduring the slings and arrows of opposition, these activists are finally in the power seat. They are among the most important voices on a crucial political question: will abortion finally scuttle health-care reform?
They are America's Roman Catholic bishops.
It goes without saying that the Catholic hierarchy has always been pro-life. Nevertheless, the new prominence of this ancient fraternity is somewhat surprising. For one thing, the American public hardly regards the institutional Catholic Church as sacrosanct. Thanks to continuing sex scandals, many Americans--even American Catholics--roll their eyes on the subject of the Catholic hierarchy's ability to stand as a moral example.
Also, American Catholics reflect the voting public at large, which is to say that they are--and have long been--pro-choice. According to a 1999 poll, more than half of American Catholics believe you can be a good Catholic and disregard the bishops' teachings on abortion.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Health & Medicine • --The 2009 American Health Care Reform Debate • Law & Legal Issues • Life Ethics • Marriage & Family • Religion & Culture • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Roman Catholic
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What bothers my heart are a few questions:
• It was curfew time when these attackers came in and carried out their heinous activities. Who are responsible for these areas? What happened to those who should enforce the curfew? The purpose of the curfew is to stop events like this.
• Failure of government to provide full security for its citizenry leaves a people with very little option but to provide for their own kind of security. History has shown that these kinds of security are bred in vengeance, retaliation, bitterness, hatred and malice. This gives birth to an almost endless cycle of senseless violence as can be seen in many nations of the world today. Where is our government in all the levels of governance? Where were they on this night? Where were they on 17th January? Shall we continue to have the ugly sight of mass burials? Are there no leaders who fear God, who will swallow their pride and choose to be humble before God for the sake of those faces of slaughtered children?
• The new dimension these attacks are assuming is revealing a system of well-trained terror groups who rights now have attacked these villages, and only God knows which community will be next.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of Nigeria • * Culture-Watch • Violence • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General
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California passed a gas tax last week to help make up for its nearly $20 billion budget gap, the latest in a series of measures to right the state's teetering economy. The country of Greece is in even worse shape, with accumulated debt higher than 110 percent of GDP, set to reach 125 percent this year. Can a state declare bankruptcy? Can a country?
No and no. Chapter 9 of the U.S. bankruptcy code allows individuals and municipalities (cities, towns, villages, etc.) to declare bankruptcy. But that doesn't include states. (The statute defines "municipality" as a "political subdivision or public agency or instrumentality of a State"—that is, not a state itself.)
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • Politics in General • State Government
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A little-noticed law could soon result in smaller Social Security checks for hundreds of thousands of the elderly and disabled who owe the U.S. money from defaulted loans and other debts more than a decade old.
Social Security benefits are off-limits to creditors, such as credit-card companies and banks. But the U.S. can collect debts to federal agencies by "offsetting," or withholding Social Security and disability payments.
The Treasury currently withholds benefits of 3.1 million Social Security recipients to recover defaulted student-, farm- and small-business loans, unpaid income taxes, amounts veterans owe for health care, and other debts to the government.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Aging / the Elderly • * Economics, Politics • Economy • Personal Finance • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • The U.S. Government
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Under the canons of the Episcopal Church (III.11.4), a majority of bishops exercising jurisdiction and diocesan standing committees must consent to a bishop-elect's ordination as bishop within 120 days of receiving notice of the election.
The consent process for the Rev. Canon Mary Glasspool, who was elected the day after Bruce as a second bishop suffragan in Los Angeles, has not yet been completed. The diocese said March 3 that Glasspool had received 55 of the 56 standing committee consents needed. That information is unofficial, pending verification by the presiding bishop's office. There is no official information about the number of bishops with jurisdiction who have consented to Glasspool's ordination and consecration, which is also scheduled for May 15. The 120-day process for Glasspool lasts until May 8 and the diocese has been updating the process each Wednesday on its website here.
As outlined under Canon III.11.4 (a) for every bishop election, the presiding bishop confirms the receipt of consents from a majority of bishops with jurisdiction, and reviews the evidence of consents from diocesan standing committees sent to her by the standing committee of the electing diocese.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops
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Here's the kind of question that might violate the rules you learned about proper dinner conversation: Does President Obama's next Supreme Court nominee need to be a Protestant?
If Justice John Paul Stevens decides to call it a career after he turns 90 next month, the Supreme Court would for the first time in its history be without a justice belonging to America's largest religious affiliations.
Perhaps that would mean only that religion is no longer important in the mix of experience and expertise that a president seeks in a Supreme Court nominee. There was a time, of course, in which there was a "Catholic seat" on the court, followed in 1916 with the appointment of the court's first Jew. The days when one of each seemed sufficient are long over.
Catholics became a majority of the nine-member court in 2006 with the confirmation of Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. Justice Sonia Sotomayor made it six last summer. And the other two justices besides Stevens are Jewish.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • Office of the President • President Barack Obama
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Pastor Yohanna Gyang Jugu, of Church of Christ in Nigeria, sat outside his burned-down church, tears in his eyes.
"We were sleeping and we heard gunshots all around," he said. "I woke up and went outside. There was nowhere to pass. Fulani men had surrounded the village. They caught my wife and killed her, and my daughter. They were cutting people down with machetes."
During the burial service, Solomn Zang, the commissioner for works and transport in Plateau State, where Dogo Nahawa is located, said that the military was not sufficient for protection.
"God willing, we will do something about this," he said. "Next time if this happens you shouldn't call the police or the military, call on your neighbors to come and fight."
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Violence • * International News & Commentary • Africa • Nigeria • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations
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As religion is the corner-stone on which alone we have attempted to rear the fabric of morality, the degree of attention which it has received in the instruction and discipline of the Institute, forms another topic in our report. And here while the retrospect affords cause for congratulation that much has been done, it still leaves room for regret that much also has been left undone. It would be an affectation of modesty, however, to disclaim the consciousness that in all our plans and operations, there has been a uniform and earnest endeavor to sustain our religious professions. Accordingly, pains have been taken to give interest to the services of the chapel, and the decorum with which these have been attended by the students has been peculiarly gratifying. The regular and private reading of the Holy Scriptures has been a prescribed, duty and provision made for it in the daily routine of business. Portions of the inspired volume have been explained, after having been committed to memory, weekly; as also the Catechism and Services of the Episcopal Church. The observance of the Lord's day has been enforced, on the one hand, with a moderation which perceives the danger of rendering its duties tedious and irksome; yet on the other, with a strictness which would guard against the opposite and more common error, of allowing it to relax into a mere holiday for indulgence and amusement. With this view, the tasks of a sacred character required on Sundays have been light, while alluring and persuasive methods have been varied and multiplied, to induce a profitable employment of the time not appropriated to devotional exercises. We thus have succeeded, to an encouraging extent, in preserving the appropriate quiet of the day, and in using it as a means of spiritual edification, without investing it with the gloom and repulsiveness which not unfrequently counteract the beneficent design of the institution; a point which every one practically acquainted with the government of the young, will acknowledge to be as difficult as any other within the sphere of Christian education. In like manner we have been careful to render all the associations of Religion agreeable. Aware, too, that in moral culture, it is the indirect influence which the young disciple is exposed, in the tone and manner of things and in the every day habits of those around him, that operates to the formation of his sentiments and character more powerfully than any repetition of precepts or formal exhibition of example, we have endeavored that religion should be viewed as the source of contentment and self-government to its possessors, and not at variance with the declaration that its ways are "ways of pleasantness, and all its paths are peace." Pious sensibility has been tenderly cherished whenever it has appeared, and in awakening it, much has been done in the way of private and familiar conversation.
--William Augustus Muhlenberg, Christian Education (1831)
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • * Culture-Watch • Education
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The state budget presented six weeks ago by Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon may have overestimated revenues by as much as $1 billion, lawmakers warned Tuesday.
The stunning deficit could force lawmakers to go beyond program and service cuts to consider major structural changes to state government.
“It is clear that even as Missouri’s economy begins to rebound, state revenues will continue to lag for a prolonged period of time,” Nixon, a Democrat, said in a statement Monday. “As a result, we will need to downsize the scope of state government, while protecting necessary services to the citizens of Missouri.”
That announcement was underscored Tuesday by the release of state revenues for February, which showed a year-to-date decline of 12.7 percent compared with this time last year, and a 14.6 percent drop in revenues for February.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • Politics in General • State Government
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The Reformation was bad for England, and the nation would do well to become a Catholic country again.
This was the affirmation proposed by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor on Tuesday during a debate hosted by The Spectator magazine as part of its debate series. The topic under discussion was "England Should Be a Catholic Country Again," and the cardinal -- who is a retired archbishop of Westminster -- was joined by author Piers Paul Read and Dom Antony Sutch, parish priest of St. Benets Catholic Church, in speaking for the motion.
Speaking against the motion were Lord Richard Harries, retired Anglican bishop of Oxford; Matthew Parris, former Conservative Member of Parliament and currently a columnist for the Times; and Stephen Pound, Labour Party Member of Parliament.
Though affirming that the Reformation "brought a tremendous loss to this country," the core of Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor's contribution focused on an ecumenical vision.
"My vision is for the English Church, united with all its history and genius, is to be aligned and in communion with the billion and more Catholic Christians throughout the world, with 4,000 or 5,000 bishops and in communion with the Bishop of Rome, the Pope," he said.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • CoE Bishops • * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Roman Catholic
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Urgent warnings have been circulated throughout Nato and the European Union for secret intelligence material to be protected from a recent surge in cyberwar attacks originating in China.
The attacks have also hit government and military institutions in the United States, where analysts said that the West had no effective response and that EU systems were especially vulnerable because most cyber security efforts were left to member states.
Nato diplomatic sources told The Times: “Everyone has been made aware that the Chinese have become very active with cyber-attacks and we’re now getting regular warnings from the office for internal security.” The sources said that the number of attacks had increased significantly over the past 12 months, with China among the most active players.
In the US, an official report released on Friday said the number of attacks on Congress and other government agencies had risen exponentially in the past year to an estimated 1.6 billion every month.
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Science & Technology • * Economics, Politics • Defense, National Security, Military • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A. • Asia • China • England / UK • Europe
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There are basically two kinds of homeowners on Dana Lane — those who bought high like the Sandovals, and those who had been there awhile and saw their equity ballooning until it stopped.
"Like everybody else, I'm in an upside-down loan," says Brenda Moore, who owes more than $300,000 on her mortgage. This is remarkable considering she bought her house in 1989 for $80,000. A search of public records reveals that Moore, a retired nurse, has refinanced her home eight times since 1998.
The loans are from a who's who of subprime lenders. With each loan she took out more equity, and each time the loan terms got worse.
Read or better listen to it all.
Filed under: * Economics, Politics • Economy • Housing/Real Estate Market • Personal Finance • The Banking System/Sector • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007--
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Almighty God, who hast revealed to thy Church thine eternal Being of glorious majesty and perfect love as one God in Trinity of Persons: Give us grace that, like thy bishop Gregory of Nyssa, we may continue steadfast in the confession of this faith, and constant in our worship of thee, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who livest and reignest now and for ever.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • Spirituality/Prayer
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He went away from there and came to his own country; and his disciples followed him. And on the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue; and many who heard him were astonished, saying, "Where did this man get all this? What is the wisdom given to him? What mighty works are wrought by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him. And Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house." And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands upon a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief.
--Mark 6:1-6a
Filed under: * Theology • Theology: Scripture
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O Thou who hast prepared a place for my soul, prepare my soul for that place. Prepare it with holiness; prepare it with desire; and even while it sojourneth upon earth, let it dwell in heaven with thee, beholding the beauty of thy countenance and the glory of thy saints, now and for evermore.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church Year / Liturgical Seasons • Lent • Spirituality/Prayer
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China’s central bank chief laid the groundwork for an appreciation of the renminbi at the weekend when he described the current dollar peg as temporary, striking a more emollient tone after months of tough opposition in Beijing to a shift in exchange rate policy.
Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China, gave the strongest hint yet from a senior official that China would abandon the unofficial dollar peg, in place since mid-2008. He said it was a “special” policy to weather the financial crisis.
“This is a part of our package of policies for dealing with the global financial crisis. Sooner or later, we will exit the policies.”
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Globalization • * Economics, Politics • Economy • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • The U.S. Government • The United States Currency (Dollar etc) • * International News & Commentary • Asia • China
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College graduates are more likely to consider the Ten Commandments irrelevant, and reject the Bible as the word of God, than those with no college degree, according to a recent study.
A “distinct shift” occurs after college regarding beliefs and opinion, said Richard Brake, director of university studies at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
The ISI surveyed 2,508 Americans on questions intended to measure the impact of a college degree on people’s beliefs. The Wilmington, Del.-based ISI has administered the survey for the past three years.
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Education • Religion & Culture • Young Adults • * Theology • Ethics / Moral Theology
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Iraq election workers began tallying votes from 47,000 polling stations across the country Monday, a day after the country pulled off a landmark vote despite scattered dozens of explosions that went off in Baghdad and in other parts of the country.
At the bustling headquarters of the Iraqi High Electoral Commission (IHEC), cheers went up as the first boxes of tally sheets from individual polling stations arrived. The boxes, from polling sites from the Rasafah district of Baghdad, were put through metal detectors before dozens of IHEC employees began unsealing the envelopes.
The IHEC said 62.4 percent of eligible Iraqis voted. That's down from an official figure of 79.6 percent in the last parliamentary elections, when Shiite Arab and Kurdish voters turned out in huge numbers, but represents the first national parliamentary elections with wide Sunni Arab participation.
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Violence • * Economics, Politics • Iraq War • Politics in General • * International News & Commentary • Middle East • Iraq
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Certainly, religion is one of the many dividing lines in Jos and elsewhere in Nigeria. But it is not the main one.
In Jos, as elsewhere, the cause of fighting has, more often been the struggle for resources than it has religion. In Jos, my AFP colleague Aminu Abubakar reports that the original cause of the latest clash was the alleged theft of cattle, blamed by a group of settler-farmers on a group of cattle herders. Often the fighting in the north is between the semi-nomadic cattle herders (who happen to be mostly Muslim) and settler-farmers (who happen to be mostly Christian), fighting about the diminishing access to land.
"For all those who will go out and fight their Muslim or Christian brothers on the streets, there are many more (Nigerians) who will take them into their home to protect them, when fighting breaks out," a Nigerian Islamic law student once told me, attending an animist festival in the south.
The reason these conflicts turn deadly in Nigeria is not any greater degree of religious animosity there than elsewhere, however much exists. The reason is poor government: one that fails to send in troops early enough to quell trouble when it flares and never jails those responsible when it is over. Mediation of disputes is too often left to others, too.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of Nigeria • * Culture-Watch • Violence • * International News & Commentary • Africa • Nigeria • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations
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Like the diocesan chancellor, Bishop Lawrence viewed the TEC attorney’s actions as adversarial and a challenge to his and the diocese’s authority. Lawrence asked members of the diocese to not strike out in unilateral directions and told them he would be communicating to them in the days leading up to their new convention date.
The Diocese of South Carolina and its bishop have been critical of the national church. In October of 2009, the diocese voted, among other things, that it would limit its involvement with TEC bodies that assented to actions contrary to the faith.
It also appears that the Diocese of South Carolina will not join in an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court regarding the case against All Saint’s Waccamaw Island.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues • * South Carolina
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The Vatican's chief of doctrine said Saturday that the whole point of talks on Anglican-Catholic religious unity is to bring the Protestants back to Rome.
William Cardinal Levada, prefect the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, told a dinner of about 300 in Kingston that "union with the Catholic Church is the goal of ecumenism (at least), we phrase it that way.
"Yet the very process of moving towards union works a change in churches ..."
The Catholic Church is enriched when another group adds its means of worship, although he hastened to add it would not be any "essential elements of sanctification or truth." Those were already provided to the Church by Christ.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • - Anglican: Latest News • * Religion News & Commentary • Ecumenical Relations • Other Churches • Roman Catholic
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According to the U.S. Census Bureau's figures, Oregon has grown in population from 3,421,399 in 2000 to 3,825,657 in 2009. This represents a population growth of approximately 11.82%.
According to Episcopal Church statistics, the Diocese of Oregon went from Average Sunday Attendance (or ASA) of 7,553 in 1998 to 6,924 in 2008. This represents an ASA decline of about 8% over this ten year period.
In order to generate a pictorial chart of some Oregon diocesan statistics, please go here and enter "Oregon" in the second line down under "Diocese" and then click on "View Diocese Chart" under the third line to the left.
The Diocese of Oregon' website may be found here.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Bishops • TEC Data
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...any time the word "bomb" comes up at all — in a lesson on a war in history, in a novel in literature class — kids start laughing and pointing at ...[my nephew].
It's a problem that's affecting his slang.
"Everybody's favorite phrase is 'That's the bomb.' You know, like 'That video game's the bomb.' But I can't say that because kids will make fun of me."
What's a parent to do?
"Do the teachers know this is going on?" I asked.
"Sure, they see it and they hear it. But they'd rather not get involved. Mostly, they just pretend that it's not there."
"I've told him I can come to his school and talk to the principal, the teachers, the kids, whoever," said his father, an immigrant from India who works as an engineer and moved to this particular suburb for the good schools and seeming openness to diversity.
My nephew reacted like I would have when I was 14 — as if he'd rather be run over by a truck than have his father come to school to talk about what a great religion Islam is....
Read the whole thing.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Children • Education • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A. • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Faiths • Islam
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I agree with Richard Harries' defence of faith groups who want to conduct civil partnerships in places of worship. But I really dislike the way he poses as a defender of religious liberty. We Lords-spiritual have no right to oppose them holding civil ceremonies in places of worship, he loftily says: "it would harm no one, and it accords with their deepest religious convictions. Religious freedom is indivisible". This is laughable. For an Anglican bishop to say this is like a Thatcherite saying "compassion must always come first".
The Church of England has many things going for it: it has lovely buildings, lovely music, lovely liturgies, lovely literature, and a lovely habit of theological vagueness. But it does not have the moral high ground in terms of religious liberty. Indeed it is founded on the denial of religious liberty. This is too often obscured by its reputation for "liberalism", which is based in the fact that it is more liberal than certain other churches on certain issues, and manages to find a few nice people to say nice things on Thought for the Day.
According to the vague, lazy orthodoxy about our history, the C of E is deeply entwined in the story of British liberalism. From the time of the first Elizabeth, did this Church not nurture the distinctive English tradition of toleration, pluralism, fair play? Did it not reject the authoritarian ways of another church we won't name, and choose freedom? No, actually. It is truer to say that our tradition of liberty arose in opposition to the established Church.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • * Christian Life / Church Life • Church History • * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • England / UK
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The Rt Revd Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, has complained of a “strident and bullying campaign” to marginalise Christianity in the UK.
At a symposium organised in the House of Lords last week by the Christian Broadcasting Council, Lord Carey said: “Christianity, which has given so much to our country, is now being sidelined as never before as though it is a stranger to our nation.”
Britain had “reached a point”, he said, “where politicians are mocked for merely expressing their faith. I cannot imagine any politician expressing concern that Britain should remain a Christian country. That reticence is a scandal and a disgrace to our history.”
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • England / UK
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I mention that some Christian theologians seem to say that Allah is not the same God as the Judaeo-Christian God. At that question, Dr Nazir-Ali becomes visibly uncomfortable. He pauses a long time, formulating his reply, as if his life depended on the answer.
The terrifying truth is that, in modern Britain, his life could indeed depend on how he answers this question. He knows this well, for he has received death threats in the past, and has been under police protection.
"I would say that Islam has a sense of the God of the Bible but, for various reasons, understands the nature of that God, and God's action in the world, quite differently," he says.
I then ask whether he regards it as an open theological question as to whether they are the same.
He replies quickly: "I don't think that they are the same. Muslims, like everyone else, have some sense of the One God... but the way in which they understand the nature and the work of that God is very different from the Judaeo-Christian way.
"While Islam wants to take power to change the world, Christianity is about turning away from power to change the world. And that has to do with a view of God. We have a God who humbled himself and took the form of a slave, and accepted death. And that is the source of Christian power, the Cross. So, clearly, in any Christian view of polity, and Muslim view of polity, there must be a radical difference.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • CoE Bishops • * Culture-Watch • Religion & Culture • * International News & Commentary • England / UK • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Roman Catholic • Other Faiths • Islam • Muslim-Christian relations • * Theology
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This new program of legal mayhem began with the filing of this suit against the parish of St. Francis Anglican Church in Turlock. St. Francis is a duly constituted member of the only true Diocese of San Joaquin, and wants nothing to do with the non-Diocese. But the non-Diocese wants to claim its property and assets -- its bank accounts, its prayer books and altar furnishings, and the building which it owns, and in which it worships.
How can this be? Well might you ask. For in the make-believe world of Bishop Lamb, the Presiding Bishop and President Anderson, St. Francis still "belongs" in some fashion to ECUSA -- in their eyes, it never left. And so they want to "embrace" it in their loving grasp, and to take all of its property and assets. Never mind that although there are some Episcopalian parishioners in Turlock, who are worshipping for the time being in other premises, they by themselves would not be enough to maintain and insure the property, and pay for a full-time rector. If the Anglican parishioners choose not to return to the fold and support their church, well, the Episcopal remnant will just run through the parish bank accounts until the property can be sold to someone else (but certainly not to the Anglicans, because they are in "competition", and the Presiding Bishop is dead-set against helping "competitors"), and then that money can be used to prop up the non-Diocese. What a wonderful and Christian-like plan!
And now, as I have reported, the non-Diocese has embarked on a program to sue all of the individually incorporated parishes in the Anglican Diocese, using the St. Francis complaint as a template. A second such lawsuit has now been filed against St. Michael's in Ridgecrest, and still others are in the works. Each of the lawsuits seeks a "declaration" from the court where it has been filed that the parish corporation's assets are held in trust for ECUSA and Bishop Lamb's group, and so cannot be controlled or used by the people who are the current vestry members and clergy. (The latter have been "deposed", don't you remember? So they cannot function in an Episcopal church, and must be made to hand their churches over to those who will "loyally guard and preserve the Parish Premises and Parish Assets for the mission of the Church, . . . adhere to the Church and Diocesan Canons and . . . protect and serve loyal Episcopalians in the Parish", to quote from paragraph 80 of the complaint.)
Other lawsuits against the remaining incorporated parishes in the Diocese of San Joaquin are surely coming....
Read it carefully and follow all the links.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Southern Cone • Episcopal Church (TEC) • House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Bishops • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: San Joaquin • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues
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The Diocese of Rio Grande and the Episcopal Church thought they'd received a favorable court ruling in a property dispute involving a breakaway congregation.
Then the judge changed his mind and ordered both parties to appear in 210th District Court in El Paso County, Texas, on March 3.
"He basically said he wants to make a decision based on findings of fact, that he wants this to go to trial, either a bench trial or a jury trial," said diocesan associate chancellor Bill Juvrud in a March 3 telephone interview from his office. No trial date has been set.
"We've been in the middle of litigation on this for awhile," acknowledged Juvrud.
The case stems from the Oct. 21, 2008 vote by a majority of members of St. Francis on-the-Hill Episcopal Church in El Paso to disaffiliate from the local diocese and from the Episcopal Church.
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Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • TEC Conflicts • TEC Conflicts: Rio Grande • * Culture-Watch • Law & Legal Issues
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Given its focus and central argument, it is particularly alarming that the address offers no engagement with Scripture or Christian tradition or Anglican teaching either in relation to sexuality or in its attempt to argue that ethical diversity in this area is legitimate. Although many of the practical implications of his argument for diversity remain rather vague it is clear that he is seeking to move the Church of England and the Communion away from its current position. In so doing he also makes a number of claims in passing that raise deeper theological questions about the nature of sin and grace and the relation of church and society.
In summary, the general position advocated is one which would move the Church of England away not only from its current teaching but also from its methodology of careful, rigorous engagement with the complexities of this subject rooted in Scripture, tradition and wider ecumenical reflections. What is being advocated instead is the sort of approach taken by the North American provinces which has moved from the seemingly uncritical (and theologically undefended) acceptance of a diversity of views on sexuality within a small part of Christ’s church to the inevitable abandonment of traditional teaching and discipline within the Anglican province and then to the marginalisation and exclusion of those who seek to uphold the biblical and traditional Christian sexual ethic. It is, sadly, for that reason, that the address is of such significance and concern and merits careful analysis, critique and engagement from the wider church, including others in episcopal leadership.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Anglican Provinces • Church of England (CoE) • CoE Bishops • Sexuality Debate (in Anglican Communion) • Same-sex blessings • * Religion News & Commentary • Ecumenical Relations • * Theology • Anthropology • Ethics / Moral Theology • Theology: Scripture
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"This is not a criminal proceeding," Weinstein says. "We are talking about a code of conduct, which, I want to emphasize, both students and their parents sign before they begin any extracurricular activity, and they've all agreed to it."
The code of conduct specifically prohibits students from consuming alcohol or drugs away from school.
Tenth-grader Justin Janowski says he doesn't like the policy and thinks parents should be the ones making decisions about how to punish their kids outside of school. But he grudgingly admits the policy is effective.
"I mean, when I was a wrestler and played football like that's one thing I didn't want to do was get kicked off the team for getting bad grades. Or I don't know, get caught smoking cigarettes outside of school, so I didn't do it," says Janowksi. "I stayed good."
Janowski attends high school in a nearby district with the same policy. In the past decade, following the Columbine shooting, schools have suspended students for all sorts of misdeeds away from campus — vandalism, minor drug possession or cyber-bullying. Courts have tended to uphold these policies as long as officials can show some connection to school safety. But beyond the legal issues, there is also rigorous debate about whether "zero-tolerance" policies are effective.
Read or better yet listen to it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Education • Law & Legal Issues • Marriage & Family • Teens / Youth
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While Britain was panicking about a sterling crisis and the terrifying financial consequences of a hung parliament, I spent last week in Japan. It was a good vantage point to put Britain’s financial and political travails into perspective.
Japan’s budget deficit of 10.5 per cent of GDP is this year second to Britain’s among the G7 countries, but in every other respect the fiscal situation in Japan is far worse. Because the Japanese Government has borrowed similarly prodigious sums almost every year since 1990, it carries by far the world’s heaviest debt load, with net public debt now running at 115 per cent of GDP, about the same as in Italy and Greece. And there is not the slightest prospect of any reduction in borrowing in the foreseeable future because of the political situation in Japan. It has had four prime ministers in three years, its civil service is in more or less open warfare with the elected politicians and there has been no effective government since the resignation of Junichiro Koizumi in 2006.
Read it all.
Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Globalization • * Economics, Politics • Economy • The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007-- • Politics in General • * International News & Commentary • Asia • Japan • England / UK
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
(The above is my title, you can see his by going to the link below--KSH)
The Christian churches in the United States are in trouble for all the usual reasons — human sinfulness and selfishness, the temptations of life in an affluent society, doctrinal and moral controversies and uncertainties and on and on and on — but also and to a surprisingly large degree they are in trouble because they are trying to address the problems of the twenty first century with a business model and a set of tools that date from the middle of the twentieth. The mainline churches in particular are organized like General Motors was organized in the 1950s: they have cost structures and operating procedures that simply don’t work today. They are organized around what I’ve been calling the blue social model, built by rules that don’t work anymore, and oriented to a set of ideas that are well past their sell-by date.
Without even questioning it, most churchgoers assume that a successful church has its own building and a full-time staff including one or more professionally trained leaders (ordained or not depending on the denomination). Perhaps no more than half of all congregations across the country can afford this at all; most manage only by neglecting maintenance on their buildings or otherwise by cutting corners. And even when they manage to make the payroll and keep the roof in repair, congregations spend most of their energy just keeping the show going from year to year. The life of the community centers around the attempt to maintain a model of congregational life that doesn’t work, can’t work, won’t work no matter how hard they try. People who don’t like futile tasks have a tendency to wander off and do other things and little by little the life and vitality (and the rising generations) drift away.
At the next level up, there is another level of ecclesiastical bureaucrats and officials staffing regional offices. When my dad was a young priest in the Episcopal diocese of North Carolina back in the late 1950s the bishop had a secretary and that was pretty much it for diocesan staff. These days the Episcopal church is in decline, with perhaps a third to a half or more of its parishes unable to meet their basic expenses and with members dying off or drifting away much faster than new people come through the door — but no respectable bishop would be caught dead with the pathetic staff with which Bishop Baker ran a healthy and growing diocese in North Carolina back in the 1950s. (Bishop Baker was impressive in another way; he could tie his handkerchief into the shape of a bunny rabbit, put it flat on the palm of his hand, and have it hop off. I was only six when he showed me this trick, but it was clear to me that this man had something special to offer. Since that time I’ve traveled all over the world and met bishops, archbishops, cardinals and even a pope — but none of them made quite the impression on me that Bishop Baker and his jumping handkerchief did.)
Bishops today in their sinking, decaying dioceses surround themselves with large staffs who hold frequent meetings and no doubt accomplish many wonderful things, although nobody outside the office ever quite knows what these are. And it isn’t just Anglicans. Lutherans, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, UCC, the whole crowd has pretty much the same story to tell. Staffs grow; procedures flourish and become ever more complex; more and more years of school are required from an increasingly ‘professional’ church staff: everything gets better and better every year — except somehow the churches keep shrinking. Inside, the professionals are pretty busy jumping through hoops and writing memos to each other and grand sweeping statements of support for raising the minimum wage and other noble causes — but outside the regional headquarters and away from the hum of the computers and printers, local congregations lose members, watch their buildings fall year by year into greater disrepair, and in the end they close their doors.
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Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • General Convention 2009 • House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson • Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori • TEC Bishops • TEC Diocesan Conventions • TEC House of Deputies • TEC Parishes • TEC Polity & Canons • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Lutheran • Methodist • Presbyterian • United Church of Christ • * Theology • Seminary / Theological Education
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
It is hard to overestimate the hostility that the philosophical community has shown toward evolutionary psychology. With very few exceptions -- although I am skeptical about much I am prepared to take it seriously -- it is hated and despised, often, it seems to me, on less than convincing grounds. (Misreading statistics and so forth.) But even if the objections are well taken, this does not explain the visceral hostility. My strong suspicion is that the philosophers are using their clever critiques to mask the same fear as that of Bishop Wilberforce. The nonbelievers stand side by side with the believers in wanting humans on a unique, higher-than-anyone-else pinnacle.
The fact is, however, that we are animals and we were produced by natural selection, so even if you reject evolutionary psychology you had better get over your worries and start looking for a convincing and profitable approach. A number of people have been trying to do this, showing how culture is connected to our biology and how this connection has been shaped by selection. Leaders in this direction are Californian researchers Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd. In their Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution, they argue that culture is influenced and spread because humans have certain biases or tendencies -- biases or tendencies rooted in selection -- that direct the success of some ideas or practices over others....
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • History • Philosophy • Psychology • Science & Technology • * Theology • Anthropology
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
To the young Tom Hanks, history was as dull as an algebra equation. For Hanks — a classic baby boomer, born in 1956 — World War II was just a string of long-ago muzzle flashes in black-and-white. Yet he did have a more direct connection to the global cataclysm. His father had been a U.S. Naval mechanic (second class) in World War II. But Amos Hanks wasn't the type to tell his son tales of bravery and sacrifice. "Growing up, I always knew Dad was somewhere in the Pacific fixing things," Hanks says. "He had nothing nice to say about the Navy. He hated the Navy. He hated everybody in the Navy. He had no glorious stories about it."
Occasionally, Hanks enjoyed a war thriller like Battle of the Bulge, but he much preferred the Three Stooges, James Bond and any film with Sophia Loren. Like a lot of Americans, he found memorizing historical facts boring. Because his family was directly related to Nancy Hanks Lincoln, mother of the 16th U.S. President, he routinely recycled the same short paper he had written about her for easy classroom grades. "My idea of American history was just a course you were forced to take," Hanks says, laughing.
Yet over the past two decades — from his movies Saving Private Ryan and Charlie Wilson's War to the HBO miniseries he has produced, From the Earth to the Moon, Band of Brothers, John Adams and The Pacific, which begins March 14 at 9 p.m. — Hanks has become American history's highest-profile professor, bringing a nuanced view of the past into the homes and lives of countless millions. (HBO is owned by TIME's parent company, Time Warner.) His view of American history is a mixture of idealism and realism, both of which have characterized all the work he has produced; he's a Kennedy liberal with old-time values, the kind that embraces Main Street on the Fourth of July. The success of Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers turned him into a Tom Brokaw–like spokesperson for the Greatest Generation. When he visits Johnson Space Center in Houston or Fort Bragg in North Carolina, he is feted as if Neil Armstrong had entered the room. He's the visual David McCullough of his generation, framing the heroic tales of explorers, astronauts and soldiers for a wide audience. (McCullough's John Adams has sold about 3 million copies; Hanks' John Adams brought in 5.5 million viewers per episode.) And in the history world, his branding on a nonfiction title carries something like the power of Oprah.
But the context for Hanks' history lessons has changed. Band of Brothers, HBO's best-selling DVD to date, began airing two days before 9/11; The Pacific, his new 10-hour epic about the Pacific theater in World War II, plays out against a very different backdrop, when the country is weary of war and American exceptionalism is a much tougher sell. World War II in the European theater was a case of massive armies arrayed against an unambiguous evil. The Pacific war was mainly fought by isolated groups of men and was overlaid by a sense that our foes were fundamentally different from us. In that sense, the war in the Pacific bears a closer relation to the complex war on terrorism the U.S. is waging now, making the new series a trickier prospect but one with potential for more depth and resonance....
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • History • Movies & Television • * Economics, Politics • Defense, National Security, Military • * International News & Commentary • America/U.S.A.
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
But ignoring what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe."
--Mark 5:36
Filed under: * Theology • Theology: Scripture
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
O Eternal God, who through thy Son our Lord hast promised a blessing upon those who hear thy Word and faithfully keep it: Open our ears, we humbly beseech thee, to hear what thou sayest, and enlighten our minds, that what we hear we may understand, and understanding may carry into good effect by thy bounteous prompting; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.
Filed under: * Christian Life / Church Life • Church Year / Liturgical Seasons • Lent • Spirituality/Prayer
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
A US Catholic group on Friday accused Roman Catholic bishops of meddling in health care reforms by making backroom deals to ensure the bill does not allow funding for abortion.
"Religious and ethical concerns can legitimately inform public policy, but the bishops have overstepped the mark," said Jon O'Brien, president of Catholics for Choice.
"Interference by the US Catholic bishops in health care reform does not help women. The bishops should not be allowed to use health care reform to restrict women's access to safe and legal reproductive healthcare services," he said.
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Filed under: * Culture-Watch • Health & Medicine • --The 2009 American Health Care Reform Debate • Law & Legal Issues • Life Ethics • Religion & Culture • * Economics, Politics • Politics in General • House of Representatives • Office of the President • President Barack Obama • Senate • * Religion News & Commentary • Other Churches • Roman Catholic
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com
Read it carefully and read it all.
Filed under: * Anglican - Episcopal • Episcopal Church (TEC) • * International News & Commentary • Caribbean • Haiti
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© 2010 Kendall S. Harmon. All rights reserved.
For original material from Titusonenine (such as articles and commentary by Dr. Harmon) permission to copy and distribute free of charge is granted, provided this notice, the logo, and the web site address are visible on all copies. For permission for use in for-profit publications, please email KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com