Bushfires: Melbourne Diocese responds
Anglican Media Melbourne has the latest on Melbourne Diocese’s response to the Bushfire tragedy – including Archbishop Freier’s launch of a Bush Fire Appeal.
See also “Churches hit hard but stay focussed on pastoral care” by Barney Zwartz in The Age.
Photo: The Rev Stephen Holmes (vicar of Whittlesea and Kinglake) and Abp Philip Freier, at the ruins of St Peter’s Kinglake.
Hospitals betray their history by banishing prayer
“The long withdrawing roar of the sea of faith seems to be getting louder: nurses cannot pray, the Creed cannot be recited at Christian services for fear of offending non-believers, Christian marriage counsellors are removed because they believe in Christian marriage and Christian adoption agencies cannot be publicly funded because they believe that children are best brought up in a family with a mother and father to look after them.
It seems certain that no other faith would be subjected to such strictures and, indeed, to the benign neglect to which the churches have become accustomed. A place for Christians in the public square must be reclaimed. …”
– Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali comments on the recent case in the UK where a nurse was suspended for offering to pray for a patient. In The Telegraph. (h/t Anglican Mainstream. Photo: Joy Gwaltney.)
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…