Give no assistance or encouragement
This Memorandum has been sent to clergy in the Diocese of New Westminster:
Memorandum
To: Diocesan Clergy, Members of Diocesan Council
From: Bishop Michael Ingham
Date: February 19, 2009
Subject: New Activities of the Network
Dear Friends in Christ:
Throughout the centuries, Anglicanism has held together evangelicals, liberals, and anglo-catholics in a single church. Such is our ethos and mysterium. Read more
Launch of church planting network
“Last night Al Stewart, Andrew Heard and Steve Chong cast a bold vision to create a new Australian church planting network. … There was a great buzz as 170 crowded into a room at the Wesley Centre.… People came who are already part of Christian networks — RICE, FIEC, Presbyterian churches, Baptist Churches, Church Army, Anglican Churches and others.”
– Michael Kellahan blogs about the meeting last night. (Photo courtesy of Michael’s blog.)
Carl Jung and the Gnostic Reconciliation of Gender Opposites
Ed Hird, Rector of St. Simon’s Church in North Vancouver (ANiC), gave this address at the CWiPPTHINK 09 conference in San Diego earlier this month. –
“Leanne Payne wrote an unforgettable book in 1995 entitled ‘Crisis in Masculinity’. We live in an age where equality is equated with sameness, where men and women are deeply confused about their gender identity, about what really is authentic male and authentic female. I believe that this Gnostic Reconciliation of Gender Opposites, this gender-blending about authentic maleness and femaleness, is the direct result of our culture’s embracing of the Jungian agenda. …”
– Read Ed’s talk (PDF file – direct link) at the St. Simon’s website.
Here one moment — tribute song for the victims of the Victorian bushfires
Colin Buchanan writes,
“I wrote HERE ONE MOMENT in 1994 after the Sydney fires, which claimed life and property within about a 10 min drive of my home.
In 2001 the fires came up to the back of our house at about 2 am in the morning — I stayed, the family had been evacuated. It was quite an experience standing in my backyard when the flames finally appeared coming up through the bush. Being threatened by fire just makes the reports that much more real, even though we lost nothing.
I felt the Victorian fires — our worst ever with loss of life topping a horrifying 200 average Aussies — warranted a new verse for Here One Moment.”
– See his website to download the song and lyrics.
Connecting with families via DVD
One of the ways in which Sydney parishes are seeking to connect with their communities is through a DVD being produced by Colin Buchanan. (Colin and his friend Nudge made an appearance at The Big Day In.) The aim is to offer it to as many families as possible. It will be available from March 18th.
Churches participating in Connect09 have until next Friday (February 27 – the deadline has been extended a week) to place their orders. The DVDs which are heavily subsidised to allow them to be given away. Please pray for this effort.
Engaging With Barth
Justin Taylor at Between Two Worlds draws attention to the availability (in the US) of Engaging With Barth: Contemporary Evangelical Critiques.
Contributors include Mike Ovey and Mark Thompson.
Biblical requirements for Presbyters
“In writing to both Timothy and Titus the Apostle Paul sets out qualifications and standards expected of those to be presbyters. …
What is immediately striking from the person described by Paul in both places is the almost total lack of ability. Only two abilities are required, and these are not accidental. …”
– Church Society has published online their booklet on what ought to be expected of Christian leaders.
Sydney bushfire suburb in fundraiser
Residents of a Sydney suburb threatened with destruction by a bushfire in 2001 will host a fundraising event for the victims of Victoria’s bushfires. …
“Heathcote in the Sutherland Shire has been threatened by ferocious fires many, many times over the years with the last one … requiring evacuations of massive sections of our suburb in the middle of the night with flames clearly visible in the distance,” Heathcote Anglican Church Assistant Minister Tom Hargreaves said. …
– Story from The Australian. (View of Heathcote: Google Earth.)
Responding to the fires
“Every morning I wake up and it’s okay—until, with a dull thud, it comes back to me: image after image of people who died in the fires; rows of army tents with homeless people staying in them; entire communities that have been wiped out; my friend whose parents lost their house; a family known to me who died in their car in their driveway; a 12-year-old girl, badly burned, whose parents and sister died.
How do we respond to a tragedy like this?…”
– Jean Williams in Melbourne writes at The Sola Panel. Will your church be observing the National Day of Mourning on Sunday?
‘As Darwin turns 200, Jefferts Schori the scientist reflects’
“Jefferts Schori’s supporters say her unique background has invigorated her church and brought fresh insights into age-old problems. …
Jefferts Schori said science informs everything from how she interprets the Bible to her views on homosexuality — two subjects that now embroil her church and the larger Anglican Communion.”
– Article from Episcopal Life Online. (Photo © 2009 Episcopal Life Online.)
Primates’ Report on The Episcopal Church
The American Anglican Council has prepared a comprehensive document entitled ‘The Episcopal Church: Tearing the fabric of the Communion to shreds’.
Archbishop Peter Akinola requested its preparation to aid the Global South Primates at the meeting in Alexandria earlier this month and decided to release it when he wrote his Open Letter to Archbishop Rowan Williams.
It’s available as an 820kb PDF file – direct link. (h/t Stand Firm.)
Of Fire and Flu
My grandfather died of the flu. He was a man in his prime of life with a large family of young children. Within a few days he was dead.
Usually influenza is of greatest danger to young children or the elderly. However the so-called “Spanish flu” was notorious for its attack on healthy young adults.
Most Australians today have never heard of “the Spanish flu”. It was a great pandemic that spread across the world at the end of the First World War – killing more people than the war did. …
– The Dean of Sydney, Phillip Jensen, writes for the St. Andrew’s Cathedral newsletter.
Is the liberal tide in the Church of England beginning to ebb?
In contrast to the bad natured meeting of July last year, this week’s General Synod of the Church of England has passed off not only peacefully, but also with a significant step forward for those who want to see the Church of England recover its confidence in the gospel. A motion by lay member Paul Eddy affirming the uniqueness of Christ was agreed with 283 votes in favour and only 8 against.
Its significance was not lost on journalist Ruth Gledhill of the London Times who was quick to claim, under the headline ‘Anglicans called on to convert non-Christian believers’, that ‘The established Church of England put decades of liberal-inspired political correctness behind it in a move that led one bishop to condemn in anger the “evangelistic rants”.’ …
– Charles Raven writes at Anglican SPREAD. (Photo: C of E website.)
From Hatred to Reconciliation
Justin Taylor has linked to a 3.5 minute video clip from ABC News in the US – about a sudden transformation. Worth watching.
Another Canadian parish joins Anglican Network
“The congregation of St Mary’s Anglican Church, in Nanoose Bay, British Columbia voted overwhelmingly on Sunday, February 8, to come under the episcopal oversight of Bishop Donald Harvey, Moderator of the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC), and under the Primatial authority of Archbishop Gregory Venables of the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone. …”
– press release from the Anglican Network in Canada.
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…