I was born in a free country
“Media release July 28 2017 in response to complaints accepted by the Tasmanian Anti-Discrimination Commissioner.
Tasmanian Anti-Discrimination Commissioner Sarah Bolt has informed me that she has accepted a complaint against my church, in part for things that I wrote on my blog in 2011 in defence of marriage.
No one is forced to read my writings, it is the mere fact of their existence that may prove to be unlawful.
I bear no ill-will whatsoever towards the complainant. I am however bemused that a Christian pastor can be called to account before a government tribunal for expressing Christian teaching about marriage. …”
– Pastor of Cornerstone Presbyterian Church in Hobart, Campbell Markum, responds publicly to correspondence from the Tasmanian ‘Anti-Discrimination Commissioner’. Read it all.
Nathan Tasker sings Eternity
From Nathan Tasker’s album “Home” (iTunes), the single “Eternity (What we were made for)”.
Related:
Eternity: How Arthur Stace’s handwritten chalk message became a symbol of Sydney – Sun-Herald.
From here to Eternity: Arthur Stace in his own words
In 1964, 79 year-old Arthur Stace was interviewed on Sydney radio about why he wrote “Eternity”.
We’ve transcribed the brief segment. (A few words are unclear.)
Presenter: [One of ] the things that strikes a visitor to Sydney, and indeed many other towns right throughout New South Wales, is the fact that someone has been there before, in writing “Eternity” on the footpaths, on walls, almost anywhere, in very fine handwriting, and in yellow chalk.
For Monitor, Jim Waugh found Mr Arthur Stace, who writes “Eternity” and asked him, “Why?”. Read more
Colin Buchanan sings about Mr Eternity
“Award-winning musician Colin Buchanan will perform a special tribute tomorrow to the man who emblazoned Sydney and Melbourne with ‘Eternity’.
To mark the 50th anniversary of the death of Arthur Stace, Buchanan wrote Eternity (Arthur Stace).
During a 10:30am commemorative service tomorrow for Stace at St Andrew’s Cathedral, Sydney, Buchanan will perform the song – which you can listen to below. …”
– Listen at Eternity newspaper.
Relationship building between city and country with spirit levels and spiritual support
“For many years, Stewart Cuddy has been a Sydney lawyer attending an Anglican parish in one of Sydney’s most affluent suburbs. But this week he is a labourer, on the end of a chainsaw or power drill, working with a church in remote the remote New South Wales town of Walgett.
Mr Cuddy is part of a group of volunteers who head west every year on a grey nomad trip with a difference…”
– Story about St Peter’s Walgett and St James’ Turramurra from ABC News.
Societas 2017
Moore College’s annual student magazine publication, Societas, is now available.
Always a good read!
‘Mr Eternity’ remembered at Hammondville
“This month will mark 50 years since the death of Arthur Stace at Hammondville. Internationally recognised as ‘Mr Eternity’, Stace spent 30 years anonymously writing the word ‘Eternity’ across the streets of Sydney. …
After spending more than three decades writing Eternity on footpaths (500,000 times) – with initial inspiration coming in a sermon by Baptist evangelist John Ridley – Arthur Stace spent his final years as an aged care resident at Hammondville before dying of a stroke on July 30, 1967.”
– Story from HammondCare.
We understand that HammondCare’s David Martin will be on Open House on Hope 103.2FM this Sunday evening.
Related:
Cathedral to remember ‘Mr Eternity’, Arthur Stace, this Sunday.
The Eternity waterfall after 40 years.
(Photo: Arthur as the Emergency depot Manager at the Hammond Hotel Chippendale, 1930s. Courtesy HammondCare, used with permission. © HammondCare.)
Leaving the denomination
“In 2012, the Tron Church in Glasgow City Centre, to which I belong, took the difficult decision to leave the Church of Scotland. In this short article I hope to describe something of the experience our congregation went through, and something of what it feels like five years on, in 2017.…”
– Edward Lobb writes for Anglican Mainstream.
Background:
St. George’s Tron, Glasgow, secedes from Church of Scotland, June 2012.
Walking in opposite directions (PDF), May 2011.
(Photo: Cornhill Scotland.)
‘No change to religion in Queensland state schools’
“There had been no change to religious instruction policy in Queensland schools said education Minister Kate Jones.
Ms Jones said the Palaszczuk Government supported religious instruction in state schools in consultation with parents…”
– Part of a media statement from the Queensland Government.
For background – see this earlier opinion piece from Murray Campbell:
“In the school playground, children talk about everything and anything: what they watch on television, who is eating what for lunch, their favourite sporting players and what bands they’re listening too, and what they’re hoping to do on the weekend. But if the Queensland Education Department have their way, the one topic children will not be allowed to speak about is Jesus.
In our click bait media culture, it is sometimes hard to discern real stories from the dubious, but sure enough, this story is legitimate.
The Queensland Education Department have undertaken to inform schools that children are not to discuss Christianity outside formal Religious Instruction classes.”
and also this story from News.com.au, Christmas cards, Jesus talk to be discouraged in ‘inclusive’ Qld schools.
“Christmas cards and Jesus talk may be quashed in Queensland school yards after a review into religious instruction by the state’s education department. The Australian has today revealed that the move to discourage Christianity references in the state’s school yards comes as part of a bid to crack down on “junior evangelists” who may be imposing their beliefs on non-Christians. …”
Bill Muehlenberg at CultureWatch writes (28 July 2017):
“This hastily released statement is really about two things: damage control, and sleight-of-hand government-speak. There was a huge public backlash about this, with petitions circulating, letters being written, and MPs being contacted. So the Labor government had to move quickly.”
Photo: The Hon. Kate Jones.
Northwest Network July 2017
The latest issue of the Diocese of North West Australia’s newsletter is now out.
A great way to discover what is happening in the North West, so you can pray.
Report on the Anglican Connection Conference, Dallas, 13-15 June 2017
“ ‘A dog’s breakfast’. During a recent conversation in the UK, a casual observer used that phrase to describe to me the Anglican Church in the United States of America.
The fracture in the global Anglican Communion is most acute in the States, where the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) has been set up as a parallel Anglican province, bringing together the various Anglican groups that have been forming over the last twenty years or so – such as the Nigerian based, Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA). However, the gospel clarity of the 16th century English Reformers – expressed in the Thirty-Nine Articles and the 1552 Prayer Book – is not yet found in North American Anglican structures. This is why the formation of the Anglican Connection is important.
Initiated by John Mason, among others, the Anglican Connection works outside the formal structures of the Anglican Church. It is an affiliation of like-minded gospel-focused ministers and church leaders who are committed to making disciples of Christ and whose ministry is grounded in the Scriptures and framed by the riches of the English Reformation. …”
– At The Australian Church Record, Stephen Tong reports on last month’s Anglican Connection Conference in Dallas.
(We understand that recordings of the talks will be available within days, and we’ll post a link when they are online.)
Music for the Church: Mark Dever interviews Keith Getty
“Mark Dever recently sat down with hymn writer and musician Keith Getty to talk about his hymn-writing, the effects of technology on church music, and more.”
– An interesting and encouraging interview, as well as insights on how Mark Dever picks songs.
Listen at the 9Marks website.
Cathedral to remember “Mr. Eternity” Arthur Stace, 50 years on
This Sunday (30th July) marks the 50th anniversary of the homecalling of Arthur Stace, the man who wrote “Eternity” on the streets of Sydney from 1932 until 1966.
He died at Hammondville Nursing Home on the evening of Sunday 30th July 1967.
On Sunday, Arthur Stace will be remembered at a special service at St. Andrew’s Cathedral at 10:30am.
Why did he write “Eternity” right across our city? What happened to change him from a life of alcohol and crime and hopelessness? Was he a mystic or a loner? This Sunday, hear the wonderful news he discovered, and understand what drove this humble Sydney icon.
(He’s also being remembered, this Sunday and next, in the western suburbs. Is your church doing something? Let the webmaster know.)
Photo of Arthur Stace by Les Nixon, via Ramon Williams, used by permission. Taken at Burton Street Tabernacle, 27 December 1952. Right hand photo: the Eternity memorial in Town Hall Arcade.
Related: The Eternity waterfall after 40 years – 12th July 2017.
In Memoriam: Haddon Robinson
“Dr. Haddon W. Robinson, longtime faculty member, former President of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and one of the world’s foremost experts in Biblical preaching, went to be with the Lord on July 22, 2017.”
– Gordon-Conwell Seminary gives thanks for Haddon Robinson.
‘Becoming more truly who I am: a transgender female priest’
In an Ad Clerum (a letter to the clergy) dated 22 July 2017, Archbishop of Brisbane Dr Phillip Aspinall writes:
“Recently the Reverend Dr Jonathan Inkpin shared with me a deeply personal journey involving a life-time struggle with gender issues and personal identity. That journey has now culminated in a decision to transition gender and a formal request to be known by the wider diocesan family as Josephine or Jo.
Jo has written a letter which tells of that journey and asked me to distribute it to you all in the hope that you are properly informed and that unhelpful speculation might be avoided.”
Dr Inkpin is a member of the faculty of St Francis Theological College in Brisbane, and posts the full text of the letter. (Photo via St. Frances’ College.)
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…