Archbishop Davies to Sydney Anglicans: Enrol to have your say in the postal plebiscite
Archbishop of Sydney, Dr. Glenn Davies, has recorded a brief video message, and has written to Sydney Anglicans with an encouragement to participate in the postal plebiscite.
His letter may be downloaded from this link (PDF file). We have reproduced the text below: Read more
Presbyterian response to the announced postal marriage plebiscite
“The 2016 GAA resolved as follows:
Min 67.8 “The General Assembly urges congregations to support the ‘No’ case in opposing the redefinition of marriage.”
Without binding consciences, please read the following as a request from the PCA that when the government asks for your opinion that you consider supporting the “NO” vote.
The Australian Government plans to conduct a postal vote seeking the opinion of Australians on marriage. Ballot papers will begin arriving at our homes on 12 September, just a month from now.
The Presbyterian Church of Australia opposes the introduction of legislation for so called ‘same-sex marriage’. We affirm that the true definition of marriage is found in God’s Word: the life-long union of one man with one woman, voluntarily entered into, excluding all others.
It’s important to urge every Presbyterian Christian to engage in the process and vote, and to “support the NO case”. We ask every attendee at church to both register and vote, and then seek to persuade as many of their family and friends to do likewise.
There’s no doubt that the postal vote can be won in favour of the current definition. There is a large number of Australians, many of whom have not had their say, who affirm the common view of marriage as God-given and God-blessed.
Your participation will make a difference, but we need you to be earnest, active and in prayer about it. There are many powerful voices clamouring to tear down what God declares to be holy. The church must not be silent on this.
While we speak up and have our say, we do so with a gracious engagement and with respect for those with whom we disagree.
John P Wilson
Moderator-General
Presbyterian Church of Australia.”
Source: Presbyterian Church of Australia.
New Head for Anglican EdComm
“Anglican EdComm, the Education Commission of the Anglican Diocese of Sydney has announced the appointment of Stephen Kinsella as its next Executive Director.
Mr Kinsella, who is currently Headmaster of The Illawarra Grammar School will take up his new appointment in early 2018.”
– Story from SydneyAnglicans.net.
(Photo: The Illawarra Grammar School.)
Bill fails religious protection test – Anglican Diocese of Sydney Media Statement
Anglican Diocese of Sydney
Media Statement, 6th August 2017
Bill fails religious protection test
“There are serious religious issues and freedom of conscience concerns arising from the Marriage Amendment (Definition and Religious Freedoms) Bill 2017 being promoted by some liberal MPs” said the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney today. Read more
Moore College Sunday resources
Moore College has released a couple of videos you might be able to use in conjunction with Moore College Sunday (nominally this Sunday, 6th August).
Moore College – A Light for your path.
Lots of other resources here.
From The Principal’s message at the link above:
“We must never lose our sense of dependence upon God and his grace towards us.
Without his sustaining and guiding providence Moore College would go the way of many others before it – drifting from the word of God, blending into the world of the secular academy, losing touch with the gospel mission that alone justifies its existence.
Our need and our vulnerability are well-known to God. We must be aware of them too. That, as much as anything else, is a stimulus to prayer.”
The message lives on
“Mr Eternity could never have imagined he would have crowds of Sydney-siders remembering him 50 years after his death, but that’s what happened at St Andrew’s Cathedral on Sunday.
But then again, he wouldn’t have imagined he would prompt city authorities to emblazon Eternity in fireworks on the Harbour Bridge at the turn of the century, either.
Arthur Stace was an alcoholic converted during the Great Depression, who then went on to devote his life to reminding people of Eternity by writing the word in perfect copperplate on Sydney Streets.…”
– Russell Powell reports on the tribute to Arthur Stace, “Mr. Eternity”, last Sunday at the Cathedral. (Photo of Arthur Stace courtesy HammondCare.)
See also this report from Eternity News, and these related posts.
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.
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.
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.
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.
‘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.)
ABC ignored church’s ‘positive story’
“A senior female Anglican leader has expressed ‘disappointment’ that her ‘positive’ story in fighting domestic violence was ignored by the ABC in its controversial TV program claiming Christian men who go to church occasionally are the worst abusers of women.
Sydney diocese Archdeacon for Women Kara Hartley was interviewed for more than an hour by ABC journalist Julia Baird for the report on 7:30 that aired on Wednesday night, but none of her comments were aired.…
Archdeacon Hartley’s remarks came as the Catholic Archbishop of Brisbane, Mark Coleridge, revealed he had, on request, provided the ABC with extensive comments for a related online essay by Baird and co-author Hayley Gleeson. But not only did Baird and Gleeson not publish any of his remarks, they falsely reported he had not responded.
Only after the diocese made an official complaint to the ABC did it amend the article yesterday.”
– Story from The Australian. (Photo courtesy Sam Law.)
Related:
A summary of major public statements from Diocesan Leadership on the issue of Domestic Violence – Anglican Diocese of Sydney.
Domestic Violence: A starting point for answers – Kara Hartley, The Australian Church Record.
Bolt Report editorial, 20 July 2017. – Sky News via The Herald Sun.
Update:
An Unholy Row – ABC TV Media Watch, 24 July 2017.
Orange East welcomes new Rector
“Bishop Ian Palmer commissioned the Reverend Bob Cameron as Rector of the parish of Orange East in a service in St Barnabas’ Church on Saturday morning, July 15.”
– News from the Diocese of Bathurst.
Top Centre news July 2017
The July 2017 edition of Top Centre, the newsletter of the Diocese of the Northern Territory, is available on their website.
The Eternity waterfall after 40 years
Forty years ago, the Eternity plaque at the waterfall in Sydney Square was unveilled.
On Tuesday, 12th July 1977, The Sydney Morning Herald’s Column 8 wrote:
“TRUE to his words of last November, Ridley Smith, the Sydney Square architect, has immortalised the late Arthur Stace, ‘Mr Eternity’. You may recall that Column 8 campaigned unashamedly for a suitable memorial to Mr Stace, Sydney’s footpath evangelist for 20 years until 1967. Ridley Smith promised it without strings.
TODAY, the memorial above will be officially unveilled (a small explanatory plaque is yet to come). Yesterday Column 8 had an informal peek. Mr Stace would be proud. There, set in aggregate near the Sydney Square waterfall, in letters almost 21cm (8 in) high, is the famous copperplate message. ‘Eternity’. The one-word sermon gleams in wrought aluminium. There’s no undue prominence. No garish presentation. Merely the simple ‘Eternity’ on the pebbles, as Arthur Stace would have wanted it.”
In 1994, journalist Alan Gill wrote, “The waterfall adjoins a modest cafeteria. [The Architect of St. Andrew’s House and Sydney Square, Ridley] Smith once told me that he hoped visitors would say ‘Meet you at Eternity’ as well as ‘Meet you in Eternity’.” (1)
Ridley Smith (pictured) was named for evangelist John G. Ridley, who was a friend of his father. In November 1932, Arthur Stace had been in the congregation at the Burton Street Tabernacle in Darlinghurst when John Ridley preached on the need to be ready for eternity. It was this sermon which inspired Stace to begin his 34 year campaign of writing that word on the streets of Sydney.
Arthur Stace died on 30 July 1967, fifty years ago this month.
Did the ‘small explanatory plaque’ mentioned by Column 8 ever appear? In 1994, Alan Gill wrote that some complained “the present inscription is ‘out of the way’ and doesn’t explain who Arthur Stace was. Other admirers of Arthur disagree. They believe the ‘odd’ location of the present tribute and the absence of an explanation are part of that blend of mystery and surprise that ‘Mr Eternity’ himself would appreciate.”
(Top photo showing the waterfall on the day of the unveilling, and the photo of Architect Ridley Smith in 2009, courtesy Ramon Williams, Worldwide Photos. Ramon adds, “Ridley Smith sprinkled water around the ‘Eternity’ replica so as to help photograph it.” While the pavement around the memorial has been replaced, “Eternity” on the pebbles remains, as seen in this 2014 photo.)
(1) Alan Gill, “Sydney’s Phantom Preacher”, The Catholic Weekly, 31 August 1994.
A Tale of Two Communions
“Whenever a church leader makes an important decision, takes a strong stand and then explains their action, they not only reveal their own priorities and convictions but also, more significantly, shape the future of the church they serve and represent. For good reason, such steps are often called ‘defining moments’ and, with the passing of time, are frequently shown to be, what might be called, ‘determining moments’. A series of such moments seems to have taken place in recent days.
On June 30, 2017, Canon Andy Lines was consecrated as the Missionary Bishop of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) to provide spiritual oversight to Anglican churches in Europe that exist outside the current Anglican structures.
As well as the principal consecrator, The Most Rev. Dr. Foley Beach (Archbishop of the ACNA), 11 Primates, 3 Archbishops, and 13 other GAFCON-linked Anglican bishops were involved in Lines’ consecration. …”
– Here’s a must read article from Rob Smith, in which he examines allegations made by the Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia concerning participation in the consecration of Bishop Andy Lines. See it at The Australian Church Record.
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…