Monthly Archives: April 2013

Same-sex blessings in the Diocese of Rupert’s Land

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In spite of assurances given during the 2010 Anglican General Synod that the ACoC was not approving the local option (each diocese decides for itself) for the blessing of same-sex unions, many dioceses have done just that. The latest to do so is the Diocese of Rupert’s Land.

Here (page 5), you will find a regurgitation of the, by now, familiar litany explaining why the diocese feels compelled to do something that 60 million Anglicans believe they should not do. The Diocese has prepared a “protocol”:

The Bishop and clergy of Rupert’s Land have completed preparation of a protocol for the pastoral practice of blessing same-sex unions. The protocol says why same-sex unions may be blessed in Rupert’s Land parishes and how this should be done.

The “protocol” is quick to point out that:

Different Anglicans and different parishes hold different convictions on this point, arising from differing interpretations of scripture and tradition.

It omits to mention that the number of Anglicans – or, indeed, Christians – worldwide  that agree with the diocese’s interpretation is miniscule.

“Diversity” is honoured – probably because conservatives contribute most of the money and, for that reason, the diocese can’t afford to chase them out – much as it might secretly want to:

Diversity of views is honoured and appreciated. Congregations and individuals are called to show pastoral generosity to one another. No cleric and no parish is required to participate in same-sex blessing.

Clergy opposed to blessing same sex couples will have to refer them to the bishop who will then refer them to clergy who have seen the light and are not opposed. So recalcitrant clergy might just as well get with the program since it’s going to happen anyway:

Clergy opposed to same-sex blessing should refer couples to the bishop.

Let’s be clear, though, that this is not a “marriage”, even though it bears an uncanny resemblance to one:

In order to be clearly distinguished from a marriage liturgy, the rite of blessing for a same-sex union will not include an exchange of legal consents, an opportunity for objections, a declaration of union, a rite of civil marriage, a signing of the parish marriage register or a nuptial blessing.

Repeat after me: “this is not a marriage.”

An interview with Tito Zavala, Bishop of Chile

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An interesting interview with the Presiding Bishop of the Southern Cone.

Read it all here:

On crossing borders – the local ACoC bishop is Michael Bird, incidentally:

Did you ask permission of the local Anglican Church of Canada bishop to visit here?
No, because I am coming to another, different Anglican church.

On why “reconciling” ANiC and the ACoC à la Justin Welby’s recipe won’t work – the ACoC has “another gospel…. not the biblical gospel of Jesus Christ”:

Do you or GAFCON have any plans to reconcile ACNA with the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada?
We don’t see our role in that way. The new Archbishop of Canterbury wants to work for the reconciliation of the church around the world. I don’t know how he will do it. I don’t know if TEC or the ACC will change. We will not renounce what we believe. Our understanding in GAFCON is that TEC and the ACC have another gospel; it is not the biblical gospel of Jesus Christ. If they move back to the Bible we can be in communion.

On what really sets Canterbury’s policy:

You have spoken of “the heavy machinery” or bureaucracy behind the Archbishop of Canterbury. How much does it run things?
I met the last Archbishop of Canterbury. Rowan Williams is a very nice man. But all the machinery behind him, the bureaucracy, is led by liberals; the Anglican Consultative Council is controlled by liberals; the Anglican Communion Office is controlled by liberals as well.

On the worldwide Anglican Communion of which TEC and the ACoC are not a part according to Zavala:

Don’t we really have two separate international entities now, the FCA and the more liberal rest of the Communion? And the Archbishop of Canterbury is trying to straddle them both. Do we really have a global Communion anymore?
Anglicans are one universal body. We have internal tensions. That is happening now. Maybe we will have to live forever with those tensions. We had that issue in the Southern Cone in 2003. Why not leave the Communion? We decided no, because we are true Anglicans. Instead we broke communion with the ACC and TEC.

On how Canadian church services are short:

Tell me more about the Anglican Church in Chile.
Most Chilean pastors are full-time priests but we often meet in schools. Our church services can be three or four hours long. If the sermon is less than an hour, the pastor is not considered a good preacher. People sometimes walk 1½ hours to get to church. Some services begin at 11, stop at 1 for lunch and resume from 2 until 4.

How seeker friendly churches looked in the 16th Century

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A few years ago, I visited the monasteries of Meteora in Greece. The Great Meteoron monastery is the largest and oldest and was established around 1340 by St. Athanasios Meteorites.

The Great Meteoron monastary has impressive 16th Century frescoes decorating the narthex – the area where the unbaptized had to wait while Communion was taking place in the sanctuary. To edify the newcomers, the frescoes depict not only notable events in Christ’s life such as his Resurrection, but the gruesome deaths of early Christian martyrs. Rather than a cheery church greeter, the 16th Century seeker was assaulted by images of people being skinned, roasted and having appendages, intestines, eyes and just about anything else that we usually consider permanently attached, removed. The idea was not only to create an indelible impression of the sacrifices made by those who founded the church, but that the neophyte should count the cost before making a rash decision.

The odd thing is, the tactic was more successful than our contemporary mania of making the church so doctrinally malleable, so comfortable with secular culture, that its members can do and believe almost anything without so much as an ecclesiastical eyebrow being raised.

And, just as bad, so can the clergy.

Students in Pakistan Madrassa start singing Anglican hymns

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Prayer mats have been removed from a Pakistan Madrassa and co-ed prayer rooms have been set up to cater to its mostly Anglican students.

Daily prayers at the Karachi Islamic Business and Enterprise Madrassa, where 75 per cent of pupils are Anglican, are not based specifically on the Koran, but may make reference to it alongside other religious texts.

None of the meat served at the school, which has over 1,000 pupils aged between 11 and 19, is halal.

Not very plausible, is it?

Yet no-one is particularly surprised that the exact opposite is taking place in a UK Church of England school; you can read all about it here, but I would like to highlight one sentence:

Mr McAteer, who pointed out that the Church of England describes itself as ‘a faith for all faiths’, told the Sunday Times: ‘The values we support are very much Christian values of honesty, integrity, justice.’

I don’t know how McAteer  came up with the laughably incoherent idea that the Church of England is ‘a faith for all faiths’. An institution that claims to be able to encompass “faiths” whose beliefs are logically contradictory (after all, Jesus cannot be both divine as Christianity teaches and not divine as Islam teaches) ends up being a faith with no faith.

Come to think of it, maybe McAteer  is on to something.

Diocese of Niagara: the significance of the Cross according to the Koran

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One can always count on the Niagara Anglican’s Michael Burslem for a spot of bracing balderdash.

This month he informs us that God is not “appeased” by Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, that the atonement for the sins of mankind was really quite unnecessary.

Because God just wants a mush of mercy, love and, you guessed it, equality. Because the Koran says so. So does John Lennon.

From here (page 6):

However, God didn’t need appeasement. God allowed the religious sacrificial system, but really wanted them to be merciful, love justice and to walk humbly with God.

[….]

The cross is not an appeasement, but an example of how we all should live. It’s tremendously costly, but God is, as the Koran says, the Lord, the Beneficent, the Merciful. God loves all humanity equally. We need to respond to that love by treating each other as God would treat us, with mercy, justice and humility.

That God loves us, not that we’ll go to heaven when we die, is the Good News we all desperately desire and long for. We need to listen to it, and to proclaim it

I nearly forgot: heaven is irrelevant because God still loves us when we are six feet under being eaten by worms.

I have to admire the Diocese of Niagara’s chutzpah

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A short while after I was served with a statement of claim demanding $400,000 for damaging the bishop’s reputation, I received a letter from him inviting me to contribute to his diocesan fundraiser. It begins with a nice photo of the bishop:

Begging Letter

On the assumption that I will no longer be able to afford my own stamp, it even comes with a pre-paid envelope.

The Father’s Love

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When little problems leap out of life’s precarious vortex to assail us, I often write a song. I have no idea why, but I do know that I haven’t the time now since I have to grope my way through some excruciatingly boring Discovery documents.

So I am appropriating a song I wrote for one of our daughters when she was having a difficult time a few years back:

The Father’s love
The Father’s love is deeper than the deepest ocean floor.
The Father’s love is brighter than the brightest morning star.
Chorus
Love so strong, to give your Son to death; he knew no sin.
To open heaven’s door for us where we are welcomed in.

The Father’s love, it reaches to the distant galaxies.
The Father’s love is always here, it even rescues me.
© 2008 David Jenkins

Prophetic words from Bishop Moses Tay

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Bishop Moses Tay had the notable distinction of horrifying the Diocese of New Westminster in the 1990s: he denounced totem poles as “artefacts of an alien religion”. You can’t get less inclusive than that:

Philip Jenkins notes that when Tay visited Stanley Park in Vancouver in the early 1990s, he was deeply troubled by the totem poles he saw there. He concluded that “as artefacts of an alien religion, these were idols possessed by evil spirits, and they required handling by prayer and exorcism.” Jenkins goes on to suggest that this behavior “horrified the local Anglican church,” which “regarded exorcism as an absurd superstition.”

I had the pleasure of leading the musical part of the worship during an Order of St. Luke conference in the late 1990s where Moses Tay was the main speaker. The bishop said something that has always stuck in my mind. It was this:

“You Canadian Christians have a besetting sin: you become offended too easily.”

How right he was.

Bishop Michael Bird is suing me

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On February 19th 2008, the Diocese of Niagara served St. Hilda’s with legal papers with the intention of taking possession of St. Hilda’s building and freezing our bank account.

On February 19th 2013, exactly five years later, I was served personally with a statement of claim for defamation of character from the Diocese of Niagara’s Bishop Michael Bird.

The claim is seeking:

  • $400,000 in damages plus court costs and their legal costs.
  • An interim and permanent injunction to shut down Anglican Samizdat.
  • An interim and permanent injunction prohibiting me from publishing further comments about Michael Bird.

The claim quotes – with sporadic accuracy – 31 blog postings that are alleged to be libellous. On the advice of my lawyer, the posts were removed the day after receiving the statement of claim.

Contrary to what one might expect in such circumstances, I did not receive a cease and desist letter in advance of the suit.

Initial negotiations for an early settlement have been unsuccessful.

I have filed a statement of defence, the pleadings are now closed and we have commenced the Discovery process.

Stay tuned.