From here:
A church in New Westminster hopes the fear of god will scare off illegal dumpers.
After years of dealing with unwanted refuse, St. Barnabas’ Anglican church has erected a sign that reads “Do not drop your crap here. God.”
The deluge of theological crap descending steadily from its diocese seems to bother St. Barnabas much less, however.
The diocese sold St. Richard’s Anglican Church to the North Vancouver Islamic Association for $3.05 million as a site for the Ar-Rahman mosque.
After selling a church to a competing religion, the next obvious step for members of the diocese is to start attending the mosque. After all, all religions are equally valid; there are many ways to God; we don’t want to exclude anyone; everyone knows Michael Ingham’s book should have been titled “Mosques of the Spirit”.
From here:
On Sunday March 30th, forty-five Anglicans and Lutherans were guests at Masjid Ar-Ramnan, the mosque in the former St. Richard’s building in North Vancouver. As part of a North Vancouver Lenten Visiting Program “Who is my neighbour?”
Skelton was recently interviewed by the CBC (listen here, March 18 starting at 2:17:00). Her appointment as bishop, she tells us, was the result of “a thing called discernment”; nothing to do with a thing called career advancement ambition. Well, she didn’t actually make the latter remark.
In the interview, she states once again that she is fully supportive of the blessing of same-sex unions and that there is no longer much of a wedge between those who support same-sex unions and those who don’t. She has reached this conclusion by listening; to whom, I wonder? Obviously not to those who left the diocese over the issue.
Losing the majority of those with whom one disagrees and calling it “healing” would, in the secular realm, be a thing called spin. In the Diocese of New Westminster where selective listening is such a refined art, it’s a thing called discernment.
Rev. Melissa Skelton is being installed as Bishop of the Diocese of New Westminster today, replacing Michael Ingham.
For those who may be nursing a hope that the diocese’s policy on blessing same-sex unions might change, this interview should disabuse you (my emphasis):
Q. Since Bishop Ingham was a controversial figure in the 70-million member global Anglican communion, how will you handle his legacy?
A. I intend to listen and learn a lot about what this experience has been like for the diocese — the positive parts of this and the more difficult parts. I’m trying to come to this with a real beginner’s mind, not making assumptions about people’s experience. By the way, I’m fully supportive of offering blessings of covenantal relationships between same-sex couples in the Anglican Church.
What Skelton has already learned from her predecessor is that she can glibly ignore the wishes of the majority in the Anglican Communion and be complacently secure in the conviction that she will not be censured by the Anglican Church of Canada, its Primate, Canterbury or the Archbishop of Canterbury. What God thinks about it, as revealed in the book Skelton claims to follow, might be an entirely different matter; but who cares about him when Fred Hiltz is on your side.
The Diocese of New Westminster, having been instrumental in shattering what is left of unity in the Anglican Communion, is now desperately seeking it in the most unlikely place: the diocese is busy trying to find commonality with Roman Catholicism. It is only fitting that it is basing these conversations on a missive from ARCIC since, as former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carey, has pointed out, ARCIC is irrelevant to most Christians.
The Diocese of New Westminster: blazing new trails through the wilderness of the irrelevant.
From here:
Meet Your Relatives – Grassroots Ecumenism
100 clergy and lay attend the first of three Anglican – Roman Catholic Dialogue eventsOn Sunday the 26th of January nearly 100 clergy and laity gathered at Saint Helen’s Roman Catholic Parish in Burnaby for the first of three sessions entitled ‘Meet Your Relatives: Grassroots Ecumenism’. This event has arisen after the clergy of the Archdiocese of Vancouver (Roman Catholic) and the Diocese of New Westminster (Anglican) met for a study day two years ago. The ecumenical officers and committees of the two dioceses were charged with crafting an event for laity and clergy to build upon the success of the clergy day.
[…..]
Their conversations have been based on ‘Growing Together in Unity and Mission’, a statement of the international Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission. [ARCIC]
The Diocese of New Westminster’s new bishop, Rev. Melissa Skelton, is aware that her new diocese has a few problems:
How much work do you have to do in healing the effects of the same-sex union issue?
In my first year, that’s something I’ve got to figure out. I’ve heard there’s still a sense of hurt and difficulty in parishes around that. I have an organization development background, and I think the first thing one does in any kind of organization development work is what, in some ways, is called diagnosis.
To help with the “diagnosis” I’d like to point out: the blessing of same-sex unions in the Diocese of New Westminster precipitated a split in the Anglican Church of Canada, a split which has made a significant contribution to worldwide Anglican schism; the loss of thousands of Canadian Anglicans to ANiC; the loss of the largest congregation in Canada; acrimonious lawsuits; a substantial loss of revenue for the ACoC; the firing of clergy – including the world’s best known Anglican evangelical theologian – by the diocese; and the unedifying spectacle of ACoC bishops and clergy behaving like spoiled children who don’t get their own way.
Still, I expect all that is pretty obvious to someone with an “organization development background”; enjoy your new organization and keep us all posted on how the healing is going.
The Reverend Canon Melissa M Skelton.
In this video, Skelton declares that she wishes to bring “restoration of a sense of feeling and reality of unity in the diocese.” Clearly, she supports the Ingham decisions that split the diocese, since she believes that the diocese was “called” – presumably by God – to go “down that road.”
Her recipe for “the re-unification of the diocese” is listening by using circle processes. I’m not sure what she means by circle processes – other than going around in circles, an activity at which Anglicans have had plenty of practice, particularly when pretending to listen. Doubtless, a veneer of unity won’t be too hard to manufacture since the most vigorous dissenters from diocesan dogma have already left. Those who remain will be too timid to make much of a fuss, contenting themselves, instead, with their appointed role of token conservatives: evidence of diocesan diversity.
Earlier this year, Skelton was hoping to be bishop of New Jersey; New Westminster, with its “difficult 20 years”, must have been her second career choice.
Here is the list; each candidate has provided some self-promotional material – euphemistically known as a Curriculum Vitae – which can be inspected by clicking on the candidate’s name. The good news is that there may be relief for those of you suffering from incurable insomnia: each of the aspiring bishops has made a video.
Notable by his absence is Dean Peter Elliott.
Listed in alphabetical order, the eight (8) candidates which the Committee recommends to you for consideration are:
Ven. Ellen Clark-King, Vicar, Christ Church Cathedral, Diocese of New Westminster (Ph.D., M.A., C.T., B.A.)
Rev. Canon Dawn L. Davis, Incumbent Priest, Trinity Church Aurora, Diocese of Toronto (CHRP, M.Div., B.A.)
Rev. John Hebenton, Vicar, Anglican Parish of Gate Pa, Tauranga, Diocese of Waiapu, Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia (BSc, LTh [Hons], M.Min, B.A.)
Rev. Richard G. Leggett, Incumbent Priest, St. Faith’s Anglican Church, Diocese of New Westminster (Ph.D., M.A., M.Div., B.A.)
Ven. Lynne E. McNaughton, Incumbent Priest, St. Clement Anglican Church, Diocese of New Westminster (D. Min., M.Div., B.A.)
Rev. John Oakes, Hon. Assoc. Priest, All Saints Episcopal Church, Belmont, Diocese of Massachusetts, TEC and on leave with permission to officiate, Diocese of New Westminster (Ph.D., M.Div., M.A., M.C.S., Dipl. C.S., B.A.)
Rev. Canon Melissa M. Skelton, Canon for Congregational Development and Leadership & Rector, St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Diocese of Olympia, TEC (M.Div., M.B.A., M.A., B.A.)
Ven. John R. Stephens, Incumbent Priest, St. Philip’s Anglican Church, Diocese of New Westminster (M.Div., B.Sc.)
Rather than celebrate All Souls’ Day, St. John the Divine, perhaps in recognition of the state of its diocese, is celebrating the Day of the Dead by singing and dancing to – what else – Grateful Dead songs:
What is the Day of the Dead, All Souls Day, “El dia de los
muertos” November 2? It is a holiday that celebrates friends and family members who have died. It is celebrated in Spain, Brazil and Mexico and in cultures around the world with festivals and parades, sugar skulls and marigolds and favourite foods and beverages of the departed and visiting graves with these as gifts. It is the perfect occasion for St John’s to welcome the wider community to an evening of reflections by Pitman Potter, singing Grateful Dead songs with FOMO and friends, dancing together in spirit, and raising money for The Helping Hands Society.
The above description seeks to amalgamate the Day of the Dead and All Souls’ Day – yet another Anglican attempt at via media, I suppose. They are, however, quite different: All Souls Day is a commemoration of the faithful departed (surely there must be some in the diocese) while the Day of the Dead celebrations:
can be traced back to a precolumbian past.
Rituals celebrating the deaths of ancestors had been observed by these civilizations perhaps for as long as 2,500–3,000 years. In the pre-Hispanic era skulls were commonly kept as trophies and displayed during the rituals to symbolize death and rebirth.
The festival that became the modern Day of the Dead fell in the ninth month of the Aztec calendar, about the beginning of August, and was celebrated for an entire month. The festivities were dedicated to the goddess known as the “Lady of the Dead”, corresponding to the modern Catrina.
Since most of the congregation left St. John’s Shaughnessy, the building has been costing the diocese $20,000 per month to maintain. The diocese is finally publicly admitting that the rump congregation of St. John’s has little use for such a large building:
St. John’s (Shaughnessy) has the stewardship of a building that is far beyond their current parish needs. They are in active search for a complementary “tenant”.
The diocese wants to:
lease a significant space from the Parish of St. John’s (Shaughnessy) at a rate that would be approximately half of the current occupancy cost …….. We currently occupy approx. 4100 sq. ft.; the space we are looking at in the Admin and Christian Education Building is approx. 11,000 sq. ft. – the complete lower floor with entrance on the Cartier side of the building.
The congregation that was chased out of the building thoughtfully kept it in good condition for the new tenants:
It has been determined that the building structure is very sound.
Although, sadly:
The building systems (air management, heating, electrical, single glaze windows, etc.) are at the stage of requiring updating to current standards. The building’s roof is in need of replacement and is scheduled for 2014.
As the document notes:
This is an opportunity for the Diocese.
An opportunity to convert a building designed for worship into one designed for administration; and that, after all, is what being a Missional Church is really all about.
