Anglican Church of North America clergy in the 2014 March for Life, Washington:
Anglican Church of Canada clergy in the 2013 Toronto Pride Parade:
Which church would you rather belong to?
Contrasting marches
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Diocese of Niagara sells rectory to owner of PinkCherry Sex Toys
As part of a negotiated settlement between St. Hilda’s congregation and the Diocese of Niagara, the diocese took possession of St. Hilda’s rectory in 2012 and sold it in December for $650,000.
As is common in this area of Oakville, the new owner of the house tore down the rectory to build a new, much larger house.
The new resident of what used to be St. Hilda’s rectory is Daniel Freedman, owner of PinkCherry Sex Toys, Canada’s largest vendor of…. well, all sorts of interesting items.
Not that the diocese is interested in such things.
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Canadian United Church clergy join a union
Apparently, they want better protection “from workplace violence and harassment”; things like little old ladies hitting them with their handbags.
From here:
A group of United Church ministers in Ontario has joined Canada’s largest private-sector union.
Clergy have launched Unifaith, a community chapter of Unifor, which has more than 300,000 members.
“A large number of colleagues are aware of issues of workplace bullying, isolation and desolation for those serving in their vocation. This has been an ongoing concern for us for many years now,” said Rev. Jim Evans, Unifaith’s interim president. “We’ve looked at various ways to address what could happen in terms of advocacy and professional development for those who are indeed in desperate circumstances.”
Just as my hopes were raised by the risible prospect of placard wielding clergy manning – sorry, womanning – picket lines to keep worshippers out of churches they have long since abandoned, they were dashed by this:
Evans said there is no chance of a strike at any time.
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Anglican Church of Canada does Christian unity
From here:
Canadians prepared the resources for this year’s liturgy and daily reflections. They chose as a theme Paul’s rhetorical question in addressing divisions in the church in Corinth, “Has Christ been divided?” (1 Corinthians 1:13). The question calls us to confess the scandal of disunity and it’s marring effect on the witness of the church catholic. This week always has about it a spirit of repentance and renewal.
[…..]
In this Week of Prayer for Christian Unity let us be mindful of the great “Don de Dieu” the great gift of God’s peace and unity in Christ for us and for the world. And let us pray that as church leaders, church councils, and neighbours in faith we may embrace and embody that gift with passion and perseverance for the glory of Christ and the good of the world.
How should one respond to the Anglican Church of Canada, unrepentant fomenter of strife, litigation, worldwide schism and cosmic mayhem, celebrating Christian unity?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rj6FEfmyVj0
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New Diocese of New Westminster bishop to do problem diagnosis
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.
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Fred Hiltz in a Four-Way
With three clerical ladies. I don’t know who in Anglican PR land came up with this pithy epithet but, whoever you are, please stop. You are making my job much harder.
The heads of North American Anglican and Lutheran churches are combining their efforts when issuing things like pastoral letters in cases of continental calamities.
The issuing of natural disaster pastoral letters is of such import that their combining will undoubtedly send transcendent ripples of well-being wafting through the entire eco-system. Future generations will declare that this was moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal. Really.
From here:
The heads of the Anglican Church of Canada, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC), the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) have agreed to co-ordinate their responses to “events that transcend” their borders, such as natural disasters.
They could, for instance, issue a joint pastoral letter in response to a natural calamity
[….]
Leaders of the four churches reached this agreement when they met for a day and a half of informal talks last December in Winnipeg. Since 2010, the heads of these four churches have met for informal talks, “becoming colloquially known as the Four-Way“, said Myers.
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Aliens among us
From here:
A former Canadian defense minister has declared on Russian TV that not only do aliens already walk amongst us but they are refusing to share their advanced technologies until we change our warring and polluting ways.
According to Paul Hellyer, who was a Liberal defense minister from 1963 to 1967 under prime minister Lester B. Pearson, there are 80 different species of extra-terrestrials.
A few members of one of the 80 alien species that have an obsessive interest in what, in their tongue, they call eco-justice, were recently spotted in Toronto trying to blend inconspicuously into the crowd:
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Justin Welby calls Nigeria’s Anglican Church “A Powerhouse”
From here:
The Archbishop, who regularly speaks with contacts in Nigeria, described its Anglican Church as an ‘extraordinary powerhouse’.
Welby did not go on to point out that while Anglicanism in Nigeria is a Powerhouse, in the West it’s more of a Bathhouse: a Gay Bathhouse.
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Anglican Church of Canada marriage canon commission formed
Fred Hiltz has assembled the commission that will seek “broad consultation” for introducing a synod motion to change the marriage canon to include same-sex marriage. They will pay particular attention to:
a) the Solemn Declaration in relation to this matter;
b) the immunity under the civil law and the Human Rights Codes of the various Provinces and Territories within Canada of those bishops, dioceses and priests who refuse to participate in or authorize the marriage of same-sex couples on the basis of conscience; and
c) a biblical and theological rationale for this change in teaching on the nature of Christian marriage.
Notice in particular point c): it does not ask whether there is a “biblical and theological rationale for this change in teaching”, that is taken for granted. The commission is expect to come up with a rationale whether it is there or not. The members of the commission are:
Canon Robert Falby (Chair)
Dr. Patricia Bays
The Very Rev. Kevin Dixon
The Rev. Dr. Paul Friesen
The Rev. Canon Paul Jennings
Dr. Stephen Martin
The Rt. Rev. Linda Nicholls
The Most Rev. John Privett
I don’t see any conservatives in evidence. It seems fairly clear that after a couple of years of nugatory “broad consultation” by the regular morosophs, there will be a motion before Synod 2016 to change the marriage canon.
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Facebook Likes for sale
It seems that there is a “click farm” industry which, for a modest sum, can make almost anyone or anything popular.
From here:
Celebrities, businesses and even the U.S. State Department have bought bogus Facebook likes, Twitter followers or YouTube viewers from offshore “click farms,” where workers tap, tap, tap the thumbs up button, view videos or retweet comments to inflate social media numbers.
Hope at last for those whose Likes are lacking.
