Lily of the Valley

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A song I wrote in 2001.

For those interested in such things, yes, it does have some strange chords. Here are the words:

Lily of the Valley                                                    David Jenkins

Jesus Christ, Son of God, glory of the Father.
Name above every name, seated on the throne.
Behold the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world:
Chorus
He’s the lily of the valley, he’s the fairest of the fair.
He is beauty uncreated, he’s majestic beyond compare;
Beloved of the Father, Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ, Son of man, loves us like no other.
Emanuel, God with us, closer that a brother.
Behold the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world:
© 2001 David Jenkins

New Anglican anti-racism task force

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The Anglican Church of Canada has formed a task force that is supposed to dismantle racism within the church. Having already dismantled Christianity, the clerics have decided to take a break and try something a little easier.

Naturally, there are some new acronyms to learn and inwardly digest: BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Colour), ACIP (Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples) and BlAC (Black Anglicans of Canada). This will be bad news for those of you still struggling with LGBTQQIP2SAA. To avoid confusion, it might be worth lumping them all together to form LGBTQQIP2SAABlACACIPBIPOC.

Incidentally, any children reading this who want to find out more about LGBTQQIP2SAA can go to Kids Help Phone. It’s a Canadian registered charity that will explain more than your parents want you to know.

But back to our topic. In spite of the reservations of some, CoGS (Council of General Synod) will be employing certain aspects of Critical Race Theory. This, in a nutshell, tells us that all white people are racist. It’s innate: we are born that way. A pale person who claims otherwise is doubly racist for not recognising it, confessing, donning sackcloth and ashes and self-flagellating over her white racist privilege. There is no way out.

Unfortunately for CoGS, most of its members are non-BIPOCs, and thus riddled with racist bias, so the whole project is a bit of a non-starter.

Still, it’s good to see that in this time of contagion, the clergy are hard at work trying to entice congregations back to church by telling them they are loathsome racists in dire need of anti-racism training. That should work.

From here:

In a virtual meeting held July 25, the Council of General Synod (CoGS) voted to approve the creation of a task force charged with dismantling racism within the Anglican Church of Canada.

[……]

The motion called for CoGS to establish a dismantling racism task force that would:
“Review policies and processes to identify systemic barriers to full participation for Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) in the structures and governance of General Synod and make recommendations for redress”;• Update and promote the Anglican Church of Canada’s Charter for Racial Justice;• “Recommend a process of anti-racism education and training for the Council of General Synod as well as Coordinating Committees, Councils, Commissions and employees of General Synod”;• Develop “a plan to engage the whole church in the work of dismantling racism, including identifying and/or developing resources and training to be offered to Provinces and dioceses”; and• Report the results of its work, at the latest, to the meeting of General Synod in 2022, “including recommendations for ongoing work to dismantle racism within the Church.”

Extreme diversity

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What happens when the church decides to worship diversity rather than God?

Jesus with breasts and beard dancing under a rainbow:

From here:

The Church of Iceland’s new ‘woke’ ad welcoming people to Sunday School has sparked outrage after it featured a bearded Jesus Christ with breasts, makeup and a dress.

The advert, which apparently shows Jesus shaking his ‘breasts’ while dancing under a rainbow, appeared on the National Church’s Facebook page on September 11.

The advert has since been deleted from the Church’s page, but will be depicted on buses in the Icelandic capital Reykjavik for at least another two weeks.

The Church of Iceland’s new ‘woke’ ad welcoming people to Sunday School has sparked outrage after it featured a bearded Jesus Christ with breasts, makeup and a dress

The Church said in a statement: ‘The 2020 Assembly of the National Church regrets that the picture of Jesus in a Sunday school advertisement has hurt people. The goal was to emphasise diversity, not to hurt people or shock them.’

Petur Georg Markan, media representative for the Church of Iceland, said that is positive for Jesus Christ to appear in different forms and that the church celebrates diversity.

The comedy in all this, if there is any, is that for years Christians have had to put up with sacrilegious tripe from halfwits posing as artists: piss Christ, Madonna in elephant dung, and so on. Now we have to put up with sacrilegious tripe from halfwits posing as clergy.

Bishops rejoice at the possibility of life on Venus

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The discovery of phosphine gas in the atmosphere of Venus means there could be life there, since phosphine gas on earth is made by microorganisms that live in oxygen-free environments. This has excited Anglican Primate Linda Nicholls and Archbishop Mark MacDonald. Regrettably, no phosphine gas whatsoever has been detected in the Anglican Church of Canada, a similar oxygen-free environment.

Mark MacDonald, overcome with joy at the discovery, made this ecstatic, if incoherent, pronouncement: “It is in concert with an Indigenous-informed, Christ- and Spirit-infused view of this universe.” The Indigenous microbes of Venus have not welcomed the comment yet because they are still trying to find out what it means.

Linda Nicholls, not one to waste an opportunity provided by the discovery of galactic microbes, sees this as an excuse to promote her green crusade:

“She did, however, see the discovery announced Monday as one more cause for humans to be mindful of their place in creation and of their responsibility to it.

Nicholls goes on to muse that galactic microbes might be more important than humans made in the image of God. And they wonder why the Anglican church is in decline:

“It should also remind us that human beings are a part of that creation—with particular capacity to create and destroy—but we are not the only or best part!

Read it all here.

Our Father in Heaven

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A song I wrote for a friend in a time of trial.

Yes, I know, I know, you can’t understand the words (perhaps it’s because I don’t have an accent?), so here they are:

Our Father in heaven                             David Jenkins

Our Father in heaven, how holy your name,
Your love and protection to me you have given.

You reach down from heaven to touch me and fill
My heart with your peace, you make my mind still.

I will trust you forever, forever you will
Take my hand, guide me through life’s deepest ills.

Our Father in heaven, how holy your name,
My love I will give you, for all of my days.
© 2012 David Jenkins

Greening Niagara becomes Climate Justice Niagara

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This is a sensible move: the church I attended before the diocese bulldozed it was becoming increasingly green, mainly because there was mold growing in the carpet. The epithet “Climate Justice” is sufficiently stern to discourage unwanted verdant foliage in the dampest of church carpets.

As the document below tells us, sin and separation from God are not the most important issues facing us today, climate change is. The good news is that the mere renaming of “Greening Niagara” to “Climate Justice Niagara” is going to change all that. In fact, as I type this, I feel the cool winds of Justice blowing from the diocesan cathedral in Hamilton. Or maybe winter is coming.

I admit, I did learn one useful thing from the article below: God, on the advice of the Anglican Church of Canada, has abandoned transcendence, left heaven, and now lives on earth with us – “Sadly and tragically our common home with God is in poor health and in steep decline”. A bit like Laben’s household gods Rachel stole and hid in  her camel’s saddle.

From here:

Our common home is also God’s own house, permeated by the Spirit of God from the dawn of creation, where the Son of God pitched his tent in the supreme event of the incarnation. (Joshtrom Isaac Kureethadam)

Introducing Climate Justice Niagara (CJN), formerly known as Greening Niagara, with a new and broader focus and mandate about the most important issue facing us  today — climate change! Sadly and tragically our common home with God is in poor health and in steep decline. But God made us stewards and protectors of the earth. The Gospel calls us to challenge and change the unjust structures in society that oppress and marginalize people, including the injustices that contribute to the climate crisis. In that call we find a building block of Niagara’s Mission Action Plan: “Prioritize social justice action with an emphasis on environmental justice.”