A song I wrote a few years ago. An antidote to “All you need is love”:
The words:
Love is patient, love is kind; love forgives time after time.
Never proud or envious,
forgetting wrongs, love always trusts.
Chorus
For God is love, who took our sin
Upon a cross of pain so grim.
A gift of love so great and pure:
To live in Love for evermore
Love is constant, love always hopes; slow to anger, love never boasts.
Greatest gift of the Father’s heart, fulfilled one day, now seen in part.
Love must guide us on our way, as we love those we meet each day.
Loving Him who first loved us; forgiving all as he forgives.
I suspected this was coming. Even though churches are holding online services, it would look pretty silly – elitist even – to have an online display of a priest receiving communion alone. I hope ANiC doesn’t do the same but I fear it will.
What I would like to see is an online Eucharist where each household watching has bread and wine or juice that is consecrated liturgically as usual – except the elements are not all local to the priest. An extraordinary solution to fit the extraordinary times.
Therefore, the bishops of our province have agreed together that our virtual worship through Holy Week and the season of Easter, or until such time that we can gather in community together, will not include the liturgy of the Eucharist. Sacramental celebrations are the work of the whole People of God and require a gathering of people who can be physically present to one another. That is impossible for most of us at this time. The Great Three Days of Easter, and through the 50 days of the season, we will be fasting from the Eucharist but feasting on the Word. We believe that the Risen One, the Word, by the power of the Holy Spirit, is present and active with us as we hear and receive him in the word of the scriptures, in that word interpreted and proclaimed in preaching, and in the word inwardly digested, by faith, in each person.
To come from glory to this world of sin and suffering;
To die upon the cross of shame, to give your life for me:
Oh what love is this whose power can hold
the planets in their course.
Oh what love is this that’s strong enough
to break upon the cross.
What love is this, oh what love.
To live a life of sacrifice, a King without your crown;
To be punished by the world
that through your word was born:
Oh what love is this whose agony will put an end to pain.
Oh what love is this whose blood pours out
in suffering for our gain.
What love is this, oh what love.
This is how the church is responding to the Wuhan virus that is creating worldwide havoc.
I’ll start with the most fatuous: almost every Anglican archbishop is exhorting us to light a candle. A bit like this:
I have nothing against candles – except that we now have incandescent, fluorescent and LED lights that work better and don’t set things on fire. The problem is, whenever something bad happens, people compulsively light candles to symbolise…. something, nobody really knows what. Instead of a candle, why aren’t the bishops telling us to put a cross in the window; at least that is a clear symbol that announces to passers by the convictions of the occupants.
Then we have the synchronised recitation of the Lord’s Prayer. That can’t be bad, other than the “Thy will be done” bit. What, perish the thought, if His will is to smite what is undoubtedly an evil generation and its ecclesiastical enablers, hip and thigh?
Lastly, the church is no longer meeting. I find myself in two minds about this. As far as I am aware, never in the history of the church have Christians been afraid to congregate. If persecuted, Christians met in secret. I believe that the church continued to meet during the black death – someone correct me if I am wrong. Are Christians just as afraid of death as everyone else? I know, we don’t want to see the grim reaper marching through our congregations, that’s why I am in two minds about it.
What is the missing component? Repentance. Admittedly, the Anglican Church of Canada is in a state of constant repentance about bringing Christianity to the original inhabitants of Canada. But what about the very real current evils it tolerates – even celebrates – in our society? In Canada, 100,000 babies are murdered in the womb every year; euthanasia is now legal and has killed more people than the Wuhan virus (as of this writing); children are fed transgender nonsense by adults and being butchered to become something they are not and never will be. Has the church stood against any of this?
I know that to even suggest that God might be judging the world will evoke shrieks of horror from all, the loudest coming from clergy. But what if it is true? Should not the church be calling on the country to repent just in case? Before it gets even worse.
Why do people – well, bishops in this case – think lighting candles is a good idea when times are trying?
Come to think of it, Bishop Jane Alexander may be on to something. In the 17th Century, the Great Fire of London purged the city of the unsanitary conditions that spawned the Great Plague. Her eight o’clock diocesan fire hazard could do the same for Edmonton.
Anglican Primate Linda Nicholls has the following admonition to those of her flock worried about the prospect of contracting the COVID-19 virus: whatever you do, don’t call it the Wuhan virus. That would be racist, the only sin left in the Anglican Church of Canada.
We urge our member churches to reflect a compassionate, peace-seeking response to COVID-19 by:
….. Actively repudiating the racism and xenophobia that has shaped certain reactions to COVID-19;
So, wash your hands and watch you mouth.
Even worse, if you really slip up and call it the Chinese virus, your bigotry will probably invite heavenly retribution; just writing that had me sneezing faster than I could say “xenophobia”.
No doubt about it, the Cathedral clerics are practicing for the year 2040 when, according to recent projections, the Anglican Church of Canada will cease to exist. Something will take its place and it will probably be Islam, so the church might as well get a head start and turn the cathedral into a mosque now.
The event was billed as an attempt to “improve interfaith understanding and constructive engagement”.
Here is the Islamic call to prayer which, you will not be surprised to see, makes no mention of Jesus but makes much of Muhammad being the messenger of God, a contention which, if true, make nonsense of Christianity.
God is Great! God is Great! God is Great! God is Great!
I bear witness that there is no god except the One God.
I bear witness that there is no god except the One God.
I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of God.
I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of God.
Hurry to the prayer. Hurry to the prayer.
Hurry to salvation. Hurry to salvation.
God is Great! God is Great!
There is no god except the One God.
The Muslims attending the event were there to explain Jesus to the Christians who attended. An odd choice considering that Islam teaches that Jesus did not die on the cross, was not resurrected, was not the Son of God and did not make atonement for the sins of the world.
If that hasn’t irritated you enough, you can seek further irritation by reading the entire article here (page 13). Perhaps you will get the same impression as me: Cathedral Christians are ashamed of their own beliefs.
An open exhibition on Jesus from an Islamic perspective was set up in the Cathedral’s parish hall, where members of the Muslim community engaged with the congregation and shared their belief and love for Jesus. Imams from Vancouver Mosque were also available for any detailed questions.
[…..]
Islamic Call to Prayer was made from the Cathedral pulpit at 12:30pm with an English explanation. This call to prayer is similar to the Christian church tradition of ringing bells before important services. The attendees also witnessed the Noon Prayer at 1:15pm followed by an explanation about the concept and purpose of prayer in Islam.
I suppose the good news is, when the Cathedral completes its metamorphosis into a mosque, there will be no more same-sex marriages held there.
If you have any ideas that have not yet occurred to any of the 85,000 environmental scientists working on reversing anthropogenic global warming, then the Anglican Church of Canada will give you – 20 of you – $2500 each.
My submission is to ban Anglican Church of Canada sermons: the reduction in hot air would probably catapult us into the next ice age.
When I saw the submission date, the obvious thought occurred to me. I quickly came to my senses and discarded it, since the Anglican Foundation of Canada has no sense of humour or of the ridiculous and is blissfully oblivious of the irony that, even though it can’t solve its own problems, it thinks it can solve everybody else’s.
No doubt about it, the Cathedral clerics are practicing for the year 2040 when, according to recent projections, the Anglican Church of Canada will cease to exist. Something will take its place and it will probably be Islam, so the church might as well get a head start and turn the cathedral into a mosque now.
