#Nadal sets up Australian Open final w/ #Federer after marathon Dimitrov win https://t.co/P1bE5PSdLv @Metro_Sport #ausopen #tennis #history

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) January 27, 2017

Job done…@rogerfederer is into his first #AusOpen Final since 2010. pic.twitter.com/xYmXFGg5zB

— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) January 26, 2017

Some of the bigger names have also warmed the hearts, with Venus Williams, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal all rolling back the years to delight fans who feared their best days were behind them.

But perhaps the greatest tale of all has been the remarkable renaissance of Croatia’s Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, who has battled her way to the Australian Open semi-final at the age of 34, 19 years after her previous match win at the tournament, and 18 years since her only other grand slam semi.

Read it all.

I'm so happy for you,Mirjana!
What a journey, you deserve all the success!Good luck in your @AustralianOpen semifinal,half italian girl!😊😊 pic.twitter.com/TpulrQ3ZMa

— Roberta Vinci (@roberta_vinci) January 25, 2017

The body of Archbishop Brown Turei, one of three leaders of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, is to lie in state at Kauaetangohia Marae near the northernmost point of East Cape for two nights before his funeral on Saturday.

Brown Turei died surrounded by his family and loved ones in Gisborne Hospital on Monday, aged 92.

He was ordained a deacon in 1949 and a priest the following year.

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Victoria police say they have foiled an alleged plot by terrorists to attack landmark locations in Melbourne’s CBD including St Paul’s Cathedral, Flinders Street station and Federation Square with explosives and other weapons, possibly on Christmas Day.

The chief police commissioner, Graham Ashton, told reporters on Friday morning that five search warrants were conducted at properties in Flemington, Meadow Heights, Dallas, Campbellfield and Gladstone Park on Thursday night.

Seven arrests were made, with five people remaining in custody, he said. Some of the men would appear in court on Friday afternoon, he said.

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The Anglican church is celebrating 150 of worship in the Tawa area this year.

On November 27, a celebratory service was held at St Christopher’s Church, on the corner of Main Rd and Lyndhurst Rd, with Bishop Justin Duckworth giving the sermon.

It was the second event held in Tawa this year to mark the occasion.

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A search for somewhere convenient for Friday prayers has led to an unusual joining of two communities.

Every Friday, St Paul’s Anglican church in Beaconsfield, just outside Western Australia’s port city of Fremantle, hosts Muslim prayers in its community hall.

Fittingly, the hall was the original church.

Read it all (and there is a video also).

HAMISH FITZSIMMONS: How do you and your colleagues deal with what you do every day?

PAULINA SCULLI: It’s a common question that people ask me.

And I often say that I feel that I have the heart to do it. That I let myself feel the grief and that I don’t shy away from that grief.

And I let myself be heartbroken ’cause I’ve seen a lot of people die and a lot of really difficult situations, and I let them touch me. And because I let those situations actually touch my heart, I feel that I journey with people and move through with them and I just feel at the end of it, I feel that I’ve accomplished something in that I’ve been able to support people through a difficult process.

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How do we think about the value of our work?

There is a trend in recent theology to locate the meaning of our work in eternity. If we, as God’s people do good things, these things will remain forever. So, they argue, do whatever you are doing with great heart because ”“ultimately ”“ what you do will be a part of God’s kingdom and the new creation.

Others argue that the only thing that matters in our lives is how we use our vocation to advance the kingdom through gospel proclamation. In other words, our jobs and lives only matter so much as we can tell people about Jesus; everything else is just details.

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In The Irish Times, expatriates described how the liberal abortion laws of their adopted homes made Ireland appear regressive in comparison, motivating them to hold their own demonstrations calling for repeal.

One woman, a television producer based in Vancouver, described how living in such a “progressive and liberal society as Canada has made it apparent to me how far Ireland has to go in terms of women’s rights and politics in general”.What was left unsaid ”“ as has become routine in these discussions ”“ is just how extreme the abortion laws are in some of the supposedly more civilised countries we are being asked to look up to.

In Canada, there are no legal restrictions on abortion whatsoever, allowing terminations up until birth for any reason that doctors are comfortable with.

Contrary to its liberal image, the country is apparently uninterested in transparency when it comes to this legal regime, refusing to collect statistics on the number of late-term abortions….

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According to statistics and a recent pew sheet of my church; the Anglican Church has been in decline in the West for over 100 years. Numbers of Anglicans in Australia have also been in steady decline since 2001.

Being part of a traditional parish in the Diocese of Sydney, the challenge of growth and decline is more than just cyclical, it is generational. While the majority of the diocese has moved its worship form away from traditional setting, parishes like St Paul’s Burwood has the challenge of protecting and using the liturgy regularly while still focusing on outreach.

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The ICBC also highlights that Māori and Pacific voices have been notably absent in public conversations over assisted suicide, raising questions whether the debate so far has accurately reflected this country’s cultural diversity on these issues.

The submission also flags:

1. The limits of claiming assisted dying as a personal ”˜right’. The ICBC propose that an individual choice to die does not exist in a vacuum. The ICBC reminds Kiwis that no person is free of social responsibility for others who may suffer as a result of their choice to die.

2. Overseas experience indicates that assisted suicide promotes suicide by normalising it.

Read it all.

Ballarat’s Anglican Bishop Garry Weatherill has declared his support for same-sex marriage and said he opposed the Federal Government’s proposed plebiscite on the issue.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull yesterday introduced legislation into the Lower House for a plebiscite on same-sex marriage to be held on February 11.

At this stage, Labor is expected to block the passage of the bill.

Read it all.

Dr Freier’s letter notes that the doctrine of the Book of Common Prayer – that marriage is between a man and a woman “under God” – would remain unchanged.
“I do not believe the Anglican Church in Australia is likely to revise its doctrine of marriage,” he writes.
“But … the church also understands the desire of two people to express their commitment of love and self-sacrifice and Christians have not always shown the respect or perspective they should.”

Read it all.

The proposed plebiscite on same-sex marriage has been one of the more contentious topics in 2016. Individual Anglicans have adopted a variety of positions taken in good conscience based on their Christian understanding of the principles and issues, and this is right and proper.

Personally, I welcome the plebiscite, though with strong reservations that we must guard the tenor of the debate, and keep it positive. The Government promised a plebiscite in campaigning for the July election and, having been elected, they have the reasonable expectation of honouring this commitment. Further, those who oppose same-sex marriage will surely find it easier to accept it becoming approved in law if they have been given a vote. It is of course, far from certain at the present time that the measures will gain parliamentary approval.

If the plebiscite does happen it will be important that Christians ”“ and others ”“ vote according to their conscience and their view of what is best for society, and that the Government brings legislation to enact the will of the people. It is proper to expect that the Parliament should honour the results of the plebiscite.

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Last year, it was almost unimaginable that the Republican and Democratic parties would end up nominating their most polarising, politically compromised candidates to contest this year’s presidential election. But they did. Waleed Aly, Scott Stephens and Timothy Lynch consider what this means.

In 2016, American voters are faced with the strange prospect of voting, not so much for their favoured candidate, as against their rival.

As a result, neither candidate can really win; they can only hope that the other one loses. But is it enough not to lose? Is something more demanded by this election?

Read it all.

I will take comments on this submitted by email only to KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com.

This post is to highlight what has mostly been missed in all the intense heat and noise of the same-sex-blessing feud: ironic though it may seem to some, the actual teaching of our church forbids the marrying of divorcees whilst it appears to allow bishops to authorise the blessing of committed same-sex couples in their jurisdiction.

Read it all (his emphasis).

A 100-year-old church in Porirua is scheduled to be sold and removed, but its angry congregation will fight to the last to ensure its survival.

The blink-and-you-miss-it St Philip’s Church, opposite Paremata School, is a well-used and welcome haven to its 27 members.

That’s why they were shocked when a parish review, carried out by the Anglican Diocese this year, recommended St Philip’s be sold.

Read it all from Stuff.

People from all faiths, backgrounds and traditions have come together today as a show of solidarity at a multifaith service at the Anglican Parish of Gosford.

The service was led by Central Coast Anglican Archdeacon Rod Bower and also featured the Islamic Grand Mufti of Australia Dr Ibrahim Abu Mohammed, local Buddhist leader Gen Kelsang Dawa and Newcastle Anglican Bishop Greg Thompson.

It was organised as a response to the protest by a group of right-wing extremists from the Party of Freedom who posed as Muslims and stormed a sermon by Gosford Anglican priest Father Bower recently.

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The need for “new leadership, new vision and ideas” are reasons behind Archbishop William Brown Turei’s decision to retire after 65 years as a priest.

Archbishop Turei has announced he will resign as Bishop (pihopa) of Tairawhiti at the end of this year and as Bishop of Aotearoa ”” leader of the Maori arm of the Anglican Church ”” from the end of March in 2017. He has planned his resignation in two stages “to allow Tairawhiti and Waipounamu to elect new bishops and have full representation in place before the election for a new Bishop of Aotearoa is convened”.

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The rate of suicide among young Indigenous men is the highest in the world, according to a new report highlighting the challenges facing young Australians.

The first ever Australian Youth Development Index (YDI) was compiled as part of International Youth Day.

The index helps formulate youth development policy in the domains of education, health and wellbeing, employment as well as political and civic participation, measured across 16 key indicators.

It rates a state or territory’s performance with a score between zero and one, with one being a perfect score.

Among the reports findings were alarming statistics on youth suicide, which showed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men between 25 and 29 had the highest suicide rates in the entire world…

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He was the senior Newcastle cleric with a prominent role on the Anglican Church’s sexual abuse working group in 2003 that developed national professional standards.

But the 13th Anglican Dean of Newcastle, Graeme Lawrence, was also in a “gang of three” protecting a notorious Hunter paedophile priest, and led a Griffith group of offenders to the Hunter who were later defrocked after child sex allegations, the royal commission has heard.

Over the next two weeks the commission will hear evidence Mr Lawrence’s power and influence protected child sex offenders for several decades, but did not end with his defrocking in 2012.

“It is anticipated there will be evidence that Lawrence had, and continues to have, considerable influence in the diocese,” counsel assisting Naomi Sharp told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse sitting in Newcastle on Tuesday.

Read it all from the Newcastle Herald.

A devastating story of mass child rape perpetrated by an Anglican paedophile ring is unfolding in the latest hearing of Australia’s Royal Commission into child sexual abuse.

The first day of the two-week sessions heard of the crimes perpetrated by Rev Peter Rushton, an Anglican priest who was Archdeacon of Maitland and who died in 2007.

His catalogue of child rape and abuse was finally exposed by an ABC investigation. He led a paedophile ring involving other clergy and lay people from the Newcastle diocese over as many as four decades.

Rushton’s godson, Paul Gray, told how he was taken to St Alban’s School for Boys in Hunter Valley. This was the 1960s, and boys would be anally and orally raped by groups of men in a locked room called the “f***ing room”, according to Daily Mail Australia.

Read it all from Christian Today.

The Anglican Primate of Australia Archbishop Philip Freier has expressed solidarity with Newcastle Anglican Bishop Greg Thompson and his officers before a Royal Commission public hearing in Newcastle on August 2.

Archbishop Freier said evidence of clergy sexual abuse and predatory behaviour in Newcastle that included a former bishop was “shocking and distressing”.

“We express our solidarity with and prayers for Newcastle Bishop Greg Thompson and his officers who have worked diligently to end the culture of abuse and silence within the diocese,” the archbishop said.

Read it all.

s it true that all defenders of the traditional definition of marriage act out of “condemnation ”¦ animosity ”¦ casual and deliberate prejudice”¦ [and] hate” towards same-sex attracted people, as Penny Wong suggests? Well, until a few years ago the senator herself opposed the redefinition of marriage; so did her leader Bill Shorten; and so did a number of other political leaders. I do not think they were being hateful bigots at that time.
Straight politicians don’t understand what it’s like to hide their relationships in fear

Presumably, their views of marriage and family, or of the needs of same-sex people, or of the proper role of the state and culture etc then supported leaving marriage as it was; presumably, over time they were persuaded differently. Others still hold the position these leaders previously held: why presume they are driven by hate? Could it not be that they have real reasons for supporting the traditional conception of marriage? And real questions about the proposed alternative?

Only a decade ago same-sex marriage was a radical proposal with little support among the major parties or general population. The then Penny Wong was in the vast majority. Shifting opinion might be explained by growing sympathy for those with same-sex attraction or changing views (and increasing confusion) about the meaning of marriage. But another reason might be that people have felt pressured into supporting this social change (or cowed into silence) by fear they will be tagged “bigot” if they don’t.

The fact is that many ordinary Australians are both pro-gay people and pro-traditional marriage….

Read it all.

Cardinal John Dew is to be one of New Zealand’s representatives at an event in Rome at which pairs of Anglican and Catholic bishops from different countries will meet Pope Francis and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The event, which is scheduled for October 5-7, will reportedly involve pairs of Anglican and Catholic bishops from 36 countries.

According to a report on Vatican Radio, the pairs of bishops will pray with Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin Welby at the church of St Gregorio al Celio in Rome.

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Bendigo was ringing with the sound of bells on Sunday to mark the re-opening of St Paul’s Anglican Cathedral.

The bells went quiet about 2.45pm in preparation for an invitation-only opening service for the diocese.

Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia, The Most Reverend Dr Philip Freier, delivered the sermon.

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Liberal Anglican priest Dr Helen Jacobi says she is ashamed of her Church after its General Synod voted today to postpone any “blessings” for gay marriages for at least two years.

The synod, meeting in Napier, decided not to adopt a new liturgy for blessing same-sex unions that was developed over the past two years by a working group led by Auckland lawyer Bruce Gray QC.

Instead it voted to send the issue back to another working group to report back to the next synod in 2018.

“The synod has allowed the views of ‘conservatives’ to rule, rather than working for the just inclusion of all faithful people in the life of the church,” said Dr Jacobi, the minister at Auckland’s gay-friendly church St-Matthew-in-the-City.

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The Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia has tabled the ”˜A Way Forward ’ report on blessings of same-sex couples until General Synod 2018, “with a firm expectation that a decision to move forward will be made” at that time.
Archbishop Brown Turei, Archbishop Philip Richardson and Archbishop Winston Halapua will appoint a working group to establish a structure that allows both those who can and cannot support the blessing of same-sex relationships to remain within the church with integrity.
“We are aware of the considerable pain that this decision will cause to those most affected,” said the three archbishops today.
“But we are confident that our determination to work together across our differences will bring us to a place of dignity and justice for everyone.”

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New Zealand’s Anglican Church is sticking to its guns on ruling out same-sex marriage, but may be open to the idea of blessing same-sex couples that have been married.

The blessing, which would take place in a church, would be spoken in the past tense as the union had already happened and there would be no exchange of rings.

The church is holding its two-yearly meeting, or general synod, in Napier this week, with one of the major items on the agenda a report entitled A Way Forward, which raised the option of blessings for same-sex couples.

Read it all.