The Venerable Christine Elizabeth Hardman, aged 64, holds a B.Sc (Econ) from the University of London and trained for ordination on the St Albans Ministerial Training Scheme. She later studied for a Master’s degree in Applied Theology from Westminster College, Oxford. She became a Deaconess in 1984 and was ordained Deacon in 1987, serving as Curate at St John the Baptist, Markyate Street in the Diocese of St Albans. She took up the role of Tutor and Course Director on the St Albans Ministerial Training Scheme from 1988-1996. During this period the Scheme merged with the Oxford Ministry Course and she became its Director of Mission Studies.

Christine was ordained Priest in 1994 and became Vicar of Holy Trinity and Christ the King, Stevenage in 1996 and also Rural Dean of Stevenage in 1999. She served as Archdeacon of Lewisham and Greenwich from 2001 to 2012.

In 2012 Christine became Assistant Priest at Southwark Cathedral and received the Bishop’s Permission to Officiate in the Diocese of St Albans where she has been acting Warden of Readers.

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Wycliffe Hall, Oxford has today received a vote of confidence in 13 out of 16 criteria including its governance, management, constitution and organisation as part of a periodic external review (PER) report on published today. Additional categories for endorsement include its teaching and learning; its worship and training in public life; its ministerial, personal and spiritual formation; and its aims, objectives and evaluation of the institution.

At the time of the review, Wycliffe Hall had 50 Church of England ordinands engaged in training. Another 81 students are members of the Hall, comprising a mix of independent part-time students, independent undergraduates and postgraduates.

Revd Dr Simon Vibert, Acting Principal of Wycliffe Hall commented, “Wycliffe welcomes the very positive report from the review team and looks forward to continuing to improve the formation and training offered at the Hall.”

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The worldwide Anglican Communion’s fifth Mark of Mission calls us “to strive to safeguard the integrity of creation, and sustain and renew the life of the earth.” Canadian Anglicans are especially conscious of our obligations as caretakers of (in the words of one of our eucharistic prayers) “this fragile earth, our island home.” We are now reminded of it when we renew our baptismal vows. The recent meeting of the Sacred Circle further called to mind the special relationship Indigenous people have with the land, and the often damaging effect settlers continue to have.

I therefore invite all members of the Anglican Church of Canada to join with me on September 1 and pray in an especially intentional way for the integrity of God’s creation, and for the will and the means to confront and resolve the ecological crisis our planet is facing.

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From the Daily Post Nigeria
Following ongoing killings in some communities in Plateau State, the Anglican Bishop of Jos, Rev Dr Benjamin Kwashi, has appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari to urgently address the lingering crisis bedeviling the North Central Region.

Kwashi made the appeal while speaking during a peaceful protest by Plateau citizens, who protested to the State House of Assembly to register their displeasure over renewed killings in the State.

The Cleric, while addressing the gathering, revealed that the Plateau State was losing citizens to attacks.

“As a pastor, I have conducted more burial-occasions by attacks than weddings and naming ceremonies since 2001.

“It’s sad to note that most victims of the attacks are armless children, some infants, women and youth; the present administration must end the killings, attention should not be concentrated only at the north east alone, people are being killed here in Plateau, Benue Nasarawa and Kaduna states.”

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The Rector of East Roseville, the Rev Michael Kellahan, has been appointed the executive director of Freedom for Faith ”“ a legal think-tank that promotes and protects religious freedom in Australia.

Mr Kellahan will continue his work in the parish, combined with a part-time role at Freedom for Faith. “These are critical times for the future of religious freedom in Australia,” Mr Kellahan told Southern Cross. “Debates are happening and decisions are being taken now which could influence the cultural landscape for decades to come.”

Bishop Robert Forsyth and Professor Patrick Parkinson are among the leaders of the organisation, which also has advisers from Baptist, Presbyterian, Seventh-day Adventist and Pentecostal traditions, and from the legal profession. An office in North Sydney has been established as a base but the organisation will operate nationally as well as running a website, freedomforfaith.org.au.

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An interview with Bishop John the day after his 15th anniversary as the Bishop of Tasmania and the day after he announced his resignation

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The Church of England Pensions Board (“the Board”) today announced that it has issued £100 million of bonds, giving it access to long-term finance to purchase additional retirement properties, which will secure the future of clergy housing in retirement.

The bonds are repayable in tranches between 2038 and 2048 and were issued through a special purpose vehicle, CHARM Finance plc. £70 million of the bonds were placed immediately, and the remaining £30 million retained to provide quick access to the capital markets if required in the future.

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A prominent priest in the Diocese of Menevia has announced he is leaving the Catholic Church for the Anglican Communion.

Fr Ceirion Gilbert was a parish priest at Briton Ferry in Neath, director of youth services, chaplain to two secondary schools, secretary to the bishop’s council and in charge of the diocese’s online and social media presence. He is also a fluent Welsh speaker. He has now, however, announced he is to be received into the Church in Wales on 12 October and will continue ordained ministry in the Diocese of Llandaff.

In the letter below he explains why he decided to leave the Catholic Church.
…the church is wherever and whenever in a life or in the life of a community Christ is proclaimed as Lord, and the Paschal Mystery of sacrificial and hence life-nurturing Love proclaimed, not so much in rite and liturgy but in reality and life. The question that will be asked of us before the Gates of he Kingdom of heaven will not be what particular brand of Christianity we belonged to but, surely, the one question that takes different forms in the Gospel stories but remains essentially the same: “Have you loved? Have you been a person of compassion, solidarity, of healing and hope, as you were able, in the places and with the people whose stories touched your own?” Love one another, as I have loved you. Ecumenism is not about doing everything we can do so that “they ( non-Catholics) come back to us” (an interpretation that, sadly, seems still to be in practice that of the Catholic Hierarchy) but is rather about dismantling the unnecessary and obstructive barriers of dogma and definition, history and tradition that have decimated our common home and prevent us from seeing the clarity of that simple but immense and profound truth. We are all disciples, walking in our own ways, in our own time, with our own baggage, and yes with our own styles and differences of expression and language – but together following him, the crucified and risen one. Where he leads us, not where we think we should be going.

And it is him, his words and his life that have led me to that other “truth” that I find defines my life and my choices – and this decision, as well. What is the Church – and ministry and priesthood and liturgy and sacrament- really “for”?

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Next year’s census has a very subtle edit that may completely change the way Australia sees itself and have drastic consequences for the way government money is spent on welfare and education.

For the first time since the “no religion” option was introduced in 1991, the Australian Bureau of Statistics will place it first on a list of answers to the question “what is the person’s religion”, and move the “Catholic” option into second position.

As every politician knows, getting to top spot on the ballot paper has a big impact.

In the last census taken in 2011, 5.4 million people picked the “Catholic” box and a total of 13.1 million Australians (61.1 per cent) said their religion was some type of Christianity. Meanwhile 4.7 million (22.2 per cent) Australians picked “no religion”, or wrote down agnosticism, atheism, humanism or rationalism. The “no religion” option was in a difficult-to-find location under the “other please specify” box.
…..
the ACL has previously reminded members about the importance of ticking the right box on the census form. Governments use the ABS data to “plan for services and infrastructure” and “we need to prove the size of the constituency who hold these values,” the ACL told members in August 2011.

So is it possible Australia is no longer a Christian nation? When a similar change was introduced into the New Zealand census the country’s Christians lost their position as the majority and the number of people recording no religion jumped from 35 per cent to 42 per cent.

And placing the ‘no religion’ box at the top of the list could swing the results significantly, according to associate professor Roger Wilkins at the University of Melbourne

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The primate of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion), the Most Rev’d Nicholas Okoh, has said that the continued stay of the Chibok girls in captivity has harmed the country.

He said, “The story of the Chibok girls is a bad story, bad story in the sense that the parents are not happy, the government is not happy and the public is baffled. From what the president is saying, you can sense that he is not happy about the inability of government to bring the girls back. But here we are, some have said that the Chibok girls have been married off, some said they have been distributed to various places, that they are not together as a group, or they have been used as suicide bombers. We don’t know exactly. It complicates the situation. We are hoping that the military will be able to do more. All those areas that they have captured and rescued people, where are the Chibok girls? We have not really solved the problem. We have not reached them”.

Appeal to government”¦

“We appeal to government to seek a more advanced way of doing it in terms of technology which can help us locate their whereabouts. As it is now, the soldiers have searched the Sambisa Forest and have not been able to see them. It will continue to be a festering sore in our lives if we are unable to find these girls. We plead with our government, the US, EU, UN and anybody who can help us to come out and help us find the girls”.

500 Days: It Is Sad That Abducted Girls’ Whereabouts Unknown ”“ Hosea-Abana

In the words of the chairman, Chibok Community in Abuja, Tsambido Hosea-Abana, it is sad that abducted girls’ whereabouts are still unknown after 500 days.

He said, “We are feeling very bad. It is not only that the girls were abducted, the pitable thing is that we do not even know their whereabouts. We were accusing the past administration of not doing something visible. We were hoping that by now, we are under three months of the new administration, this administration would have established that these girls are in a particular place and they are working on ways to bring them out”.

The feelings of the Chibok girls”¦

We don’t know where they are, so we feel so sad. Even the parents at home, if you want to talk to them, some of them decide not to talk because of sadness and annoyance.

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Six people protesting against the mandatory detention of asylum seeker children have been arrested for staging a sit-in at a Tasmanian senator’s office.

The protesters, from Christian group Love Makes A Way, had been holding prayer vigils at Senator David Bushby’s office since just after midday.

They called on the senator to withdraw his support for the mandatory detention of children and refused to leave when his office closed at 5:00pm.

They were then arrested and charged with trespass before being granted bail.

Among the protesters were leaders from Anglican, Baptist and Uniting Churches and the Salvation Army.
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In a statement released prior to the protest said the protesters included Reverend Richard Humphrey, who is Dean of St David’s Anglican Cathedral, David Reeve, who is chairperson of Presbytery of Tasmania, Uniting Church, and Captain Craig Farrell, who is territorial youth secretary of The Salvation Army Southern Territory.

Last year, the group staged similar protests in Launceston and Perth, Western Australia, when they staged sit-ins at the offices of Andrew Nikolic and Julie Bishop respectively.

The eight ministers involved in the Perth sit-in were charged with trespass and given spent sentences.

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Maori Anglican Church leaders launched into a “spontaneous” and “thunderous” haka after voting to support the current New Zealand flag.

About 160 people met at the church’s synod in Wellington this month, where the possibility of changing the flag was raised and discussed.

Options for a new flag have recently been narrowed down to a long list of 40 designs.
…….
…the church unanimously voted to support keeping the current flag, arguing it best reflected the country’s journey and sense of history.

Wellington Bishop Muru Walters said that after the vote all delegates stood up and sung the national anthem before performing the haka.

“It was spontaneous and it was really thunderous. There was a passion for what was being passed.”

The former Maori All Black said that he had never seen such a haka at a gathering of the governing council.

The reason the church voted against a flag change was about tradition, Muru said.

“Why change the flag after all these years? It has been part of our journey and our history and our understanding of ourselves. It’s a huge change and an unnecessary one.

“When you watch the haka there are some who think it is outdated and England is trying to make the All Blacks get rid of it, but it is what the All Blacks have done for years. It’s a tradition we need to keep.”

If the country was going to fight to keep the haka, then keeping the flag was part of that struggle, he said.

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The Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Glenn Davies, has announced he has chosen the Rev Michael Stead to be the next Bishop of South Sydney.

He will replace Bishop Robert Forsyth, who retires in December after 15 years in the position.

Dr Stead holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of New South Wales, is an honours graduate of Moore College with a Bachelor of Divinity and a Diploma of Ministry, and was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy by the University of Gloucestershire in 2007. He is a part-time lecturer in Old Testament at Moore Theological College.

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Two well-loved, historic Far North churches have dubious futures as the The Anglican Diocese of Auckland discuss their sale.

St Catherine’s at Okaihau and St Stephen the Martyr’s in Kaikohe may get new owners if the decision goes ahead.

Anglican manager Kevin Third says the diocese is concerned about declining congregation numbers and the cost of keeping the churches open.

But member of Pakaraka Holy Trinity Anne Herbert is against selling them.

“All these churches are without debt, they are in good order because we’ve kept them so. We’re not quite sure what’s behind the thinking there.”

“I dont want the church hall and the church closed down. We have an op shop there that’ll be affected and the church also caters to the stockyard.

“So it means we’re not helping the community. Kaikohe is a community that needs help.”

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The Anglican Primate of the Church of Nigeria, Anglican Communion, Most Reverend Nicholas Okoh, has urged churches nationwide to give wide support to President Muhammadu Buhari’s ”˜Anti-corruption Agenda’.

The Archbishop described the behaviour of some public office holders as a huge disappointment to Nigeria, emphasising that Nigeria had garnered enough international support to enable her address squarely the rot in the system.

According to him, the church has always been in the vanguard of anti-corruption crusade.

“The Church has been preaching and teaching that people should live right.

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The Anglican church has issued an invitation to the country’s various leaders to attend a prayer session for the nation on August 25 at the Holy Trinity Cathedral as election nears.
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[The cathedral’s interim Rector, Rev Carl] Williams said the church will hold a series of prayer events leading up to election and beyond. He defined prayer as the “engine room of the church.”
…
The entire nation is invited, Williams said… The general election takes place on September 7

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The Church of England, with the exception of a high profile, now retired, Archbishop (and friend) and without doubt some of our Church members and clergy, has been resolutely against a change in the law.

Of course, this leaves those of us who don’t want PAS open to the criticism that we don’t care about those in great distress in the hour of death. As a former hospice chaplain, I refute this. In fact the Christian Church has a long and noble history of seeking to assist people to die well without killing them.

Palliative care options may be inconsistent across the country, but a huge amount of know how has been, and is being learnt about effective pain control. The Church’s position is not that ”˜pain is a noble thing.’ We need more palliative care provision rather than handing out the right in law to take life.

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The building stands as a memorial with magnificent stain glass windows dedicated to former congregation members. Everywhere inside this 68 year old building are memorials to various members of the church dedicated because of their contributions to the congregation.

Many churches are suffering the same fate at present. Everyone is on a tight budget, economics are forcing members of the church to work on Sundays, the church congregation has aged and those members live on a fixed income, and a church cannot survive on fundraisers like bakes sales,” said Dyas.

The Church is doing everything it can to survive at this point. Letters have been sent out to members and former members for support. “We are trying to do the best with what we have,” said Dyas. “But, ultimately the decision will come from the Diocese.”

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On Sept. 11 the House of Commons will vote on a bill to allow people with terminal illnesses to take their own lives with the assistance of doctors. If the bill passes in this second reading stage of the Parliamentary process, little will stand in the way of its becoming law.

The bill would allow euthanasia for mentally competent adults who are deemed to have less than six months to live. They would need the consent of a high-court judge and two doctors.
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Church of England representatives have released statements opposing the bill. One of the clearest voices is Care Not Killing, comprising Roman Catholic, evangelical Protestant, and disability networks.

“The reality is that Britain’s law on assisted suicide is clear and right and is working well,” said Dr. Peter Saunders, campaign director of Care Not Killing.

The waters have been muddied somewhat by the Most Rev. George L. Carey, the 103rd Archbishop of Canterbury, supporting the bill.
…..
Supporting him are faith leaders including … the Rt. Rev. Alan Wilson, Bishop of Buckingham…

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South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir has failed to sign a peace deal in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa, aimed at ending the civil war in his country.
The government has initialled a draft agreement, but requested a further 15 days before signing in full.
International sanctions had been threatened by mediators if both sides failed to reach an agreement on Monday 17 August.

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After his consecration in 1990 and given what he describes as his exposure and experiences which were compounded by his “undue” knowledge of Islam, Idowu-Fearon said his colleagues, fellow bishops, did everything possible to frustrate him in the course of his service. According to him, “my being elected as Bishop of Sokoto was seen by some in the then House of Bishops as a way of humbling me but God used our time in Sokoto to expose us to the international community.

And, when Kaduna Diocese was going to be vacant, efforts were made to send me to be bishop in Cyprus and the Gulf; this was to get me out of the country. The form was filled and my signature forged without my knowledge. In Cyprus for an interfaith meeting, the Lord revealed it to me through Australian missionaries who volunteered to host me for the conference and the plot was confirmed by the then Secretary General of the Anglican Communion.

After my first five years as the first ecclesiastical Archbishop of Kaduna province, again, the powers that be felt that I was too close to the then Archbishop of Canterbury and the Communion at large, that I was promoting Western relativism and that I was going to sell the province of Nigeria to the West. Two bishops were specially commissioned to sell me as a convert to Islam and that Fearon is a Muslim, drinking tea with the Sultan and that Fearon was promoting homosexuality in Nigeria.”

The Road to Lambeth

Idowu-Fearon’s journey to Lambeth as Secretary General at the Canterbury did not come on a platter of gold. Although he applied for the position, along with 31 others from various countries, Idowu-Fearon believes that God made it possible for him to use his undergraduate and graduate studies in the United Kingdom to make contacts that ultimately laid the foundation for his nomination after beating three other candidates who made the shortlist.

According to him, in the years after 1990, opportunities started to open up for him in Britain and the United States of America during which he served on various commissions within the Anglican Communion. Idowu-Fearon was a founding member of the Canterbury’s Compass Rose Council, a foundation member and one of the first three presidents of the Network for Interfaith Concerns.

He was also member of the 13-man committee of the Archbishop of Canterbury that looked into the responses to Lambeth Resolution 1; 10 of 1998 as well as member of the committee that produced the Windsor Commission Report of 2003. According to Idowu-Fearon, “as I was thinking and praying about taking an early retirement in order to spend the rest of my active life to build an army of well-informed and articulate Christian leaders to constructively engage their Muslim neighbours and build a culture of respect and peaceful co-existence, the Lord opened a new world of service to me.”

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…Perhaps it is no surprise that Archbishop Idowu-Fearon decided to leave Nigeria and take up his new role as secretary-general of the Anglican Communion.

He also revealed that his attempts to promote unity between Christians and Muslims in the face of Boko Haram’s attacks were not always welcome, even as he said the Church of Nigeria distanced itself from him when he was appointed in his new role.

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RS Thomas’s poetry “reduces most other modern verse to footling whimsy”, said Kingsley Amis. It is simple in expression, powerful, and sometimes bleak, which is the feeling of his parish of Aberdaron ”“ he was an Anglican priest ”“ on the windswept Llyn peninsula in Wales. It is the last stop on the pilgrims’ route to Bardsey Island, where holy men sleep in their tombs.

I found Aberdaron last week. I had gone in search of Thomas’s places: the medieval church, in earshot of the crashing waves, where he preached to the minority in the village who were not “chapel”; the cliffs and beach; and (which took detective work) Thomas’s vicarage. It looms vast and austere on the hill behind shrubs grown wild, the walls clad in slate that has flaked off in patches, exposing the Welsh stone underneath. Two doctors bought it as a restoration job but have given up, perhaps daunted. The neighbour said I could wander down the grass-covered lane and look.

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For her choice of hymns to play on an old pipe organ in a church built in 1790, Johanna Goldenberg doesn’t dust off a tune written years ago by some English vicar in a country parish.

Instead, she chooses a contemporary piece. A reflection, she says, that there’s still plenty of history to be made at St. Mary’s Anglican Church in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley.

“This is not a museum,” she says. “This is a vibrant, thriving church. It’s a wonderful little church, I love it.”

This weekend, St. Mary’s is celebrating its 225th anniversary and on Sunday a special service is being held that Archbishop Fred Hiltz, the primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, will attend.

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The Archbishop of Sydney, Dr Glenn Davies, has congratulated the Prime Minister and the Coalition for backing a plebiscite on same-sex marriage.

“I believe that marriage is a foundational concept to our society and indeed to human civilisation as a whole, in accordance with God’s own plan for all people, and it is intrinsic to the continuation of the human race as the bedrock of the family from which succeeding generations are born.”

“Despite the relentless campaign by some sections of the community, it is only now that other views are starting to be heard in the media, not only from the churches. T

a href=”http://sydneyanglicans.net/mediareleases/archbishop-backs-plebiscite-plan”>Read it all.

Jeremy Timm, a Reader, has described the “tears and soul-searching” that he endured before deciding to convert his civil partnership to marriage, knowing that this would result in the loss of his permission to officiate (PTO).

Mr Timm, a Reader in the Howden Team Ministry in Hull, was told by the Archbishop of York, Dr Sentamu, last month, that his PTO would be revoked if he pursued his intention to convert his partnership with Mike Brown.

Writing on the website of Changing Attitude, Mr Timm described being “placed in an impossible situation by the Church of England . . . faced with choosing between marriage or ministry”.

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The demolition of St. Martin’s Anglican Church is now a done deal as the North Peace Savings and Credit Union moves forward with plans for of a new three story administrative centre at the location.

Negotiations for purchase of a portion of the site, adjacent to the existing credit union building on 100th Street, began back in 2013 and the demolition followed the removal of hazardous materials.

Read it all. You can read about the final worship service there and you can find the location here.

The BBC’s John McManus says Archbishop [Josiah] Idowu-Fearon, who is the new secretary-general of the Anglican Communion, has a strong reputation for promoting dialogue between Christians and Muslims.
But the archbishop told our correspondent that efforts to maintain unity were undermined by some fellow Christians who failed to engage with their Muslim counterparts.
“We warned the leadership in my country, the Christian Association of Nigeria: ‘Let us listen to the Muslim leadership, because the leadership is not in support of Boko Haram.’
“‘Oh no no no,’ they said, ‘they are always deceiving us. They are all the same,'” he said.

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Christchurch’s Anglican Diocese has avoided censure for incorrectly using funds from an insurance payout to help pay for the transitional cathedral.

A High Court judgment released on Wednesday said it was sufficient for the Church Property Trustees (CPT), which holds property on various trusts for the diocese, to repay the $4 million it used from the quake-damaged Christ Church Cathedral insurance payout to construct the new building near Latimer Square.

The CPT repaid the money with funds diverted from a trust account after an interim High Court judgment in 2012 said the $39m payout for the Christ Church Cathedral could only be utilised for work on the existing structure or its successor in the Square.

The Great Christchurch Buildings Trust ”“ a pressure group led by former MPs Jim Anderton and Philip Burdon ”“ took legal action, believing the CPT should be penalised for its breach.

Justice Rachel Dunningham, who heard the respective arguments at a hearing in Christchurch in April, said the CPT would not be held liable.

The CPT was not at fault for under-insuring Christ Church Cathedral because it had based its policy on an estimate that did not reflect the value of the property

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Close to 4 million Kenyans consume illegal alcoholic brews, found a 2013 survey by the National Authority for the Campaign against Alcohol and Drug Abuse. The biggest challenge is corruption among government officials, said the agency’s John Mututho.

Some clergy have been joining community members to seek out and storm the makeshift breweries ”” many just drums or pots hidden in forests, private residences or buried near riverbeds.

“We commend the steps taken by the president. As clergy, we do not encourage drinking,” said Anglican Bishop Julius Kalu of Mombasa. “We urge more steps to ensure those addicted are rehabilitated.”

Kyalo agrees. The president, he said, “took bold steps, but he has to address the root cause of the problem. This is deeply rooted, where people are poor. He must deal with poverty, which is increasing.”

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