On a typical Sunday, [Canon to the Ordinary Paul] Cooney said, church attendance at parishes in the diocese ranges from 14 to 1,039. In half of the diocese’s parishes, fewer than 115 people attend Sunday services. And in the average parish, Church School draws just 27 children.

Data from parochial reports show that over the last 20 years, the diocese’s membership has remained stable in the low 40,000s. But during that same period, the number of pledging households has decreased by about 20 percent.

Over the last 20 years, “we’ve become modestly smaller,” Cooney said.

Despite a lack of consistency in the way membership data has been recorded, the reports indicate a gradual but marked decline in the last 40 years: Since 1967, the number of active communicants in the diocese’s parishes has dropped by approximately 26 percent.

“More analysis remains to be done,” Cooney wrote in a recent memo to the council. “However, it comes as no surprise from reviewing the data thus far that we face the challenging situation of fragile and in some cases declining membership. Of particular concern is the typically small number of children in our congregations.”

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–Non Sibi Sed Cunctis

—“Not for Ones Self but for All,” the school motto of the Millbrook School where we are this weekend visiting Selimah for parent’s weekend

One of the most interesting facets of the intra-Catholic furor over Kmiec, Kaveny, Cafardi and other pro-life, pro-Obama Catholics is the way this argument seems to have displaced the struggle between bishops and pro-choice Catholic politicians that was so prominent in 1984 (when the contest was between Geraldine Ferraro and New York’s Cardinal John O’Connor) and 2004 (when the candidacy of John Kerry embroiled the entire U.S. bishops conference in a dispute over whether pro-choice Catholic politicians ought to be permitted to receive holy communion). That displacement, however, is likely to be temporary.

In the wake of ill-advised (and nationally televised) ventures into theology by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden, several bishops””including Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput, Madison Bishop Robert Morlino and Washington Archbishop Donald Wuerl””issued statements underscoring the Catholic Church’s unswerving moral opposition to abortion from the very beginnings of Christianity; the morality of abortion was not an open question for serious Catholics, as Pelosi in particular had suggested. (After receiving what seems to have been an avalanche of protest over the Speaker’s misstatement on “Meet the Press,” Pelosi’s own archbishop, George Niederauer of San Francisco, announced publicly that he would invite Mrs. Pelosi in for a conversation.) Moreover, in the wake of both the Pelosi and Biden incidents, the chairmen of the bishops’ pro-life and doctrine committees, Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia and Bishop William Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., issued sharp statements deploring the misrepresentation of Catholic teaching by the Speaker and the senator.

Many U.S. bishops, in other words, seem exasperated with Catholic politicians who present themselves as ardent Catholics and yet consistently oppose the Church on what the bishops consider the premier civil-rights issue of the day.

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So can Catholics vote for a pro-choice candidate? The answer is yes, but as I found when I publicly endorsed Obama, you’ve then got “some ‘splain’n’ to do.” It’s a matter of conscience, but had Obama proclaimed himself to be pro-choice and said nothing more, it would have been problematic. But there are those additional words about appropriate education as well as adoption and assistance for mothers who choose to keep their baby.

This is not just debate posturing. It is consistent with Obama’s successful effort to add language to the Democratic platform affirming the choice of a mother to keep her child by pledging pre- and post-natal care, funded maternity leave and income support for poor women who, studies show, are four times more likely to pursue an abortion absent some tangible assistance.

Some might ask, isn’t John McCain, the self-proclaimed “pro-lifer,” still a morally superior choice for Catholics? Not necessarily. McCain’s commitment, as he stressed in the debate, is to try to reverse Roe vs. Wade. But Republicans have been after this for decades, and the effort has not saved a single child. Even if Roe were reversed — unlikely, in my judgment — it merely transfers the question to the states, most of which are not expected to ban abortion. A Catholic serious about preserving life could reasonably find Obama’s educational and material assistance to mothers the practical, stronger alternative.

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The two traditional roles of the saints are the patron (who intercedes on behalf of those on earth) and the companion (who provides believers with an example of Christian life). And the paucity of lay saints — more specifically, married ones — in the roster is somewhat embarrassing.

Two reasons underlie this anomaly: the outmoded belief, almost as old as the church, that the celibate life was “better” than married life, and the fact that the church’s canonization process is an arduous one, requiring someone to gather paperwork, interview contemporaries if that is still possible and present the case to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

Certainly there have been as many saintly wives and husbands as there have been holy priests and nuns. But religious orders and dioceses know how to navigate the canonization procedures on behalf of bishops, priests, brothers and sisters. By contrast, how many families have the resources to embark on the decades-long process on behalf of even the holiest mother or father? As a result, married Catholics have few exemplars other than Mary and Joseph, whose situation was hardly replicable.

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I did not vote for the deposition of Bishop Duncan for a couple of reasons. I was one of the few who believed that his intention to lead his diocese out of The Episcopal Church was not the same as actually doing it. Secondly, I was impressed with the argument of one of our own partnered gay priests now serving in another diocese that we must act to end the cycle of violence that our Communion struggles really extend on all sides. In that vein, I have also believed that we have to find a broader canonical framework with which to account for one another, which allows for removal and transfer within the Communion of the Anglican Church, and not deposition. I also think accountability should have come from the highest ranking bishop in our Communion five years ago, who had the right idea of making Lambeth 2008 a place for conversation and relationship building, but ought to have started at that point several years ago in face to face interaction.

Is it all now too late? The planet is still in peril. Trillions of dollars of value have been wiped off the portfolios of millions never to be returned in quite that same way. The Church is divided and we face a public to whom we are obliged to witness to the reconciling love of God in Jesus, who has every right to judge us according to the Gospel we promise to proclaim in word and deed but also to live.

With Christ it is never too late. Error turns into truth, sin into righteousness and death into life. The cross and resurrection are our ultimate points of accountability, and even righteous people get things wrong but can start again.

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It’s been learned tonight that Bishop Peter James Lee and the Diocese of Virginia have requested that Christ Church Alexandria deed their disputed church property personally to the Bishop of Virginia.

A congregational vote is scheduled for this Sunday.

According to the current rector of Christ Church, Pierce Klemmt and Senior Warden, Rawles Jones, “the Diocese has asked Christ Church to quitclaim its interest in the property to the Diocese.” In a letter sent to members of the congregation, they write that “The Vestry has considered this course of action and recommends it to the Congregation.”

The Diocese of Virginia is pursuing the people of Christ Church Alexandria to turn control of their property over to the Bishop of Virginia in Richmond.

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The financial world is a mess, both in the United States and abroad. Its problems, moreover, have been leaking into the general economy, and the leaks are now turning into a gusher. In the near term, unemployment will rise, business activity will falter and headlines will continue to be scary.

So … I’ve been buying American stocks. This is my personal account I’m talking about, in which I previously owned nothing but U.S. government bonds. (This description leaves aside my Berkshire Hathaway holdings, which are all committed to philanthropy.) If prices keep looking attractive, my non-Berkshire net worth will soon be 100 percent in U.S. equities.

Why?

A simple rule dictates my buying: Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful. And most certainly, fear is now widespread, gripping even seasoned investors.

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Bishop Jefferts Schori also wrote the other seven members of the standing committee on Oct. 9. Citing Title 1, Canon 17, Section 8, she said that she no longer “recognize[d]” them as the ecclesiastical authority.

“Any person accepting any office in this Church shall well and faithfully perform the duties of that office in accordance with the constitution and canons of this church and of the diocese in which the office is being exercised,” the passage states. It does not identify who decides whether a person has failed in that capacity, or specify a procedure for determining whether a breach of fiduciary duty has occurred. This point was raised by the Rev. David Wilson, president of the standing committee of the continuing Diocese of Pittsburgh and rector of St. Paul’s, Kittanning. Fr. Wilson responded to Bishop Jefferts Schori on Oct. 16.

“The only reason we are the ecclesiastical authority for the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh is because of your illegal ”˜deposition’ of Bishop Robert W. Duncan,” Fr. Wilson said. “Your effort to take advantage of this illegal action by following it with a subsequent illegal action (i.e., seeking to ”˜recognize’ members of a diocesan standing committee despite the fact that you have no jurisdiction or authority to do so) is wholly improper.”

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In difficult dinner-table conversations, college students and their parents are revisiting how to pay tuition as personal finances weaken and lenders get tough.

Diana and Ronnie Jacobs, of Salem, Ind., thought their family had a workable plan for college for her twin sons, using a combination of savings, income, scholarship aid and a relatively modest amount of borrowing. Then her husband lost his job at Colgate-Palmolive.

“It just seems like it’s really hard, because it is,” Ms. Jacobs, an information technology specialist, said of her financial situation. “I have two kids in college and I want to say ”˜come home,’ but at the same time I want to provide them with a good education.”

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While the majority of parishes within the Pittsburgh Diocese of the Episcopal Church have voted to realign themselves with a different communion, one church in the local area has decided to remain.

The Rev. Chuck Weiss, rector of St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Canonsburg, believes his congregation is the only one in District 10 that remains with the Anglican Communion.

Weiss came to the church less than two years ago. At the time, he said, the congregation made it clear they were proud to be part of the national Episcopal Church and its tradition of honoring differences.

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Peter Frank, a spokesman for the Pittsburgh diocese, said the vote was done according to the denomination’s constitution, and the diocese hope to mediate with the national Episcopal Church to resolve differences – such as property issues – related to the realignment.

“The diocese wants an opportunity to have a graceful separation. That will be difficult if the other party chooses to sue us,” he said….

After the convention vote, Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, who oversees the national Episcopal Church, issued a statement recognizing those who voted against the realignment as the “true church.”

The Rev. James Simons, the standing committee’s one member who opposed seceding, said other parishes may eventually decide to remain. In the absence of a bishop, the standing committee becomes the ecclesiastical authority. In September Schori removed Robert Duncan, bishop of the Pittsburgh Diocese, from office. A previous committee had determined that Bishop had abandoned the communion of the church.

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Euro: 5.02% vs. prior 5.08%; Dollar: 4.42% vs. prior 4.50%; Sterling: 6.16% vs. prior 6.18%.

The good news is the move is in the right direction, the struggle is the process is painfully slow–KSH.

His head bent, bat in hand, David Ortiz trudged to first base. He was out, as he has been so many times this postseason. He walked to the dugout, to teammates who suffered the same fate at the plate. He looked broken. And as he limped back, boos were heard at the once-beloved slugger.

Then the ball lifted, lifted and carried, and dropped into the right-field stands. He had broken out and brought his team back into a game and a series that was seemingly over. It was a three-run home run in the seventh, bringing the Sox within 7-4, and the Rays were the ones suddenly reeling. It wasn’t enough, but he didn’t need to do it all.

He left that to his teammates.

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The answer is that they should lead us into a growing gospel fellowship on the one hand and to the development of alternative oversight on the other.

Taking alternative oversight first: the reason we’re interested in Episcopal oversight at all is that we believe in being part of an Episcopal church for good theological and pragmatic reasons. We are not Congregationalists in that we believe it biblical to be connexional. It is right therefore that it should not simply be the local congregation that validates its own senior ministry. Nor, as David Holloway pointed out a couple of years ago are we Presbyterian with its belief in a regulative principle. “Good” episcopacy is part of the “bene esse” of the church, in providing personal rather than committee leadership. However, where the teaching and actions of a bishop promote an unbiblical way of thinking, then we simply have to look elsewhere for a bishop. If we fail to do this then our congregations will not see us taking New Testament teaching seriously and the process of accommodation will continue.

Seeking alternative oversight is not necessarily a confrontational act. For a start it doesn’t mean finding alternative oversight for everybody. For many of us, our existing diocesan bishops are orthodox men who are fully supportive of our ministries. Such men need our support not our rebuke. To say that alternative oversight is key to a strategy for addressing our present difficulties is not to say that it should apply across the board.

We need to recognise secondly that the Church of England already accepts that there may be circumstances where alternative oversight is needed.

Read it all (Thanks to SS for the link).

The longtime private secretary of the late Pope John Paul II revealed in a film screened Thursday that the pope was lightly wounded in a 1982 knife attack by a priest in Portugal.
Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz made the revelation in “Testimony,” a movie on John Paul’s life that was screened for Pope Benedict XVI and top clergy at the Vatican.

It was known that John Paul was assaulted by a knife-wielding Spanish priest while visiting the shrine of Fatima in Portugal to give thanks for surviving an assassination attempt. He when he was shot by a Turkish gunman in St. Peter’s Square in 1981.

“Today I can say what up to now we have kept secret,” Dziwisz said in the movie. “That priest wounded the Holy Father.”

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10. How many parishes and missions will be in the reorganized Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh?

We don’t know, and won’t for sometime. We currently believe there will be over 20 “non-realigning” parishes. So far, 19 parishes have allowed that their names be posted on this website as “non-realigning.” We will have a better idea of the number of parishes when we gather for our Special Convention. The actions taken at the Convention on October 4 will not provide conclusive indications, since Deputies vote on their own behalf and may not reflect the position of their Vestry or congregation. We hope that over the next several months many currently undecided parishes will determine that they wish to remain in the reorganized Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh. Any parish that initially chooses “realignment” will be welcomed back with joy and love at any time in the future.

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AFTER governments announced a £2-trillion bail-out of banks across the world this week, charities and churches were left wondering whether there would be enough money left to help the poor.

The World Bank warned that the “unprecedented turmoil” in the financial markets, the tightening of credit, and the global economic slowdown could do “serious and in some cases permanent damage” to the world’s poorest people. This year, 100 million people have been driven into poverty. “That number will grow,” the bank’s president, Robert Zoellick, said on Sunday.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, speaking in London on Wednesday, at the end of a meeting of Christian and Muslim scholars, was asked who was responsible for the financial crisis. Dr Williams told reporters: “I was going to say Satan. . . The root problem is human greed.” The priority given to the poor by Christianity and Islam was not always reflected in the realities of economic activity, he said.

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Google Inc., owner of the most popular Internet search engine, said third-quarter profit climbed 26 percent as more customers used Web search ads to spur sales in a slowing economy, sending the shares higher….

Advertisers are shifting budgets away from TV and print media toward ads that run alongside search listings, targeting online shoppers. The Internet will account for 8.7 percent of the $284 billion in U.S. ad spending this year, up from 7.2 percent in 2007, according to Barclays Capital.

“This was exactly the kind of shot in the arm that investors need,” said Jeff Lindsay, an analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. in New York. “People lost a lot of faith in the Internet, but this is exactly what the doctor ordered.”

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Times are tough at the medical university and hospital. To preserve jobs in a brutal economic climate, one of South Carolina’s largest economic engines is slashing costs by instituting a hiring freeze, cutting overtime and using less paper and electricity. The Medical University of South Carolina and the Medical Hospital Authority employ about 11,000 people. At the hospital, underfunded Medicaid services are on the chopping block, and the workforce is being adjusted through attrition.

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How do you marry someone you haven’t lived with? It’s a question Shad Imam has heard over and over again, most recently from a woman sitting next to him on a plane.

He knows it sounds weird, but after nearly six years of marriage, what he has works. And he can’t imagine being with anyone other than the woman his mother picked out for him.

“It depends on your expectations,” Imam says. “My expectation was that I would love my wife regardless of who she was.”

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Dear Sisters and Brothers,

The Supreme Court of California has determined that all citizens of our state should have equal access to marriage as a civil right based in our state constitution. The Court’s ruling provides the Church with an opportunity to reflect on our own theology of marriage. In the Diocese of Los Angeles, we have sought to provide the Church’s blessing to all the baptized people of God.
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Among those are people who have sought to have same-sex relationships blessed in the community of faith. I know that the acceptance of same-sex unions has caused spiritual struggle and questioning for some members of our Diocese, our Church and the Anglican Communion. My policy has been to allow clergy to respond to the needs of their community with pastoral sensitivity including the blessing of these unions as they deem appropriate to the pastoral context.

Earlier this year, when the court made same-sex marriage an option in civil law, I felt it necessary to convene a task force to develop a diocesan policy by which clergy in our Diocese might officiate at same-sex marriages. The task force has developed educational materials that I hope will help you and members of our Diocese to reflect on the issues involved in same sex-marriage as we discern our way forward.

I hope that all clergy in our Diocese might educate our congregations about marriage and have conversations about it.

Performing and blessing these marriages is not simply theoretical. There are real people in congregations large and small who have waited sometimes for many years for this opportunity, and the witness of their faithful love has been an inspiration to me. Other couples will step forward in the future. I hope you will take the opportunity in the next several weeks to listen to their stories. Many among these couples are members of our congregations.

While no one in this Diocese will be forced to move beyond what his or her conscience allows, we seek to provide that gracious space for those whose conscience compels them to bless the marriages of all faithful people as together we discern the work of the Holy Spirit who continues to lead us into all truth.

Your Brother in Christ,

(The Rt. Rev.) J. Jon Bruno is Bishop of Los Angeles

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The American housing market, where the global economic crisis began, is far from hitting bottom.

Home prices across much of the country are likely to fall through late 2009, economists say, and in some markets the trend could last even longer depending on the severity of the anticipated recession.

In hard-hit areas like California, Florida and Arizona, the grim calculus is the same: More and more homes are going up for sale, but fewer and fewer people are willing or able to buy them.

Adding to the worries nationwide are rising unemployment, falling wages and escalating mortgage rates ”” all of which will reduce the already diminished pool of would-be buyers.

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People who have lost a significant amount of weight and keep it off for years are constantly vigilant about what they consume, rarely overeat for emotional reasons and do about an hour a day of exercise, a new study shows.

“They are doing the behaviors that we know work, and they are doing them every day. They don’t give up,” says Suzanne Phelan, assistant professor of kinesiology at California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo. She presented her findings here at the recent meeting of the Obesity Society, an organization of weight-loss researchers and professionals.

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The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia and a group of 11 conservative breakaway congregations wrangled yesterday over ownership of the historic Falls Church, a 276-year-old congregation that until two years ago was one of the crown jewels of the denomination.

During the trial at the Fairfax County Courthouse, witnesses said the Northern Virginia church near the intersection of Lee Highway and Leesburg Pike has been overseen by its own trustees since 1746, when John Trammell, a local landowner, deeded 2 acres to build a church.

A group of Colonists, including George Washington’s father, had been meeting since about 1732 at the spot that today has several brick buildings – one dating from 1769 – and a historic graveyard.

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At this synod on the Bible, however, one of the “fraternal delegates,” meaning a representative of another Christian confession, has more star power than most Catholic prelates in the hall: Anglican Bishop N.T. “Tom” Wright, the bishop of Durham in England, and one of the world’s best-known New Testament scholars.

In a room full of people who devour Biblical commentaries the way others churn through spy novels, heads turn when Wright walks in the room.

Though a committed member of the Church of England, Wright belongs to that wing of the Anglican Communion that stresses the grand tradition of Christian orthodoxy shared with Rome. He’s known for respectful, but firm, clashes with liberal Biblical scholars such as Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan on matters such as the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection.

Especially among English-speaking bishops and experts at the synod, Wright has been one fraternal delegate who needs no introduction. Several bishops who know Wright only by name have asked to have him pointed out, or to be introduced to him, because of their esteem for his work. In some cases, bishops have said that meeting Wright has been a highlight of the synod.

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In response to a suit initiated by others, we are asking the courts to rule that we were within our rights to insist that the clergy at the parishes involved have indeed abandoned their ministry in our Canadian church. We contend they said so in a letter to the bishop last May as they handed in their licences from him and purported to join another church, based in Argentina.

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Obama’s ability to keep his cool under fire ”“ and not attack back ”“ “should certainly have an initial positive for Obama,” says Ben Voth, a forensics expert at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “The question is whether any lingering doubts would creep in later.”

Mr. Voth also says McCain’s “base of supporters were probably satisfied that he did venture into the aggressive waters they wanted him to.”

McCain’s biggest problems are that there are fewer than three weeks until Election Day, and the nation is in a financial crisis. A bad economy is poison to the party that controls the White House, and McCain came right out of the starting gate Wednesday night aiming to show sympathy with the people ”“ and promising action.

“Americans are hurting right now, and they’re angry,” he said, calling his fellow citizens “innocent victims of greed and excess on Wall Street as well as Washington, D.C.”

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