Push play–powerful and painful.

Chancellor, Bishop Ajayi Crowther University, Oyo, Oyo State, Most Rev. Peter Akinola, has said the situation in the country indicates that the vision, sacrifice and labour of “our past heroes are now virtually in vain.”

He berated the nation’s leaders for sending their children to foreign schools with tax payers money after grounding the educational system.

Akinola argued that between 1990 and 2002, the federal budgetary allocation to the education sector only existed on paper, judging by the disparity between published figures and disbursments.

Akinola, who is also the Primate, Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion), spoke at the university’s maiden convocation on Monday. He spoke shortly after his investiture as the chancellor of the university by the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Olajire Olaniran.

Read it all.

England’s cathedrals are the country’s largest, most historic and most complex buildings yet they are generally in good repair and continuing to add to their glories by commissioning new works from fonts to fire doors and from choir schools to cafés, according to a new survey from English Heritage.

The English Heritage Cathedrals Fabric Condition Survey 2009 published today shows that cathedrals have spent more than £250 million on repairs since 1991 and most critical work has now been been done.

Over the next 10 years cathedrals need to spend some £100 million on mainly routine repairs, but relatively few of these are urgent, and more than £75 million of new developments are planned.

Only six cathedrals still need to carry out major repair programmes in the next 10 years: Canterbury – £16m, York – £8m, Lincoln – £13m or more, Salisbury – £15m, Chichester – £10m, Winchester – £4m. This leaves the other 55 cathedrals needing to spend an average of less than £1m each over the next 10 years.

Read it all.

In the past two months, relations between the three main Christian churches have moved in more promising directions than perhaps during the past 50 years of uninspiring liberal dialogue. By opening a new chapter of theological engagement and concrete co-operation with Orthodoxy and Anglicanism, Pope Benedict XVI is changing the terms of debate about church reunification. In time, we might witness the end of the Great Schism between east and west and a union of the main episcopally-based churches.

First there was the Rome visit in September by the Russian Orthodox Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk, Moscow’s man for ecumenical relations. In high-level meetings, both sides argued that their shared resistance to secularism and moral relativism calls forth a further rapprochement of Orthodoxy and Catholicism. Declaring that “More than ever, we Christians must stand together”, Hilarion insisted that each side can appeal to shared traditions and work towards greater closeness in a spirit of “mutual respect and love”.

That this was more than diplomatic protocol was confirmed by the Catholic Archbishop of Moscow, Monsignor Paolo Pezzi. In an interview with the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, he said that union between Catholics and Orthodox “is possible, indeed it has never been so close”. The formal end of the Great Schism of 1054, which has divided the two churches for a millennium, and the move towards full spiritual communion “could happen soon”.

Read it all.

The world’s religious situation has not greatly changed. True, the old gods of Greece and Rome have long since been discredited and discarded. But new gods have arisen in their place, and other ancient faiths have experienced a resurgence. As a result of modern communication media and ease of travel, many countries are increasingly pluralistic. What people want is an easy-going syncretism, a truce in inter-religious competition, a mishmash of the best from all religions. But we Christians cannot surrender either the finality or the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. There is simply nobody else like him; his incarnation, atonement and resurrection have no parallels. In consequence, he is the one and only mediator between God and the human race. This exclusive affirmation is strongly, even bitterly, resented. It is regarded by many as intolerably intolerant. Yet the claims of truth compel us to maintain it, however much offence it may cause.

–John R.W. Stott, The Contemporary Christian (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1992), p. 64.

Roman Catholic bishops have made big news recently by wielding significant influence over health-care debates in Congress. Many pundits and politicians are outraged at the bishops for ensuring passage of the controversial Stupak amendment, which critics argue rolls back access to a legal medical procedure as part of health-care reform. Some lawmakers have questioned the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ tax exempt status. “Do Catholic Bishops Run the United States Government?” a recent Huffington Post headline harrumphed. One editorial cartoon depicted the U.S. Capitol dome replaced by the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica. As a Catholic and progressive who values my faith tradition’s commitment to the common good on such diverse issues as poverty reduction, immigration reform, nuclear disarmament and health care, I’ve been grappling to articulate a thoughtful response to the wave of headlines. Sound-bites don’t cut it.

For many decades, Catholic bishops have been leading advocates for universal health care as a fundamental human right. Catholic hospitals serve the poor and most vulnerable on the front lines of this crisis every day. One out of every six patients receives medical care from a Catholic hospital. The Catholic Church, which operates some 600 hospitals and 1,000 long-term care facilities and clinics, is the largest non-governmental provider of health care in the nation. The bishops’ Migration and Refugee Services staff have often been lonely voices advocating for both legal and undocumented immigrants to have quality health care, a politically charged issue even some liberal elected officials refuse to touch.

Catholic leaders are not newcomers to health care and earned a seat at the table….

Read it all.

When the D.C. Council votes Tuesday on a historic measure to legalize same-sex marriage in the District, one of the most visible faces of opposition will be an unlikely one: Catholic Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl, a mild-mannered man known for compromise, pragmatism and working behind the scenes.

For most of his three years in the nation’s capital, Wuerl, 69, has avoided the limelight — a prelate who prays in front of abortion clinics without calling in the cameras. His profile has been so low that some D.C. Council members — who are expected to overwhelmingly approve a bill giving gay couples the right to marry — said they have never met the highest-ranking Catholic official in the Washington region.

Wuerl’s emergence as a vocal opponent of same-sex marriage came late, after a summer of activism led by Bishop Harry Jackson, pastor of a Pentecostal Beltsville church, and a small group of conservative clergy. But in the final days before the vote, Wuerl became the most influential opponent of the bill by using the church’s social service arm, Catholic Charities, as a negotiating tool. The Church said it would not be able to continue taking $18 million to $20 million in city funding for homeless shelters, medical clinics and other charitable endeavors if the wording of the law forced the Church to violate its teachings on marriage.

Read it all.

The 2008 parochial reports show overall church membership at 2,225,682 people, with a total average Sunday attendance (ASA) at 747,376. Those totals compare with 2007 membership of 2,285,143 and total average Sunday attendance 768,476. The dioceses in the United States saw a 2.8 percent drop in membership and a 3.1 percent decrease in ASA. Overall church membership — including 10 non-U.S. dioceses — was down 2.6 percent and attendance dropped 2.7 percent for the entire church.

The median Episcopal Church congregation in 2008 had 164 active members (down four members from 2007) and 69 people in Sunday worship, the same as in the previous year. Membership declines in the Episcopal Church mirror a pattern seen in other Christian denominations. Recent nationwide data shows the median non-Roman Catholic congregation has 75 regular participants at worship on Sundays.

Four domestic Episcopal Church dioceses grew during 2008 in both overall membership and average Sunday attendance: Alabama, Navajoland Area Mission, North Dakota and Wyoming.

Read it all.

The recent Anglican-Roman Catholic Bishops’ Dialogue held in Vancouver has produced a joint statement outlining concerns about human trafficking at the February 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver-Whistler.

Calling the Olympic Games “a celebration of human development through sport,” the statement also made it clear that the bishops are united as they “stand together to call attention to the profound social ill of human trafficking.”

Read it all.

So, no, I do not make this decision lightly. I make this decision because I am convinced that our security is at stake in Afghanistan and Pakistan. This is the epicenter of violent extremism practiced by al Qaeda. It is from here that we were attacked on 9/11, and it is from here that new attacks are being plotted as I speak. This is no idle danger; no hypothetical threat. In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. And this danger will only grow if the region slides backwards, and al Qaeda can operate with impunity. We must keep the pressure on al Qaeda, and to do that, we must increase the stability and capacity of our partners in the region.

Of course, this burden is not ours alone to bear. This is not just America’s war. Since 9/11, al Qaeda’s safe havens have been the source of attacks against London and Amman and Bali. The people and governments of both Afghanistan and Pakistan are endangered. And the stakes are even higher within a nuclear-armed Pakistan, because we know that al Qaeda and other extremists seek nuclear weapons, and we have every reason to believe that they would use them.

These facts compel us to act along with our friends and allies. Our overarching goal remains the same: to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and to prevent its capacity to threaten America and our allies in the future.

To meet that goal, we will pursue the following objectives within Afghanistan. We must deny al Qaeda a safe haven. We must reverse the Taliban’s momentum and deny it the ability to overthrow the government. And we must strengthen the capacity of Afghanistan’s security forces and government so that they can take lead responsibility for Afghanistan’s future.

Read it carefully and read it all.

An interesting site run by Philip Camill, Rusack Associate Professor of Environmental Studies and Biology and Director of the Environmental Studies Program at Bowdoin College–check it out.

Church leaders in the region voiced support yesterday for a decision handed down over the weekend by Episcopal Bishop M. Thomas Shaw that will allow church clergy in Eastern Massachusetts to officiate at the marriages of same-sex couples.

The bishop’s decision is a controversial one, handed down after the General Convention of the Episcopal Church provided new doctrine to bishops enabling them to make the change. But church leaders from Amesbury, West Newbury and Newburyport say allowing gay couples the same rights as everyone else to commit to one another is the right thing to do.

“I’m very proud of our church for doing the right thing once again,” said the Rev. Victoria Pretti of West Newbury’s All Saints Church of the ruling. “I think people understand there could be reactions ”” positive and negative ”” but the beauty and the joy of being Episcopalian is being a member of a church where people can differ in opinion and still love each other and worship with one another. I view it as a very good and positive thing.”

Read it all.

“No matter where they’ve attended school,” the reader is assured in Becoming a Master Student, the most widely used text intended to orient incoming freshmen, “liberally educated people can state what they’re willing to bet their lives on.” But this otherwise helpful book fails to give students direction on how to discover such confidence.

Read it all.

Barack Obama is to set an ambitious timetable for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan, with the first troops pulling out by July 2011. The announcement is aimed at countering US public fears that the country is being sucked into a Vietnam-style morass.

Reflecting the increased sense of urgency, Obama is to speed deployment of an extra 30,000 American troops to Afghanistan within the next six months ”“ a much faster timetable than the 12 to 18 months that had been briefed by US officials up until today.

The 30,000 figure is lower than requested by the US commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, but the Obama administration is hoping that other Nato countries will make up the difference. A senior administration official said the Nato secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, will announce the deployment of extra troops on Friday.

Read it all.

The information on the nominees may be found here; note the links to biographical information as well as the link to the videos toward the bottom of the page.

The Rt. Rev. Mark MacDonald has questioned Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori’s assertion that he must renounce his orders as a bishop of the Episcopal Church because of his ministry in Canada.

The former Bishop of Alaska and Assistant Bishop of Navajoland now serves as the Anglican Church of Canada’s National Indigenous Bishop.

Bishop MacDonald told The Living Church he was “shocked and surprised” by the Presiding Bishop’s remarks on his ministry, adding that he has “written to her asking for clarification.”

“I am on loan to the Anglican Church of Canada under the PB’s supervision. I have an unofficial position, with no set authority or jurisdiction,” he said.

Read it all.

In late 2006, Gen. David Petraeus and Gen. James F. Amos released a brilliant book with a thrilling title. It was called the “Army/Marine Corps Field Manual 3-24.” In its quiet way, this book helped overturn conventional wisdom on modern warfare and gave leaders a new way to see the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

It’s a mistake to think you can succeed in conflicts like these by defeating the enemy in battle, the manual said. Instead, these wars are better seen as political arguments for the loyalty of the population. Get villagers to work with you by offering them security. Provide services by building courts and schools and police. Over the long term, transfer authority to legitimate local governments.

This approach, called COIN, has reshaped military thinking, starting with the junior officers who developed it and then spreading simultaneously up and down the chain of command….

The administration seems to have spent the past few months trying to pare back the COIN strategy and adjust it to real world constraints….

Read it all.

You may also read more here.

The Anglican diocese of Quebec is “teetering on the verge of extinction” as parish finances continue to collapse and the number of parishioners dwindles.

This doom-and-gloom message was delivered to the recent Canadian House of Bishops meeting here by Bishop Dennis Drainville, who declared that he could possibly be “the last bishop of Quebec.”

Bishop Drainville urged the House of Bishops to have a “new vision” and to look at how “old relationships and structures” can be changed to respond to the needs of the times….

Quebec will not be the only diocese to falter, he warned. “There will be many other dioceses that will fail.”

Read it all.

The third phase of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission will begin with the new year.

The decision to move into this new phase in 2010 follows the Nov. 21 meeting between Benedict XVI and the Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, a Vatican communiqué reported Saturday.

During that meeting, the religious leaders “reaffirmed their desire to strengthen ecumenical relations between Anglicans and Roman Catholics.”

On Nov. 23, there was a meeting of the committee responsible for preparing the third phase of this commission.

The communiqué explained that “this third phase will deal with fundamental questions regarding the Church as Communion Local and Universal, and how in communion the local and universal Church comes to discern right ethical teaching.”

Read it all.

No. 2 — the longest section of the [Manhattan] declaration — applies to same-sex marriage. It amounts to a confession of confusion, a cry by the perplexed who have come to think that same-sex marriage is at the core — the rotten core — of much that ails our society. Everything from divorce to promiscuity is addressed in this section without any acknowledgement that same-sex marriage, like all marriage, is a way of containing promiscuity (or at least of inducing guilt) and that not having it would not reduce promiscuity in the least. This I state as a fact.
ad_icon

The declaration calls the out-of-wedlock birth rate the “most telling and alarming indicator” of a collapse of the “marriage culture.” Yes. But that collapse occurred long before same-sex marriage became an issue, not to mention a reality, and so one has nothing to do with the other.

It remains true that the family is the single best place to raise children. That being the case, same-sex marriage would serve the same purpose. I know of children raised by same-sex partners and they seem no worse for the experience, although — O’Reilly beware — they lack a certain knee-jerk antipathy to gays, lesbians, transsexuals and similar people of dissimilar sexuality.

Some of the declaration is couched in religious terms, and with that I cannot argue. But it is its appeal to common sense that I find so appalling.

Read it all.

But what is the Pope offering disenchanted Anglican flock? Is it that “enticing”? The invitation to Catholicism for the Anglicans hasn’t yet been structured but there may be separate services held in Catholic churches. There may also be special prayer books and training centres but the chain of command will still lead to the Pope.

The migrant Anglicans may also have to accept all Roman Catholic doctrine and teachings and could use elements of Anglican tradition. However, this is the jewel in the Nile for most; married Anglican clergy can still be ordained as Roman Catholic Priests with a view to eventually providing pastoral care for other former Anglicans.

This is where the olive branch offered by the Pope becomes somewhat tainted. Celibacy is a requirement to join the Catholic priesthood and if so, won’t the ordainment of married Anglican clergy as Roman priests smack of opportunism by the Pope? Why tear up the rulebook to accommodate married Anglicans? Does that mean celibacy will in the future be a non entity for those wishing to be Roman priests? Are all Catholics happy with this cross fertilisation?

Read the whole article.

The revised strategy for Afghanistan that President Obama will announce Tuesday is expected to focus new resources on training Afghan security forces and shoring up the central government, an approach certain to revive a debate about the possibilities and the limits of nation-building.

From Somalia, Cambodia, East Timor and the Balkans in the 1990s to Iraq today, world powers have at best a mixed record when it comes to establishing functional, stable governments in countries devastated by war. The efforts have been long and costly, tangible results often hard to measure, and support for a prolonged involvement difficult to maintain.

Congressional leaders have already voiced deep skepticism about pouring billions more dollars into an American-led war that so far has shown little progress toward making Afghanistan self-sustaining.

“You can’t be half in and half out,” said Jonathan T. Howe, a retired Navy admiral who led an ill-fated U.N. reconstruction effort in Somalia in 1993.

Read it all.

Sea levels will rise by twice as much as previously predicted as a result of global warming, an important international study has concluded.

The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) calculated that if temperatures continued to increase at the present rate, by 2100 the sea level would rise by up to 1.4 metres ”” twice that predicted two years ago.

Such a rise in sea levels would engulf island nations such as the Maldives in the Indian Ocean and Tuvalu in the Pacific, devastate coastal cities such as Calcutta and Dhaka and force London, New York and Shanghai to spend billions on flood defences.

Read the whole article.

The pending Ugandan legislation that would imprison for life or execute people who violate that country’s anti-homosexuality laws would be a “terrible violation of the human rights of an already persecuted minority,” Episcopal Church House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson has said.

Anderson was responding to a Nov. 16 request that Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, Archbishop Henri Orombi of Uganda and she speak out against the legislation. Anderson is the first to issue a statement.

Homosexuality in Uganda currently carries a penalty of up to 14 years imprisonment. If passed, the bill would extend prison sentences for homosexuals up to and including life imprisonment and introduce the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality,” which includes assault against people under the age of 18 and those with disabilities.

Read it all.

Horace Clarence Boyer had a profound impact on gospel music over the past 50 years. He rose to fame in the late 1950s as one half of the Boyer Brothers. He later embarked on an equally important career in music education, becoming one of the first scholars to formally study African-American sacred music.

Boyer died in July at age 74. This month, teachers, students and fans honored him at a memorial service in Central Florida.

The Boyer Brothers hit the road before they were even teenagers. But James Boyer says that their father, a pastor, set some ground rules.

“As little brothers will do, you fight. And my father didn’t want us to fight each other,” James Boyer says. “So he gave us an ultimatum when we were 10 and 11. He said, ‘You cannot go anywhere to sing until you stop fighting a year.’ That was the longest year of my life, and after that, I never hit him again.”

Read the whole thing or listen to it all.

The Swiss vote…[recently] to ban the construction of minarets in their alpine country is rippling across Europe. The vote reflects a fear that some of the oldest Christian societies are becoming Islamicized, but is at odds with efforts to integrate the continent’s roughly 20 million Muslims.

Churches and mainstream political parties urged the Swiss to turn down the proposal, brought by the rightist Swiss People’s Party (SVP). But 57 percent of voters in Sunday’s referendum defied expectations that they would allow a new kind of religious symbol ”“ the tall, slender tower attached to a mosque ”“ to increasingly punctuate Europe’s skyline where steeples once reigned.

For those voters, says religion researcher Jean-François Mayer, minarets are a symbol of Islam and its potential rise in influence ”“ an issue around which many different concerns can crystallize, not just in Switzerland but across Europe. Using a tool not available in other countries, the referendum, Swiss voters sent a clear message.

Read it all.

For years, Ken Uptegrove thought that another Great Depression was at hand.

Uptegrove, a computer professional in Springdale, Ark., started a garden and researched ways to live more simply. He studied the lives of early Christians, and he launched a ministry and a Web site, which he and his wife use to share their beliefs with about 100 visitors a day.

Ideally, one day they’ll move with other self-sufficient Christians — the Uptegroves do not call themselves survivalists — to a remote area where they can raise their own food and be ready should things get any worse.

Inherent in this way of life is the Christian ideal of neighborliness, Uptegrove said. Surviving is not about saving yourself alone, but about coming through disaster with enough strength to help your neighbors, too.

Read it all.

Three House Democrats are ripping a proposed tax on stock transactions, even as the idea gains traction among Democrats desperate to fund jobs creation….

“Proponents of a transaction tax argue that a small 0.25 percent tax on stocks would be paid for by the highly paid financial traders and would not affect most Americans. This is simply not true. A tax on stock transactions would affect every single person who owns and invests in stocks from small business owners to senior citizens,” the letter said.

Read it all.

What is scary [about the story of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan] is that even though he was born, raised and educated in America, The Narrative still got to him.

The Narrative is the cocktail of half-truths, propaganda and outright lies about America that have taken hold in the Arab-Muslim world since 9/11. Propagated by jihadist Web sites, mosque preachers, Arab intellectuals, satellite news stations and books ”” and tacitly endorsed by some Arab regimes ”” this narrative posits that America has declared war on Islam, as part of a grand “American-Crusader-Zionist conspiracy” to keep Muslims down.

Yes, after two decades in which U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny ”” in Bosnia, Darfur, Kuwait, Somalia, Lebanon, Kurdistan, post-earthquake Pakistan, post-tsunami Indonesia, Iraq and Afghanistan ”” a narrative that says America is dedicated to keeping Muslims down is thriving.

Read it all.