Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who alone does wondrous things. Blessed be his glorious name for ever; may his glory fill the whole earth! Amen and Amen!

–Psalm 72: 18,19

Vast economic discontent marked the mood of Tuesday’s off-year voters, portending potential trouble for incumbents generally and Democrats in particular in 2010. Still the gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey looked less like a referendum on Barack Obama than a reflection of their own candidates and issues.

The gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey looked less like a referendum on Barack Obama than a reflection of their own candidates and issues. Still, the two Republican victories, in predominantly Democratic New Jersey and in purple Virginia, had to smart.

Just under half the voters in Virginia, 48 percent, approved of the way Obama is handling his job, rising to 57 percent in New Jersey. Most in both states, in any case, said the president was not a factor in their vote.

Perhaps most striking were economic views: A vast 89 percent in New Jersey and 85 percent in Virginia said they were worried about the direction of the nation’s economy in the next year; 56 percent and 53 percent, respectively, said they were “very” worried about it.

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Independents who swept Barack Obama to a historic 2008 victory broke big for Republicans on Tuesday as the GOP wrested political control from Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey, a troubling sign for the president and his party heading into an important midterm election year.

Conservative Republican Bob McDonnell’s victory in the Virginia governor’s race over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds and moderate Republican Chris Christie’s ouster of unpopular New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine was a double-barreled triumph for a party looking to rebuild after being booted from power in national elections in 2006 and 2008.

Elsewhere on Tuesday, Maine voters rejected a state law that would allow same-sex couples to wed. If supporters had prevailed, it would have marked the first time that the electorate in any state endorsed gay marriage.

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First, a little history: “Crossing the Tiber” has always been an option for members of the Church of England. In the 19th century there was the famous case of Henry (later Cardinal) Newman, who left a distinguished position as a Oxford professor to become a Roman Catholic. He experienced, along with other Anglican clergy who joined him, a welcome which was anything but warm. Newman was re-ordained as a Roman Catholic priest and for some years languished in a poor and obscure parish in Birmingham before his new bosses finally realized that this convert possessed one of the greatest theological minds of the age. Only then was he given the position he deserved.

Closer to our own time, a group of married Episcopal clergy who were admitted into the Roman Church because of their refusal to accept the ordination of women in the 1970s found that they were regarded with suspicion by their new congregants and most experienced unhappy and frustrating pastorates.

This current invitation is a bit different in that those going to Rome have been promised that they can maintain their Anglican ways (Prayerbook, etc) and even have oversight by former Anglican bishops. Still those priests and bishops will be ruled by the Vatican. The reason dissenting Episcopalians left our church is that they didn’t like control. I doubt many of them would be anxious to trade in their current relative independence for orders from the Chair of St Peter.

It might be a different story in England where there is a much more pronounced Anglo-Catholic wing of the Church of England….

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Today the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh formally released 135 priests and deacons who have not been active in the Episcopal Church since October of last year.

In letters being mailed today from Bishop Kenneth L. Price, Jr. to each of the affected clergy, the diocese is making good on its offer to release the individuals from their licensed ministry in the Episcopal Church in a way that does not involve disciplinary action.

“The Diocese will proceed to notify the Recorder of Ordinations to remove you from the list of clergy licensed to exercise ordained ministry in The Episcopal Church,” Bishop Price writes in his letter.

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For Kristy Weenen and St. Thomas, Brooklin, it was a new beginning.

Ms. Weenen, 17, was baptized during the consecration service for St. Thomas, Brooklin’s new worship space.

“It was like I was being baptized along with the church,” said Ms. Weenen afterwards. “I was being welcomed into the church, and at the same time I was welcoming the church into its new life. It was an amazing experience.”

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Several weeks ago, the Rev. Canon Dr. Alison Barfoot was approached by a rector from the Diocese of South Carolina who wanted to build relationships between his parish and the Church of Uganda. It was the type of meeting ”” a “divine appointment,” she calls it ”” that moves her to awe and joy. When people ask how they can pray for her, she requests divine appointments, health and safety.

Dr. Barfoot, who completed a Doctor in Ministry from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in 1999, is Assistant for International Relations to the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi, Archbishop of the Church of Uganda.

Why are these meetings important? While in Herndon, Va., for a missions conference sponsored by the Anglican District of Virginia and Anglican Global Missions Partners on Oct. 24, Dr. Barfoot said, “I’m a matchmaker.” While Americans typically use that term for arranging romantic relationships, Dr. Barfoot’s matchmaking is in the service of a larger goal: She wants to deepen relationships among Anglicans with the Church of Uganda.

“The call that God gave to me is to see eastern Africa as a missionary force,” she told conference participants. “A mission force for the unreached ”” that’s my passion.”

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The woman who heads the area Anglican diocese has a question nagging at her, a question she spoke about passionately during a recent sermon at St. John’s the Baptist Episcopal Church in the Seacliff area.

That question is whether a 12-year-old Tanzanian boy named Sadiki would still be alive if she had not encountered him one day, in March, in a remote area of that East African country.

Bishop Mary Gray-Reeves told of that brief encounter movingly and with self-reproach.

It is a story that changed her life, the boy’s life and struck a chord with many others, Gray-Reeves said. It is undeniably tragic, yet growth has sprung from it.

The chance meeting with a disfigured child — an epileptic scarred and infected after falling into a cooking fire during a seizure — has led to a campaign by church members in the diocese to provide solar cooking classes, scholarships and other help to the boy’s village.

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Durham Cathedral, which would co-host the event with the University, is commonly regarded as the finest Romanesque building in the world and, together with the University-owned Durham Castle and Palace Green, is a recognised UNESCO world heritage site.

At a time of some increased sensitivity in Anglican-Roman Catholic relations, the strong ecumenical character of the invitation is very significant. The invitation is led by Dr Tom Wright both as Lord Bishop of Durham and as the University’s senior representative, and Mrs Maggie Wright, but is counter-signed and fully supported by Bishop Seamus Cunningham of the Catholic Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle, the Chapter of Durham Cathedral, the Abbot of Ampleforth Abbey and the President of Ushaw College, the Catholic seminary for the North of England.

Bishop Wright said: “Durham has in recent years become a major global centre for ecumenical work and the close interlinking of Cathedral and University means that Durham is well placed to host an event which is simultaneously academic and ecumenically spiritual.”

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A top Vatican official has joined other global Christian leaders in the eastern German town where Martin Luther broke with the papacy, at a tree-planting ceremony that looks to closer ties on the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017.

The ceremony took place in Wittenberg, the German town known as “Lutherstadt”, 492 years after Luther nailed his epoch-changing 95 theses to a church door there, leading to the breach with the 16th-century papacy

“It is possible for us today to together learn from Martin Luther,” said Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity as he planted the first of 500 trees on 1 November in a landscaped Luther Garden, forming part of the celebrations for 2017.

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More than ever, we need to renew our vision of what it means to be an evangelical Anglican. My conviction is that not only is being evangelical the most authentic way of being Anglican ”“ we’ve been saying that for years – but also that being Anglican is a great way of being evangelical.

How come?

Firstly, because the Anglican formularies (the 39 Articles, the Prayer-Book and the Homilies) subject themselves at every turn to the authority of scripture. Though they provide an extraordinarily rich theological foundation, they also offer themselves to be tested against a scriptural norm.

Second, because Anglicanism has a great sense of what is of primary and what is of secondary importance. Other Protestant denominations have a tendency to make secondary issues ”“ like the manner of baptism or church discipline or church government ”“ a primary distinguishing mark. And they endlessly divide because of it. The Anglican formularies commit us to important things ”“ and allow us freedom under Scripture on the secondaries. What a blessing!

Third, Anglicanism is a great mission strategy. From the beginning, Cranmer and the others knew that they were in a battle for hearts ”“ hearts, like Catherine Parr’s, that needed conversion. Today, the opportunities opening up for mission because of our Anglican networks ”“ in Sydney and elsewhere – are extraordinary.

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Young Anglican vicars are facing the prospect of a bleaker retirement after the Church of England’s pension scheme succumbed to the “cult of equity” and sank 100 per cent of its investments into stocks towards the end of the 1990s bull market.

The Church of England’s current pension scheme for the clergy is now considering sharply curtailing the rate at which they accrue benefits. For a young clergyman, aged 30, these benefits could turn out to be less than half of what recent retirees are receiving.

Shaun Farrell, chief executive of the Church of England Pensions Board, said the collapse of share prices had driven a “huge great hole” in the finances of the scheme, which was created in January 1998. But he said the scheme had invested in equities because its pay-out date was a long way off and “equities will give you the highest returns over the long run”.

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Most likely, the militia (and its sponsors) targeted Mabior because he was a prominent, beloved leader in the community. He had recently become archbishop of Twic East diocese, newly formed to accommodate the fast-growing church in Bor county, which is part of Jonglei state in South Sudan.

While the Obama administration has focused on legendary atrocities in Darfur, the western region of Sudan, the UN reports that the rate of violent deaths in South Sudan now surpasses that in Darfur. Lise Grande, UN Deputy Resident Coordinator in Southern Sudan, recently said more than 2,000 people had died and 250,000 had been displaced by inter-ethnic violence across the region.

Witnesses report that Mabior was shot twice in the legs and that his attackers may have also used a military knife called a “sonki.” After the first shots, 30 men and women from the church and town, including tribal chiefs, soldiers, a university student and other youth leaders, and several of the town’s oral historians, covered Mabior with their own bodies. All 30 gave their lives in their effort to protect him. Mabior died two hours later.

In the aftermath of Mabior’s death the Episcopal Church of Sudan is grieving: “Everyone in the diocese of Bor and the diocese of Twic East is painfully shocked and devastated at losing Joseph. Archdeacon Mabior was a father to many and a mentor to many of us who are clergy,” said John Chol Daau, a priest of Bor diocese currently studying at Trinity School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa., and a former Lost Boy of Sudan who worked closely with Mabior.

After Mabior’s death, Daau phoned Nathaniel Garang, the bishop of Bor. “Son, I lost a strong man, a follower of the living Christ who never hesitated to preach the gospel of Christ to our people,” Garang said as he wept. “He was like my frontline captain as he and I preached the gospel . . . a great intercessor . . . a pastor and a leader . . . full of patience and love . . . very humble. . . . He would always want to care and serve in any circumstance.”

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President Hamid Karzai, in his first speech since he was declared the winner of the much-disputed presidential election, said Tuesday that he wanted to tackle corruption but made no specific commitments to reorganize his administration.

“Afghanistan has been tarnished by administrative corruption and I will launch a campaign to clean the government of corruption,” he said.

Asked if that might involve changing key ministers and officials, he said, “These problems cannot be solved by changing high-ranking officials. We’ll review the laws and see what problems are in the law and we will draft some new laws.”

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Mgr Andrew Faley [director of ecumenism for the Bishops Conference of England and Wales]: ‘Well, I think there is an answer to it and I can understand why Bishop Gregory should say what he has said. However, I can’t really believe that the Archbishop of Canterbury, over the past several years, has not been aware of the disaffection and the unease of several groups of Anglicans within the Anglican Communion concerning particular issues within that Church which have caused them to be increasingly nervous about what it means to be in unity with that church.

‘Now, the Pope is not an ill-mannered man, as far as I’m aware, it’s not so much about ecumenical bad manners as the Pope’s concern for the unity of the church.

‘As Bishop Christopher Hill said in the joint press conference announcing this particular initiative between ”“ or sorry, not initiative, response ”“ between himself and the Archbishop of Canterbury and also Archbishop Nichols of Westminster, and Archbishop McDonald of Southwark, were present, the four of them – he said, look the last thing we want is more churches.

‘This move of the Pope is directly concerned with the unity of the church. That it’s not so much about wanting just to stand back, therefore, and see the Anglican Communion disintegrate into more and more churches. That’s exactly what Gregory doesn’t want. That’s exactly what I don’t want.’

Read it all or better yet listen to the whole podcast from which it is quoting.

Never before has this country seen so many women paralyzed by the psychological scars of combat. As of June 2008, 19,084 female veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan had received diagnoses of mental disorders from the Department of Veterans Affairs, including 8,454 women with a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress ”” and this number does not include troops still enlisted, or those who have never used the V.A. system.

Their mental anguish, from mortar attacks, the deaths of friends, or traumas that are harder to categorize, is a result of a historic shift. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the military has quietly sidestepped regulations that bar women from jobs in ground combat. With commanders needing resources in wars without front lines, women have found themselves fighting on dusty roads and darkened outposts in ways that were never imagined by their parents or publicly authorized by Congress. And they have distinguished themselves in the field.

Psychologically, it seems, they are emerging as equals. Officials with the Department of Defense said that initial studies of male and female veterans with similar time outside the relative security of bases in Iraq showed that mental health issues arose in roughly the same proportion for members of each sex, though research continues.

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The idea that the government of a major advanced country would default on its debt — that is, tell lenders that it won’t repay them all they’re owed — was, until recently, a preposterous proposition. Argentina and Russia have stiffed their creditors, but surely the likes of the United States, Japan or Britain wouldn’t. Well, it’s still a very, very long shot, but it’s no longer entirely unimaginable. Governments of rich countries are borrowing so much that it’s conceivable that one day the twin assumptions underlying their burgeoning debt (that lenders will continue to lend and that governments will continue to pay) might collapse. What happens then?

The question is so unfamiliar that the past provides few clues to the future. Psychology is crucial. To take a parallel example: the dollar. The fear is that foreigners (and Americans, too) will lose confidence in its value and dump it for yen, euros, gold or oil. If too many investors do that, a self-fulfilling stampede could trigger sell-offs in U.S. stocks and bonds. People have predicted such a crisis for decades. It hasn’t happened yet. The currency’s decline has been orderly, because the dollar retains a bedrock confidence based on America’s political stability, openness, wealth and low inflation. But something could shatter that confidence — tomorrow or 10 years from tomorrow.

The same logic applies to exploding government debt….

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Toward the end [of my talk] , I reflected on the next generation of Catholic leaders. Most empirical data has pegged this cohort of young priests, religious and lay activists as more “conservative,” and there’s a good deal of truth to that claim. In general, they’re more attracted to traditional modes of devotion and prayer, less resistant to ecclesiastical authority, and less inclined to challenge church teaching and discipline.

Yet, I argued, slapping the label “conservative” on all this is potentially misleading, because it assumes an ideological frame of reference, as if younger Catholics are picking one side or the other in the church’s version of the culture wars. My sense is that these young people are not so much reacting to (or against) anything in the church, but rather secular culture. In a nutshell, they’re seeking identity and stability in a world that seems to offer neither.

Proof of the point comes when you drill with these young Catholics. You’ll find they often hold views on a wide variety of issues — such as the environment, war and peace, the defense of the poor and of immigrants, and the death penalty — which don’t really fit the ideological stereotype.

These observations are hardly unique to me, of course, but I included them because I wanted to issue a plea to Catholics my age and older.

This new generation seems ideally positioned to address the lamentable tendency in American Catholic life to drive a wedge between the church’s pro-life message and its peace-and-justice commitments. More generally, they can help us find the sane middle between two extremes: What George Weigel correctly calls “Catholicism lite,” meaning a form of the faith sold out to secularism; and what I’ve termed “Taliban Catholicism,” meaning an angry expression of Catholicism that knows only how to excoriate and condemn. Both are real dangers, and the next generation seems well-equipped to steer a middle course, embracing a robust sense of Catholic identity without carrying a chip on their shoulder.

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Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s election by default Monday confirms at least a week earlier than expected that the Obama administration will continue for the foreseeable future to have the same mercurial partner in Afghanistan.

Karzai was expected to win the Nov. 7 runoff election easily and continue in the role he has held for nearly eight years, just as President Obama enters the final stage of deciding whether to escalate U.S. involvement in the war.

But the departure of Karzai’s chief rival, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, deprives him of a genuine win at the polls and potentially undermines the Obama administration’s goal of building a legitimate government in Kabul.

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…the Anglican experiment is far from over. For in a world of mounting religious tension, now more than ever we need the witness of precisely the sort peace treaty attempted by the Church of England.

Not, of course, that we as a church have been very good at resolving our differences over women bishops. Which gets us to the core of the problem. What happens when principles clash?

This isn’t a churchy problem to be waved away by those not involved. For what’s at stake here is how we live alongside those with whom we fundamentally disagree. The Anglican answer has always made peaceful co-existence the priority. And that can mean compromising one’s principles in the name of a greater good. And yet, of course, compromise has a limit – especially when the issue is regarded by many as a fundamental question of justice. So here then is the tragedy: even in a church of natural compromisers, compromise can’t always keep people together.

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Starting Sunday, cash-strapped California will dig deeper into the pocketbooks of wage earners — holding back 10% more than it already does in state income taxes just as the biggest shopping season of the year kicks into gear.

Technically, it’s not a tax increase, even though it may feel like one when your next paycheck arrives. As part of a bundle of budget patches adopted in the summer, the state is taking more money now in withholding, even though workers’ annual tax bills won’t change.

Think of it as a forced, interest-free loan: You’ll be repaid any extra withholding in April. Those who would receive a refund anyway will receive a larger one, and those who owe taxes will owe less.

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Quoting Cardinal William Joseph Levada, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the statement denies that the delay of the constitution’s publication is due to differing positions within the Holy See.

The note revealed that the constitution is expected to be completed by the end of the first week of November, along with a list of guidelines that will be followed in receiving these Anglican communities into the Church.

“The delay is purely technical in the sense of ensuring consistency in canonical language and references,” said Cardinal Levada in the clarification.

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Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, retired archbishop of Westminster, said a forthcoming apostolic constitution to establish “personal ordinariates” should not be seen as an attempt by the Vatican to poach Anglicans disaffected by such issues as the ordination of women and sexually active homosexuals as priests and bishops.

The former Catholic co-chairman of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission made his remarks in the Richard Stewart Memorial Lecture at Worth Abbey, near London, Oct. 29. He said the canonical structures announced in Rome and London Oct. 20 were simply a generous response to requests over a number of years by Anglican communities that wanted to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while preserving elements of distinctive spiritual patrimony.

“There is much that has been written and spoken about this matter over the past week but I would just want to emphasize that this response of Pope Benedict is no reflection or comment on the Anglican Communion as a whole or of our ongoing ecumenical relationship with them,” said the cardinal, 77, the former president of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.

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In recent years, some Americans have come to view science and religion as consistent antagonists, butting heads over everything from the origin of the cosmos to when human life begins (abortion) and when it ends (euthanasia).

Conservative denominations, like the Southern Baptists, Catholics, Assemblies of God and some non-denominational evangelicals, object to particular areas of scientific research ”” embryonic stem cells and cloning, for instance. By contrast, mainline Protestant and Jewish denominations, as well as Hindu and Muslim communities, have tended to support embryonic stem cell research, adding a new voice to such highly politicized debates.

What is sometimes obscured by the clamor is that there was once an era in American history when science and religion were considered symbiotic allies, rather than the rancorous adversaries they too often are today.

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The Roman Catholic Diocese of Fall River reacted with cautious optimism, warning that much is still unknown; local Anglican (American Episcopal) clergy said the Vatican decision will have no impact on their congregations.

“It is a most interesting development and quite preliminary at the same time,” said Father Marc H. Bergeron, director of the diocesan Ecumenical and Interfaith Affairs Office. “There are many details that remain to be worked out and possible ramifications go in many directions: What does it mean about celibacy in general? Will the invite go to men not already ordained? What about the pastoral provision already in place here in the USA in a few parishes?”

In 1980, a Vatican-approved provision allowed conservative Anglicans to convert to Catholicism. Consequently, six of these parishes are worshipping in this country.

Yet, it is unclear whether this model will work when the new provision is in place and difficult to predict how many Anglicans will choose to convert.

“American Episcopalians are quite liberal,” Bergeron said. “That seems to limit local interest.”

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There is much litigation going on currently in State courts over the polity of the Episcopal Church. At the same time, there do not appear to be any online versions readily available of ECUSA’s early Constitution, either as originally adopted or as subsequently from time to time amended. The commentary on the history of the Constitution and Canons published in 1981 by Messrs. White & Dykman, and reprinted in 1997, is available for download from this site (along with two supplements written by others, carrying the account through General Convention 1991). However, even it does not have in one place a complete version of ECUSA’s original Constitution, which is so important for understanding the nature of ECUSA’s mixed form of ecclesiastical polity.

Since the nature of ECUSA’s polity is so much in dispute these days, I have decided that as a public service, I will publish in this post the earliest version of the Church’s Constitution, as well as some further historical materials leading up to its formulation. The purpose will be so that everyone may access and understand the Church’s organic evolution (see this earlier post for even more detail and background), out of a meeting of delegates from the various successors, in each new State, of the previously established Church of England in the respective colonies.

Let us begin with the six principles for the formation of a national replacement in the States for the Church of England, as it had existed in the Colonies prior to the Revolutionary War. The Rev. Dr. William White, of Christ Church in Philadelphia, later one of the first Bishops in the newly established Church, first proposed them in a pamphlet which he had published in 1782, entitled The Case of the Episcopal Churches in the United States Considered….

Read it all and please follow all the links also.

Pete Shellem, a reporter for the Central Pennsylvania paper, the Patriot News, died last week. Shellem was best known for his investigative journalism, which directly led to the freeing of four prisoners serving life sentences for murder. Mike Feeley, Shellem’s editor at the paper, recalls Shellem’s accomplished career.

Take the time to listen to it all (a little over 5 minutes total).

In The Warning, veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk unearths the hidden history of the nation’s worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. At the center of it all he finds Brooksley Born, who speaks for the first time on television about her failed campaign to regulate the secretive, multitrillion-dollar derivatives market whose crash helped trigger the financial collapse in the fall of 2008.

“I didn’t know Brooksley Born,” says former SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt, a member of President Clinton’s powerful Working Group on Financial Markets. “I was told that she was irascible, difficult, stubborn, unreasonable.” Levitt explains how the other principals of the Working Group — former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan and former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin — convinced him that Born’s attempt to regulate the risky derivatives market could lead to financial turmoil, a conclusion he now believes was “clearly a mistake.”

Take the time to watch it all and take special note of who the key characters are.

A Michigan native who believes his church can make a difference in the staggering rate of reservation suicides was ordained Saturday as the 10th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of South Dakota.

Six hundred people gathered in the Sioux Falls Convention Center to witness the ordination and consecration of the Rev. John Tarrant in a two-hour ceremony.
Tarrant will succeed the current bishop, the Rev. Creighton Robertson, who is expected to retire at the end of the year.

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But weeks into his reign, [Bishop Lawrence] Provenzano faces another challenge: The Vatican last month announced it is setting up a new structure to allow Anglicans or their entire parishes to more easily switch to the Roman Catholic Church. This would allow married Anglican priests to continue to operate within the Catholic Church.

The move appears aimed at attracting Anglicans – or Episcopalians, as they are known in the United States – who oppose their church’s embrace of female priests and gay bishops.

Provenzano, 54, is taking it all in stride and says he is not taking any special steps to prevent defections. “This all becomes a distraction to us in terms of really doing what we are called to do, and that is preaching the Gospel, taking care of the poor, taking care of the homeless,” he said. He added that “I don’t think any parish in our diocese will take this invitation” by the Vatican. There are nearly 150 Episcopalian parishes in the Long Island diocese.

Still, some of his initial comments created a stir. Shortly after Rome’s announcement in late October, he wrote, “At the heart of all this is the reality that the Roman Catholic Church is willing to welcome angry, reactionary, misogynistic, homophobic people.”

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