A number of newspaper columnists and even Republicans such as former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson praised President Obama for his studied affirmation of American religious rights Friday in supporting the building of a mosque just blocks from ground zero. There, more than 2,700 Americans died on Sept. 11, 2001, at the hands of Islamist terrorists.

But the Obama mosque decision ”“ wading into an issue that White House press secretary Robert Gibbs only days earlier had called “a matter for … the local community to decide” ”“ is also likely to affirm a broadening political view in the United States that the president is out of step with mainstream America. Nearly 70 percent of people feel an Islamic center near ground zero is disrespectful, even deliberately provocative, according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll.

“Ground zero is, indeed, hallowed ground,” Obama told attendees at the second annual White House Ramadan dinner Friday night. “But let me be clear: As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. This is America. And our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable.”

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China surpassed Japan as the world’s second-largest economy last quarter, capping the nation’s three- decade rise from Communist isolation to emerging superpower.

Japan’s nominal gross domestic product for the second quarter totaled $1.288 trillion, less than China’s $1.337 trillion, the Japanese Cabinet Office said today. Japan remained bigger in the first half of 2010, the government agency said.

China led the world out of last year’s global recession with an economy that’s more than 90-times bigger than when leader Deng Xiaoping ditched hard-line Communist policies in favor of free-market reforms in 1978. The country of 1.3 billion people will overtake the U.S., where annual GDP is about $14 trillion, as the world’s largest economy by 2027, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. chief economist Jim O’Neill.

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When more than 1,100 students arrive for the first day of the school year at Beech Hill Elementary today, Principal Rene Harris will be making sure everything is running smoothly.

Teachers will be easing children back into the learning world after lazy summer days. Food service workers will be preparing the first day’s lunch.

And school counselor Tammy Masopust will be helping out in any way she’s needed, while quietly watching for the subtle signs that indicate students might be having problems.

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Seldom does the United States look at Europe with economic envy. The past few weeks, however, have been one of those rare phases. Concern about America’s stumbling recovery has been rising, just as anxieties about the euro area’s economy have faded. The dollar is the weakling among rich-world currencies…. But Americans should take a little heart: it is too soon to despair about their economy. And Europeans should show a little caution: it is too soon to be sure that theirs is firmly back on its feet.

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Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Wonderfully inspiring–watch it all.

Lift up our souls, O Lord, to the pure, serene light of thy presence; that there we may breathe freely, there repose in thy love, there may be at rest from ourselves, and from thence return, arrayed in thy peace, to do and bear what shall please thee; for thy holy name’s sake.

–E. B. Pusey (1800-1882)

O God, who hast taken to thyself the blessed Virgin Mary, mother of thine incarnate Son: Grant that we, who have been redeemed by his blood, may share with her the glory of thine eternal kingdom; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth against him. But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God; and he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God.”

–Acts 7:54-56

See what you make of the post about these terms here.

Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander of American and NATO forces here, began his campaign Sunday to convince an increasingly skeptical public that the American-led coalition can still succeed, saying he had not come to Afghanistan to preside over a “graceful exit.”

In interviews with The New York Times, The Washington Post and “Meet the Press,” General Petraeus said American and NATO troops were making progress on a number of Afghan fronts, including routing Taliban insurgents from their sanctuaries, reforming the Afghan government and preparing Afghan soldiers to fight on their own.

General Petraeus, who took over last month after Gen. Stanley McChrystal was fired by President Obama, said he believed he would be given the time and material necessary to prevail here. He expressed that confidence despite the fact that nearly every phase of the war is going badly ”” and despite the fact that the American public has turned against it.

“The president didn’t send me over here to seek a graceful exit,” the general said from his office at NATO headquarters in downtown Kabul. “My marching orders are to do all that is humanly possible to help us achieve our objectives.”

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As if there weren’t enough hot-button issues for debate in the 2010 midterm elections, Social Security is emerging as another one.

Democrats have been taking the offensive, apparently hoping to use the issue to their advantage as they fight to maintain control of Congress. They’re emphasizing the program’s popularity among Americans, their commitment to protecting it, and their contention that Republicans want to change Social Security to its detriment.

Social Security’s 75th anniversary is Saturday, and Democrats have tied some of their efforts to that milestone. President Obama, for one, talked about Social Security during his weekly address on Saturday.

“We have an obligation … to safeguard Social Security for our seniors, people with disabilities, and all Americans ”“ today, tomorrow, and forever,” he said. “But what we can’t afford to do is privatize Social Security.”

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Through analysis articulated in the Clergy Wellness Report (2006) and the initial findings of the Emotional Health of Clergy Report (2010), we have observed that there is more to the challenge of clergy stress than fickleness of congregations and the cultural pressures of increased consumerism among churchgoers.

This research points to interesting conclusions that differ slightly from the research Vitello noted, as well. CREDO’ s research found that the only major health factor for which Episcopal clergy are at greater risk than the larger population is stress. Yet, remarkably, work-related stress, which frequently leads the general population to employment dissatisfaction, job loss or job change, exists alongside notably lower “turnover intent” for Episcopal clergy. Compared to the general population, Episcopal clergy report significant levels of well-being, self-efficacy and meaning in their work.

“Clergy are both very happy and satisfied and very stressed,” concludes the Rev. Joseph Stewart-Sicking, who continues to study clergy emotional health. “These two dimensions are somewhat independent and are influenced by different factors. In order to help clergy achieve a healthy balance of emotions, it is not enough to reduce stressors or capitalize on the positive things in ministry; it will take both. Moreover, just helping clergy cope with problems is insufficient to help them flourish.”

Read it all and please note that both of the initial articles Mr. Gunn mentions were published here on the blog–KSH.

See what you make of it.

(–Per the diocesan website, the Rt. Rev. Edward Lee is Assisting Bishop for Ordinations and Coordinator of Campus/Young Adult Ministries in the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania).

Since 1976 when the current Book of Common Prayer restored the sacramental significance and centrality of Holy Baptism to the liturgical and ministerial life of The Episcopal Church, an interesting and exciting movement has been emerging and bubbling up in congregations and dioceses. Simply stated it’s called the “Ministry in Daily Life” movement. It has no formal national organization. Rather, it has local manifestations generated by people who are convinced that the Baptismal Covenant is the basis for intentional baptismal living and ministry every day of the week.

In the Diocese of Pennsylvania this movement has been spearheaded for over 20 years by the Center for Baptismal Living (CBL), a group of lay and clergy persons who have been committed to finding ways to raise the awareness of
both individuals and parishes to the question, what does it mean to be “sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ’s own forever” (BCP, p. 308)? Or put another way, what does baptismal living look like Monday through Saturday after the Christian community has gathered on Sunday and exited to the dismissal, “Go in peace to love and serve the Lord”?

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I’m in the middle of reading Mystery and Manners, a posthumous collection of Flannery O’Connor’s non-fiction….

What really struck me…. were a few brief observations at the very end of the piece. The speech was given at some kind of writers’ conference, and O’Connor had apparently been given a few of the participants’ short stories ahead of time. She finished by marking a few problems she had seen in them. First, she noted “the use of language in these stories was such that, with one exception, it would be difficult to distinguish one story from another” (102). There were clichés, she said, but not one enduring image. Second, it was impossible to tell where these stories unfolded. They could have happened anywhere in the world without changing the story. Finally, the characters functioned as siphons for ideas or particular actions; they lacked real, story-driving personality.

Again, mutatis mutandis, these are the problems in a great deal of theological and philosophical writing…..

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With his loathing of sectarianism and his convictions that the culture and faith of a people should be intertwined, he was drawn to the Church of England, but recognized, of course, that that body had an unsatisfactory mixture of Protestantism and Catholicism in its character and observances, being, from the viewpoint of the Catholic Church at least, not Catholic at all.

Eliot’s solution was to align himself with the Anglo-Catholic movement in the Church of England which believed that that Church was part of the universal Catholic Church from which it had been regrettably separated at the Reformation (while still retaining valid orders and sacraments – a view rejected, of course, by Rome) and to which it was aspiring to return in full Catholic communion.

So, a combination of several negative elements led Eliot in this decade (1915-25) to focus his attention, increasingly, on the Catholic faith, in its Anglican form: there was his intensifying personal suffering in a failing marriage, a sense of cultural dissolution in the Great War, the failure to find consolation in philosophy and wide reading in such as the eastern religions, and a long-standing disillusionment with Unitarianism and Protestantism in all its varieties (either as lacking doctrinal and cultural substance or relying too heavily on individual perceptions of the divine at the expense of the teachings of centuries of learning and tradition).

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Although he could not exercise Ecclesiastical Authority or exercise any of the gifts of ordination of a Priest or a Bishop during the period of his inhibition, he remained at all times the Bishop of the Diocese of Pennsylvania throughout the process. With the entry of the Final Judgment, Bishop Bennison’s Ecclesiastical Authority in the Diocese of Pennsylvania was automatically restored.

Bishop Bennison will be returning to Church House on Monday, August 16, 2010. The Secretary of the Standing Committee, Ms. Arlene McGurk and Father Glenn M. Matis, President of the Standing Committee will meet with Bishop Bennison on Tuesday afternoon, August 17, 2010 at Church House. Bishop Rodney Michel, who has been serving as Assisting Bishop for the past two years in Bishop Bennison’s absence, has been asked by Bishop Bennison to remain for a period in order to effectuate an orderly restoration of Bishop Bennison’s assumption of authority.

We in the Diocese of Pennsylvania owe a great debt of gratitude to Bishops Rodney Michel, Allen Bartlett, and Edward Lee and Chancellor Michael Rehill for their willingness to assist the Standing Committee during the period of Bishop Bennison’s inhibition.

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It is generally true that you get what you pay for, but not necessarily when it comes to higher education.

A study scheduled for release Monday about the value of a college education, at least when it comes to the basics, has found the opposite to be true in most cases. Forget Harvard and think Lamar.

Indeed, the Texas university, where tuition runs about $7,000 per year (Harvard’s is $38,000) earns an A to Harvard’s D based on an analysis of the universities’ commitment to core subjects deemed essential to a well-rounded, competitive education.

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I suspect that the ordinariate will begin on a fairly small scale, while those in charge feel their way. There will be one or two parishes in every large centre of population to begin with. After a time, the new jurisdiction will grow. Parishes will become more numerous and also larger as more and more Anglicans join them and as local Roman Catholics, dissatisfied with the way their own liturgy is conducted, start attending on Sunday (this, I predict, will have a salutory effect on many existing Catholic Parishes). And as has already happened where Anglican Rite Parishes (mostly in the US) have been set up, they will become gateways back into the Church for lapsed Catholics. They will not be divisive, as some fear; on the contrary, they will be a great blessing for the English Church. But don’t hold your breath: this is all going to take time.

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Vacation time increasingly is seen as essential for the wellbeing of clergy — and, by extension, their congregations — to be maintained.

So The Post and Courier asked a few local clergy to write about their vacations (real or hoped for). Do they get any downtime?…

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Pope Benedict XVI will arrive in the the UK on September 16 to visit Edinburgh, Glasgow and London before heading to Birmingham to attend a beatification ceremony for Cardinal John Henry Newman, a 19th century convert to Catholicism, who had been a leading Anglican cleric in Oxford.

The ceremony, on Sunday, September 19, which is part of the process towards a person becoming a saint, will be attended by hundreds of Catholics from Oxfordshire.

Father Daniel Seward, a priest at the Oratory Church, in Woodstock Road, said it was important for the city’s Catholics to see the beatification of a leading Oxford figure.

He said: “We will be sending seven coaches of worshippers up to Birmingham, about 300 people.

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“Entertainment for the sake of entertainment is missing the point,” said Cameron Cole, director of youth ministries at [Cathedral Church of the] Advent. “A lot of youth ministry focuses on entertainment and behavior modification, not on long-term spiritual formation. If there’s no belief system that undergirds it, there’s not much foundation on which to stand.”

Anglican theologian Ashley Null, a chaplain for the U.S. Olympic team, led a discussion about pressures on youth ministers to entertain, draw numbers and “fix kids.”

The push to perfection for both youth ministers and youth can be destructive, he said. “Are you pursuing perfection to your own harm?” he asked. He urged ministers to embrace God’s grace and love of imperfection.

“Love does strange things to us,” he said. “We gladly make changes out of love.”

Read it all and enjoy thew lovely picture of Ashley Null.

Professor Harries lauded Pullman for writing with “moral clout” and said he had enjoyed the book.

And he agreed with Pullman about the humane qualities of Jesus.

However, he said the author had put a “great abyss between Jesus the Good man and what the church has done to him”.

Prof Harries said this was not true to the New Testament.

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According to a much-quoted military maxim there are no atheists in a foxhole when the shelling begins.
But the Ministry of Defence (MoD) is now edging towards official recognition for the needs of non-believers serving in the armed forces by considering the appointment of Humanist chaplains.

Military sources have revealed they are “sympathetic” to the idea of establishing a organisation to represent the interests of non-religious servicemen and women.

Non-believers in the forces, including a senior Scottish officer, hope the move will pave the way for the establishment of Humanist chaplains, who would offer support and consolation to those with no spiritual beliefs.

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Most economists believe a dip back into recession ”” as well as an equally debilitating bout of deflation, or broadly falling prices ”” will be avoided. But many have nonetheless warned that the prospects are rising, and say the more probable scenario isn’t much more appealing: a protracted economic malaise with imperceptible growth and stubbornly high joblessness.

“We are mired in a jobless recovery, and the government has run out of ammunition to help out the economy,” said Sung Won Sohn, an economics professor at Cal State Channel Islands. “The current situation doesn’t look very good.”

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Check it out if you so desire.

First, the bad news: The United Methodist Church needs to change its operations denomination-wide to address financial challenges and be more relevant in its ministry around the globe.

Then, the good news: Despite these challenges, many churches of varied sizes and settings have found ways to grow and thrive.

Those are the findings of two studies by independent researchers released this week by the denomination’s Call to Action Steering Team. The reports included an “Operational Assessment of the Connectional Church” and a “Congregational Vitality” overview.

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The apostle Paul, struggling against opponents of his gospel in the city of Corinth, insisted that “the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.” Rather than resorting to violence, he sought to “demolish arguments” and “captivate every thought” through open statement of the truth.

For him, to use coercive or deceptive means would be to succumb to the forces he was opposing. His message could be defended only by clear, peaceful proclamation of the word. As Angel Nuñez of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference observed, “The greatest weapon a Christian has is godly love.”

Similarly, the Gospel of Luke tells a story about Jesus’ response to a Samaritan village that rejected him and his followers. His disciples James and John asked, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But Jesus rebuked them and said (according to some ancient manuscripts of Luke’s Gospel), “No, you don’t know what spirit you belong to” (Luke 9:51-56).

I fear that my Christian brothers and sisters in the Dove World Outreach Center, like James and John, do not know what spirit they belong to.

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“Fundamentally this thing has been reshaped, resized and rethought,” Mr. [Sergio] Marchionne [of Chrysler] said of Detroit. The biggest difference, he said, is that the Big Three have finally broken the habit of reflexively raising incentives to increase sales volumes.

“We’re not trying to kill each other for this month’s market share,” he said. “Those days are over. We’re not offering $7,000 checks to try to sell a car.”

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Germany has sparred with its European partners over how to respond to the financial crisis, argued with the United States over the benefits of stimulus versus austerity, and defiantly pursued its own vision of how to keep its economy strong.

Statistics released Friday buttress Germany’s view that it had the formula right all along. The government on Friday announced quarter-on-quarter economic growth of 2.2 percent, Germany’s best performance since reunification 20 years ago ”” and equivalent to a nearly 9 percent annual rate if growth were that robust all year.

The strong growth figures will also bolster the conviction here that German workers and companies in recent years made the short-term sacrifices necessary for long-term success that Germany’s European partners did not. And it will reinforce the widespread conviction among policy makers that they handled the financial crisis and the painful recession that followed it far better than the United States, which, they never hesitate to remind, brought the world into this crisis.

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