But the smart money was wrong. Havel was the only real choice considered when the new Czech Republic needed a president in January 1993. And Havel’s entire career and philosophy, like Orwell’s, were dedicated to navigating ideological minefields under the extreme duress of personal participation and suffering. This skill, it turns out, had some relevance in the post-Gorbachev world too. Like Orwell’s, Havel’s words and zesty one-liners can be (and have been) quoted selectively to make him sound conservative, liberal, and otherwise, and his bedrock belief in the transformative power of “calling things by their proper names” virtually ensured that some of his freewheeling opinions would set off alarm bells among those who see the shadow of socialism in such phrases as “civil society” and “new politics.”

“I once said that I considered myself a socialist,” Havel wrote in Summer Meditations. “I merely wanted to suggest that my heart was, as they say, slightly left of center.” The words could have come directly out of Orwell’s mouth: “In sentiment I am definitely ‘left,'” he wrote in 1940, “but I believe that a writer can only remain honest if he keeps free of party labels.”

Havel went on to discuss the futility of those who would pin an ideological tag to his lapel. “All my adult life, I was branded by officials as ‘an exponent of the right’ who wanted to bring capitalism back to our country,” he wrote. “Today — at a ripe old age — I am suspected by some of being left-wing, if not of harboring out-and-out socialist tendencies. What, then, is my real position? First and foremost, I have never espoused any ideology, dogma, or doctrine — left-wing, right-wing, or any other closed, ready-made system of presuppositions about the world. On the contrary, I have tried to think independently, using my own powers of reason, and I have always vigorously resisted attempts to pigeonhole me.”

Read it all.

Both as a dissident and as a national leader, Mr. [Vaclav] Havel impressed the West as one of the most important political thinkers in Central Europe. He rejected the notion, posited by reform-minded Communist leaders like Mikhail S. Gorbachev in the Soviet Union and Alexander Dubcek in Czechoslovakia, that Communist rule could be made more humane.

His star status and personal interests drew world leaders to Prague, from the Dalai Lama, with whom Mr. Havel meditated for hours, to President Bill Clinton, who, during a state visit in 1994, joined a saxophone jam session at Mr. Havel’s favorite jazz club.

Even after Mr. Havel retired in 2003, leaders sought him out, including President Obama. At their meeting in March 2009, Mr. Havel warned of the perils of limitless hope being projected onto a leader. Disappointment, he noted, could boil over into anger and resentment. Mr. Obama replied that he was becoming acutely aware of the possibility.

Read it all.

O God, who didst promise that thy glory should be revealed, and that all flesh should see it together: Stir up our hearts, we beseech thee, to prepare the way of thine only begotten Son; and pour out upon us thy loving kindness, that we who are afflicted by reason of our sins may be refreshed by the coming of our Saviour, and may behold his glory; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth one God, world without end.

–James Todd

To Titus, my true child in a common faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior. This is why I left you in Crete, that you might amend what was defective, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you, if any man is blameless, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of being profligate or insubordinate. For a bishop, as God’s steward, must be blameless; he must not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of goodness, master of himself, upright, holy, and self-controlled; he must hold firm to the sure word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to confute those who contradict it.

–Titus 1:4-9

The Green Bay Packers’ perfect season came to a crashing halt against the struggling Kansas City Chiefs, who had just fired their coach and were starting a new quarterback.

Proof again that nothing can be taken for granted in the NFL.

Kyle Orton threw for 299 yards to outduel Aaron Rodgers, and the Chiefs rallied behind interim coach Romeo Crennel for a shocking 19-14 victory on Sunday that ended the Packers’ 19-game winning streak. It was their first loss since Dec. 19, 2010, at New England.

Read it all.

A church service will be held in Padstow on Monday with members of the Catholic and Anglican communities worshipping together.

Under a legally binding sharing agreement, the Catholic community will now be able to worship together with their Anglican counterparts.

Read it all.

All of us know what it is to wait: we wait for our football team to achieve the success we know they’re capable of; for the birth of a longed for child; for a much anticipated wedding day. We know what it’s like to wait with anxiety as well: results of medical tests; news of a job; our family finances. We are used to waiting.

Waiting for Christmas is also part of our faith journey. Advent points to two great truths. First it reminds us that we are waiting for the return of Jesus in glory at the end of time when He will come to gather up all things.

Read it all (p. 13 of pdf).

The recently disclosed rupture inthe relationship of the Rwandan House of Bishops and bishops of the Anglican Mission in the Americas, although hardly yet resolved or completely transparent, illumines at least a couple of key elements about ecclesial existence, especially among Anglicans. I was never a supporter of the AMiA’s formation, for mainly two reasons: it diluted traditional Anglican witness within North America and it provided a model of and stoked the dynamics for Anglican fragmentation around the world. But for all that, many of the AMiA’s leaders have been people of enormous missionary commitment and skill, and the public dispute among their American and Rwandan leaders hardly does them the honor they deserve.

Read it all.

Episcopal Church of Sudan (ECS) officials have withdrawn an invitation for a visit by the head of the U.S.-based Episcopal Church (TEC) because of TEC’s liberal stances on sexual issues. It is a stinging rebuke of the official American branch of the global Anglican Communion. Equally striking, the Sudanese have recognized the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), the Episcopal Church’s conservative American rival.

With about 4.5 million members, the growing church in Sudan outnumbers the declining U.S. based denomination, which has fewer than 2 million. Overwhelmingly poor and besieged for years by war and persecution, mostly from the Islamist regime in Khartoum, ECS is strongly theologically conservative, like most African churches. Many Anglican churches in Africa and elsewhere in the Global South have distanced themselves from TEC even as they remain in the global Anglican Communion of about 80 million believers.

Read it all.

Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, [Devin] Hester’s mentor, is perplexed by the debate regarding Tebow’s ongoing testimony.

“Tebow is taking a lot of criticism not just because of his faith. He’s taking criticism because he’s abnormal,” said Sanders, now an analyst for the NFL Network. “The things he’s doing and the success he’s having is not normal, and people have a hard time buying into what they haven’t seen. Then to top it all off, he exercises his faith.

“To me, a young, successful guy or woman, regardless of their ethnicity, who exercises what they believe in and what they truly stand for, no matter what it is, it shouldn’t be a problem.”

Read it all.

The words, deeds and life experience of Jesus don’t describe someone who was hostile, divisive, mean-spirited or exclusionary, but someone who embraced all humankind and worked to better the lives of those shunned and oppressed by the religious and political powers who controlled his nation.

The acceptability of South Carolina’s immigration law as it relates to the Constitution of the United States of America will be decided by the federal court without religious considerations, since there is no official American faith.

While I hope that the law will be overturned, I have no idea what the court will do. As a Christian, however, I have no doubt of what Jesus would do and would kindly suggest that those who intertwine their faith and their politics pray on that as they proclaim their love for God.

Read it all.

Pope Benedict XVI seems worn out.

People who have spent time with him recently say they found him weaker than they’d ever seen him, seemingly too tired to engage with what they were saying. He no longer meets individually with visiting bishops. A few weeks ago he started using a moving platform to spare him the long walk down St. Peter’s Basilica.

Benedict turns 85 in the new year, so a slowdown is only natural. Expected. And given his age and continued rigorous work schedule, it’s remarkable he does as much as he does and is in such good health overall: Just this past week he confirmed he would travel to Mexico and Cuba next spring.

Read it all.

There’s a beautifully groomed Mary in a blue party dress, a fashionable Joseph gazing adoringly at the baby, and wise men carrying a Faberge egg, a crystal bottle of perfume and a decorated skull.

With only twelve days to go until Christmas, a church group unveiled a poster Thursday to remind people of the religious aspect of the holiday ”” while making a statement about modern-day extravagance.

The poster, deliberately designed to look like a fashion photograph, has the words: “However you dress it up, Christmas starts with Christ.”

Read it all.

Anglican Mission in the Americas Communiqué from the London Meeting

Archbishops Emmanuel Kolini, Moses Tay and Yong Ping Chung, founding archbishops of the Anglican Mission, met with Bishop Chuck Murphy December 12-14, 2011, in London, England, and were joined by Cynthia Tay, Julia Yong, Susan Grayson, Canon Mike Murphy, and Canon Kevin Donlon. They have issued the following report:

Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Advent is a season characterized by waiting, expectation and hope. In our recent time together, we took the opportunity to seek the Lord in prayer and meditation upon HIs Word as we waited to hear His voice. God, who is always faithful, gave us profound encouragement. We experienced His presence powerfully as we sought Him with expectant hearts in order to discern His good and perfect will for all of us in the Anglican Mission.
We acknowledged together the rapid and dramatic chain of events that have led to this moment. Remembering the joy and anticipation of Winter Conference 2011 as we welcomed the new leadership in the Rwandan House of Bishops makes the current reality of separation even more difficult for all concerned. We grieve the pain caused by such a radical and sudden change that resulted in the end of a meaningful sojourn with Rwanda.

We are mindful of the story of Abraham and Lot (Genesis 13:8-10) which illustrates that sometimes moments come when God’s people take different paths. Abraham and Lot separated with grace and mutual respect, and that is our desire as well. We are convinced that we can all find a godly way forward that overcomes division and builds for a future that honors God and extends His Kingdom.

Such a way forward demands humble hearts, fervent prayer, willing minds and committed effort.

In the midst of what must be recognized as a challenging transition, we believe God is showing us His direction for the future of the Anglican Mission. Our current situation necessitates a clear response based on what we have heard from the Lord, and therefore we commit to the creation of a missionary society as a cherished and honored model recognized within the wider Eastern and Western traditions of the Church. We look forward to the opportunity to give specific form and shape to this normative structure of a missionary society, seeking the input of our bishops, clergy, network leaders and laity. We are encouraged to be still before the Lord and to discern His leading to a new canonical provincial relationship. In addition, we pledge our commitment to the eight-member Council of Bishops and all of the Anglican Mission leadership and congregations. Living out this model within our Anglican context allows us to be a mission”¦nothing more, nothing less in North America and beyond. Finally, we

recognize and affirm the development of a Pastoral Declaration designed to provide the necessary order for developing a constitution.

In just a few weeks, we will gather in Houston, Texas, for Winter Conference 2012, and we look forward to the opportunity to explain the vision for a missionary society and process together this new chapter in the life of the Anglican Mission. We will hear the voices of those gathered and recommit to our Lord’s Great Commission and to one another as fellow missionaries. We believe the Lord would have us build on the past with the promise that He is with us always.

Be assured of our prayers of thanksgiving for you as we all prepare for the Nativity of our Lord and the new life He gives to each of us through His son, our Savior Jesus Christ.

“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God.”

In Afghanistan, Cpl. Clayton Rhoden earned about $2,500 a month jumping into helicopters to chase down improvised explosive devices or check out suspected bomb factories.

Now he lives with his parents, sells his blood plasma for $80 a week and works what extra duty he can get for his Marine Corps Reserve unit.

Cpl. Rhoden, who is 25, gawky and polite with a passion for soldiering, is one of the legions of veterans who served in combat yet have a harder time finding work than other people their age, a situation that officials say will grow worse as the United States completes its pullout of Iraq and as, by a White House estimate, a million new veterans join the workforce over the next five years.

Read it all.

Yesterday evening the Chapter of Trinity Cathedral voted to re-affirm its Charter of Incorporation. Article II of the Charter states its purpose as “For the support and maintenance of a cathedral church for the public worship of Almighty God according to the faith, doctrine and discipline of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America” and Article V further clarifies Trinity Cathedral’s historic identity: “This corporation acknowledges religious allegiance to the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America and that portion of the same known as the Diocese of Pittsburgh and will be subject to and governed by the laws, rules, and regulations of the same as set forth in the constitutions and canons of said Church and said Diocese.” Chapter’s decision brings to conclusion the difficult and weighty matters with which they had been wrestling during the past six months. It also effectively ends the governance provisions of the Special Resolution which was adopted by Chapter in August, 2008 and ratified by the parish in September, 2008.

Read it all.

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.

Simply amazing to see this–check it out. It was quoted in this morning’s sermon by yours truly–KSH.

Lord, for thy tender mercy’s sake,
lay not our sins to our charge,
but forgive that is past,
and give us grace to amend our sinful lives.
To decline from sin and incline to virtue,
that we may walk in a perfect heart before thee,
now and evermore.
Amen.

–Richard Farrant (1530–1580)

The setting is Bowdoin College Chapel. This is posted by one who sang in this very group what seems like many moons ago–listen to it all–KSH.

But as hard and, frankly, as weird as it’s been at times, I didn’t trade in my mantra, nor did I give up on what I learned from the research: Vulnerability is not weakness, nor is it optional. We can’t opt out of the uncertainty, exposure, and emotional risks that are woven through our daily experiences. Like it or not, vulnerability is coming, and we have to decide if we’re going to open up to it or push it away.

The only choice we really have is how we’re going to respond to feeling vulnerable. And contrary to popular belief, our shields don’t protect us. They simply keep us from being seen, heard, and known.

If there’s anything I’ve learned over the past decade and experienced firsthand over the last year, it’s this: Our willingness to own and engage with our vulnerability determines the depth of our courage and the clarity of our purpose.

Read it all (her emphasis).

O Almighty and Eternal God, the creator of all things, who hast made our days upon earth as it were a span long, and our age even as nothing in respect of Thee; give us grace, we humbly beseech Thee, to live under such a constant sense of our mortality, and of the shortness and uncertainty of this present life, that death may never surprise us in an hour that we are not aware; but, being always provided with oil in our lamps, we may be ready, whenever the Bridegroom may come, to enter with Him into the marriage feast, and receive a blessing among those who watch and wait for the coming of their Lord; to Whom, with Thee and the Holy Ghost, be all honour and glory, world without end.

–Henry Stobart, Daily Services For Christian Households (London: SPCK,1867), pp. 95-96

And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery. And another portent appeared in heaven; behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems upon his heads. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, that he might devour her child when she brought it forth…

–Revelation 12:1-4

The U.S. Senate approved Saturday a two-month extension of payroll-tax breaks and unemployment benefits, providing a measure of relief in a struggling economy but far less than the full-year extension that leaders of both parties had wanted.

The overwhelming 89-10 vote reflected a bipartisan desire to block a New Year’s tax increase, but it belied deep differences between the parties over tax and spending policy that will persist when Congress is forced to take up the issue again early next year.

Lurching toward the end of a bitterly partisan year, the Senate also passed a $1 trillion spending bill to finance most of the government”“a last-minute measure to keep the government from shutting down.

Read it all.

I maintain that no matter how much cash you have on your balance sheet, or how compliant your banker might be, or how cheap the cost of money, you will not commit substantial capital to expanding your payroll or investing significant amounts to expand plant and equipment until you know what it will cost you to run your business; until you know how much you will be taxed; until you know how federal spending will impact your customer base; until you know the cost of employee health insurance; until you are reassured that regulations that affect your business will be structured so as to incentivize rather than discourage expansion; until you have concrete assurance that the fiscal “fix” the nation so desperately needs will be crafted to stimulate the economy rather than depress it and incentivize job creation rather than discourage it; or until you are reassured that the sinkhole of unfunded liabilities like Medicare and Social Security that Republican- and Democrat-led congresses and presidents alike have dug will be repaired so that our successor generations of Americans will prosper rather than drown in dark, deep waters of debt.

My colleague Sarah Bloom Raskin””one of the newest Fed governors, and a woman possessed with a disarming ability to speak in non-quadratic-equation English””recently used the example of the common kitchen sink to illustrate a point. I am going to purloin her metaphor for my description of our present predicament. You give a dinner party. The guests leave and you are washing the dishes. When you are done, you notice the remnants of the party are clogging the sink: bits of food, coffee grinds, a hair or two and the like. You have two choices. You can reach down and scoop up the gunk, a distinctly unpleasant task. Or you can turn the water on full blast, washing the gunk down the drain, providing immediate relief from both the eyesore and the distasteful job of handling the mess. You look over your shoulder to make sure your kids aren’t looking, and, voilà, you turn the faucet on full blast, washing your immediate troubles away.

From my standpoint, resorting to further monetary accommodation to clean out the sink, clogged by the flotsam and jetsam of a jolly, drunken fiscal and financial party that has gone on far too long, is the wrong path to follow. It may provide immediate relief but risks destroying the plumbing of the entire house. It is a pyrrhic solution that ultimately comes at a devastating cost. Better that the Congress and the president””the makers of fiscal policy and regulation””roll up their sleeves and get on with the yucky task of cleaning out the clogged drain.

Read it all (emphasis mine).

From here:

[Yesterday]…in Austin the Texas Supreme Court…announced that it will hear oral arguments on Feb. 29, 2012, concerning the appellate court’s decision in a case between the parish of Good Shepherd, San Angelo, and the Episcopal Church Diocese of Northwest Texas. This follows written briefings the Court requested from each party earlier this year.

According to a statement from the Court’s public information officer, the principal issues in the property dispute between the diocese and congregation are “(1) whether in Texas the dispute should be decided by ”˜neutral principles’ ”“ using established trust and property law and taking account of deeds, the governing language employed by a local church and the larger denomination ”“ or by ”˜compulsory deference’ ”“ determining where church members place ultimate authority over property use; and (2) whether the trial court erred by deciding the diocese owns the property.”

The outcome of this appeal is likely to have significant impact for our own. Early in the new year, our legal team expects to file an amicus brief with the Court, supporting the position of the San Angelo parish.

As you continue to pray for our own legal team through this Advent and Christmas, please include the people of Good Shepherd and their legal team in your prayers.

(Please note–copied verbatim as received, edited only for format with the exception of one typo which I corrected–KSH).

The Most Rev Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church
United States of America

Thursday 15th December 2011

Dear Bishop Katharine,

Advent greetings to you in the name of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

It is with a heavy heart that I write you informing you of our decision as a House of Bishops to withdraw your invitation to the Episcopal Church of the Sudan (ECS). We acknowledge your personal efforts to spearhead prayer and support campaigns on behalf of the ECS and remain very grateful for this attention you and your church have paid to Sudan and South Sudan. However, it remains difficult for us to invite you when elements of your church continue to flagrantly disregard biblical teaching on human sexuality.

Find attached a statement further explaining our position as a province.

(Signed)

–(The Most Rev.) Dr. Daniel Deng Bul Yak, Archbishop Primate and Metropolitan of the Province of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and Bishop of the Diocese of Juba

(Please note–copied verbatim as received, edited only for format–KSH).

STATEMENT OF HOUSE OF BISHOPS OF THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF SUDAN ON HUMAN SEXUALITY

The House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan in its meeting held in Juba from 14-16, November 2011 in the context of General Synod has reaffirmed the statement of the Sudanese Bishops at the Lambeth Conference in 2008 as quoted below:

“We reject homosexual practice as contrary to Biblical teaching and can accept no place for it within ECS. We strongly oppose developments within the Anglican Church in USA and Canada in consecrating a practicing homosexual as bishop and in approving a rite for the blessing of same-sex relationships.”

We are deeply disappointed by The Episcopal Church’s refusal to abide by Biblical teaching on human sexuality and their refusal to listen to fellow Anglicans. For example, TEC Diocese of Los Angles, California in 2010 elected and consecrated Mary Douglas Glasspool as their first lesbian assistant Bishop. We are not happy with their acts of continuing ordaining homosexuals and lesbians as priests and bishops as well as blessing same sex relations in the church by some dioceses in TEC; it has pushed itself away from God’s Word and from Anglican Communion. TEC is not concerned for the unity of the Communion.

The Episcopal Church of Sudan is recognizing the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) fully as true faithful Orthodox Church and we will work with them to expand the Kingdom of God in the world. Also we will work with those Parishes and Dioceses in TEC who are Evangelical Orthodox Churches and faithful to God.

We will not compromise our faith on this and we will not give TEC advice anymore, because TEC ignored and has refused our advices.

–(The Most Rev.) Dr. Daniel Deng Bul, Archbishop and Primate of Episcopal Church of Sudan, Juba, 12th December 2011

In a ruling released yesterday afternoon by the Eighth Judicial Circuit Court in Adams County, Illinois, Judge Thomas J. Ortbal denied motions for summary judgment brought by ECUSA and its rump diocese of Quincy, which had intervened to join in ECUSA’s counterclaim against certain clergy and laity who held property and funds in trust for the (now missionary) Diocese of Quincy in ACNA.

To my knowledge, this is the first summary judgment motion lost by ECUSA, or by any of its rump dioceses, in their attempts to seize the property of the four dioceses which have thus far realigned with the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone and with the Anglican Church in North America (“ACNA”).

Read it all.

Read them both.

I was interested to see the AP describe the Presiding Bishop’s remarks as “a rare comment on a local issue.”

For months, they were the best of neighbors: the slapdash champions of economic equality, putting down stakes in an outdoor plaza, and the venerable Episcopal parish next door, whose munificence helped sustain the growing protest.

But in the weeks since Occupy Wall Street was evicted from Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, relations between the demonstrators and Trinity Wall Street, a church barely one block from the New York Stock Exchange, have reached a crossroads.

The displaced occupiers had asked the church, one of the city’s largest landholders, to hand over a gravel lot, near Canal Street and Avenue of the Americas, for use as an alternate campsite and organizing hub. The church declined, calling the proposed encampment “wrong, unsafe, unhealthy and potentially injurious.”

And now the Occupy movement, after weeks of targeting big banks and large corporations, has chosen Trinity, one of the nation’s most prominent Episcopal parishes, as its latest antagonist.

Read it all.

It’s a confusing time to be a member of the Episcopal Church. More than two decades of bickering over a range of theological issues, notably the question of whether openly gay and lesbian people can be ordained as priests and bishops, has left one of America’s oldest denominations splintered.

Over the past eight years, the ordinations of [non-celibate] gay and lesbian priests as bishops has prompted strong objections from traditionalists, and some bishops have gone as far as schism ”” leaving the Episcopal Church for an array of more conservative Anglican groups.

Into this situation comes the Rev. Gregory Brewer, who recently was elected bishop of the Diocese of Central Florida, based in Orlando. Brewer, who was pastor of Calvary-St. George’s Episcopal Church in New York City, has big shoes to fill. He will succeed the Rt. Rev. John Howe, who is retiring in March….

Read it all.