Speaking to the 8th Philippine General Synod on 2 May, the Church’s Prime Bishop, the Most Rev Edward Malecdan, argued the best way forward through the crisis of faith and order dividing Anglicans was to keep talking while taking no action that would cause irreparable harm to the fabric of the Communion.

“I think most of us know that there are problems besetting the Communion,” he observed, noting that “one of this is the practice of The Episcopal Church USA, or TEC, in consecrating practicing homosexuals and lesbians to the episcopate. The other is the acceptance of same-sex marriages in both TEC and in the Anglican Church of Canada or ACoC.”

The responses to these breaches of Communion by the US and Canada had led some provinces to call for the isolation of “these two North American Churches. They express in no uncertain terms that the Church in Canada and TEC should be out of the Communion.”

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THE President of the Church Union (CU), Fr Edwin Barnes, is to stand down because the majority of its Council opposes “assisting those who join the Ordinariate”. Last month, the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament (CBS) provoked anger among some of its members when it donated £1 million to the Roman Catholic Ordin­ariate…

Fr Barnes, who joined the Ordin­ariate earlier this year, wrote in a statement posted on the website of the CU, which says that it seeks “to promote and renew Catholic Faith and life within the Church of England”, that the group received a legal opinion from a QC suggesting that, although the organisation’s Constitution had been altered to include those outside the Church of England, “the foundation docu­ments had not, and they trumped whatever the Constitution might intend.” The legal opinion “seemed to say this was a Society for Church of England members only”.

Fr Barnes said that he sought another legal opinion, which “arrived at a different conclusion”, and suggested that the CU “might indeed function ecumenically”.

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Each year of education ups the odds by 15% that people will say there’s “truth in more than one religion,” says University of Nebraska-Lincoln professor Philip Schwadel in an article for the Review of Religious Research. Schwadel, an associate professor of sociology, looked at 1,800 U.S. adults’ reported religious beliefs and practices and their education.

People change their perspective because, as people move through high school and college, they acquire an ever-wider range of friendships, including people with different beliefs than their own, Schwadel says. “People don’t want to say their friends are going to hell,” he says.

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At the age of 15, Breivik apparently chose to be baptized and confirmed into the state church. However, the writings left behind by the 32-year-old radical also stress that he does not hold traditional Christian beliefs or practice the faith. Instead, he carefully identifies himself as a “Christian agnostic” or a “Christian atheist (cultural Christian).” In his manifesto, Breivik emphasizes his identity as a Free Mason, his interest in Odinist Norse traditions and his role as a “Justiciar Knight” in a new crusade against Islam.

“If you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God then you are a religious Christian,” he wrote, in a passage that found its way into a few media reports. “Myself and many more like me do not necessarily have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and God. We do however believe in Christianity as a cultural, social, identity and moral platform. This makes us Christian.”

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The U.S. economy is already skirting the razor’s edge that separates recession from recovery.

“There is no emerging source of demand that’s going to lead us to a surge of growth,” says Lawrence Mishel, president of the Economic Policy Institute.

He says no one is spending money enough to help the economy expand ”” not consumers, not businesses and not government.

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The myth about pastors, simply stated, is that we are helpers; that ours is a helping profession, counted alongside doctors and nurses and emergency responders and teachers and social workers.

Over and over again in my ministry, however, I am reminded that pastors are not helpers. We are not fixers or healers or solvers. We do not, cannot, provide help. Which may sound shocking, because people often turn to pastors for help … and pastors, in turn, like to think that they provide concrete help to others. But no, it is all a myth.

A story might add some explanation to my myth-busting….

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After six months battling a rebellion that his family portrayed as an Islamist conspiracy, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s son and one-time heir apparent said Wednesday that he was reversing course to forge a behind-the-scenes alliance with radical Islamist elements among the Libyan rebels to drive out their more liberal-minded confederates.

“The liberals will escape or be killed,” the son, Seif al-Islam el-Qaddafi, vowed in an hourlong interview that stretched past midnight. “We will do it together,” he added, wearing a newly grown beard and fingering Islamic prayer beads as he reclined on a love seat in a spare office tucked in a nearly deserted downtown hotel. “Libya will look like Saudi Arabia, like Iran. So what?”

The leading Islamist whom Mr. Qaddafi identified as his main counterpart in the talks, Ali Sallabi, acknowledged their conversations but dismissed any suggestion of an alliance. He said the Libyan Islamists supported the rebel leaders’ calls for a pluralistic democracy without the Qaddafis.

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O God, who knowest that we are not sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but that all our sufficiency is of thee: Assist us with thy grace in all the work which we are to undertake this day. Direct us in it by thy wisdom, support us by thy power; that doing our duty diligently, we may bring it to a good end, so that it may tend to the greater glory of thy name; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Dost thou work wonders for the dead? Do the shades rise up to praise thee? Is thy steadfast love declared in the grave, or thy faithfulness in Abaddon? Are thy wonders known in the darkness, or thy saving help in the land of forgetfulness? But I, O LORD, cry to thee; in the morning my prayer comes before thee.

–Psalm 88:10-13

Professor Willem Buiter, Citigroup’s chief economist, said the apparent ECB action was pointless. “The warped logic of intervening in two countries that don’t need it is as strange as it gets.”

Mr Buiter said Europe risks a disastrous chain of events and the worst financial collapse since the onset of the Great Depression unless Europe’s central bank steps in with sufficient muscle to back-stop the system.

“The ECB has yet so show it understands that it is the only institution that can save Italy and Spain from fundamentally unwarranted defaults. Everybody is afraid and real money investors are dumping their holdings. The ECB must step in to cap the yields at 6pc or 6.5pc and put a floor under the market,” he said.

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Lawsuits by churches, the U.S. government and civil-rights groups seeking to stop Alabama from enforcing new restrictions on illegal immigrants will be heard as one.

U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn in Birmingham, Alabama, ordered the cases’ consolidation yesterday. Episcopal, Roman Catholic and Methodist bishops; the U.S. Justice Department, and the American Civil Liberties Union sued Alabama Governor Robert Bentley starting July 8.

Church leaders claim the law stops them from carrying out their religious mission by denying food, shelter and worship to people who are in the U.S. illegally. The U.S. says the law conflicts with federal authority over aliens, such as regulation of migrant employment. The ACLU, joined by the Southern Poverty Law Center, objected that transporting children who are illegal immigrants will be a crime.

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“One of the major things that we sought to do was to craft an Ordinal that was written in contemporary English, but also was clearly in the Prayer Book tradition. Of particular focus was the strengthening of the vows that those who are ordained ascribe to,” said Bishop Bill Thompson, Chair of Prayer Book and Common Liturgy task force.

“We were very deliberate about the tone and content of the Ordinal and the fact that it is clearly connected to our Anglican roots. Our intention is for the other liturgies that we put forth to have that same quality,” Bishop Thompson said.

Read it all and take the time to examine the document itself there.

Mohamed El-Erian, chief executive of the bond giant Pimco, said investors were selling risky assets like stocks “globally prompted by concerns about the weakening economic outlook, spreading contagion in Europe and insufficient policy responses.”

With Thursday’s dive, the three major American indexes had erased all of the gains made so far in 2011, with the S.&P. and Nasdaq markedly below the start of the year.

Read it all and take a look at this graph picture which says it all.

Watch it all (Hat tip:Selimah Harmon).

Like many Afghans with similar disabilities, [Amina] Azimi fretted over her future, knowing the hardships she would face in a country where the disabled are often discriminated against in schools and the workplace. That is, when they can find a job.

“After it happened I thought I was useless and the rest of my life meaningless,” she says, recalling the attack some 15 years ago during the height of the Afghan civil war.

Today, Azimi, 26, has found a purpose: She uses the radio to boost the fortunes of people with disabilities in a country where prejudices against such people are ingrained in the culture and the number of disabled people has grown significantly because of three decades of near-constant conflict.

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Looking round the Minster, I wondered if the highly sophisticated and intelligent people reciting the Creed really believed everything they were saying. Everyone was in full voice; I failed to spot anyone with their fingers crossed. But the answer seemed to be: not exactly.

“What we’re doing is identifying back to a distant past,” explained Michael Sadgrove, the Dean of Durham. “When we say he descended to Hell, I think, if people identify with it at all, they’re identifying with a tradition. The Latin for Nicene Creed is Symbolum Nicaenum. And I think these statements of faith have a symbolic function.

“I don’t think the way to understand them is to dissect them clause by clause. The fundamental of Christian faith is that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Christians will argue for ever about how you put boundaries round that.” It was a former bishop of Durham, David Jenkins, who most clearly, and controversially, articulated the revisionist view of gospel truth. His heirs are more circumspect but not necessarily in major disagreement.

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Archbishop Akinola called on the Church of Nigeria and “all other well-meaning Nigerians to wake up and appreciate the situation.”

“Well-meaning Nigerians must resist all of this by all lawful means and the National Assembly must see the whole thing as an affront” to the Nigerian constitution “which states unambiguously that no particular religion shall be adopted as state religion.”

“Government must take decisive action and promptly cancel everything about the proposed Sharia banking,” the archbishop said, imploring Christians to “rise to defend our faith which is currently on trial” from pro-Muslim government policies and violent Islamist terror attacks.

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Centre 454 has long been associated with the Anglican Church. The group provides social services to the homeless, helping them with everything from dental appointments to applying for financial programs. They offer a cup of coffee and a place for those living on the streets to socialize when shelters are closed during the day.

For a quarter of a century, the centre was housed at the St. Alban’s Anglican Church and had its own entrance at 454 King Edward St….

An internal rift with the Anglican Church led to the centre being summarily dismissed from the parish, and its home has been at a decidedly dismal storefront on the east end of Murray Street.

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[Cofer Black]… referenced last year’s Stuxnet computer worm, which some researchers think was designed to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities.

“I’m here to tell ya … the Stuxnet attack is the Rubicon of our future,” he said. “I don’t necessarily understand how this was executed, but the important points are (that) it was really expensive, so a nation-state had to be involved.”

Hacking, once see as “college pranks,” has moved “into physical destruction of a national resource,” he said. “This is huge.”

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Debt-laden Italy is likely to default, but Spain might just avoid it, according to the British think tank, the Centre for Economics and Business Research.

With the countries weighed down by debt, the think tank modelled “good” and “bad” economic scenarios for both.

It found that Italy will not avoid default unless it sees an unlikely big jump in economic growth.

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U.S. Catholics have a responsibility to bring a “faith perspective” to the current immigration debate and to keep in mind the “whole story” of immigrants’ role in this country’s history, said Los Angeles Archbishop Jose H. Gomez during a talk at the Napa Institute July 28 in Napa.

“When we understand immigration from this perspective, we can see that immigration is not a problem for America. It’s an opportunity. It is a key to our American renewal,” he said.

The archbishop was one of several speakers during the July 28-31 annual conference sponsored by the Napa Institute, an organization that promotes Catholic thought and apologetics.

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No population group among the sixty segments examined has gone through more spiritual changes in the past two decades than women. Of the 14 religious factors studied, women have experienced statistically significant changes related to 10 of them. Of those transitions, eight represent negative movement ”“ that is, either less engagement in common religious behaviors or a shift in belief away from biblical teachings.

Five of the six religious behaviors tracked showed significant change.

–Church attendance among women sank by 11 percentage points since 1991, declining to 44%. A majority of women no longer attend church services during a typical week.
–Bible reading has plummeted by 10 percentage points, declining from half of all women reading the Bible during a typical week (excluding that done during church events) to just four out of ten doing so today (40%)….

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On April 18th, the DEVGRU squad flew to Nevada for another week of rehearsals. The practice site was a large government-owned stretch of desert with an elevation equivalent to the area surrounding Abbottabad. An extant building served as bin Laden’s house. Aircrews plotted out a path that paralleled the flight from Jalalabad to Abbottabad. Each night after sundown, drills commenced. Twelve SEALs, including Mark, boarded helo one. Eleven SEALs, Ahmed, and Cairo boarded helo two. The pilots flew in the dark, arrived at the simulated compound, and settled into a hover while the SEALs fast-roped down. Not everyone on the team was accustomed to helicopter assaults. Ahmed had been pulled from a desk job for the mission and had never descended a fast rope. He quickly learned the technique.

The assault plan was now honed. Helo one was to hover over the yard, drop two fast ropes, and let all twelve SEALs slide down into the yard. Helo two would fly to the northeast corner of the compound and let out Ahmed, Cairo, and four SEALs, who would monitor the perimeter of the building. The copter would then hover over the house, and James and the remaining six SEALs would shimmy down to the roof. As long as everything was cordial, Ahmed would hold curious neighbors at bay. The SEALs and the dog could assist more aggressively, if needed. Then, if bin Laden was proving difficult to find, Cairo could be sent into the house to search for false walls or hidden doors. “This wasn’t a hard op,” the special-operations officer told me. “It would be like hitting a target in McLean”””the upscale Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C.

This is not short but it is well worth the time. Read it all–KSH.

Two Charleston-based Coast Guard cutters helped in the recovery of 15,000 pounds of cocaine from a submarine-type craft in what’s believed to be the first time the stealth vessels increasingly favored by drug runners have been spotted in the Caribbean.

The Cutters Oak and Gallatin both took part in the effort to find and secure the wreck after the semi-submersible’s crew scuttled the boat in 75 feet of water near the Honduran-Nicaraguan border.

The crew of the Oak located the sunken vessel on the sea floor while the Gallatin participated in security and the overall effort, officials said.

Read it all from the local paper.

You have concerns that most pastors can’t begin to fathom. How does working under such extraordinary conditions affect ordinary ministry?

So many of our brothers and sisters here in Baghdad have been killed, kidnapped, or tortured even in the last few months. Members of my staff have also been killed. Just this morning, I was trying to sort out post-hospital care for our former chief of security, who recently had a leg blown off.
We cope because the Lord is always with us. When you are where the Lord wants you to be, he always enables you to cope. Look at Daniel. He had not planned to come into exile in Babylon under Nebuchadnezzar. God still provided him with all that he required. He had not intended to be an interpreter of dreams, but God gave him the knowledge to do all that he needed and enabled him to serve with joy.
In the same way, I had no intention of coming to Iraq. But God brought me here 13 years ago, and now there is nowhere in the world I would rather be. Even in the midst of terror and persecution, we have the joy of the Lord.

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Into thy hands, O Lord, we commend ourselves and all who are dear to us this day. Be with us in our going out and in our coming in. Strengthen us for the work which thou hast given us to do. And grant that, filled with thy Holy Spirit, we may walk worthy of our high calling, and cheerfully accomplish those things that thou wouldest have done; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

–F. T. Woods

And this became known to all residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks; and fear fell upon them all; and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled. Many also of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. And a number of those who practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all; and they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord grew and prevailed mightily.

–Acts 19:17-20

…another type of contagion is causing concern: the risk of problems spreading to big banks, especially in Italy and Spain.

The growing vulnerability of the giant banks in these two countries is spurring investor fears that Europe’s latest bid to get a handle on its festering debt crisis, adopted just a few weeks ago, has come up short.

The banks own so many bonds issued by their home countries that they are being weakened as the value of those bonds falls, amid concerns that the cost of government borrowing could become too expensive for Italy and Spain to bear.

Now there are signs that these concerns are, in turn, making it harder and costlier for the banks to borrow money to finance their day-to-day operations, a troubling trend that, at the worst, could lead to liquidity problems.

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A series of cyberattacks that targeted more than 70 organizations in 14 countries throughout the last five years was uncovered by Internet security firm McAfee, Vanity Fair reported Tuesday.

The attacks, discovered by McAfee Vice President of Threat Research Dmitri Alperovitch, and nicknamed “Operation Shady Rat,” are thought to be state-sponsored.

While the victims varied widely in size and location, Vanity Fair reports that the majority of them (49) were U.S.-based organizations and that defense contractors (13) were the most targeted….

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In each of its multiple lawsuits against departed parishes and dioceses, ECUSA usually files a sworn statement (“affidavit” or “declaration”) from Prof. Robert Bruce Mullin, who teaches at its General Theological Seminary in New York. Required discovery disclosures in some of the lawsuits have finally given opponents a handle on the degree of bias which Dr. Mullin brings to his task. Without mincing any words, let me come right to the point:

Over forty months from September 2007 through December 2010, ECUSA has paid Prof. Mullin, over and above his salary at GTS, a total of $672,020.00 in hourly fees. ECUSA has also paid to reimburse him for a further $8,487 in expenses he incurred in his researches, including travel to various locations to have his deposition taken, or to testify at trials.

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