We see that in our affluent western world much is lacking. Many people lack experience of God’s goodness. They no longer find any point of contact with the mainstream churches and their traditional structures. But why is this? I think this is a question on which we must reflect very seriously. Addressing it is the principal task of the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization. But naturally it is something that concerns us all. Allow me to refer here to an aspect of Germany’s particular situation. The Church in Germany is superbly organized. But behind the structures, is there also a corresponding spiritual strength, the strength of faith in the living God? We must honestly admit that we have more than enough by way of structure but not enough by way of Spirit. I would add: the real crisis facing the Church in the western world is a crisis of faith. If we do not find a way of genuinely renewing our faith, all structural reform will remain ineffective.

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What is your opinion on the Federal Government directive that the Minister of Defence should take over security in Jos?

I think it is a better step in the right direction that the Minister of Defence should take over because the way we see the whole thing, it seems that the security in Plateau State has collapsed. And this is the failure of the Inspector-General of Police. The police is to protect lives and secure the lives and property of people but since all these days, these killings have continued and we wonder when it would stop and so, I think, we have lost confidence in the police. I think, therefore, the IG (Inspector-General of Police) should be retired with immediate effect because this was what happened when there was kidnapping in the East….

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I want you to know that God loves you and goes on loving you whether you come to church or not. To get God to love you is not the object of the exercise. As St Paul makes clear in his letter to the church in Rome, there is nothing you can do that will separate you from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus (see Romans 8. 31-39). No. The reason we come to church is not so that God might love us, but that we might learn to love God and that we might learn to live God’s way; not just us, but all the world. So if you are here for the first time, or for the first time for a long time, welcome. Please don’t walk away. Because God is all merciful and all loving, and the rest of us are here, not because we are so good or so faithful or so generous, but because we are also learners in the school of God’s love, trying to find out how we can best respond to the challenges of Jesus, and knowing that whatever we do, or don’t do, he goes on loving us.

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Note the reference to the denominational membership–3.5 million–and note that the vote was 79 to 56

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Sitting in the modest living room of the home she shares with her parents, husband and two teenage children, Stella Firigou fretted about how the family would cope with the uncertainties of an economy crashing all around them. But she was adamant about one thing: she would not pay a new property tax that was the centerpiece of a new austerity package announced this month by the Greek government.

“I’m not going to pay it,” Ms. Firigou, 50, said matter-of-factly, as she lighted a cigarette and checked her ringing cellphone to avoid calls from her bank about late payments on a loan. “I can’t afford to pay it. They can take me to jail.”

While banks and European leaders hold abstract talks in foreign capitals about the impact of a potential Greek default on the euro and the world economy, something frighteningly concrete is under way in Greece: the dismantling of a middle-class welfare state in real time ”” with nothing to replace it.

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James R. Adams, an Episcopal priest who was rector of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church on Capitol Hill from 1966 until he retired in 1996, was skeptical of religious dogma. He interpreted miracle stories in the Bible as more metaphorical than historically factual, and he shared these thoughts from his pulpit.

He followed the traditions and liturgies of the established Episcopal Church, but he was also open to innovation and experimentation.

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In the end, Stuxnet may have set back Iran’s nuclear ambitions by years. But it also could prove a Pyrrhic victory for its still-unknown creator ”“ a sophisticated cyberweapons nation state that [ Ralph] Langner argues could be the US or Israel. Like the Hiroshima bomb, Stuxnet demonstrated for the first time a dangerous capability ”“ in this case to hackers, cybercrime gangs, and new cyberweapons states, he says in an interview.

With Stuxnet as a “blueprint” downloadable from the Internet, he says, “any dumb hacker” can now figure out how to build and sell cyberweapons to any hacktivist or terrorist who wants “to put the lights out” in a US city or “release a toxic gas cloud.”

What follows are excerpts of Langner’s comments from an extended interview:

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After a weekend of tense meetings among world finance officials here, euro-zone leaders were weighing options to maximize the size of their bailout fund by borrowing against it. The move could provide trillions of dollars of firepower to rescue governments and banks””-but only if all 17 euro-zone legislatures approve a two-month-old agreement to broaden the bailout fund.

Highly public opposition from Germany, the largest and most powerful euro-zone economy, could block the plan.

Policy makers are “focused on their own internal restraints, so that we don’t have the outcome that we need,” Antonio Borges, head of the International Monetary Fund’s Europe department, said Sunday. While key players were understandably acting in self-interest, he said, it was generating “disastrous” collective results.

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The reserve powers would be well advised to pull out all the stops to save Europe and its banking system. Together they hold $10 trillion in foreign bonds. If they agreed to rotate just 4pc of these holdings ($400bn) into Spanish, Italian, and Belgian debt over the next two years, they could offer a soothing balm. None has yet risen to the challenge. It is `sauve qui peut’, with no evidence of G20 leadership in sight.

Once again, the US has had to take charge. The multi-trillion package now taking shape for Euroland was largely concocted in Washington, in cahoots with the European Commission, and is being imposed on Germany by the full force of American diplomacy.

It is an ugly and twisted set of proposals, devised to accomodate Berlin’s refusal to accept fiscal union, Eurobonds, and an EU treasury. But at least it is big.

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Benedict XVI is the embodiment of resistance to the idiocies of today, when the obsession with ratings and sex are more important than any article of faith. But he performs that role with a soft voice and the steadfastness of a deeply religious man. And he binds the loyalty of those people who stand with him in opposition — some 1.2 billion Catholics in the global Church — and who are often ridiculed as idiots for doing so. They are true to the words of the apostle Paul: “God hath chosen the foolish things of the world.”

In his last Mass before he was elected as pope, Cardinal Ratzinger preached against the “dictatorship of relativism” and the ideology of “anything goes.” Today, many observers regard that sermon as a pre-emptive statement of the approach he would take as pope.

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A few years ago, Mary Finucane started noticing changes in the way her 3-year-old daughter played. The toddler had stopped running and jumping, and insisted on wearing only dresses. She sat on the front step quietly ”“ waiting, she said, for her prince. She seemed less imaginative, less spunky, less interested in the world.

Ms. Finucane believes the shift began when Caoimhe (pronounced Keeva) discovered the Disney Princesses, that omnipresent, pastel packaged franchise of slender-waisted fairy-tale heroines. When Finucane mentioned her suspicions to other parents, they mostly shrugged.

“Everyone seemed to think it was inevitable,” Finucane says. “You know, it was Disney Princesses from [ages] 2 to 5, then Hannah Montana, then ‘High School Musical.’ I thought it was so strange that these were the new trajectories of female childhood.”

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A big-time college career was a given, and thoughts of the N.F.L. percolated. During the summer before his senior year, [Mark] Herzlich committed to Virginia but reconsidered after a coaching change and chose Boston College. He was a starter by the end of his first season, led the team in tackles for loss in his second and was the Atlantic Coast Conference’s defensive player of the year in his third. Many draft experts predicted he would be a first-round choice if he left college, but he stayed. He wanted to earn his degree. The N.F.L. could wait.
But then, toward the end of that 2008 season and on through the spring, there was increasing pain in his left leg, screaming phone calls home in the middle of the night, the diagnosis and the invasive realities of treatment. Herzlich had a port, used to administer medicine intravenously, embedded in the right side of his chest. He gave up peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because he did not want his favorite food spoiled by taste buds tainted during chemotherapy.

Herzlich’s battle with Ewing’s sarcoma caused him to miss the 2009 season, but he returned for his fifth year at B.C., playing just 10 months after surgery to remove the tumor in his leg. He led the Eagles on to the field for the season-opening game against Weber State, recording five tackles to resounding cheers. He started all 13 games. He won an ESPY award for Best Comeback.

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Zengeza West MP Collen Gwiyo brought the matter to the House of Assembly this week.

“My question is directed to the Deputy Minister of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture. I would like the minister to explain government policy with regard to church disputes that are now interfering with classes, in particular there is a faction led by Bishop Kunonga of the Anglican church which has actually affected the education system,” Gwiyo said.

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The Anglican Bishop of Sarawak and Brunei, the Right Revd Datuk Bolly Lapok, has been elected the fourth Archbishop of the Province of South East Asia.

Bolly was elected during the Extraordinary Provincial Synod in Kota Kinabalu on Thursday.

He will become the province’s fourth Archbishop next year, taking over from the Most Revd Dr John Chew, who is Bishop of Singapore.

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As part of the Bible in the Life of the Church project we are undertaking a Communion-wide survey of the way Anglicans understand and engage with the Bible. We rightly say the Bible is central to our life together but we also engage with it and interpret it in different ways. What are those differences? Why might there be differences? What can we learn from those who differ from us?

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Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who dost feed the birds and clothe the flowers, and who carest for us as a father for his children: We beseech thee of thy tender goodness to save us from distrust and vain self-concern; that with unwavering faith we may cast our every care on thee, and live in daily obedience to thy will; through thy beloved Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Now there was at Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which means Dorcas. She was full of good works and acts of charity. In those days she fell sick and died; and when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, hearing that Peter was there, sent two men to him entreating him, “Please come to us without delay.” So Peter rose and went with them. And when he had come, they took him to the upper room. All the widows stood beside him weeping, and showing tunics and other garments which Dorcas made while she was with them. But Peter put them all outside and knelt down and prayed; then turning to the body he said, “Tabitha, rise.” And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter she sat up. And he gave her his hand and lifted her up. Then calling the saints and widows he presented her alive. And it became known throughout all Joppa, and many believed in the Lord. And he stayed in Joppa for many days with one Simon, a tanner.

–Acts 9:36-43

The company didn’t reveal any details about the conference, but it has been widely speculated that Amazon will announced its long-awaited 7″ Kindle tablet. The e-reader-tablet hybrid is expected to be equipped with a color screen, video-streaming services, an improved user interface and to be powered by Google’s Android operating system.

It’s estimated that the Kindle tablet will be priced around $250….

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A leading Islamic scholar has received a standing ovation from thousands of UK Muslims as he denounced terrorism and called for peace.
Wembley Arena in north-west London was a sea of colourful robes as an estimated 12,000 Muslims gathered to give their backing to a global declaration of peace.

Dr Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, founder of the Minhaj-ul-Quran International (MQI) movement, was repeatedly applauded during a speech in which he said the “terrible” 9/11 attacks in the US had distorted perceptions of Islam over the past decade.

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Two Church of Ireland rectors have broken ranks to reject Archbishop Alan Harper’s appeal for an end to discussion of the church’s first same-sex union involving a minister.

Amid growing impatience in sections of the church which has not yet made clear whether it accepts the controversial civil partnership, three weeks after the News Letter revealed the move, there are emerging warnings that if the church does not act evangelicals may find their own bishops.

In separate statements, the Rev Neville Hughes from the rural parishes of Mullabrack and Kilcluney near Markethill and the Rev Alan McCann of the urban parish of Woodburn in Carrickfergus rejected the primate of all Ireland’s call to halt discussion about the Rev Tom Gordon’s civil partnership.

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From Phil Ashey–

I’d like to share with you a letter from the Bishop and Diocesan Council of The Episcopal Church’s (TEC) Diocese of the Rio Grande. But first, a little background so that you can appreciate the letter in all its fullness.

This time two years ago, approximately 80% of the parishioners of St. Mark’s on-the-Mesa (TEC) left the parish and formed Christ the King Anglican, Albuquerque, NM (Anglican Church in North America). When those parishioners left the parish, the Diocese of the Rio Grande, and the Episcopal Church, they left everything. They left the property, building, endowments, bank accounts – even paperclips and pencils. They did so in good conscience, with generosity, and with love for those who in good conscience could not leave The Episcopal Church. Based on their reading of scripture, these parishioners did not want to fight over buildings and property in civil courts. Instead, they walked away and began a new life together as Anglican followers of Jesus Christ at Christ the King Anglican Church. Not only did the new parish draw former Episcopalians, but also Christians from other denominations who wanted to worship and serve at Christ the King Anglican.

Fast forward two years to August 31, 2011 (about three weeks ago). The congregation’s rector, the Rev. Roger Weber, former priest at St. Mark’s, received this letter from TEC Bishop Michael Vono of the Diocese of the Rio Grande…

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The European Community has always been a project led by the elites of its member states. For most of its history, outside Britain at least, it enjoyed popular support because it delivered growth and prosperity, especially in its early years. But the last two decades have seen a big change. The treaty that set up the single currency obliged all member states of the now European Union, with the exception of Denmark and Britain who had opted out, to adopt it once they met the economic criteria. For the sake of the political dynamic, the criteria for joining were sometimes fudged. The more fragile economies struggled, especially when, faced with economic downturn and unemployment, they were bound by exchange rates and interest rates better attuned to the stronger economies than to their own needs.
Over the same period, the EU welcomed in the newly liberated countries of eastern and central Europe. Their acceptance by the existing membership has been the supreme achievement of the European Union to date: a brilliant act of generosity in the interests of peace and stability. But it has been accompanied by migration from the new member states on a scale that few anticipated. That in turn has contributed to massive social change. The resulting tensions have combined to turn public opinion away from support of the European Union and its institutions.

None of us can know whether the European Union could survive the break-up of the single currency. It looks for now as if the departure of some members is more likely than the demise of the whole project. And it may yet be that the crisis will finally bring about the central political governance necessary to make the currency a success. But the pressures of national public opinion make such a dramatic breakthrough very problematic.

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The independent and bipartisan U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom could be forced to shut its doors if the Senate does not vote by week’s end to reauthorize the panel.

The commission appears to be in legislative limbo after the House voted Sept. 15 to extend the panel for an additional two years. The commission is authorized through Sept. 30, but both houses of Congress are scheduled to be in recess starting Monday (Sept. 26).

Before the House vote, Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., urged fellow members to support the watchdog panel that monitors the persecution of religious minorities across the globe. But he worried that the Senate might not act in time.

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The Obama Administration’s fight against the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which defines marriage as between one man and one woman, will undermine marriage and create a serious breach of Church-State relations, Archbishop Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, wrote in a September 20 letter to President Barack Obama, The Administration’s assault on DOMA, Archbishop Dolan said, will “precipitate a national conflict between Church and State of enormous proportions and to the detriment of both institutions.”

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On the surface, economists at the International Monetary Fund and most banks are still estimating China’s growth rate to be over 9 percent this year. China continues to run very large trade surpluses. New construction starts have soared with a government campaign to provide more affordable housing.

And yet, the country’s huge manufacturing sector is starting to slow and orders are weakening, especially for exports. The real estate bubble is starting to spring leaks, even as inflation remains stubbornly high for consumers ”” despite a series of interest rate increases and ever-tighter limits on bank lending.

Because China’s mighty growth engine has been one of the few drivers of the global economy since the financial crisis of 2008, signs of deceleration could add to worries about the global outlook.

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Hundreds of revolutionary fighters pushed into Muammar Qaddafi’s hometown Saturday in the first significant assault in about a week as Libya’s new rulers try to rout remaining loyalists of the fugitive leader. At the same time, the political leadership sought to boost its authority, promising to announce an interim government.

Explosions rocked the city of Sirte and smoke rose into the sky as Qaddafi’s forces fired mortars and rocket-propelled grenades at the fighters. Ambulances sped from the direction of the front line, and a doctor said at least one fighter was killed and 25 others wounded in the battle.

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St. John’s Vancouver Anglican Church, the largest Anglican congregation in Canada, will begin Sunday services at a new location after moving from its historic location on Granville Street and Nanton Avenue. The congregation, through a lengthy legal action, chose to leave their buildings rather than compromise their beliefs.

St. John’s Vancouver, which had been meeting at the Granville Street location for almost 100 years, will begin Sunday services on September 25 at Oakridge Adventist Church, at West 37th Avenue and Baillie Street in Vancouver.

Disagreement over basic Christian beliefs has separated Anglican congregations around the world into two camps, usually labeled orthodox and liberal, with those holding to historic, Bible-based values and beliefs in the vast majority. The St. John’s Vancouver Anglican congregation has aligned itself with the mainstream global Anglican Church, rather than continue as part of the local, more liberal Diocese of New Westminster.

“It is remarkable to be part of a Christian community which is putting faith into action in a way that seems inexplicable to those who love the world,” explained Canon David Short, Rector of St. John’s Vancouver. “We are doing something countercultural and counterintuitive for the truth of God’s word, losing something very valuable for the surpassing worth of Jesus Christ, holding the unity of faith by acting together as one, and joyfully accepting the confiscation of our property.”

The underlying, central issues of belief are: the authority of God’s Word in the Bible, the uniqueness of Jesus Christ, and the need to be saved by Him. St. John’s, along with the majority of Anglicans worldwide, joyfully upholds the historic biblical faith, expressed in the founding Anglican affirmations.

The move was the result of a court action to determine whether the Diocese of New Westminster or the St. John’s Vancouver congregation was conducting the ministry for which the buildings were intended, and is a result of an on-going world-wide upheaval in the Anglican Communion, the 80 million member Christian Protestant denomination formed 500 years ago.

St. John’s Vancouver’s final Sunday services at the Granville Street location on September 18, attended by over 1,100 congregants, included prayers to bless the Diocese of New Westminster and those that would occupy the buildings after the congregation had left. Congregation members both wept and smiled as they left the church to travel the short distance to the new location. There, they joyfully sung hymns and prayed together.

“It is inexpressibly sad that we are forced to choose between God’s final word and these wonderful buildings,” said Canon Short, “but we feel relief and much joy in God’s faithfulness and provision for us.”

St. John’s Vancouver will continue to be led by its present clergy, Canon David Short, Rector, Venerable Daniel Gifford, Associate Minister, Rev. James Wagner, and Rev. Aaron Roberts, assisted by Canon Dr. J.I. Packer, Honorary Assistant Minister and a world-renowned published theologian, a staff of 15, and by the Trustees of St. John’s Vancouver Anglican Church.

The new location secured by St. John’s Vancouver is at West 37th Avenue and Baillie Street and belongs to Oakridge Adventist Church, which has graciously offered to share its building. St. John’s Sunday services will start in Oakridge on September 25, 2011 and all other mid-week activities are planned to continue as normal in the new location.

All those who visited St. John’s Granville Street location in the past, new neighbours in the Oakridge location, and all visitors and residents in Vancouver are welcome at the services, prayer times and church events. Special events are planned during the transition period and special welcoming services will be held. (My emphasis–KSH)

An Anglican congregation in Vancouver is abandoning a historic church…after losing a court case spawned by divisions within the church over same sex marriages.

The St. John’s congregation says it’s giving up the Granville Street church, which it’s used for almost 100 years, and moving its Sunday services to another location.

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The conference ”” held at Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, a town in the Atlas Mountains about two hours south of Rabat ”” brought together Holocaust scholars and survivors, leaders of Morocco’s Jewish community and American Jewish and Moroccan Muslim students. Its twin mandates were to teach about the extermination of European Jewry and to pay homage to the courage of Morocco’s wartime king, Mohammed V, in resisting the orders of the Vichy French occupation government to round up and turn over Jews for internment and probable death.

Uncommonly among Arab and Muslim nations, Morocco has accepted the reality of the Holocaust, rather than either dismissing it outright or portraying it as a European crime for which those countries paid the price in the form of Israel’s creation. Partly, no doubt, because of Mohammed V’s stand against the Vichy regime, the current king, Mohammed VI, called in a 2009 proclamation for “an exhaustive and faithful reading of the history of this period” as part of “the duty of remembrance dictated by the Shoah.”

Still, the recent conference would never have occurred without Mr. Boudra. Now 24 and majoring in political science, Mr. Boudra grew up after much of Morocco’s Jewish population had moved to France or Israel. But he heard from his grandmother about her childhood in the Jewish quarter of Casablanca, and a grandfather still had Jewish neighbors in his apartment house.

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