There are the two dozen Church of England Bishops, and the Archbishop of Canterbury himself, who enjoy reserved places denied Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Hindus and those of other faiths and none.
Nor can we ignore the 92 hereditary peers, survivors of Tony Blair’s cull, selected from the Dukes and Earls to sustain feudal bloodlines.
The Establishment guards its perks with a ferocity sadly lacking when it comes to austerity and the Bedroom Tax.
“No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise,” said Winston Churchill. “Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”
But oh dear, the public. The gap between their perceptions and reality makes you shudder, as shown by pollster Ipsos-Mori in its end-of-year review. How many lone parents do you think there are out of every 100 people in Britain? The public’s mean estimate in a poll of 1,000 people is 28. The correct answer is three.
Similarly, the public thinks that 22 per cent of people are Muslim (in reality 5 per cent); that 22 per cent are unemployed (actually 8 per cent); that 30 per cent are black or Asian (11 per cent); that 36 per cent are aged 65-plus (16 per cent); and that 34 per cent are Christian (59 per cent).
But there’s a problem. [Charles] Lindblom’s common-sense insight has a giant exception: crises. Change, forced by outside events, then happens by “leaps and bounds.” The recent financial crisis caused Congress and two presidents to embrace measures (the rescue of big banks, General Motors and Chrysler) that were unthinkable a few months earlier. In the 1960s, civil rights demonstrations pushed Congress to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that, in outlawing most public racial discrimination, wasn’t “incremental.” History offers other examples, including the Civil War, the New Deal and both World Wars. Small changes won’t suffice when big changes are required.
On the budget, muddling through comes with a crucial assumption. It is that continuous deficits won’t provoke a crisis that compels political leaders to take harsh steps that they would otherwise not take. This optimism may be justified. For decades, “experts” have warned of the dire consequences of unchecked deficits. Yet no great crisis has occurred. But this conviction also could be complacency. Government debt is in territory that, except for wartime debt, is unprecedented. We don’t know the consequences. Someday, we may no longer have the luxury of muddling through.
Listen to it all if you so desire.
O Christ our God, who wilt come to judge the world in the manhood which thou hast assumed: We pray thee to sanctify us wholly, that in the day of thy coming we may be raised up to live and reign with thee for ever.
–Church of South India
“And to the angel of the church in La-odice’a write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation. “‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing; not knowing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. 18 Therefore I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, that you may be rich, and white garments to clothe you and to keep the shame of your nakedness from being seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, that you may see. 19 Those whom I love, I reprove and chasten; so be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. He who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I myself conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'”
–Revelation 3:14-22
The UN says more than 1,200 people have been killed in Islamist-related violence in north-east Nigeria since a state of emergency was declared in May.
The UN said the figure related to killings of civilians and the military by the Islamist group Boko Haram in the states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe.
It also includes insurgents killed by security forces repelling attacks.
Hooray for Amtrak–this is just so much fun–watch the whole thing (just under 4 minutes)
Also overlooked amidst the fallout from Evangelii Gaudium was a statement by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, which defended not only Francis’s remarks in EG, but also their specific context, as as well as the greater role of the Church vis-Ã -vis economics and morality….
The flood of North American crude oil is set to become a deluge as Mexico dismantles a 75-year-old barrier to foreign investment in its oil fields.
Plagued by almost a decade of slumping output that has degraded Mexico’s take from a $100-a-barrel oil market, President Enrique Pena Nieto is seeking an end to the state monopoly over one of the biggest crude resources in the Western Hemisphere. The doubling in Mexican oil output that Citigroup Inc. said may result from inviting international explorers to drill would be equivalent to adding another Nigeria to world supply, or about 2.5 million barrels a day.
That boom would augment a supply surge from U.S. and Canadian wells that Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) predicts will vault North American production ahead of every OPEC member except Saudi Arabia within two years.
There will soon be a rooftop swimming pool where the copper-domed bell towers of Mary Help of Christians once rose.
Formerly a hub of the East Village’s Italian-American community, the site of the Roman Catholic church is now slated for a 158-unit rental building, complete with basement gym and rooftop gardens ”” a familiar trajectory for a growing number of houses of worship as church attendance falls and real estate values soar.
In the rubble-strewn lot on Avenue A between 11th and 12th Streets where Mary Help of Christians and its school and rectory long stood, a rusty basketball hoop and strip of blacktop are all that is left. But perhaps unknown to those mourning the church’s passing, much of what was precious inside it ”” and other now-closed Catholic churches ”” sits in a Staten Island warehouse, awaiting a second chance.
In a 2007 interview with The New York Times, O’Toole described himself as a “retired Christian.” He played, among others, the pope (twice”“onstage early in his career and in “The Tudors”), a Catholic priest (“Fore Greater Glory“), and a British lord who thought he was Jesus (“The Ruling Class”).
O’Toole left his Catholic faith behind in his childhood, but often had high praise for the figure behind Christianity. Speaking of his admiration of the Sermon on the Mount, O’Toole said, “No one can take Jesus away from me”¦there’s no doubt there was a historical figure of tremendous importance, with enormous notions. Such as peace.” He didn’t have much use for the institution of the Catholic church, but he held Jesus in reverence.
– See more at: http://lauraturner.religionnews.com/2013/12/15/peter-otoole-no-one-can-take-jesus-away-from-me/#sthash.2UVvUEvq.dpuf
A United Methodist minister in Pennsylvania plans to defy a church order to surrender his credentials for performing a same-sex wedding.
The Rev. Frank Schaefer says he cannot uphold the church’s Book of Discipline because he finds it discriminatory. The Methodist church accepts gay and lesbian members but rejects the practice of homosexuality as “incompatible with Christian teaching.”
Contrary to expectations, it has turned out that children don’t provide the glue to keep cohabiting parents together. Marriage – often dismissed as just a piece of paper – does make a difference.
This year, the ”Knot Yet” report on changing marriage patterns, by the Washington-based Brookings Institution, examined why this was so and suggested the answer may lie in the decision-making process.
Most people marry after a process of discovering mutual commitment to long-term goals. That’s often lacking in cohabiting relationships where couples move in together sometimes because a lease runs out, or they are seeking cheaper rent, or it seemed like a good idea at the time.
Families that evolve from these non-decisions are, unsurprisingly, far less stable.
Some more active persecutors tell similar stories. “We harassed them and destroyed their houses. But they have no hatred or anger against us,” said Junos Digal, a member of the mob that attacked Christian targets. Squatting on a mat, with a Bible in front of him, he continued: “They are still suffering. But they have no complaints and they are living happily. There is certainly something special about how their faith enables them to overcome difficulties. This has brought me here. If Jesus could influence people’s lives to such an extent, I would prefer to be a part of that faith,” Digal said.
Asked whether he was worried that other Hindu fundamentalists would not turn their ire toward him for betraying their cause, Digal gave an interesting reply: “Many of us were misled. Now they will accept the reality. I am not worried about that.” Junos’s wife, Sailama, embraced Christian faith before he did. She said simply: “My conscience made me take this decision.” She too is unworried about a possible angry reaction from militant Hindus. “ God will protect us,” she says. “If we live, we live for Christ and if we die, we die for Christ.”
The entry of more than a dozen such new converts to their congregation brought joy and comfort to the Christians who had held to their faith amid persecution. “In our suffering, our faith has been strengthened,” said Jayanti Digal. “Even when we were suffering, our faith kept us going. Now we are glad that even those who attacked us have started embracing our faith,” she said.
Cybercriminals generally fall into one of three categories, he says. First there are the “Anonymouses of the world” or the hacktivists””people who expose information about a company or government they morally oppose. Second is organized crime. “They’re realizing there’s far more money in cybercrime than prostitution,” Mr. DeCesare says. “You can buy somebody’s I.D. for less than $10 online.” Third are activities funded by states and other political groups. “Every government has a cyber division,” he says, including the U.S. But cyber dangers now stretch beyond state lines to groups such as al Qaeda. “Cybercrime is a lot like that””[the country is] almost not relevant anymore,” making it difficult to hold governments accountable.
From a consumer standpoint, Mr. DeCesare knows from personal experience how easy it is to be fooled online. One of his three children once clicked on a site that turned out to be pornographic. “A Selena Gomez site was not what it was advertised to be,” he remembers. Mr. DeCesare now cautions his children against going to celebrity-related websites, which are common points of attack. The “bad guys,” he says, often build their own sites around popular stars.
Read it all (emphasis mine).
“The state has got to feel a little foolish enforcing these old statutes that are particular to Utah history,” says Kathleen Flake, chair of Mormon studies at the University of Virginia. “We no longer criminalize adultery or fornication. Any college dormitory could run afoul of these laws.”
Americans today recognize “a zone of privacy around sexual activity,” says Flake, who is working on a book about Mormon polygamy. “Why isn’t that granted to people who believe themselves to be married to multiple partners as opposed to those who simply have multiple partners?”
Now it is, at least to one judge.
South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir says an attempted coup by soldiers loyal to his sacked former deputy Riek Machar has been put down.
It comes after heavy gunfire overnight in the capital, Juba.
Mr Kiir told reporters in the capital that the government was in full control and the culprits being pursued, and announced a night-time curfew.
Several people are reported wounded and hundreds of civilians have sought refuge at the UN mission in Juba.
Americans’ rating of the honesty and ethics of the clergy has fallen to 47%, the first time this rating has dropped below 50% since Gallup first asked about the clergy in 1977. Clergy have historically ranked near the top among professions on this measure, hitting a high rating of 67% in 1985.
The prayers are jarring because they are so personal and raw, clearly not written to “edify the saints” in a published manuscript. They are, well, just prayers.
Part of the rawness and authenticity of the prayers come with the way O’Connor refuses to sentimentalize her personal relationship with Jesus (thought it’s clear she has one). She is here constantly aware of her own fallenness and of the seeming silence of the God to whom she pours out these little notes.
O’Connor notes that her attention is “fugitive” in prayer. She confesses that hell seems more “feasible” in her mind than heaven because, “I can fancy the tortures of the damned but I cannot imagine the disembodied souls hanging in a crystal for all eternity praising God.”
This means that the U.S. Catholic population, which is projected to grow to nearly 80,000,000 by 2038, will be served by only 25,000 priests. Over a fifty year period, the American Catholic Church will see a 50 percent increase in members and a 60 percent decline in the number of priests to serve them.
As the Church’s demographics have changed and vocations have declined, some parishes have become larger and more complex. One third of American parishes have grown in size to what would be considered a “mega-church”””in the Protestant Evangelical community, a mega-church is one with more than 2,000 members. A few American Catholic churches have as many as 20,000 parishioners. As parishes continue to expand, creative pastors and staff are launching dozens of new ministries and activities for people of all ages.
The Archbishop of Canterbury met with members of the Hindu Christian Forum at Lambeth Palace last Friday.
Archbishop Justin heard about the history of the Forum and its current work, including the innovative ”˜Comparing Notes’ dialogue series, and contributions to this year’s Inter Faith Week.
The conversation also covered a number of issues including understandings of conversion, the place of faith in society, and the recent inclusion of caste as a category within equalities legislation.
THE Bishop of Osun North Diocese of the Anglican Communion, Right Reverend A.T Olaoye, at Okuku, has called on the Federal Government to be wary of the military and the police, saying that some of the security agents were thwarting government’s efforts in the fight against insurgency in the country, just as he cautioned the Osun State governor, Rauf Aregbesola, to exercise caution in the implementation of the new education policy for the state.
Olaoye lamented that “it is worrisome to note that we are still battling with the terrorists’ attacks till now”, accusing some officers in the military and the police for allegedly leaking intelligence reports to members of the Islamic group, thereby thwarting the efforts of the federal government in restoring peace in some troubled states in the North.
“If the Lord told me I could redo two years of my life–if I could take a mulligan–I would choose the two years after Bible College. Hands down. I joke about it, but it really was the worst time. There was so much pride in my life….”
Go here, then to the table of contents, then to page 58 to read the rest.
The Very Reverend Dr. Logan McMenamie, Dean of Columbia and rector of Christ Church Cathedral, Victoria, was elected to become the 13th Bishop of the Diocese of British Columbia, which is made up members of the Anglican Church of Canada on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands.
On December 7th members of the Anglican Diocese of British Columbia, gathered to choose the 13th Bishop at an Electoral Synod held at Christ Church Cathedral, Victoria, BC. A body of delegates comprising 61 clergy (priests and deacons) and 110 lay members of synod participated in voting. McMenamie was chosen on the third ballot.
O Lord our God, in whose hands is the issue of all things, and who requirest from thy stewards not success but faithfulness: Give us such faith in thee and in thy sure purposes, that we measure not our lives by what we have done or failed to do, but by our obedience to thy holy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
“And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: ‘The words of the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one shall shut, who shuts and no one opens.”‘I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut; I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name. Behold, I will make those of the synagogue of Satan who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie–behold, I will make them come and bow down before your feet, and learn that I have loved you. Because you have kept my word of patient endurance, I will keep you from the hour of trial which is coming on the whole world, to try those who dwell upon the earth. I am coming soon; hold fast what you have, so that no one may seize your crown. He who conquers, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God; never shall he go out of it, and I will write on him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which comes down from my God out of heaven, and my own new name. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’
–Revelation 3:7-13
With news bulletins popping up on my phone and airport TV monitors reporting the breaking news, I called my office and we decided to send a Rapid Response Team of crisis-trained chaplains who had years of fire, police and emergency management experience to assess the need for emotional and spiritual care.
As God would have it, these specially-trained chaplains were already in the New Jersey and New York region as part of our response to Hurricane Sandy.
As the chaplains arrived just a few hours later at a police checkpoint near the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, the police immediately invited the chaplains in and directed them to the Incident Command Center to offer support to the first responders who were first on the scene at the school.
I’d be more sympathetic to complaints about the war on Christmas if they weren’t coming from the very people who have waged a largely successful war on Advent. Because, let’s face it, the idea that Christmas should be celebrated in early December, or even mid-December, is not a Christian concept; Christmas celebrations historically were confined to ”¦ Christmas. They were even banned in several of the Protestant colonies, and once the bans were lifted, Christmas remained unrecognizably low-key by today’s standards. The monthlong Christmas celebration is a secular invention, promoted and pushed a little harder each year by a retail industry bent on doing what it does best: convince us to buy more and more things we don’t need.
And the complaint about a societal war on Christmas is not a religious complaint; it’s a political complaint, which politicians have used quite effectively to make too many people believe that Christians have been marginalized by the larger society ”” as if we weren’t ourselves the larger society.
Adding insult to spiritual injury, the assault on Advent crowds out the real observation of Christmas ”” the one that starts on the evening of Dec. 24 and runs through Epiphany, 12 days later. Try to find a Christmas carol then or, after the new year, anyone who even says “happy holidays,” much less “merry Christmas.”