Read it all.

CofE: Sympathy for the Devil
Legal Hobby with AS Haley

With thanks to Anglican TV

In recent years, especially since 9/11, the world of Islam has become a strange and fearful place. Muslim extremists avow their faith even as they violate the sacredness of Ramadan, perverting a month meant for prayers and contemplation with warfare and wanton killing. Those who do not speak out against this unholy violation are also turning away from God’s gift.

Violence is not a monopoly of any one people or culture. But many Muslims have given it a new meaning by making their violence inseparable from their belief. This then is a measure of how great the distance is now between many of those who wear the mantle of Islam and the message Muhammad delivered. The Prophet likely foresaw the time ahead when some followers would make a mockery of Islam and warned, “Islam began as a stranger and will become once more a stranger.”

Yet within Islam itself lies the cure for the malady that grips those Muslims and their leaders who think that through violent jihad, or holy war, they will reconstruct their imagined glorious past.

Read it all.

If the Church of England General Synod votes to approve women bishops it will end one of its longest-running rows. Why has it proved so difficult?…

Read it all

Bad stats. When will we learn? Is anybody willing to own it?

Thankfully, at least one person is.

Tyler Charles. Charles is author of the original piece in RELEVANT magazine.

On Monday of this week, Tyler Charles wrote a helpful mea culpa over at High Calling. In it, he admitted what he called his own “amateur” journalism and confessed to being guilty of “hyping bad stats.”

In the recent article, Charles confessed, “the statistics upon which my entire article hinged were, how should I say this, um…iffy. At best”¦ the data had been extrapolated from a study designed to determine something completely different.”

Charles explains, “after closer examination, the sample size was too small to legitimately make the claims I had clearly and consistently made.” Charles stepped forward because “I couldn’t justify the conclusions my article suggested.”

Read it all from Christianity Today.

ST. GEORGE, SC, JULY 10, 2014 ”“ Testimony continued today for the third day of the trial between the Diocese of South Carolina vs The Episcopal Church (TEC) and The Episcopal Church in South Carolina (TECSC).

Witnesses for the Plaintiff were called from The Cathedral Church of St. Luke and St. Paul in Charleston, St. Luke’s on Hilton Head Island, Holy Comforter in Sumter, Resurrection in Surfside, Church of the Redeemer, Orangeburg and St. John’s in Florence.

Read it all.

The litigation between the Diocese of South Carolina and the The Episcopal Church in South Carolina will run July 7-18. These antiphonal love songs represent the love between the church and Christ”“

Hear my cry, O God; listen to my prayer. From the ends of the earth I call to you, I call as my heart grows faint; lead me to the rock that is higher than I. For you have been my refuge, a strong tower against the foe. I long to dwell in your tent forever and take refuge in the shelter of your wings. Psalm 61:1-4

The beloved shepherd to the Shulamite girl: Your neck is like the tower of David, built with elegance; on it hang a thousand shields, all of them shields of warriors. Song of Solomon 4:4

I love you, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call to the LORD, who is worthy of praise, and I am saved from my enemies. Psalm 18:1-3

The beloved shepherd to the Shulamite girl: Your neck is like the tower of David, built with elegance; on it hang a thousand shields, all of them shields of warriors. Song of Solomon 4:4

Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle. He is my loving God and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield, in whom I take refuge, who subdues peoples under me. . . . Part your heavens, O LORD, and come down. Psalm 144:1-5a

Part your heavens, O Lord, and come down to the courtroom in South Carolina. Amen.

Please pray it all if you wish and there are more prayers from Lent and Beyond for South Carolina here. We are grateful to Lent and Beyond for these wonderful prayers.

So what kind of final can we expect Sunday at Estádio do Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro? If recent history is any indication, something strange and compelling will occur. Something wholly unexpected, and perhaps wretched, for the biggest stars in a moment of unrelieved pressure.

There was Roberto Baggio of Italy, ballooning his penalty kick in the 1994 final and dropping his head like the blade of a guillotine. And Ronaldo of Brazil having some sort of panic attack or seizure before the 1998 final. And Zinedine Zidane head-butting Marco Materazzi in the 2006 final, diminishing France’s chances against Italy and his own lofty reputation.

Perhaps Sunday’s hero will be a quiet player who brings loud celebration, as Andrés Iniesta did with his extra-time goal to give the World Cup to Spain in 2010. Or a lesser-known player like Sergio Romero, the Argentine goalkeeper, who struggled for playing time at Monaco in the French league but saved two penalties against the Netherlands, kissing his gloves and pounding his chest.

Read it all.

MONDAY
THE FINAL VOTE ON WOMEN BISHOPS PASSED.

Update: Audio of the Women Bishops Debate and vote is now available:
Starts in Morning Session here from 1hr:43mins:00secs in.
Continues in the Afternoon Session here

The first vote on the Measure passed with a 2/3 majority in all 3 houses
Bishops: In favour 37; Against 2; Abstained 1
Clergy: In favour 162; Against 25; Abstained 4
Laity: In favour 152; Against 45; Abstained 5

The second vote on the Amending Canon passed with a 2/3 majority in all 3 houses
Bishops: In favour 37; Against 2; Abstained 1
Clergy: In favour 164; Against 24; Abstained 3
Laity: In favour 153; Against 40; Abstained 8

Consequential motions including Rescinding the Act of Synod of 1993 [which provided legal alternative provision for parishes] have passed on a show of hands

There is a Media Release: Church of England to have women bishops

SYNOD IS NOW OVER

Click on the link below for all of the links to each day’s updates and resources.

________________________________________

Synod debates when in session may be listened to below.

This post will be updated from time to time

—————————————–
Press release about Agenda

Daily Agenda and Timetable and Brief Agenda and Papers

Live Video Feed when in session or listen here [In accordance with the system established for the first time last year, it looks as if audio recordings of debates will not be available to listen to again, only those selected speeches the CofE Media office approve of and decide to upload – UPDATE: the Media Office is now uploading media files shortly after debates]

Twitter: #synod and it may be worth following: @CofEgensyn, @C_of_E if interested

Tuesday July 15th
Tuesday Morning
Report of Tuesday Morning Business – Synod and Convocation elections and representation, Ecclesiastical Property, Retirements of Bishops of Blackburn and Oxford, Proroguing of Synod
Audio [Awaited]

Monday July 14th
Monday Evening
Report of Monday Evening Business – Retired clergy, Audit Committee
Audio
PR: New arrangements for housing retired clergy announced

Monday Afternoon
Report of Monday Afternoon Business – Women bishops debate and vote, Magna Carta
Audio – starts with continuation of Women Bishops Debate and Final Vote, then debate on Magna Carta
Press Release on Women Bishops Result

Monday Morning
Audio – Starts with Armed Forces: Women Bishops final debate starts at 1hr:43mins:00secs in
Report of Earlier Monday Morning Business – Armed Forces
Report GS 1960

Sunday July 13th
Sunday Afternoon
Report of Sunday Afternoon Business – Churches Conservation Trust, Archbishops’ Council Report, Novel Texts for Baptism, Clergy Clothing, Credit Unions
Audio

Sunday Evening
Report of Sunday Evening Business – Financial, Archbishops Council’s Budget and Church Commissioners’ Report
Audio

Saturday July 12
Saturday Morning
Report of Saturday Morning Business – Archbishop of York’s Presidential Address, Standing Orders, Domestic Legislation
Audio
– Women Bishops: The House of Bishops having consider the draft legislation Synod apparently reviewed in the review stage on Friday where some numbering was changed; and the Convocations of the two Provinces of York and Canterbury declining to meet to consider the legislation. the legislation was sent back to be debated and voted on on Monday in this form:
Draft Measure
Draft Amending Canon

Saturday Afternoon
The Uncommon Good – Jim Wallis Talk etc
Audio
Report of Saturday Afternoon Business – The Common Good
Audio

Saturday Evening
Report of Saturday Evening Business – Vestments
Audio

Friday July 11
Transcript of Women Bishops Legislation debate
Audio Women Bishops from 1hr:19mins:40secs in until 1hr:53mins:27secs in

Report of Friday Afternoon and Evening Business
– Worship and Introductions
– Progress of Measures and Statutory Instruments
– Business Committee Report [GS 1949]
– Appointments to the Archbishops Council GS1950]

LEGISLATIVE BUSINESS
501 Draft Bishops and Priests (Consecration and Ordination of Women) Measure (GS 1925B) and Draft Amending Canon No. 33 (GS 1926B)

”“ Report by the Business Committee on the Article 8 Reference (GS 1951)

-502 Draft Bishops and Priests (Consecration and Ordination of Women) Measure (GS 1925B) and Draft Amending Canon No. 33 (GS 1926B)
”“ Draft Measure and Draft Amending Canon for Final Drafting (GS 1925-6Z)

519-20 Draft Safeguarding and Clergy Discipline Measure (GS 1952) and Draft Amending Canon No. 34 (GS 1953)
”“ Draft Measure and Draft Amending Canon for First Consideration

Evening Worship

8:30 pm to 10 pm Questions
Update: Questions are here A recording of the answers is awaited.

Tova, a self-identified witch who uses her first name only and created the website The Way Of The Witch, spoke with joined HuffPost Live’s Ricky Camilleri for a discussion about witch hunts in the 21st century. During the conversation, she shared what life is like for herself and her children in Utah.

“I live in a pretty small community outside Salt Lake City, and we have some pretty tight-held belief systems here. Although [witches] are not really just out there trying to be different, certainly people know that we live in a different way, they know that we practice things they don’t understand, and I think it promotes fear,” Tova said.

During her kids’ earlier years, the family faced social challenges because of Tova’s beliefs, she said.

Read it all.

The journey to St. Lydia’s began when Emily Scott and Rachel Pollak came from the Western United States to the East Coast to attend St. Lawrence College. Scott, an Episcopalian, hailed from Bothwell, Washington. Pollak, a Unitarian, came from Salt Lake City, Utah. Both also went on to complete graduate degrees at Yale Divinity School in 2007. By this time they were friends sharing ideas about what “doing church” would look like in the Twenty-first Century.

Scott graduated from the Institute of Sacred Music as a liturgist and musician. She had a passion for worship, arts and liturgy that emerged from her upbringing as an Episcopalian. Pollak received a Master of Arts and Religion from Yale. However, their paths diverged after Pollak moved to study at the Art Institute of Chicago while Scott stayed on the East Coast to work at a local church in New York City.

After she moved to the massive city, Scott began holding more and more dinner parties. The first traces of an idea about a new church can be seen in those friendly gatherings….

Part one is here and part two is there. Read them both.

The Church Commissioners for England are pleased to announce that their indirect investment exposure to Wonga in their venture capital portfolio has been removed. The Church Commissioners no longer have any financial or any other interest in Wonga.

The terms ensure that the Church Commissioners have not made any profit from their investment exposure to Wonga.

At no time have the Commissioners invested directly in Wonga or in other pay day lenders. The indirect exposure of the Commissioners through pooled funds represented considerably less than 0.01% of the value of Wonga.

Read it all.

His advisers might be hoping for a similar understanding of their fallibility. Following an interview published Thursday in which the Archbishop said he wanted to “compete” pay day loan company Wonga out of business by creating credit unions “that are much more professional”, it has emerged that the Church has actually invested in Wonga. The stake is indirectly held by one of its pension funds via a U.S. venture capital fund company called Accel Partners.

The Archbishop said on the BBC’s Radio 4 Today program this morning that he was “embarrassed” and “irritated” to have discovered the holding.

One might forgive the Archbishop for missing the memo on this.

The Church’s pension funds are not only “committed to managing its assets in a way that reflects the Church’s teaching and values” but are also signatories to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment. Its Ethical Investment Advisory Group carries out investment research on behalf of the three national investment bodies of the Church of England, the Church Commissioners for England, the CBF Church of England Funds, and the Church of England Pensions Board.

But keeping track of a fund’s investments might prove trickier than it seems.

Read it all from 2013.

An NHS chaplain, Canon Jeremy Pemberton, who in April became the first Church of England priest to marry a same-sex partner, is unable to take up a new post because his bishop is refusing him a licence.

Canon Pemberton is Deputy Senior Chaplain and Deputy Bereavement and Voluntary Services Manager in the United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust. He married Laurence Cunnington in April (News, 17 April), in defiance of House of Bishops pastoral guidance, issued in February.

He received an informal rebuke from the Bishop of Lincoln, the Rt Revd Christopher Lowson, but kept his general preacher’s licence in the diocese. His NHS post at the trust is also unaffected.

The Acting Bishop of Southwell & Nottingham, however, the diocese in which Canon Pemberton lives, the Rt Revd Richard Inwood, withdrew his permission to officiate

Read it all.

Just as there is an evil zeal of bitterness
which separates from God and leads to hell,
so there is a good zeal
which separates from vices and leads to God
and to life everlasting.
This zeal, therefore, the sisters should practice
with the most fervent love.
Thus they should anticipate one another in honor (Rom. 12:10);
most patiently endure one another’s infirmities,
whether of body or of character;
vie in paying obedience one to another —
no one following what she considers useful for herself,
but rather what benefits another — ;
tender the charity of sisterhood chastely;
fear God in love;
love their Abbess with a sincere and humble charity;
prefer nothing whatever to Christ.
And may He bring us all together to life everlasting!

–The Rule of Benedict, Chapter 72: On the Good Zeal Which They Ought to Have

Almighty and everlasting God, whose precepts are the wisdom of a loving Father: Give us grace, following the teaching and example of thy servant Benedict, to walk with loving and willing hearts in the school of the Lord’s service; let thine ears be open unto our prayers; and prosper with thy blessing the work of our hands; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

O God, the author and fountain of hope, enable us to rely with confident expectation on thy promises, knowing that the trials and hindrances of the present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed, and having our faces steadfastly set towards the light that shineth more and more to the perfect day; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

I bless the Lord who gives me counsel;
in the night also my heart instructs me.
I keep the Lord always before me;
because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.

Therefore my heart is glad, and my soul rejoices;
my body also dwells secure.
For thou dost not give me up to Sheol,
or let thy godly one see the Pit.

Thou dost show me the path of life;
in thy presence there is fulness of joy,
in thy right hand are pleasures for evermore.

–Psalm 16:7-11

The Church of England has jettisoned its stake in the payday lender Wonga, finally distancing itself from the firm it accused of exploiting the poor.

The move by the Church’s financial arm, the Church Commissioners, represents a victory for the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev Justin Welby who has waged a high-profile campaign against high interest lenders.

He faced acute embarrassment last summer when, just a day after the publication of an interview in which he spoke of hoping to force Wonga out of business, it emerged that the Church’s financial arm, the Church Commissioners, had an indirect investment in the company….

Read it all.

The US Supreme Court yesterday vindicated two Christian-owned companies, Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Woods, that have a pro-life objection to including in their employee health plans certain contraceptive drugs and devices. In a 5-4 decision, the Court said that the government did not meet the test set up by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), a 1993 law passed with overwhelming support in Congress and proudly signed into law by President Bill Clinton.

The controversy is over the contraceptives mandate in the 2010 health care reform law, which requires employers’ health plans to cover a wide range of contraceptive drugs and devices, including some the companies and others regard as abortifacients. Churches are exempt from the mandate; after widespread protest, religious nonprofits such as colleges and hospitals were offered an “accommodation”: the insurer provides to the organization a health plan excluding objectionable contraceptives and then announces to the employees that those contraceptives will be paid for by the insurer. No relief at all was offered to companies like those in the cases decided yesterday: religion has no place in commerce, the government claimed. Some 100 lawsuits, by businesses as well as religious nonprofits, have been launched against the contraceptives mandate.

Besides the relief granted to the two companies and others with similar religious claims, what’s most important is the Supreme Court’s rejection of the government’s effort to make business a religion-free zone.

Read it all.