For casual soccer fans, it may be difficult to fully understand the absurdity of Leicester City’s having a chance to clinch England’s Premier League title this weekend. To say it is an upset or a shock or a stunner seems wholly inadequate, particularly when one considers that those words are so often used to describe one-time results (the United States over the Soviet Union in the 1980 Olympic hockey tournament, for example) as opposed to the feat of endurance that is required for a relative minnow like Leicester to dominate the sharks of English soccer for a nine-month season.

One way to view Leicester City’s unlikely title is through gambling odds. Before this season began, British bookmakers listed Leicester ”” pronounced Less-ter ”” as a 5,000-to-1 shot to emerge as the Premier League champion. By comparison, the so-called Miracle Mets of 1969 were a 100-to-1 choice, and Buster Douglas was just a 42-to-1 underdog when he upset Mike Tyson in 1990 to win the heavyweight championship.

Being 5,000 to 1 really put Leicester City more in line with the odds one might see in the novelty category often offered by British bookies ”” bets on things that are so outlandish and unlikely as to be unimaginable ”” but even there, Leicester City was a long shot. The odds that Simon Cowell, the acid-tongued producer of “American Idol,” would become the next British prime minister were only 500 to 1, for example….

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The Archbishop is to celebrate Ascension Day at St John the Baptist & All Saints Easingwold on Thursday 5 May at 7.30pm ”“ all welcome. He is visiting Strensall Barracks to meet with soldiers and their families at Hurst Hall on Saturday 7 May at 10.15am and following this, is to join in the fundraising paper-chain event with Kidz Club ”“ linking St Mary’s Church to the Methodist Church. An ”˜Ask the Archbishop’ question and answer is taking place at The Ship Inn, Strensall at 11.45am on Saturday”“ all welcome. Join the Archbishop at St Helen and the Holy Cross Church, Sheriff Hutton for a 10.30am Eucharist on Sunday 8th May”“ all welcome.

In a busy week which includes a community soup lunch at Oulston on Tuesday and meeting with USA/UK Youth interns on Wednesday, the Archbishop will also be leading Pilgrimage Prayers at 11 local churches and calling in at eight schools at Husthwaite, Crayke, Shipton, Brafferton, Alne, Easingwold, Sutton on the Forest and Huby. The Archbishop will also be meeting the community at Easingwold Market Place on Friday morning.

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O God, our heavenly Father, who so loved the world that thou didst give thine only Son to die upon the cross: Pour thy love into our hearts, we humbly beseech thee; that we loving thee above all things, may give up ourselves, our time, our money, our talents, to thy service; for the sake of him who loved us and gave himself for us, Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord.

Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed on and triumph, as it did among you, and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men; for not all have faith. But the Lord is faithful; he will strengthen you and guard you from evil. And we have confidence in the Lord about you, that you are doing and will do the things which we command. May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ.

But nones aren’t inheriting the Earth just yet. In many parts of the world””sub-Saharan Africa in particular””religion is growing so fast that nones’ share of the global population will actually shrink in 25 years as the world turns into what one researcher has described as “the secularizing West and the rapidly growing rest.” (The other highly secular part of the world is China, where the Cultural Revolution tamped down religion for decades, while in some former Communist countries, religion is on the increase.)

And even in the secularizing West, the rash of “religious freedom bills”””which essentially decriminalize discrimination””are the latest front in a faith-tinged culture war in the United States that shows no signs of abetting anytime soon.

Within the ranks of the unaffiliated, divisions run deep. Some are avowed atheists. Others are agnostic. And many more simply don’t care to state a preference. Organized around skepticism toward organizations and united by a common belief that they do not believe, nones as a group are just as internally complex as many religions. And as with religions, these internal contradictions could keep new followers away.

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GAFCON April 2016 from GAFCON Official on Vimeo.

Bishop Stephen Andrews will lead Canada’s largest Anglican theological college
Stephen Andrews has announced that as of Aug. 1, he’ll be the new principal of Wycliffe College, the largest Anglican theological college in the country, located on the campus of the University of Toronto.

“I’m thrilled by it and I’m a little bit nervous about it,” said Andrews, who was the president of Thorneloe, a federated university on Laurentian University’s campus, for eight years before becoming bishop.

“It’s an important responsibility in the life of the church.”

Andrews is an American who was born in Colorado and grew up in Minnesota. He moved to Vancouver, B.C. in 1979 to study theology, and stayed in Canada after marrying his Canadian wife, Fawna.

He actually did some of his studies at Wycliffe after deciding to become an Anglican priest.

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He normally advises people on spiritual matters. But after last month’s terror attacks in Brussels, airport chaplain Michel Gaillard is busy helping staff cope with the trauma as they return to their jobs.

Father Michel Gaillard runs his fingers over a wooden bench covered in a thin layer of dust – a remnant of the bomb blasts that hit Zaventem airport the morning of March 22, killing 16 people. The airport chapel is still closed to the public. It’s normally where passengers or staff would come to pray. But now, it functions as more of a counselling center, where Gaillard helps people deal with the trauma of recent events. The chaplain says he’ll never forget the day of the attacks.
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For many people though, March 22 will remain the day their lives changed forever. Gaillard says he has listened to so many stories and painful testimonies of people who were injured by the blasts, in some cases losing their feet or hands. He has also been dealing with the grief of people who lost loved ones. “The question I am asked most is: Was God present at that moment? And my answer is: There is one hand launching the bombs. And there is another hand helping to save the lives, to heal the hearts. Actually, there were many people who came to try and save others. And that’s where you find God,” said Gaillard.

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In the summer of 1825, young Ralph Waldo Emerson took a break from his theological studies to work on his Uncle Ladd’s farm near Newton, Mass. There he met a laborer known to history only as “a Methodist named Tarbox,” who told Emerson “that men were always praying, and that all prayers were granted.” The idea of constant prayer was not new to Emerson, writes his biographer, Robert D. Richardson Jr., but Emerson “first felt its force for real life” there in his uncle’s fields.

What is prayer? In its simplest form, prayer is an address to a deity. But in “Self-Reliance,” Emerson says that “prayer is in all action”: in the farmer kneeling to weed his field, for example. And clearly Emerson means mindful action: No farmer wakes at mid-morning and says, “Gee, I wonder what I should do today?”

Emerson’s sense of prayer as mindful action appeals to my students at Florida State University, especially as graduation nears and the world of work beckons. I teach English, and in this job market you can say of humanities classrooms what is said often of trenches: There are no atheists there. My students are prayerful, though in the Emersonian way, which is to say they pray by doing, because they know that before they find their place in the world, they have a journey ahead of them.

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Perched on the Niger River, Timbuktu was once a major stop on trade routes across North Africa and a coveted destination for scholars nearly 600 years ago.

“Mali, in that era ”” the golden era of the 15th and 16th centuries ”” was the center of a great North African empire, and Timbuktu was the cultural, economic and intellectual capital of that empire,” says author Joshua Hammer.

Writing mostly in Arabic, the scholars that visited Timbuktu studied astronomy, medicine, poetry, and music and debated the details of Islamic law.

“Books were produced there ”” manuscripts ”” at a huge rate, and then over the centuries were scattered,” Hammer says. “The French colonial army invaded and conquered the north of Mali in the 19th century, and began seizing manuscripts where they could find them, taking them to museums in Paris and libraries in Paris.”

The people of Mali didn’t want to part with these precious treasures, so they hid away these prized manuscripts, and many were forgotten for decades.

But about 15 years ago, thanks to international funding from UNESCO and the efforts of Abdel Kader Haidara, a young man from the city, hundreds of thousands of these manuscripts were brought back to Timbuktu and preserved by teams of librarians in newly built facilities.

As a young man, Haidara scoured the country, traveling on camel and by boat to convince the owners of these manuscripts to entrust them to him in exchange for livestock and cash. The librarian wanted to ensure these invaluable volumes, some of which were buried in the desert, would last for hundreds more years.

But trouble was coming to Timbuktu…

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Churches should take advantage of the opportunities presented by the shrinkage of the State by delivering “substantial public services”, says a report launched in the House of Lords on Monday.

Amid cuts in public spending, the Church needs to “re-imagine its role and to re-orientate itself more radically towards social action and the delivery of public services”, say the authors of Faith in Public Service, Ian Sansbury, Ben Cowdrey, and Lea Kauffmann-de Vries. The report is published by the Oasis Foundation, a non-denominational social-justice charity. The Revd Steve Chalke, a Baptist minister and the founder of Oasis, has written its introduction.

The report suggests that individual churches could “go further than the delivery of foodbanks and debt advice”, and move more into the provision of health-care and education. They might, however, need more “effective leadership, governance, finance and HR function” to do so.

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In deciding how to vote it is important that we recognise that we are answering a different sort of question from that at general elections but, as there, we also need to keep front and centre the test of what it means to love our neighbours and how our vote can serve the common good. That means not deciding on the basis of what is best for me personally (usually understood in simple financial terms) or even for the UK alone but to look at our personal and national good in the context of international society and the importance of good relationships. It also means trying to step back and take in the bigger picture both historically but also in terms of the present nature and likely future development of the EU. At least three broad areas require serious Christian reflection and evaluation in discerning how to vote.

First, as regards its form, the EU is an international legal and political entity based on treaties between national governments. This means considering a Christian attitude to the role and limits of nations and national identity and the dangers of empire as well as consideration of the principle of the free movement of peoples and how it relates to our sense of belonging and place of national borders. Second, the EU also has motives and aims which shape its ethos. Here Christians must evaluate how it has assisted in moving Europe from war to peace, whether and how it has enabled solidarity both within Europe and between Europe and the poorer parts of the world, and whether, particularly in relation to economic life, it is driven by our contemporary idols in the Western world and, through the Euro and austerity, serving or undermining human flourishing. Finally, as the EU is best viewed as a political community it needs, from a Christian perspective, to be assessed in terms of how well it serves the pursuit of justice and whether its political structures are ”“ or can be – representative of its 500 million people and whether they uphold the principle of subsidiarity which seeks to respect local and national governing structures and non-governmental forms of social life.

In the light of all these issues a number of arguments on both sides need to be rejected by Christians but, after exploring each of these areas, I believe it is possible to sketch out potential Christian arguments for each side of the debate focussing on these issues, often neglected in the wider political debate.

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Everlasting God, who didst so kindle the flame of holy love in the heart of blessed Catherine of Siena, as she meditated on the passion of thy Son our Savior, that she devoted her life to the poor and the sick, and to the peace and unity of the Church: Grant that we also may share in the mystery of Christ’s death, and rejoice in the revelation of His Glory, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Catherine of Siena: Doctor of the Church and Unforgettable Fire https://t.co/6pVeMTt2w4 pic.twitter.com/sVLjzRZTVE

— Aleteia (@AleteiaEN) April 29, 2016

O Lord Jesus Christ, who didst say that in thee we may have peace, and hast bidden us to be of good cheer, since thou hast overcome the world: Give ears to hear and faith to receive thy word; that in all the confusions and tensions of this present time, with mind serene and steadfast purpose, we may continue to abide in thee, who livest and wast dead and art alive for evermore.

Praise the LORD! O give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures for ever! Who can utter the mighty doings of the LORD, or show forth all his praise? Blessed are they who observe justice, who do righteousness at all times!

–Psalm 106:1-3

The 16th meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council ended this week in Lusaka, Zambia. I could tell you my interpretation of what the council did, which is quite different from Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby’s interpretation. However, I think it would serve you best if I focused on just the facts and let you draw your own conclusion.

* On January 15, 2016, the Primates of the Anglican Communion resolved as follows:“It is our unanimous desire to walk together. However given the seriousness of these matters we formally acknowledge this distance by requiring that for a period of three years The Episcopal Church no longer represent us on ecumenical and interfaith bodies, should not be appointed or elected to an internal standing committee and that while participating in the internal bodies of the Anglican Communion, they will not take part in decision making on any issues pertaining to doctrine or polity.” Addendum A, paras. 7 and 8

* On April 19, at the conclusion of the Anglican Consultative Council, an internal body of the Anglican Communion, the delegates from The Episcopal Church wrote in “A Letter from Lusaka”: “We want to assure you that we participated fully in this meeting and that we were warmly welcomed and included by other ACC members.”

* According to the Anglican Communion Office, Bishop of Connecticut, Ian Douglas proposed or seconded several resolutions for ACC-16. These include but are not limited to resolutions on:
– Anglican inter-faith engagement
– Ensuring both continuity and turnover of the leadership of the Anglican Consultative Council
– An Anglican Congress

* On April 19, Rebecca Wilson, an Episcopal Church communications consultant who traveled to Lusaka, posted the following comment online:…

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The following is an update from SAMS missionaries, Johann and Louise Vanderbijl in Gambella, Ethiopia:

We are calling for a week of prayer for Gambella, from Sunday, April 24 to Sunday May 1.

Last night, a “highlander” was bringing water to refugees in a nearby camp called Jewi when he accidentally hit and killed two Nuer. The driver and some innocent bystanders were immediately beaten to death and more were murdered later that night brining the total up to nine. This is not the only recent incident preceding and following the Jikwo, Lare, and Nininyang massacre. The hatred has to stop somewhere and we are asking the Lord to do what appears to be impossible for humans in spite of their best attempts.

Also, we had planned to bring in a Professor from Addis to teach all our students, both full-time and part-time, on the subject of Early African Church History. This is scheduled for May 2 ”“ 6. Our faculty believe that we must take a step of faith and proceed with this course even though at present fear still keeps our students apart. We believe that this fear is not from God as He clearly says He has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, and of power, and of a sound mind and we believe we must take a public stand in faith. While we will not force anyone to attend, we are encouraging our Nuer brethren to allow us to bus them to and from the Anglican Centre.

And so we need your prayers for that week also. Satan is seeking to bring this College to its knees”¦and so to our knees we will go! Remember, St Frumentius is the only seminary in the area. It is no wonder that the forces of darkness rally against us in such a violent manner!

I include a poem I wrote after the most recent killing in Jewi…

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The leader of the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, is looking to stop the publication of a new tell-all memoir written by his father Ron Miscavige.

In a document first published by Tony Ortega, noted Scientology reporter, lawyers from Johnsons Solicitors, working on behalf of David Miscavige, contacted Silvertail Books, the publisher responsible for “Ruthless” in the U.K. and Ireland asking them to halt release of the book, scheduled to debut May 3.

Asserting that they were “putting them on notice,” the letter claimed the material contained in the memoir was “highly defamatory” and that “in the event that you proceed with the release of this book, in total disregard for the truth, our client will be left with no alternative but to seek the protection of UK/Irish defamation and other laws.”

The letter sent by David Miscavige’s counsel also suggests that a similar missive had been sent to St. Martin’s Press, the publisher in charge of the book’s U.S. release.

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With thanks to Kevin Kallsen and George Conger of Anglican TV

The Archbishop briefed members of the ACC last week about the Primates’ meeting; and this week they unanimously agreed a resolution backing the Primates’ decisions.

Speaking to ACNS last night, as he prepared to fly out of Lusaka at the end of the ACC-16 meeting, Archbishop Welby welcomed the resolution. “The actions of the ACC demonstrate that it is working in close collaboration with the Primates, as has been the aim since both started and is set out especially in Resolution 52 of the Lambeth Conference 1988,” Archbishop Welby said.

“Given that my report, referred to in the resolution, incorporated the Communiqué and was very explicit on consequences; the resolution clearly supports and accepts all the Primates’ Meeting conclusions.

“No member of the Episcopal Church stood for office in the ACC or Standing Committee. The consequences of the Primates meeting have been fully implemented.”

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..Our time together over the last thirteen days has visibly demonstrated, once again, our unity in diversity as the provinces of the Anglican Communion. Meeting fellow Anglicans from around the world in discussions, around the altar, in tea breaks, and at meals, we learned from each other what intentional discipleship across our differences means as the Body of Christ in the world today. We are thankful to God and to The Episcopal Church for this privilege of representing our church on the Anglican Consultative Council.

Because this ACC meeting was held in the shadow of the January Primates Gathering and Meeting that sought to restrict our participation as members from The Episcopal Church, we want to assure you that we participated fully in this meeting and that we were warmly welcomed and included by other ACC members. Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby did report to the ACC on the Primates Gathering and Meeting [see here ] on the first day of the meeting. Beyond that report, ACC members seemed to have little energy for answering the primates’ call for consequences, for discussing disagreements over human sexuality, or for taking up the call of Anglican Communion Secretary-General Josiah Idowu-Fearon to pursue the Anglican Covenant. Yesterday, in fact, a resolution that sought to pursue further consequences against The Episcopal Church was withdrawn just before it was scheduled for debate.
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On April 15, the three of us had the opportunity to meet informally with Archbishop Justin, Caroline his wife and members of his staff at Lambeth Palace. Our conversation was easy, open and honest, and we came away from the conversation with the conviction that while the Archbishop does not agree with the actions of our General Convention regarding marriage equality, he is firmly committed to our unity as the Anglican Communion and the autonomy of Anglican provinces. He expressed fervent hope that The Episcopal Church will continue to be committed to and involved in the life of the Anglican Communion. We are grateful to Archbishop Justin for taking the time to meet with us, for his candor, and for assuring us of his respect for us and for the Episcopal Church.

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Sing joyfully to God our strength; sing loud unto the God of Jacob!
Take the song, bring forth the timbrel, the pleasant harp, and the viol.
Blow the trumpet in the new moon, even in the time appointed, and at our feast day.
For this is a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. Psalm 81:1-4

We have now had confirmed what many recognised to be true from the outset of this tragedy. Yet there remain unanswered questions and unresolved accountabilities. No judicial action can bring back the lives of those who were lost or undo the sorrow of those who continue to mourn them. And we cannot escape the reality that this verdict comes too late for some who did not live to see the consummation of their tireless quest.

At the heart of the Christian faith is a narrative of justice, and justice must be allowed to take its course. But our Christian message is also one of forgiveness, grace and mercy. It is only now that some of the wounds can begin to heal and that some of the hurts can begin to be released ”“ truth and justice are crucial to that process, but grace and mercy must also play their part in the journey forward.

Now is the time for us to show our true dignity; we must not now become consumed by bitterness, recrimination and hate, as we allow justice to take its course. We continue to pray for the families of the 96 and everyone whose lives are affected and scarred by this tragedy.

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We live before a watching world. Jesus did say: ”˜By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another’ (John 13.35). So there is no excuse for rudeness or cavalier attitudes to each other. Paul, in the chapter that begins to work out the implications of the gospel for our daily living and relationships, writes: ”˜Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honour’ (Romans 12.10). So in that sense ”˜good disagreement’ is a healthy and desirable thing to aim for.
Live and let live attitude?

But the concept of ”˜good disagreement’ is becoming something that is applied in a much broader way. It is being used to promote a ”˜live and let live’ approach to important doctrinal issues and sexual ethics in particular. Unity is appealed to in a way that trumps vital revealed truths. Is this helpful or right?

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New Zealand has become the latest country to launch a branch of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans(FCA).

Australia launched a branch of the GAFCON-affiliated movement in 2015 and this week in Auckland and Christchurch nearly 500 Anglicans from around New Zealand met to launch the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans NZ (FCANZ).
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One of the first decisions of the new branch was to recognise West Hamilton Community Church as ‘authentically Anglican’.

The church’s Rev. Michael and Kimberley Hewat spoke of their experiences of being excluded from existing Anglican structures due to their stand against doctrinal change.

Mr Behan commended the Hewats and the church for their stand for the truth.

“We rejoice in our fellowship with you, we stand shoulder to shoulder with you in gospel ministry, and we recognise you as authentically Anglican.” he said.

Mr Behan stressed that FCANZ is not advocating splitting from the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia, and will promote faithfulness to the gospel with grace and truth, and provide fellowship to all orthodox Anglicans both in and outside of existing Anglican structures.

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Update Entirely coincidentally, and no doubt with new typewriter ribbons obtained, the resolutions have now been published here
On Monday, April 18th, 44 resolutions were passed at ACC-16 in Lusaka. It is now 48 hours later, and there has been no official publication of those resolutions on the ACC-16 page nor by ACNS though there is much contradictory speculation.

In these days of the teleprinter and the horseless carriage, it should be possible to transmit the resolutions from Lusaka to London without going by sea mail so that the copy typists of Lambeth Palace and St Andrew’s House can type them up on their Remington Imperials, Roneo scan them and distribute them within a few hours.

When they are available we will publish the link to them.

So here is my assessment of the Lusaka meeting:

1. The Primates earlier (in a January meeting) offered absolutely the most minimal discipline that could be done without totally losing credibility. TEC was not supposed to vote or deliberate about polity, doctrine, or ecumenical affairs.

2. TEC came to Lusaka.

3. TEC voted at Lusaka.

4. TEC fully participated in the meeting in Lusaka.

5. TEC reported that they fully participated and voted, claiming themselves that they did not follow the decision of the Primates Meeting.

6. Many institutional leaders gave a litany of reasons why the Primates don’t have authority.

7. Many utterly distorted the context of the desire to “walk together” and completely ignored the discipline that is necessary for that to happen.

8. The focus of the meeting (made clear by the resolutions) was institutional- rather than Gospel-centered, and a close examination of most of what came out of the meeting reveals that even when Gospel language is used, it means different things to different people.

In dramatic contrast was the meeting of the GAFCON Primates in Nairobi, which I did attend and which met shortly after the ACC. It was originally scheduled to be in Chile, but there were problems getting visas for some of the people, so we had to move it to Nairobi at the last minute.

The atmosphere in Nairobi was very, VERY different from the many “institutional” meetings I have attended. The most dramatic difference was that the undergirding principle of the GAFCON Primates meeting was the Gospel. By that, I mean people being saved, forgiven, discipled, and transformed. The Primates are in absolute agreement about the supreme authority of Scripture, but even though everyone knows it is a shared value, it is repeated constantly, not because those speaking are trying to convince people to accept Biblical authority, but because the life-giving power of the Word is being celebrated…

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..The appendix [to the GAFCON Primates Nairobi Communiqué 2016] is worth paying attention to.

The recent meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council in Lusaka, Zambia has again highlighted the inability of the current instruments to uphold godly order within the Communion. Delegates from the Episcopal Church, by their own admission, voted on matters that pertained to polity and doctrine, in defiance of the Primates.

GAFCON’s claim is clear. TEC made a deliberate choice to go against the will of the Primates and they freely admit to it. Here Rebecca Wilson (the communications officer that TEC brought with them to the ACC) confirms that TEC understood themselves to being voting on Doctrine and Polity contrary to the express wish of the Primates.

So get your head around that. TEC is deliberately choosing to advertise the fact that it rejected the Primates’ request. They also voted on amendments to the ACC’s constitution which are clearly matters of polity.

Read it all and it is also on Stand Firm