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In 2008, Christine was appointed Vicar of St Mary and St Lawrence, Goring-by-Sea, and it was during this period that her middle daughter died from cancer. Within a year of being at Goring-by-Sea, she was recruited as Archdeacon of Chesterfield in 2010.

Christine is also a non-executive director of Ecclesiastical Insurance, and has held several national church posts, including membership of the General Synod, the Anglican Communion Indaba conversations that seek to energise mission and build the international community of Anglican Christians through respectful listening, one of the eight female participant observers on the House of Bishops, and as a vocations consultant and selector, helping to discern those who are to be recommended for ordination. Christine has also been a member of Derby Cathedral Council.

“I was thrilled, and a little daunted, to be offered the post of Dean of Lincoln,” said Christine.

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To God the Father, who first loved us, and made us accepted in the Beloved; to God the Son, who loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood; to God the Holy Ghost, who sheddeth the love of God abroad in our hearts: to the one true God be all love and all glory for time and for eternity.

But I trust in thee, O LORD, I say, “Thou art my God.” My times are in thy hand; deliver me from the hand of my enemies and persecutors! Let thy face shine on thy servant; save me in thy steadfast love!

–Psalm 31:15-16

An Islamic State executioner from Belgium who announced the group’s responsibility for the March 22 terror attacks in Brussels was communicating recently with several young Belgians arrested this week for plotting further attacks, according to officials briefed on the probe.

Four adults and several teenagers were arrested in and around the northern Belgian city of Antwerp on Wednesday after authorities intercepted their communications with Islamic State operative Hicham Chaib, the official said. While Belgian authorities officially acknowledged they arrested four adults on Wednesday, they wouldn’t comment on the minors.

Belgian authorities found evidence that the group had plans to strike densely populated targets, including the central train station of Antwerp, but investigators doubt that those plans were fleshed out. “It’s better to have a less strong judicial file than a terror attack,” the official said.

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(Diocese of Egypt)

Bishop Mouneer wrote :

I am now in a pastoral visit to our churches in Iran. Yesterday was the first service in St Paul Church in Tehran. The people in this church reminded me with the ” Faithful Remnants ” who waiting for the Lord. I rejoiced and prayed so that the Lord may bless them and send servants to encourage them.

+Mouneer

Read it all and please consider joining Bishop Mouneer in his prayers. There are some more prayers here.

The Columba Declaration has been discussed for the past 15 years and officially ties the two churches, which have been seperate since the 16th century Reformation. It was passed at the Scottish Church’s general assembly on Wednesday. The CoE’s general synod passed the measure in February.

The Archbishop of Canterbury became the first CoE leader to join a debate at the general assembly and urged support for the report. Justin Welby acknowledged significant differences in the doctrines of the two churches but said the Columba Declaration provided a framework to affirm common ground.

Earlier in the assembly’s five day meeting the CoS agreed to accept ministers who are in same-sex marriages, something the CoE has not done.

“We won’t always necessarily find ourselves walking in step with one another, something I’ve been particularly conscious of, as, like you, we have been considering the issues around same-sex marriages, and following your earlier debate on ministers in same-sex marriages,” Welby said in his address.

“But what we believe we are providing in this report is a sound framework for us to affirm and build on the agreement we have, for the sake of our common witness to Christ.”

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You can listen directly here or download it there,

The Archbishop of Uganda, the Most Revd Stanley Ntagali, has warned against syncretism ”“ the practice of merging different religious beliefs. The warning came after a prominent Christian politician made a public visit to her ancestral shrine to give thanks for her re-election ”“ a practice in line with the country’s traditional religions.

“We value our ancestors because we are connected to them by the relationship we have,” Archbishop Ntagali said. “But, we must always trust only in God. We no longer need to go through the spirits of the dead because Jesus is our hope and protector. He alone is the way, the truth and the life, as Jesus says in John 14:6.

“The Church of Uganda condemns syncretism,” he said, as he urged bishops and clergy to “use this opportunity to proclaim the sufficiency of Christ crucified to meet all our needs, and to work pastorally with Christians to apply this glorious truth practically in their lives.

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..in the local Christian community, the parting of ways between the Anglican Church and Chung Chi College, the divinity college of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, is seen as a profound political development.

Its roots can be traced to efforts by Beijing to penetrate Hong Kong churches to persuade them to focus on spiritual matters and support the administration in the fields of education and social welfare.
…….
..the leadership of the Anglican Church appears to have lost its voice amid the political turmoil in society, shirking from its duty to speak up on sensitive political issues for fear of offending the powers that be.

Beijing has appointed [Archbishop] Paul Kwong, the spiritual leader of the Anglican Church, into the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, making the church a subject of the Communist Party’s rule.

In fact, the appointment implies that the Anglican Church is no longer an independent Christian church but a part of the Communist Party.

Many Hong Kong people lament that Sheng Kung Hui now belongs to the pro-Beijing camp, with its leader telling his congregation to “stay silent just like Jesus did on the cross” while the debate on the government’s political reform proposal was raging two years ago.

His position on the issue is that Hong Kong people should not go against the central government when it comes to its policies for the city.

Kwong also criticized those who joined the Occupy protests for trying to “force” central authorities to meet their demand for an election without Beijing intervention, adding that people should also try to look at the issue from the central government’s perspective.

He kept quiet when the authorities started condemning the Occupy protesters for “thinking only about their own interests and not considering the good of the public”.

It is somewhat unnerving that just weeks before the Anglican Church announced its decision on the breakup with Chung Chi College, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced the latest round of restrictions on religions including Christianity..

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By Elizabeth Kendal at Lapidomedia
At 6 pm on 1 May, two Sudanese Air Force MiG fighter jets attacked residential areas within Heiban town in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan, killing six children, three from one family.

The dead children were named as: Nidal Abdolrahman Ibrahim (12), Ibrahim Abdolrahman Ibrahim (10), Jihan Abdolrahman Ibrahim (5), Hafez Mahmud (10) Kuku Dawli (4), and Yusif Yagoub (4).

Despite an almost complete news blackout, the ”˜Heiban Massacre’ is not an isolated incident.

The Government of Sudan’s genocidal jihad against the non-Arab and mostly non-Muslim peoples of Sudan’s ”˜New South’ ”“ Abyei, South Kordofan and Blue Nile ”“ continues a campaign that has just entered its sixth year.

For the Christians of the Nuba Mountains, it is the second ‘genocide’ in a generation.

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I first met John Webster in 1996 when he began as Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity in the University of Oxford. He was, as a friend of mine and I observed at the time, ‘quite frankly the most impressive theological voice in Oxford today’. We went together to every one of his lectures that was advertised. His very first lecture series on Christology was full of insights that have served me well ever since. It was from John that I first heard the common sense observation ‘we can never talk about God behind his back: our thinking and speaking of God is always done in his presence’. Theology suddenly becomes an intensely serious matter when that simple truth is remembered. It must never be a guise for intellectual self-assertion or ecclesiastical control.

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As a theologically very under-educated Archbishop, I am slowly learning a little..

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..Over the last few years, realizing that Archbishop Eliud would retire, I would watch the Kenyan House of Bishops. In particular, I watched to see how they handled disagreement and pursued peace. At one meeting after another, I kept noticing one relatively young Bishop. Any time he would report on his activities with the poor, it would be truly inspirational. The best part, however, would be in the midst of disagreements. Bishop Jackson would not say much as he listened to arguments. When he finally did speak to an issue I noticed two things. First, his comments were always measured and wise beyond his years. He never denigrated anyone, but always found ways to frame things so that others were interested in coming together. The second thing I noticed was that what he recommended was always what we wound up doing. Not from the standpoint of “Jackson says do this so we will”¦” but from the standpoint that he always seemed to identify a position that the group eventually decided to pursue. He is an extraordinary leader who leads with great humility but also great clarity about care for people (especially the poor), while never wavering from Biblical truth.

I believe that the selection of Jackson Ole Sapit as Archbishop of Kenya will prove to be a great move. I have loved Archbishops David Gitari, Benjamin Nzimbi, and Eliud Wabukala. Now I am thrilled to see the process work so wonderfully well in the selection of Jackson Ole Sapit..

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One of Randy Hollerith’s earliest memories is of watching stonemasons at work at the Washington National Cathedral when his great-aunts took him there as a child. Now, as the nationally prominent institution’s next dean, Hollerith will be responsible for stabilizing the cathedral in a different way.

The cathedral, a huge, soaring hilltop church known for hosting presidential funerals and other major national worship events, announced Monday that the 52-year-old Richmond priest will take over in August.

Hollerith follows Gary Hall, a gregarious, Hollywood-bred activist who brought the Gothic cathedral into the news by hosting same-sex weddings, gun control events and Muslim prayer, among other things. Hollerith isn’t as widely known and describes himself as not driven by issues; he was picked out of a field of 32 candidates in good part because of his experience as a strategic fundraiser and manager. That’s considered essential at a time when the cathedral needs to raise tens of millions of dollars to get on stable financial footing because of a damaging earthquake and a culture that is largely deserting its commitment to religious institutions.

Read it all from the Washington Post.

Today the media are reporting on yet another doomsday report that suggests Christianity is in decline.

Researchers at the St Mary’s Catholic University in Twickenham analysed data collected through the British Social Attitudes surveys over the last three decades. It found that in 2014, 48.5% of those asked said they had no religion, compared to 25% that fell into the ‘none’ category in the 2011 census.

Those who did define themselves as Christian ”“ from a variety of denominations ”“ made up 43.8% of the population. The report said churches in general were struggling to retain people brought up as Christians.

Read it all from the PC website.

Teaching of Christianity in schools is set to be transformed by a new”¯resource from the Church of England, launched today. Understanding Christianity is”¯a”¯set of comprehensive materials”¯and training which will enable pupils”¯from age 4 to 14”¯to develop”¯their understanding of Christianity, as a contribution to making sense”¯of the world and their own experience within it.

Available to all schools across the country the resource was written by a team of RE advisers from RE Today Services, in collaboration with more than 30 expert teachers”¯and academics, and”¯has been trialled in over 50 schools.

Understanding Christianity was”¯commissioned by the Church of England Education Office with the generous support of Culham St Gabriels,”¯The Sir Halley Stewart Trust, the Jerusalem Trust and”¯an anonymous donor.

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O Lord our God, who by thy Son Jesus Christ didst call thine apostles and send them forth to preach the Gospel to the nations: We bless thy holy name for thy servant Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterbury, whose labors in propagating thy Church among the English people we commemorate today; and we pray that all whom thou dost call and send may do thy will, and bide thy time, and see thy glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

St Augustine of Canterbury preaching before Ethelbert, Anglo-Saxon king of Kent whom he baptised in 597. pic.twitter.com/9K53LfhlSc

— Hannibal Della Genga (@PopeLeoXII) February 29, 2016

O Almighty God, who on the day of Pentecost didst send the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, to abide in thy Church unto the end: Bestow upon us, and upon all thy faithful people, his manifold gifts of grace; that with minds enlightened by his truth and hearts purified by his presence, we may day by day be strengthened with power in the inward man; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who, with thee and the same Spirit, liveth and reigneth one God world without end.

Trust in the Lord, and do good;
so you will dwell in the land, and enjoy security.
Take delight in the Lord,
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Commit your way to the Lord;
trust in him, and he will act.

–Psalm 37:3-5

The House of Bishops of the Church of England met on 23-24 May 2016.

On its first day the Bishops received an update on the shared conversations process, received a report from the Faith and Order Commission and discussed the contribution and vision of the Church of England on Education. A substantial amount of time was spent on safeguarding including receiving the report of the Elliot Review from the Bishop of Crediton, Sarah Mullally.

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Love will keep us together, the Rev. Eli Sule Yakku of Central Nigeria said at the end of a long day filled with both kind and harsh words on the floor of the 2016 General Conference over lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people and their role in The United Methodist Church.

The day started with a silent vigil by LGBTQ clergy and clergy candidates. Delegates walked past people wearing robes and holding crosses draped with “Shower of Stoles.” Many United Methodist clergy and clergy candidates came out as gay in the past two weeks.

During a particularly tense moment, a delegate rose and asked Bishop William T. McAlilly to step down as the presiding officer.

The decision to accept a recommendation from the Council of Bishops held all votes on human sexuality and referred all that legislation and the entire subject to a yet-to-be named special commission that will examine “every paragraph in our Book of Discipline regarding human sexuality.”

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According to the United Nations, last year some eight million people around the world were displaced from their homes by conflict and social upheaval””the largest number ever recorded in a single year. This coming week (May 23-24), as the UN convenes the first World Humanitarian Summit, correspondent Kim Lawton talks with prominent Roman Catholic theologian and ethicist Rev. David Hollenbach SJ about the global refugee crisis and the moral obligations he believes the US government and individual Americans have to respond.

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Christian morality is being ushered out of American social structures and off the cultural main stage, leaving a vacuum in its place””and the broader culture is attempting to fill the void. New research from Barna reveals growing concern about the moral condition of the nation, even as many American adults admit they are uncertain about how to determine right from wrong. So what do Americans believe? Is truth relative or absolute? And do Christians see truth and morality in radically different ways from the broader public, or are they equally influenced by the growing tide of secularism and religious skepticism?

A majority of American adults across age group, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status and political ideology expresses concern about the nation’s moral condition””eight in 10 overall (80%). The proportion is closer to nine in 10 among Elders (89%) and Boomers (87%), while about three-quarters of Gen-Xers (75%) and Millennials (74%) report concern. Similarly, practicing Christians (90%) are more likely than adults of no faith (67%) or those who identify with a religious faith other than Christianity (72%) to say they are concerned about the moral condition of the nation. Though measurable differences exist between population segments, moral concern is widespread across the demographic board.

Much less widespread, however, is consensus on morality itself. What is it based on? Where does it come from? How can someone know what to do when making moral decisions? According to a majority of American adults (57%), knowing what is right or wrong is a matter of personal experience. This view is much more prevalent among younger generations than among older adults.

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InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA announces that Tom Lin has been selected by the InterVarsity Board of Trustees to become the next president of the campus ministry. He will start on August 10.

Tom has been vice president and director of missions for InterVarsity since February 2011, and also director of Urbana 12 and Urbana 15, InterVarsity’s triennial student missions conference. He succeeds Jim Lundgren, who has served as InterVarsity’s interim president for the past year.

In InterVarsity’s 75 years of campus ministry on U.S. college and university campuses, Tom becomes the first InterVarsity president who began his InterVarsity career working in campus ministry. After graduating from Harvard in 1994, he planted a chapter for Asian American students at Harvard, and another chapter at Boston University. He led numerous student missions projects in the U.S. and overseas, and helped design national training for InterVarsity staff.

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Monday May 23, 2016, clergy and lay delegates from the Diocese of the Carolinas voted unanimously to elect Bishop David C. Bryan as the first Suffragan Bishop of the Diocese of the Carolinas.

Bryan has served as Bishop of the Southeast (PEARUSA) Network since September 2013.This Network, one of three in PEARUSA, is part of a missionary district established by the Anglican Province of Rwanda in the United States.

This June, Archbishop Rwaje of Rwanda will formally hand over all three networks to Archbishop Foley Beach and the Anglican Church in North America. Two of the networks will become dioceses. The clergy and churches in Bishop Bryan’s network will have the opportunity to become part of an already existing Diocese of the Carolinas under Bishop Steve Wood.

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In an America riddled with anxieties, the worries that Mr. [Kody] Foster and his neighbors bring through the doors of the Tapering Vapor are common and potent: Fear that an honest, 40-hour working-class job can no longer pay the bills. Fear of a fraying social fabric. Fear that the country’s future might pale in comparison with its past.

Wilkes County, with a population of nearly 69,000, has felt those stings more than many other places. The textile and furniture industries have been struggling here for years, and the recession and the loss of the Lowe’s headquarters have helped drive down the median household income. That figure fell by more than 30 percent between 2000 and 2014 when adjusted for inflation, the second-steepest decrease in the nation, according to an analysis of census data by the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Still, the regulars at the Tapering Vapor ”” overwhelmingly white, mostly working class and ranging from their 20s to middle age ”” provide a haze-shrouded snapshot of an anxious nation navigating an election year fueled by disquiet and malaise.

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.. I want my students to get the distinctive feel of Anglican theology, which is a large mass, and Anglican worship, which is beautiful and profound, and, thirdly, the Anglican lifestyle. That’s how I like to speak about Anglican ethics, because the word “lifestyle” points to people actually living and enjoying the reality of the life that they’re living, whereas if you talk about ethics people just think of codes of specific dos and don’ts. Anglicans prefer to talk about moral theology rather than ethics.

Well, put those themes together””the Anglican way of theologizing, the Anglican way of worship, and the Anglican way of loving God and loving your neighbour””and you’ve got something rather rich and rather precious. I hope that I can give my students some sense of what it feels like to be an Anglican and why it is that some of us feel that the Anglican heritage is rather grand.

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When the suffering doesn’t go away through reading the Bible or prayer, the person affected may despair of his or her spiritual ability or maturity. The very thing that should provide unshakable confidence, that should strengthen our faith in Christ, becomes a source of shame if our faith isn’t “strong enough” to beat the illness.

Most of the time when a physician treats a chemical imbalance and there are some manifestations of those challenges, that imbalance doesn’t go away by prayer or by reading your Bible alone. Sometimes medication is needed and there should be not shame in that.

The more Christians struggle with how to deal with mental illness, the more we fail to create a safe and healthy environment in which to discuss and deal with these issues. As a result, many of our Christian churches, homes, and institutions promulgate an aura of mistrust, guilt, and shame.

As more of us are coming forward with our own stories of struggle and pain, I’m encouraged that it’s okay to talk about these things. We have to defeat the shame because the reality is that many Christians struggle with mental illness.

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Heavenly Father, who didst call thy servant Bede, while still a child, to devote his life to thy service in the disciplines of religion and scholarship: Grant that as he labored in the Spirit to bring the riches of thy truth to his generation, so we, in our various vocations, may strive to make thee known in all the world; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

26 May 735 Death of The Venerable Bede, author of The Ecclesiastical History of the English People. pic.twitter.com/a520SE4E3f

— Matthew Lewis (@MattLewisAuthor) May 26, 2016