Tantawangalo’s historic Anglican Church faces closure under a proposal being put to the community next week.

The Sapphire Coast Anglican Parish, which looks after nine churches, is looking at ways to grow its congregation and is proposing to sell St John’s at Tantawangalo and invest all monies into nearby St Peter’s church at Candelo.

The parish has three active churches all within 15km of each other – Kameruka, Tantawangalo and Candelo – all built between 1869-1906 when distances were harder to negotiate.

A wooden church at Tantawangalo was first built in 1877 before the current brick building replaced it in 1908

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The gods are dying. The gods of this world are sick unto death. If someone does not believe this, the next time he happens to wake up in the great silence of the night or of the day, just listen. And after a while, at the heart of the silence, he will hear the sound that gives it away: the soft, crazy thud of the feet of the gods as they stagger across the earth; the huge white hands fluttering like moths; the little moans of bewilderment and anguish. And we all shudder at the sound because to witness the death of gods is a fearsome thing.

Which gods? The gods that we worship. The gods that our enemies worship. Their sacred names? There is Science, for one: he who was to redeem the world from poverty and disease, on whose mighty shoulders mankind was to be borne onward and upward toward the high stars. There is Communism, that holy one so terrible in his predilection for blood sacrifice but so magnificent in his promise of the messianic age: from each according to his ability, to each according to his need. Or Democracy, that gentler god with his gospel of freedom for all peoples, including those people who after centuries of exploitation and neglect at the hands of the older democracies can be set free now only to flounder in danger of falling prey to new exploiters. And we must not leave out from this role of the dying what often passes for the god of the church: the god who sanctifies our foreign policy and our business methods, our political views and our racial prejudices. The god who, bless him, asks so little and promises so much: peace of mind, the end of our inferiority complexes. Go to church and feel better. The family that prays together stays together. Not everybody can afford a psychiatrist or two weeks of solid rest in the country, but anybody can afford this god. He comes cheap.

These are the gods in whom the world has put its ultimate trust. Some of them are our particular gods, and there are plenty of others, each can name for himself. And where are they now? They are dying, dying, and their twilight thickens into night. Where is the security that they promised? Where is the peace? The terrible truth is that the gods of this world are no more worthy of our ultimate trust than are the men who created them. Conditional trust, not ultimate trust.

And where are we? Stripped of our securities and bereft of our man-made gods, we stand as lonely and hypnotized spectators at the dance of death as it is played out in our time

–Frederick Buechner, The Magnificent Defeat (New York: Harperone, 1985 paperback edition of the 1966 original), pp. 24-25

Sunday food for Thought from Frederick Buechner: “The gods of this world are sick unto death” https://t.co/kyKZZLgKIb #theology pic.twitter.com/ORMh7XqoJD

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) May 21, 2017

Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Lagos West, Dr. Olusola Odedeji, has joined forces with the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in coming down hard on the federal government for adopting anti-people and anti-Christian measures.

The Bishop said the change promised the electorate in 2015 is yet to be effected. He said: “what they are doing to bring about the desired change is yet to yield result.”

On security, he lamented that Fulani herdsmen have replaced Boko Haram insurgents. Odedeji, who is the second Bishop of the Diocese, told the almost 1,000 delegates and dignitaries that an international body came up with a survey on the top fifty countries where Christians are being persecuted and placed Nigeria in the 12th position.

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The Anglican Church of Southern Africa faces a civil action of over R4 million from one of its former priests following differences with the church which span a period of more than 10 years.
Reverend June Major, who now lives in Durban, is suing for alleged financial loss, impairment to her dignity and emotional stress, allegedly as a result of a job she applied for in Australia and then did not get.

She has blamed the church’s failure to provide important “information timeously” to the Diocese of Wangaratta, for her inability to secure the job, which would have earned her R42 000 a month and other benefits.

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The Princess Royal has praised the Church of Scotland’s General Assembly as a place for “reasoned debate” in her opening address at the annual event.

Her remarks come ahead of a debate at the assembly later this week which could move the Kirk a step closer to allowing ministers to perform same-sex marriage.

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Truth: Ninety-seven percent of all cases are resolved through a plea bargain. If all cases went to trial, the criminal justice system would collapse. Pleas can be used to intimidate inmates or to get them to help with other cases. For example, a woman was offered a lighter sentence if she would be wired and placed in a dangerous situation to get information for the police. There are times when people plead guilty to a charge they did not commit so they can be released from incarceration. For them, each day increases the risk of losing their job, home, and most importantly with women, custody of their children.

One of the most infamous cases of this is Kalief Browder, who was sent to Rikers Island when he was 16 years old because he was accused of stealing a backpack. Although he never stood trial or was found guilty, he spent three years at the New York City jail complex, nearly two of them in solitary confinement. He was beaten by corrections staff and other inmates. He refused to accept a plea deal even though it would have meant his immediate release because he insisted on his innocence. Ultimately, prosecutors dropped the charge. Haunted by the trauma of his ordeal, he committed suicide at the age of 22.

As Christians, we should be NORPs, but not have NORP think when it comes to the criminal justice system. I hope you will not tune out conversations about mass incarceration. As scripture says, “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy” (Prov.31:8-9).

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Two million people are teetering on the brink of famine in northeastern Nigeria but efforts to reach some are being thwarted by Boko Haram jihadists, the UN’s food agency said Thursday.

More than 20 million people across Nigeria, South Sudan, Somalia and Yemen, are in areas hit by drought and are experiencing famine or are at high risk of famine in “the biggest crisis we have seen in the past 50 years”, said Denise Brown, emergency coordinator for the UN’s World Food Programme.

“While they are all in difficulty, northeastern Nigeria is one that has got under our skin at WFP,” she added.

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Ms. Runkles’s story sheds light on a delicate issue: how Christian schools, which advocate abstinence until marriage, treat pregnant teenagers.

“You have these two competing values,” said Brad Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia who directs the National Marriage Project, which conducts research on marriage and families. “On the one hand, the school is seeking to maintain some kind of commitment to what has classically been called chastity — or today might be called abstinence. At the same time, there’s an expectation in many Christian circles that we are doing all that we can to honor life.”

Navigating that balance is exceedingly difficult for Christian educators, and schools respond in various ways, said Rick Kempton, chairman of the board of the Association of Christian Schools International, which represents about 3,000 schools in the United States and many others overseas.

“There’s a biblical term that many Christian schools use, and it is the whole idea of grace: What would Jesus do?” Mr. Kempton said. Of Ms. Runkles, he added: “She’s making the right choice. But you don’t want to create a celebration that makes other young ladies feel like, ‘Well, that seems like a pretty good option.’”

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Almighty God, Lord of heaven and earth, in whom we live and move and have our being: We beseech thee to send thine abundant blessing upon the earth that it may bring forth its fruits in due season; and grant that we, being filled with thy bounty, may evermore give thanks unto thee, who art the giver of all good; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Mightier than the thunders of many waters, mightier than the waves of the sea, the LORD on high is mighty! Thy decrees are very sure; holiness befits thy house, O LORD, for evermore.

–Psalm 93:4-5