In his seminars, [Dr. John] Aldis addresses why addicts’ lives are worth saving. That might seem self-evident, but at this point in the opioid epidemic many West Virginians feel too exhausted and resentful to help. People like Lori Swadley and the Hope Dealer women and John Aldis must combat a widespread attitude of “Leave ’em lie, let ’em die.” A community sucked dry by addiction becomes understandably wary of coddling users, and some locals worry that making Narcan easily available could foster complacency about overdoses.

William Poe, a paramedic, told me, “The thing about Narcan is that it kind of makes it O.K. to overdose, because then you can keep it in your house and keep it private. And a lot of times we’re the wake-up call. I remember one time, we had a kid who had O.D.’d, and we had him in the ambulance. A call came over the radio—someone about his age had just died from an overdose. And the kid was, like, ‘I’m so glad you guys brought me back.’ ” It was humiliating when an ambulance showed up at your house and carted you out, pale and retching, but it also might push you to change. Then again, Poe mused, when most of your neighbors—not to mention your mom and your grandma—already knew that you used heroin, shaming might have little effect.

Read it all.

Terrifying, moving, must read on US opioid crisis by the New Yorker: The Addicts Next Door https://t.co/sKvXPngdU0

— Jan Fiegel (@janfiegel) June 12, 2017

My question here is: How well this common vision of the Anglican Communion matches God’s actual identity as I spoke of it before — the “it is finished” identity of Jesus Christ by which God orders the history of creation? On the one hand, much of this divine identity is implied by the theological introduction of the Covenant: the great vision of creation’s Christ-embraced end, in Eph. 1:10; the providential shaping of time; the sense that there is a temporal history that marks the very character of the “wider church” and her particular “families” of identities, and so on. Much is helpfully implied in all this. But what the Covenant clearly failed to do was to take these brief pointers and flesh them out in way that could properly describe the divine movement implied in all this and demonstrate its ecclesiological form, as it were. When it came to the debated Section 4 of the Covenant — revised several times more than any other part — the question of how in fact to deal with one another in the Communion became an explosive topic: drawn-out procedures of requests, committees, recommendations all seemed laborious; a reluctance to give anybody “power” to make any final decisions — primates, joint committees, and so on — made the process even more intricate and undefinitive. It wasn’t that none of this could work; it has seemed, rather, that the purpose of Section 4 was only vaguely coherent in the preceding vision. “Too juridical,” as some argued, as if mission had given rise to committees, and not the other way around. But, for lack of a Covenant, committees have been all that we were left with.

In brief, the Covenant’s over-scheme could not integrate communion and change together in a concrete fashion. What are we to do with our declining Christian and specifically Anglican churches in the West and their eviscerating Christian cultural contexts? What are we to do with clamoring expansion of African and Asian churches — including Anglican ones — that stand in deep tension with the deracinated cultures of the West? How to disengage political corruption from ecclesial affairs, or reengage societies whose political form has left the gospel behind? These are all very real elements of historical change that the Covenant’s vision of communion, rich though it was, failed to engage concretely. (No one else, by the way, has done so either.) That failure was embodied in the great debate over the final section of the Covenant dealing with common life and decision-making. And that debate, although it has abated somewhat in public terms, is still with us, and has stymied in some ways the practical adoption of the profound theological vision of the Covenant that deserved to be assimilated into our common life.

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Canon [Andy] Lines’s presence in the UK without Welby’s approval could be seen as provocative. But Lines’s backers complain that the Archbishop failed to rebuke the Scottish Episcopalians for permitting gay marriage, even though it is out of step with Church of England official policy.

The former Bishop of Rochester Michael Nazir-Ali, a prominent traditionalist who is attending the meeting in Chicago where Canon Lines is to be consecrated, said: ‘The Scottish Episcopal Church has done something that will cause many people to exercise their right of conscience and not remain in it. Who is going to look after them?
‘The question is not just about territory. It is also about faith.’

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We continue to exhort the need to work together without exclusion, in faithfulness to the deposit of the faith we have inherited, to the scriptures and the creeds, and paying attention to the Great Commission, our call to evangelism and sharing in the mission of God.

I believe that the example of how we addressed the separate issue of ordination of women to the episcopacy illustrates this; the Right Reverend Rod Thomas’ consecration as Bishop of Maidstone served to provide episcopal oversight for those who disagreed with the ordination of women to the episcopate. This clearly demonstrates how those with differing views still have their place in the Church of England, and are important in enabling the flourishing of the Church. Because of this commitment to each other I do not consider the appointment of a “missionary bishop” to be necessary. The idea of a “missionary bishop” who was not a Church of England appointment, would be a cross-border intervention and, in the absence of a Royal Mandate, would carry no weight in the Church of England. Historically, there has been resistance to cross-border interventions and ordinations from the earliest years of the universal Church’s existence. Such weighty authority as canons 15 and 16 of the First Council of Nicaea in AD 325 are uncompromising in this regard and make reference to the “great disturbance and discords that occur” when bishops and their clergy seek to minister in this way.

I would also like to remind you of the 1988 Lambeth Conference resolution number 72 on episcopal responsibilities and diocesan boundaries. This resolution reaffirms the historical position of respect for diocesan boundaries and the authority of bishops within these boundaries. It also affirms that it deemed inappropriate behaviour for any bishop or priest of this Communion to exercise episcopal or pastoral ministry within another diocese without first obtaining the permission and invitation of the ecclesial authority thereof. The conclusion of this resolution was that in order to maintain our unity, “it seems fair that we should speak of our mutual respect for one another, and the positions we hold, that serves as a sign of our unity.”

The issue of cross-border interventions has continued to come up in recent conversations within the Anglican Communion, and may well be something that is included in the agenda for the next Primates’ meeting, which takes place from 2 to 7 October 2017, in Canterbury.

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The Penguins answered every challenge to do the unthinkable — repeat https://t.co/VnIyQ0omhi pic.twitter.com/3XHrogVWCw

— Post-Gazette Sports (@PGSportsNow) June 12, 2017

[The] Reverend Canon Katherine Bowyer will become the first female Anglican Dean of Newcastle and the first person born in the diocese to be elected to the position.

Acting-Bishop of Newcastle Dr Peter Stuart announced the historic appointment on Sunday, revealing Canon Bowyer had unanimously been accepted as the next Dean and Parish Priest of Christ Church Cathedral.

“Katherine is a highly experienced priest who loves the cathedral, its music and its many ministries,” Dr Stuart said.

Canon Bowyer will replace outgoing Dean Stephen Williams, who will conclude his ministry in August before retiring in October.

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Geoffrey’s long association with the diocese of Chichester has been characterised by the generosity with which he shared his gifts of holiness, learning, and personal friendship. We shall miss his presence, his imaginative understanding of the past and of traditions that enrich our own, his humour, his hospitality, and his encouragement of younger scholars, lay and ordained, and the enthusiasm with which he helped them identify the value of their hopes and plans.

Geoffrey died as he had lived: in the rhythm of liturgical prayer, and fortified by the sacramental life that is the mark of a catholic Christian.

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Attracted as it may have been towards such a path, the Committee never entertained it as a possibility, and the reason for this was simply the rigid and incongruous way the arguments had been marshalled into two opposing camps. So the sum of the “reasoning” that it had to offer to the Scottish Synod is this:- It’s an all-or-nothing decision. You can take an initiative to care for the needs of gay couples, or you can keep faith with the doctrines of the universal church, but you cannot do both. But is the alternative really so exclusive? There is every reason to doubt it. It appears so to the Committee simply because they have suppressed the logic of other possibilities. They wanted a deductive logic, which would start from premises in Scripture and Tradition and yield conclusions that would meet the perceived pastoral need. In their attempt to get it, they maimed Scripture and Tradition to the point where they could supply no premises at all; having failed to get it, they effectively denied the possibility of any chain of reason that could bind practical innovation to Scripture and Tradition. But the logic of practical reason is always inductive, not deductive. And they never looked for a reasoning of that kind.

There will be questions, some of which will presumably be aired at the Synod, whether this or that initiative will attract the censure or support of the Anglican Communion, and how greatly that matters. But the question our review raises is a prior question, on which the minds of Scottish Anglicans, as of Anglicans worldwide, ought to be focussed before any thought is given to a concrete decision and its consequences: how to conceive and discuss new pastoral initiatives in faithfulness to the catholic Christian identity the church professes. If an Anglican church is convinced of the need to provide new support for same-sex couples, can it find a way of imagining that innovation that will not result in a shipwreck of its identity? If it cannot, it hardly matters what others will think of what it does or does not make up its mind to do, for it has given up the attempt to be true to itself.

Read it all (emphasis mine).

Grant, O God, that we may follow the example of thy faithful servant Barnabas, who, seeking not his own renown but the well-being of thy Church, gave generously of his life and substance for the relief of the poor and the spread of the Gospel; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Feast day of Barnabas 'Son of encouragement'
'Therefore encourage one another and build each other up. (1 Thes 5:11) pic.twitter.com/tXopcLaPjV

— Pete Greig (@PeteGreig) June 11, 2015

Blessed Lord, grant us thy Holy Spirit to work in us daily a true and lasting repentance, and keep us ever, as contrite Christian people, willing to acknowledge and lament our sins; yet also keep us ever, O Lord, steadfast and strong in our faith in the forgiveness of our sins, and in our purpose to amend our lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

When I am afraid, I put my trust in thee. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust without a fear. What can flesh do to me?

–Psalm 56:3-4