ARDF–Support the Hurricane Relief Effort in Texas https://t.co/LHnoQ5mVkR #hurricaneharvey #compassion #stewardship #texas

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) August 28, 2017

A council that placed a child with a foster family whose use of Arabic confused and upset her is to be forced by the children’s commissioner to explain its decision.

The Times revealed yesterday that the five-year-old girl, a native English speaker from a Christian family, has spent six months with Muslim foster carers who allegedly removed her necklace, which had a cross, and refused to allow her to eat bacon.

A social services supervisor for Tower Hamlets in east London described the child sobbing and begging not to be returned to the foster family because “she doesn’t understand the Arabic”. The girl is also understood to have said that she was regularly expected to eat meals on the floor.

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A group of pagans has written to the Archbishop of Canterbury demanding two churches to make amends for those it says were stolen 1,300 years ago.

The Odinist Fellowship, which represents 1,000 members of the pagan religion, wrote to the Church of England last month asking for two churches to be returned to make up for actions which took place during the Christianisation of England.

The letter, addressed directly to Archbishop Welby, said: “With a view to re-establishing better relations between the Odinist Fellowship and the Christian churches in England, and persuaded that a restitution of past wrongs is the best way to lay the foundations of improved relations, we wish you to be aware that the great majority of Odinists believe that honour requires the English church to issue a public apology for its former crimes against the Odinists.”

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Journalists and Christian leaders alike shared their tributes.

“Michael Cromartie was different from what most people think of when they think ‘evangelicals and politics.’ Thanks be to God,” said Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, who admired his humble character and effective engagement with journalists.

“After his cancer diagnosis, every time I saw Mike he would say, ‘Pray like a Pentecostal.’ We did,” Moore shared with CT. “Mike now is in the presence of the Lord of Pentecost. We will miss him here, and must pray for more like him.”

Michael Wear, a former White House faith adviser under Barack Obama, described Cromartie as “one of Christianity’s principal ambassadors in Washington, [representing] Jesus with joyful confidence.”

“I’ve seen the effects of his life and work up close, and both the church and the nation are better off because of him,” said Wear. “Michael was a friend whose encouragement I did not deserve, and whose insight has shaped my work, my life, and my faith. In the days ahead, we should look to Michael’s example to stoke our imagination for what a faithful public witness can look like in this moment.”

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'I Have a Dream': Read, watch+listen to the speech on its 54th anniversary https://t.co/v8YOdOzYGq #race #history #usa #oratory #language

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) August 28, 2017

“I don’t know that I’ve ever prayed…like I prayed today, just asking God to have mercy on us" #HarveyStorm https://t.co/haaUGlY8Ta

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) August 28, 2017

Almost all Houston-area churches—including the Bayou City’s biggest congregations such as Second Baptist, Houston’s First Baptist, Church Without Walls, Wheeler Avenue Baptist, and Woodlands Church—canceled all Sunday activities as a precaution.

The congregations were glad they did when unprecedented rain levels ended up blocking many routes and leaking into some church buildings by Saturday night and Sunday morning.

“We have five services on the weekend, and I cannot ever remember canceling all services,” said Chris Seay, lead pastor at Ecclesia. “We asked our community to stay home with family and to look out for their neighbors.”

Gregg Matte, pastor at Houston’s First Baptist, spent the weekend checking in with members of his congregation—from elderly evacuees to a local TV meteorologist—with whom he has been texting Bible verses in between broadcasts.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever prayed like that, like I prayed today, just asking God to have mercy on us,” Matte said in a Facebook video Sunday evening. “Just make the rain stop.”

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Therefore, brethren, may this be the result of my admonition, that you understand that in raising your hearts to the Scriptures (when the gospel was sounding forth, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” and the rest that was read), you were lifting your eyes to the mountains. For unless the mountains said these things, you would not find out how to think of them at all. Therefore from the mountains came your help, that you even heard of these things; but you cannot yet understand what you have heard. Call for help from the Lord, who made heaven and earth; for the mountains were enabled only so to speak as not of themselves to illuminate, because they themselves are also illuminated by hearing. Thence John, who said these things, received them, he who lay on the Lord’s breast, and from the Lord’s breast drank in what he might give us to drink. But he gave us words to drink.

Thou oughtest then to receive understanding from the source from which he drank who gave thee to drink; so that thou mayest lift up thine eyes to the mountains from whence shall come thine aid, so that from thence thou mayest receive, as it were, the cup, that is, the word, given thee to drink; and yet, since thy help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth, thou mayest fill thy breast from the source from which he filled his; whence thou saidst, “My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth:” let him, then, fill who can. Brethren, this is what I have said: Let each one lift up his heart in the manner that seems fitting, and receive what is spoken. But perhaps you will say that I am more present to you than God. Far be such a thought from you! He is much more present to you; for I appear to your eyes, He presides over your consciences. Give me then your ears, Him your hearts, that you may fill both. Behold, your eyes, and those your bodily senses, you lift up to us; and yet not to us, for we are not of those mountains, but to the gospel itself, to the evangelist himself: your hearts, however, to the Lord to be filled. Moreover, let each one so lift up as to see what he lifts up, and whither. What do I mean by saying, “what he lifts up, and whither?” Let him see to it what sort of a heart he lifts up, because it is to the Lord he lifts it up, lest, encumbered by a load of fleshly pleasure, it fall ere ever it is raised. But does each one see that he bears a burden of flesh? Let him strive by continence to purify that which he may lift up to God. For “Blessed are the pure in heart, because they shall see God.”

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O, how wonderful is Thy goodness, for it is unlike all other good things. I desire to come to Thee; and all that I have need of on the way I desire from Thee, and chiefly that without which I can not come to Thee. If Thou forsake me, I perish; yet I know that Thou wilt not forsake me unless I forsake Thee; nor will I forsake Thee, for Thou art the highest good. There is none who rightly seeketh Thee that doth not find Thee. He alone seeketh Thee aright whom Thou teachest aright to seek Thee, and how he should seek Thee. O, good Father, free me entirely from the error in which I have hitherto wandered, and yet wander; and teach me the way in which no foe can encounter me before I come to Thee. If I love naught above Thee, I beseech Thee that I may find Thee; and if I desire any thing beyond measure and wrongly, deliver me from it. Make me worthy to behold Thee.

–Saint Augustine’s Soliloquies, Book I

Today we commemorate Saint Augustine, Bishop & Doctor of the Church. We pray for all Theologians and Preaches. Saint Augustine, pray for us. pic.twitter.com/pJJq30R2HD

— Father Roger Parker (@SCathsParsonage) August 28, 2017

O Lord God, who art the light of the minds that know thee, the life of the souls that love thee, and the strength of the hearts that serve thee: Help us, following the example of thy servant Augustine of Hippo, so to know thee that we may truly love thee, and so to love thee that we may fully serve thee, whom to serve is perfect freedom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

O Thou, from whom to be turned is to fall, to whom to be turned is to rise, and in whom to stand is to abide for ever: Grant us in all our duties thy help, in all our perplexities thy guidance, in all our dangers thy protection, and in all our sorrows thy peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

A #Prayer to Begin the Day from Saint Augustine 'O Thou, from whom to be turned is to fall' https://t.co/ovA7354UZO pic.twitter.com/8E6HSIUaYn

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) August 28, 2017

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.

–Psalm 1:1-3

The Christ Church Cathedral means more to the city than it does to the Anglican church, Christchurch Mayor Lianne Dalziel says.

Dalziel made the comment in Cathedral Square during Sunday’s launch of an 8.4 metre-tall model of the People’s Steeple, built by United States master carpenter Marcus Brandt.

Brandt, who has the support of the Restore Christchurch Cathedral Group, wants to rebuild the collapsed Christ Church Cathedral spire in timber and hoist it into place using ropes, pullies and 500 volunteers.

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Dr Nicholas Okoh, Primate of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) on Saturday appealed to Nigerians to avoid hate speech.‎ Okoh made the call in Kano when he led some members of his church to visit Gov. Abdullahi Ganduje at the Government House.

The clergyman, who described the trend in recent times as alarming,‎ urged Nigerians to work assiduously to control hate speech.‎ “Hate speech has serious consequences on our country as it promotes violence, extremism and conflicts. “Most of the adherents of these two religions don’t have the real understanding of the teaching‎s of their religions; that is why we having problem with hate speeches,” he said. Okoh called on Nigerians to preach love, tolerance and understanding in order to move the country forward.‎

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Serene Son of God, whose will subdued the troubled waters and laid to rest the fears of men: Let thy majesty master us, thy power of calm control us; that for our fears we may have faith, and for our disquietude perfect trust in thee; who dost live and govern all things, world without end.

–Robert W. Rodenmayer, ed., The Pastor’s Prayerbook: Selected and arranged for various occasions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960)

Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD, O my soul! I will praise the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have being. Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no help. When his breath departs he returns to his earth; on that very day his plans perish. Happy is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the LORD his God, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith for ever…

–Psalm 146:1-3 (my emphasis)

I have found that it is unproductive to force theological ideas—like Augustine’s understanding of evil, Dante’s depiction of the beatific vision or Flannery O’Connor’s morbid but hopeful anthropology—into the minds of students despite their disinterest.

Instead, I try to translate the import of these weighty concerns, claims and questions so students can feel what Augustine or Dante felt when facing these existential summits, or so they can entertain Plato’s suggestion that perception and reality are not necessarily what they seem.

Theology is impotent and irrelevant when simply presented as a set of ideas, doctrines or conclusions to be passively internalized. Instead, it is the kind of discipline that requires first making the questions that drive theological inquiry meaningful, long before answers can even be introduced.

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Trinity School for Ministry is pleased to announce the appointment of The Rev. Dr. Jack Gabig as the new Associate Professor of Practical Theology and Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program. Trinity’s Board of Trustees ratified the call to Dr. Gabig after a unanimous vote of the faculty in July.

“I am pleased to announce the appointment of The Rev. Dr. Jack Gabig as a full-time member of our residential faculty,” said The Very Rev. Dr. Henry L. Thompson III, Dean & President of Trinity. “He brings many years of pastoral wisdom, creative energy, innovative thinking, passion for academic rigor, and an abundance of love centered in the love of Jesus Christ.”

Dr. Gabig received his MDiv from Trinity School for Ministry and then served for eight years as Assistant Rector at the Church of the Ascension in Pittsburgh, PA. He then moved to England where he completed his Ph.D. at King’s College in London during which time he served as a Chaplain at New College, Oxford. Dr. Gabig, who currently serves as the Associate Professor of Practical Theology and the Director of Advanced Degree Programs at Nashotah House Theological Seminary in Nashotah, WI, will join the Trinity Community on August 28, 2017

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If the North American Church of today can thoughtfully take into consideration these three social realities, we might not only catch up to how fast culture is changing, but we’ll also play a role in leading some of the change.

ABNY SOCIAL REALITY #1: Demographic Shifts in the U.S.

Much has been said about the 2010 U.S. Census and how demographers forecast that in the next few decades the U.S. will no longer have a majority race.

Basically, the U.S. is becoming like the city of 40 or 50 years ago where Whites were leaving and minorities were moving in.

In his book, Diversity Explosion: How New Racial Demographics Are Remaking America, sociologist and senior fellow at the Brookings Institute, William Frey, points out that Whites are aging and having fewer children. This, alongside the growth of Latino, Asian, and multiracial groups, will mean that in less than 30 years, Whites will comprise less than half of the U.S. population.

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In 2015, more than 33,000 Americans died from opioid overdoses, according to the CDC, which says preliminary data from 2016 suggests the total number of overdose deaths will increase.

Daniel Ciccarone, an associate editor for the International Journal of Drug Policy and professor at the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, said the lag time of a year is an improvement from how data was collected a few years ago, but it’s still a problem for understanding the scope of the current epidemic.

“The numbers are extraordinary and it’s easy to get kind of numbed when you’re in that kind of event when you say, ‘well, this has had more deaths than the Vietnam War, this has had more deaths in a given year than HIV-AIDS,'” Ciccarone said. “We’re reached epidemic levels because this is of crisis proportions. It’s going to require a crisis response: resources, time, effort, humanity, compassion of a historic proportion.”

Read it all or you can watch the full video report here (just under 11 minutes).

Almighty God, Lord of the storm and of the calm, the vexed sea and the quiet haven, of day and of night, of life and of death, – grant unto us so to have our hearts stayed upon Thy faithfulness, Thine unchangingness and love, that, whatsoever betide us, however black the cloud or dark the night, with quiet faith trusting in Thee we may look upon Thee with untroubled eye, and walking in lowliness towards Thee, and in lovingness towards one another, abide all storms and troubles of this mortal life, beseeching Thee that they may turn to the soul’s true good. We ask it for Thy mercy’s sake, shown in Jesus Christ our Lord.

–Robert W. Rodenmayer, ed., The Pastor’s Prayerbook: Selected and arranged for various occasions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960)

Now these are the last words of David:

The oracle of David, the son of Jesse,
the oracle of the man who was raised on high,
the anointed of the God of Jacob,
the sweet psalmist of Israel:

“The Spirit of the Lord speaks by me,
his word is upon my tongue.
The God of Israel has spoken,
the Rock of Israel has said to me:
When one rules justly over men,
ruling in the fear of God,
he dawns on them like the morning light,
like the sun shining forth upon a cloudless morning,
like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth.
Yea, does not my house stand so with God?
For he has made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and secure.
For will he not cause to prosper
all my help and my desire?
But godless men are all like thorns that are thrown away;
for they cannot be taken with the hand;
but the man who touches them
arms himself with iron and the shaft of a spear,
and they are utterly consumed with fire.”

–2 Samuel 23:1-7

To assist individuals as they observe the Day of Prayer and Fasting on August 30, 2017, the Diocese has created a set of resources including a brief explanation of fasting, suggested methods for prayer, scripture readings and listings of our parishes, clergy, legal team, parish chancellors and standing committee.

Download the resource sheet.

Please make use of these optional resources if you find them helpful.

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#Harvey is now a category 3 #hurricane with 120-mph winds & a pressure of 943 mb (27.85") See the latest advisory at https://t.co/tW4KeGdBFb pic.twitter.com/s0FrcURAsA

— NHC Atlantic Ops (@NHC_Atlantic) August 25, 2017

As someone who has lived through 2 hurricanes and fled from+prepared for many others, my heart and prayers go out to Texas. The single best word to describe going through a a major hurricane is DISRUPTIVE, and until you have been thru a Cat 3 or greater you dont know what its like–KSH.

What are your hopes for this book?

Several. First, I hope Christians come away with a basic understanding of theological anthropology—that God created humanity in his image, male and female, and that male and female are made exclusively for one another.

Second, Christians are called to both conviction and compassion. As you once reminded me in personal conversation, Sam, grace and truth aren’t in tension when we look at Jesus. I hope this book models the unity Jesus Christ so lovingly and compassionately displays. I want Christians to see that the Christian story provides a framework for understanding this controversy in terms of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration. In light of the gospel, there’s hope for those with gender dysphoria and those who identify as transgender.

Third, I hope this book starts conversations inside churches, and that churches get serious about being safe places for those with gender-identity conflicts to talk openly and seek help.

Fourth, I want the transgender community in America to know Christians aren’t their enemy, despite the stereotypes. We are called to neighbor love, and that can’t be be limited to people who agree with us. When transgender persons are bullied, mocked, ridiculed, or physically harmed, Christians must defend their humanity and inviolable dignity—even when we think they’re transgressing sacred boundaries that God wisely and beautifully imposed on humanity.

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Earlier this year, a 7-year-old girl from Minnesota entered an examination room at a clinic just outside of Detroit. Thinking this was a regular visit, she allowed the doctor to remove her pants and underwear and place her on the examination table. Suddenly, while two women in the clinic held her hands, the physician spread her legs and cut her clitoris. Two months later she told investigators the pain ran down to her ankles and she could barely walk.

In April Dr. Jumana Nagarwala, who allegedly performed the procedure, was charged with conspiracy to commit female genital mutilation. Dr. Fakhruddin Attar, the owner of the since-closed clinic, was also charged. Investigators suspect Ms. Nagarwala may be involved in 100 other cases, and the trial starts in October. This marks the first time a female genital mutilation case is going to federal court. The lawyers for the Michigan physician will argue the girl “underwent a benign religious procedure.” This is a dangerous hypocrisy with far-reaching consequences.

Female genital mutilation has been illegal in the U.S. since 1996. Yet a 2012 study in the journal Public Health Reports estimates that more than 500,000 girls in the U.S. have undergone the procedure or are at risk. These girls live all over the country, with larger concentrations in California, New York and Minnesota. Most go through this process in secret, and only 25 states have laws that criminalize the procedure. In Maine, the American Civil Liberties Union has opposed a bill to do so on the ground that “the risk of mutilation isn’t worth expanding Maine’s criminal code.”

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[Carol Berkin’s new book]…A Sovereign People prods us to remember that the early statesmen of this country sometimes were less like the formal tableau in John Trumbull’s famous painting of the signing of the Declaration (a painting produced many years after the event itself) and more like a quarrelsome neighborhood association, full of old grievances and new disagreements over any number of issues.

Some of the best passages in the book explore the weaknesses that beset these men: Adams’s injured vanity, Hamilton’s impatience with anyone not as smart as he, Jefferson’s tendency to overlook hard truths about his idealized French revolutionaries. We get less well-known figures as well, such as a young John Marshall, bright but with “lax, lounging manners,” according to his cousin Jefferson. Berkin’s description of the high-maintenance Elbridge Gerry, a man “whose mission in life often seemed to be alienating others,” will help readers understand why Adams’s appointment of Gerry to represent the United States in France in 1798 was one of the decisions that doomed that particular diplomatic errand to failure.

Perhaps the accidental hero of the story, if there is one, is John Adams, whose decision to seek yet another negotiation with France at the end of 1798 made a mockery of his administration’s drive toward war preparation. In stepping back from the brink, Adams opened the way for a new treaty with France that recognized American neutrality, but he also doomed his party and his own career. Berkin portrays a man who knew he lacked the glitter of Hamilton and the patrician dignity of Washington, but who knew, at the end, who he was: “a statesman rather than a politician. He would act in the best interests of the nation, not the narrow interests of the party.” We can only hope that we have such leaders in our own time. We do not know where the story ends.

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It remains unclear what the 14-strong Task Force will recommend, but one option presented in the minutes is a first reading of proposed changes to the BCP in 2018, so that revision could take place in 2021, “including consultation with ACC [Anglican Consultative Council] and the Lambeth Conference”. The latter takes place in 2020.The 2018 Convention would be presented with a new form of the introduction to marriage and catechism.

“For conservatives this would be concerning,” the March minutes state. “Yet these proposed revisions would be ‘two people’, not explicitly ‘same sex’.”

The minutes ask: “Is there a way to disagree that does not require schism?” and note that “Many want to be in a Church where people have theological differences but still pray together.” But they also suggest that the experience of the C of E should serve as a cautionary tale.

“The Church of England allowed certain divisions regarding women’s ordination that we should be careful not to emulate, as they have become deeply entrenched,” they say. “Creating carve-outs for pockets of the Church under one ecclesiastical structure could lead to difficulties down the line.”

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O God, who didst call thy servant Louis of France to an earthly throne that he might advance thy heavenly kingdom, and didst give him zeal for thy Church and love for thy people: Mercifully grant that we who commemorate him this day may be fruitful in good works, and attain to the glorious crown of thy saints; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

#SaintoftheDay is St Louis of France, friend of Aquinas, known for his prayerfulness, penitence & love of the poor. pic.twitter.com/buIlIXkiMj

— Westminster Diocese (@RCWestminster) August 25, 2016

Blessed Spirit of God, come to us in all thy fullness and power, to enrich us in our poverty, to inflame us in our feebleness. Be closer to us than breathing, nearer than hands or feet. As the branches are in the vine, so may we abide in thee. Compass our minds with thy wisdom. Saturate our souls with thy righteousness. Fire our wills with thy might. Melt our hearts with thy love. Do everything at all times to make us wholly thine until thy wealth is ours and we are lost in thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

–Robert W. Rodenmayer, ed., The Pastor’s Prayerbook: Selected and arranged for various occasions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960)