Archbishop Sir David Moxon has called on churches in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia to recognise and respond to human trafficking in our region.

In a seminar at Vaughan Park, Archbishop David Moxon has joined fellow advocates for the elimination of human trafficking to outline how we can help identify and put a stop to trafficking in the Pacific.

As an isolated and supposedly clean, green and pure country, we don’t usually associate the dark and sordid crime of human trafficking with Aotearoa.

But it’s here.

Police have documented cases of people who were brought to Aotearoa under false pretences to work in forced-labour conditions. This happens especially when there are unfilled labour demands in our hospitality, nursing, horticulture, construction and fishing industries.

Sr Gemma Wilson from Aotearoa New Zealand Religious Against Trafficking in Humans (ANZRATH) spoke about the challenges of anti-trafficking work, while Rev Chris Frazer (a Diocese of Wellington deacon for social justice) shared how she works alongside the Department of Immigration and other churches to help authorities intervene in human trafficking situations. Also speaking on the issues was Clare Mercer, a young Christian leader who has taken part in anti-trafficking work in Greece.

Human trafficking is the second largest illicit crime in the world, reaping billions of dollars in illegal profits every year….

Read it all.

“The image of God inside people is at stake.” Most Rev. Sir David Moxon, KZNM. A discussion on the refugee and #humantrafficking #laycentre pic.twitter.com/a1UtEpFbd3

— The Lay Centre (@LayCentre) February 3, 2017

The language used in debates both inside and outside Parliament has become “unacceptable”, the Church of England’s bishops have said in a joint statement.

The College of Bishops published a statement on Friday which argues that the tenor of the political debate is “not worthy of our country”.

The declaration, which was drafted by a group of senior bishops and put out in the name of all 118 bishops, reads: “In the last few days, the use of language, both in debates and outside Parliament, has been unacceptable.

“We should speak to others with respect. And we should also listen. We should do this especially with the poor, with the marginalised, and with those whose voices are often not heard in our national conversation.

“We should not denigrate, patronise or ignore the honest views of fellow citizens, but seek to respect their opinions, their participation in society, and their votes.”

The statement was released a few hours after the Bishop of Leeds, the Rt Revd Nick Baines, joined calls for the Prime Minister to apologise for his “destructive” language in the House of Commons on Wednesday evening.

Read it all.

“We should not denigrate, patronise or ignore the honest views of fellow citizens, but seek to respect their opinions, their participation in society, and their votes.”https://t.co/ER1RdkeVIs

— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) September 29, 2019

This month, Archbishop Foley Beach has kindly invited me to write the monthly Chairman’s letter and it is a great joy to have this opportunity to write to you. I am full of thankfulness for God’s goodness and favour to the Gafcon movement as ordinary Anglicans around the world work together to make Christ known and encourage each other in faithful discipleship. As former Gafcon Chairman Archbishop Nicholas Okoh has recently commented, the church should be a colony of heaven. It is our great calling to serve the Kingdom of God, and to strive to ensure that the world does not colonise the Church.

Gafcon is committed to strategic ministry as we proclaim Christ faithfully to the nations. This week, our Church Planting Network is holding its first annual conference in North Carolina with church planters from across the Communion in attendance and early next month there will be another Bishops Training Institute Conference, this time in Brazil and our first in South America.

Here in Rwanda there are also exciting developments. On 6th September, all eleven of our dioceses began a project coordinated by the Gafcon Church Planting network in partnership with mission agencies including CRU (Campus Crusade for Christ) and the Christian Motorcycle Association (CMA). Each diocese has received a new motorcycle and a Jesus Film backpack for evangelism and church planting. This pilot project will enable us to reach more men, women and children all over Rwanda. It will be carefully monitored over the next ten months and I hope it can be developed to reach many more with the gospel around the world.

This is just one way in which Gafcon is reaching Anglicans at the grassroots and equipping for mission. However, we do need to ensure that we have global Anglican Communion structures which are fit for purpose and I am very much looking forward to welcoming bishops and their spouses from around the world to our Kigali 2020 Conference from 9th-14th June. The program is taking shape and I am very excited by all I believe the Lord will do among us as we meet together.

Read it all.

3/3 We seek only to be a colony of heaven!” – Archbishop Laurent Mbanda, Vice Chairman and Primate of Rwanda

Read the full letter here:https://t.co/rxtVBIe1wY pic.twitter.com/AzQqmLlBf7

— GAFCON (@gafconference) September 30, 2019

You can listen directly there and download the mp3 there (American history buffs will want to watch for a reference to the building of the Golden Gate Bridge).

John 4:43-54
Go home: your son will live

Healing the royal official’s son
by Joseph-Marie Vien, 1752. pic.twitter.com/0Swr93J4eH

— Kalina Boulter (@KalinaBoulter) March 12, 2018

Today is Michaelmas, the golden autumn feast of St Michael and All Angels. It falls at perhaps the most beautiful time of the year, on the cusp between the last glow of fiery summer and the yellow-gold ‘fallowing’ leaves of autumn; the wings of Michael and his angels seem to flutter in harmony with the unleaving of the trees. ‘Michaelmas’ has been the English name for the feast since at least the eleventh century, and it’s a lovely one in every context: Michaelmas daisies, Michaelmas fairs, Michaelmas moons, and more. (Terms, too.) The Anglo-Saxon poem the Menologium alliteratively calls it the ‘high-angel’s tide in harvest’, i.e. ‘the archangel’s day in autumn’:

Hwæt, we weorðiað wide geond eorðan
heahengles tiid on hærfeste,
Michaheles, swa þæt menigo wat,
fif nihtum ufor… emnihtes dæg.

Lo, we honour widely throughout the earth
the high-angel’s tide in harvest,
Michael, as the multitude know,
five nights after the equinox day.

St Michael is particularly associated with heights, and churches on hills and in high places were very often dedicated to him. Dragon-slayer, guardian of humanity, and bearer of the scales of divine justice, St Michael was an immensely popular figure in the Middle Ages, and in this post are four pieces about St Michael by medieval English writers…

Read it all.

Today is Michaelmas, the feast of St Michael the Archangel – guardian of high places, weigher of souls, heavenly warrior against the forces of evil. St Michael in some medieval art, poems, and prayers: https://t.co/UxIhZ84HYs pic.twitter.com/72xZ78DUfU

— Clerk of Oxford (@ClerkofOxford) September 29, 2019

O everlasting God, who hast ordained and constituted the ministries of angels and men in a wonderful order: Mercifully grant that, as thy holy angels always serve and worship thee in heaven, so by thy appointment they may help and defend us on earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in Battle! pic.twitter.com/7wyyuZwXCG

— Dr Taylor Marshall 🔥 (@TaylorRMarshall) September 29, 2019

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who dost feed the birds and clothe the flowers, and who carest for us as a father for his children: We beseech thee of thy tender goodness to save us from distrust and vain self-concern; that with unwavering faith we may cast our every care on thee, and live in daily obedience to thy will; through thy beloved Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

I will sing of thy steadfast love, O LORD, for ever; with my mouth I will proclaim thy faithfulness to all generations. For thy steadfast love was established for ever, thy faithfulness is firm as the heavens.

–Psalm 89:1-2