In the last few days there have been terrorist attacks in Maiduguri, Ankara, Istanbul, Brussels.
People from all around the world and all traditions stand in solidarity with those places under attack.
Eternal God
hear the cries of your people
as we stand in solidarity
with those under attack.
Protect the innocent,
comfort the needy,
confound the wicked.
Give strength to the rescuers,
determination to peacemakers,
courage to law-enforcers,
strength to the weary.
Amen.
Well said!
Concur!
We can hope that new primates will change the ethos of the Primates’ Meeting. I’m making no bets on it.
100% agreement.
Beautifully balanced – and witty, too! Well said!
It’s happening here in the USA and unless you believe that our current president represents God’s punishment (personally, I think God wouldn’t be so tacky) we haven’t blown up yet. As you say, it’s about goodness and love–how radical can we get?
Thank you for an excellent statement!
Well said. Most of the Primates have only limited authority even within their own provinces, and absolutely no authority outside them. Trying to turn international Anglican conferences and meetings into disciplinary bodies is the stuff of fiction. All of that sort of pre-meeting hoopla makes the real work of the meeting, in terms of open dialogue and interaction, much more difficult.
Well said! There’s been lots of blogging recently about the sensitive consciences of those who inexplicably claim they will be ‘forced’ to marry same-sex couples. At the same time I’m being forced to send loving committed and legally married same-sex couples away without even a formal blessing. Respect for conscience should cut both ways.
Kelvin, listening can – and often does – result in disciplining. To try to separate them, as you have in your original piece, is therefore to miss the point. With the enormous divide that exists on this particular issue, one or other side is ultimately going to have to be ‘disciplined’ – and, no, discipline doesn’t have to be harsh or violent. It can equally be gently persuasive.
Isn’t the lesson from both TEC and the SEC is that no-one need be disciplined for following their personal conscience; the issue only arises when one side seeks to force the other to act against their conscience and only one side is doing that.
There’s no “gently persuasive” way to say that my spouse and I aren’t loved by God and our sacramental marriage deeply infused with God’s grace.
Discipline should be to those who have supported criminalization of LGBT people.
Why should ‘listening’ result in disciplining? It should lead to understanding of an opposite point of view and respect for another’s conscience. Neither the primates nor Lambeth nor the Communion has any power to ‘discipline’ anyone and neither should it. We aren’t Roman Catholics and we don’t have a
Pope. The Scottish Episcopal Church allow the exercise of conscience on both sides. The problem is that too many Christians want to impose their rules over against another persons conscience. That’s just not right.
And what’s the point anyway? The ‘consequences’ haven’t changed the mind of the America Anglicans, the prospect didn’t stop the Scottish Church, it’s not going to stop Canada or South Africa.
No society or organisation can allow diametrically opposing opinions on the same issue to be held with the same validity, Richard. They can, and often will allow for debate and ‘listening’ but in the long run, one opinion of the other has to be accepted over and against the other. Those who continue to hold the unsuccessful opinion will then have to accept the other, or face ‘discipline’ in one of a number of forms. When said society allows meaningless phrases such as ‘hate crime’ to brandied about with no legal or linguistic definition to support them, that society opens itself to a form of anarchy.
But I thought that that the CofE has ‘two integrities’ on women as priests and bishops. What about ‘mutual flourishing’. In your view this is obviously impossible in long term (actually I happen to agree with you on that.) but what’s sauce for the goose etc
We are supposed to be living side by side with these tensions. The Scottish Church has said that no one is to be forced to marry or not marry same sex couples. I know some people think that is impossible, I’ve been told so by members of ‘Christian concern’ etc. But we cannot allow these people to dictate to us what we hold by our consciences also to be true.
My interlocutor from yesterday has asked me another very good question on twitter. As I discussed your blog with other Christians its led me to another big question Do you believe god has a unique plan for us all? The first thing to note is that Mark is very good at asking questions. I came…
I was asked a really good question on Twitter last night. It was this: @thurible As the most knowledgeable and wise Christian I follow, can I ask you a question? Do you believe god intervenes in the world? I gave a quick answer, but it might be worth my saying a bit more about it…
I’ve been asked for advice from someone thinking about starting a blog to cover an interesting international trip. Here’s my top tips. Easiest way to start is to sign up with wordpress.com. You can have a blog set up in five minutes and have your first post up there for all the world to see…
Tomorrow (Saturday) morning I’m doing a guided tour of St Mary’s followed by a cup of tea and a blether about the place. It is free and is open to anyone – folk who have been around a while and folk trying out the congregation and wanting to hear a bit more about it. It…
Leave a Reply