See Amid the Winter's Snow
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The Diocese of Toronto is not just about composting
I thought it was, but apparently, it isn’t. As Bishop Colin Johnson tells us in this address to synod, it’s also about things like Occupy Toronto
slogans and living simply.
This is not just about recycling or composting, although that might be a good start for some people. Most of us need to learn to live simply, so that others can simply live. The Occupy movement’s slogan, I think, might be more useful: “A few might be guilty, but all of us are responsible.” And so we spend time at this synod considering our environment, our place in it, our responsibility, how it is part of God’s mission.
Now he has inspired us with his address, I would like to encourage Bishop Colin to simplify his life by moving into a one room tent in St. James’ park where he will be able to continue his “long-standing work of advocacy and direct service regarding poverty, [and] homelessness” unfettered by the constraints of ecclesiastical bureaucracy.
Bishop Colin astutely notes that Occupy Toronto has managed to achieve something that has eluded the Diocese of Toronto for decades. It has:
touched something real and deep in the psyche of our world today, an anxiety and a disenfranchisement and a sense of huge loss, but what they also touched was really an active hope. That the world as it is, is not the world as it should be. One of the slogans that I saw at one of the tents really struck me. It said: “As you look around the world, does it feel right?”
The slogan was quite true, of course, although it would have been less so had the occupiers made more use of the toilets instead of the grass.
Occupy Christmas
Is now live.
It exhorts us to pay attention to what is important: Christmas with “No credit cards. No big business. Just Christmas”.
So what is “Just Christmas”? The anti-festive malcontents don’t propose to occupy Christmas with the birth of Jesus, joy to the world, the mystery of the Incarnation or anything so trite. The real meaning of Christmas, the logos of the layabouts is the damaging of corporate America:
Occupy Christmas is about turning the tables on Corporate American greed during the season when the 99% can cause the most economic damage and send the clearest message. Instead of spending your hard earned money with Corporate America this (or any) Christmas, why not make the conscious decision to fuel your own local economy? Why not refuse to use credit cards?
At least I have to give the Occupy movement credit for being non-inclusive: they could have called it “Occupy the Holiday Season”.
Richard Dawkins illustrates the atheist’s moral dilemma
In this audio clip, Dawkins is cornered into admitting that, without God, morality is arbitrary. Dawkins’ reluctance is born of that fact that, just like everybody else, he really doesn’t believe that morality is arbitrary. If he were as reasonable as he would like us to think, he should acknowledge that humanity’s innate belief in non-arbitrary morality is evidence for God’s existence.
But he’s not that reasonable.
Quebec taxpayers to fund university research chair on homophobia
It’s enough to bring on a bout of taxophobia.
From here:
The Université de Québec at Montréal is the first on the North American continent to fund a research chair devoted to studying homophobia.
Sexological research undertaken by the university hopes to quantify effects of homophobia on the LGBT community and inform public debate on policy and social justice.
The Quebecois government has given $475,000 (CAD), around £290,000, to the French-speaking university’s programme, which was launched in a ceremony attended by Jean Charest, the Premier of Quebec.
The Archbishop of Wales effuses over the “common faith journey” of Muslims and Christians
From here:
The Archbishop of Wales will praise the “open and honest” relationship that exists in Wales between Christians and Muslims in a lecture tomorrow (Tuesday Nov 22) to celebrate National Interfaith week.
Dr Barry Morgan will pay tribute to the Muslim Council of Wales, as well as the First Minister, for their commitment to promoting good relations between people of different faiths.
He will say, “I want to thank the Muslim Council of Wales and Saleem Kidwai, its Secretary General, in particular, for all he has done to foster good interfaith relationships in Wales over the last decade. Because of his commitment to our common Faith journey and because the fostering of good interfaith relationships has been high on the agenda of our own Welsh Government, I also want to thank the First Minister for continuing the sterling work of his predecessor Rhodri Morgan for this. Wales has not seen some of the problems encountered in other parts of the United Kingdom.
Christians should, of course, be on good terms with Muslims: it is very difficult to present Christ to someone with whom one is on bad terms.
Two things that can never be on good terms are Christianity and Islam because Christianity teaches that Jesus is God’s highest revelation of himself to man while Islam teaches he was merely a prophet. Both cannot be correct, so there is no “common Faith journey” in Islam and Christianity.
From an empirical perspective, almost every country that is predominantly Islamic persecutes Christians, often to the point of death and every country that is a part of what used to be known as Christendom tolerates Muslims, often to the point of self-effacement.
When is hate speech not hate speech?
Hate speech definition:
Speech not protected by the First Amendment, because it is intended to foster hatred against individuals or groups based on race, religion, gender, sexual preference, place of national origin, or other improper classification.
So, for example, to hold up a sign suggesting that we should kill and eat homosexuals would be hate speech because it fosters hatred towards a definable group – homosexuals.
As the occupy protesters are keen to remind us, the wealthy are also a definable group, but it is just fine to foster hatred against them because…. well, I have no idea, but it is.
Of course, everyone knows that the wealthy won’t complain because most have succumbed to the prevailing dogma that being wealthy is Bad, so they secretly feel guilty about their opulence. Unless they are socialists or democrats and then they just lie about it.
It’s easy to see why St. James isn’t offering Occupy Toronto sanctuary
This is what has been done to St. Paul’s Cathedral:
Mr Cottam wrote: ‘Desecration: – graffiti have been scratched and painted on to the great west doors of the cathedral, the chapter house door and most notably a sacrilegious message painted on the restored pillars of the west portico.
‘Human defecation has occurred in the west portico entrance and inside the cathedral on several occasions.’
The Dean of St. James Cathedral, Douglas Stoute, has reiterated that the Occupy Toronto protesters will not be allowed to take sanctuary on Cathedral property, having concluded, I imagine, that it is one thing to stand with the poor – or the faux-poor, depending on one’s perspective – it is quite another to stand in their excrement.
Christopher Hitchens: on the way out
Because he is dying, Christopher Hitchens doesn’t make many public appearances these days, but he did manage to attend the 2011 Texas Freethought Convention to receive the Freethinker of the Year Award.
His tenacity to hang on a little longer is overshadowed only by his determination to continue to reject God: by the benighted insights of his overweening ego, to reject God is to embrace freedom.
The closer Hitchens comes to death the more determined he seems to be to revile God’s greatest revelation of himself in Jesus Christ – an act both profoundly foolish and, from my perspective, terrifying.
I’ll miss him; God have mercy on him in spite of his monumental arrogance.
Occupy Toronto is angry at the Church
From here:
TORONTO – Occupy Toronto protesters in St. James Park lashed out at the neighbouring church on Saturday, calling its officials un-Christian for vowing to stand behind a possible eviction.
Douglas Stoute, the rector of St. James Cathedral located on the west side of the park, said Thursday the church would back any decision made by Justice David Brown, who will decide Monday whether or not to uphold a city-issued eviction that would see the removal of occupiers from the park, including the church’s portion.
[…..]
Up until now, St. James Cathedral has allowed a food station, several tents and a yurt to be on its portion of the park since occupiers set up camp in mid-October. And some demonstrators recently said they would flee to the church’s portion of land should police end up enforcing an eviction.
“They’re not Christians,” Occupy organizer Antonin Smith said angrily Saturday in reaction to Stout’s announcement, calling the support the church has given the park occupiers to this point “cosmetic.”
“I appreciate the support they’ve given us, I just thought it extended a lot further…I don’t appreciate being stabbed in the back,” said Smith, who had been in discussions with the church since the occupation of the park began.
“If Jesus were here, he’d be in a tent…Given his values, I imagine he’d be walking with as, along with Allah and Buddha,” he said.
I almost feel sorry for Douglas Stoute. There he is working for a denomination that has, for the most part not only abandoned Christianity, but forgotten what it is, being lectured by squatting miscreants on the nature of Christianity.
To compound the irony, the half baked things the occupiers are saying about Christianity and the reason for the Incarnation could just have easily fallen from the lips of a trendy Anglican bishop – or Dean Douglas Stoute.