Pick up your tent and walk

Posted on by
9

The Rev. Graham Taylor has a truly radical idea for the St. Paul’s occupiers, based on the Bible verse that seems to have escaped the attention of other ecclesiastical potentates from the Church of England: 2 Thessalonians 3:10.

Graham Taylor is a successful author of children’s books (well, some adults including me like them, too), including his best known book, Shadowmancer; funnily enough, he’s always had to work for a living.

From here:

It is damnable that such a good man as Graham Knowles should be forced out by a crisis on the church steps which has the sole purpose of hijacking the media spotlight. Is there no one in the Church brave enough to say what most of the right-minded people in this country really feel about those surrounding our nations foremost church?

The Church should have realised that any offer of help to the anti-capitalists would have been used against them. If the protesters were people of honour, they would have thanked the Dean for his hospitality and moved on. St Paul’s Chapter should have been firm from the start, robust in its message and united in its determination for law and order.

I believe that the message of Jesus to the protesters would be to tell them to pick up their tents and walk – get a job – for the worker is worth his keep and not to be kept on state benefits. Much of what Jesus taught was tough love. It was about sacrifice, community and commitment.

His call to the protesters would be to put the time they spend sitting in their tents working for those who are really in need. If they are truly concerned about the economic crisis, then they should be contributing with hard work instead of hard talk. Their idle words should be translated into care for those around them.

In these difficult financial times, it is very easy to blame the bankers and financiers for all our financial woes. They have become the demonic enemy to be cast out of the City.

Yet, this dispute isn’t about the poor; it is an attack by a motivated liberalati on the way in which we live in this country. It is an attack not on our financial institutions but on our way of life. I have to ask those protesting about poverty why don’t they go and sweep the streets of the housing estates or clean up the mess still left over from the riots? After all, that is what Jesus would do.

Anglican clergyman agues for civil same-sex marriage before Australian parliament

Posted on by
1

The very Reverend Peter Catt reckons that same sex marriage doesn’t impinge on marriage at all, even though it unavoidably changes the Biblical definition of marriage from a divinely established covenant between a man and a woman to something arbitrary and man-made. Rev. Peter Catt is Dean of St. John’s Cathedral, so perhaps he hasn’t been able to find the time to read the Bible.

From here:

THE Anglican Church of Australia’s Very Reverend Peter Catt says a same-sex marriage Bill would not deny or denigrate the legitimacy of marriage.

Addressing the parliamentary hearing on same-sex marriage on behalf of the church’s social responsibilities committee, Dr Catt said civil unions instead extended the liberties of same or opposite-sex couples.

“I really don’t see that this impinges on marriage at all,” he said.

He said children were better off in a relationship with good values, which included gay couples, and said bad marriages actually did more to undermine the institution of marriage.

Occupy St John’s, Shaughnessy

Posted on by
Reply

The Diocese of New Westminster, having secured legal ownership of St John’s, Shaughnessy’s building, is looking for a new rector for the church. Such is the paucity of suitable contenders in Canada, that Michael Ingham on a recent trip to Canterbury, asked Rowan Williams for suggestions.

And now, according to this, Rowan Williams has come through:

Archbishop Rowan Williams has followed-up and recently sent +Michael a letter suggesting two possible candidates for the Interim Ministry position at St John’s, Shaughnessy.

It looks as if Rev. Giles Fraser or Rev. Graeme Knowles might have found a new job.

The Diocese of Montreal loses money in the markets

Posted on by
5

Obviously no one has told the diocese that capitalism doesn’t work any more and, even if it did, that it is fundamentally unChristian.

From the diocesan paper (page 4):

The fund that handles the investments of the Diocese of Montreal has not escaped the impact of conditions in Canadian and world financial markets.

According to a report to the diocesan synod in late October, the net asset value of the Anglican Balanced Fund, a private mutual fund in which the units are owned by the Diocese, certain parishes and related institutions, stood at $27.69 a unit (the equivalent of a share) on August 31, down from $29.33 at the end of 2010 and $28.40 year earlier.

Coincidentally, in the same issue we find a favourable review of Terry Eagleton’s “Why Marx was right”.  I am unsure as to how a revue of a book about Marx found its way into an ostensibly Christian paper other than to note that not only did Marx predict the end of capitalism but that, as could be said of many of Canada’s Anglican clergy: “He was, of course, an atheist; but one does not need to be religious to be spiritual”.

It does go to show that those in charge of diocesan investments should read their own paper, not to mention consult their lefty clergy, Rev. Canon Paul Jennings, Very Rev. Michael Pitts and Rev. James McDermott all of whom visited Occupy Montreal upon which they bestowed their anti-capitalist blessing.

And now for something completely different

Posted on by
1

An Anglican clergyman says something sensible about how Christianity might be applied to the financial mess and the St. Paul’s occupation.

Read it all here:

The best thing the Church seemed to be able to come up with was the Archbishop of Canterbury’s support for a new ‘Robin Hood’ tax — in other words, another financial instrument to add to the pile. But what might have been a better response, given the complexity of the issues involved?

The first answer in any realm of public responsibility lies in the model Jesus Christ set before his followers, as the Lord of all who nevertheless came “not to be served, but to serve”.

I remember a lecturer many years ago who argued that this ought to be the guiding principle of Christians in the arts. The first goal of the artist, he said, should not be self-expression but service of others. The answer to the question, “What should I paint or sculpt or design?” should be, “What could I paint or sculpt or design that would be of benefit to someone else?”

Yet this can apply to financiers as much as to artists. The guiding principle here should be not “How much money can we make?” but, “How can I best be of service?” In every occupation and relationship, those who claim to follow Christ should follow his example of being “the servant of all”.

 

Gaza flotilla crybabies

Posted on by
Reply

The latest Gaza flotilla, the Canadian Boat to Gaza, transported a group of Canadian poseurs to meet their fate as martyrs manqué at the hands of the IDF.

According to an initial report:

“There is one Canadian, from London, Ont., who was harshly beaten,” said Dylan Penner, an Ottawa-based spokesman for the group Canadian Boat to Gaza.

A subsequent report softened the harsh beating to being roughed up:

However, Penner said he had been told some activists — including David Heap, a Canadian from London, Ont. — were “roughed up” when they refused to leave their vessel. Two other Canadians — Montrealer Ehab Lotayef and Torontonian Karen DeVito — were also aboard the Tahrir, but organizers haven’t been able to reach any of the activists directly so far.

Now, it’s apparent that the twerp, David Heap, is tweeting from an air-conditioned Israeli jail equipped with free Internet access, having fully recovered from possibly being jostled as he was removed from the boat:

Foremost among these is David Heap, a University of Western Ontario faculty member who claims to have been “tasered” and “bruised” as Israeli soldiers hauled his unco-operative self from the high seas. From the title of the article he wrote for the left-wing site Rabble.ca — “I write from cell 9 in the Apartheid State of Israel” — you would think he was Martin Luther King with a Twitter account, penning manifestos from a Birmingham jail. But even by his own morally self-aggrandizing account, he is “basically ok” after his high-seas experience.

[…..]

Heap and his friends set their compass for a confrontation with the Israeli Defense Forces, the most humane and professional military in the Middle East. And their only real punishment for trying to bring material goods to a terrorist-controlled regime in Gaza is to spend a few days in climate-controlled, Internet-equipped Israeli jails complaining about their ordeal to journalist pals back home.

Mr. Heap’s whining campaign isn’t nearly as dangerous as the tactics used by other activists, but it certainly is far more annoying.

David Heap is employed by the University of Western Ontario to teach French Studies, not, presumably, from a flotilla boat as this UWO graduate notes:

As a UWO graduate, and an Ontario tax payer, I would like to find out if Dr. Heap is currently drawing a salary supported by the tax payer, while undertaking non-academic activities of dubious nature, which have been denounced by our Foreign Minister John Baird in the past. I would also like to find out if students that registered at the faculty to be instructed in French by Dr. Heap are receiving an equivalent level of instruction, given the potential for Dr. Heap to be absent for quite some time?