Also sprach Zarathustra – and Peter Elliot

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The remarkably fitting theme music for Peter Elliot’s musing is the tone poem by Richard Strauss, inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophical novel about the death of God.

It is more widely known, of course, as the music in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey; it introduces a bunch of monkeys banging bones on the ground in front of a large black obelisk. Symbolic of a contemporary Anglican synod, perhaps.

I’m not sure which of these ideas is supposed to be the backdrop for Dean Peter’s exhortations, but I suppose either would work.

The Anglican Church of Canada’s nuclear resolution

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Is here:

A181: Toward a World Free of Nuclear Weapons
Subject: Toward a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

Moved by: The Rev. Canon Dr. William E. Prentice, Diocese of Ottawa

Seconded by: The Rev. Dr. Linda Privitera, Diocese of Ottawa

Be it resolved that this General Synod:

Expresses its support for a world free of nuclear weapons, and asks the General Secretary to convey our position to the Government of Canada, requesting:

  1. from the Government information about Canadian activities in the last three years to support nuclear disarmament, and
  2. from the Prime Minister a public affirmation of Canada’s commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons.

Source Partners in Mission and Ecojustice Committee

BREAKING NEWS: world leaders are hailing the call by Canadian Anglicans to get rid of nuclear weapons as an innovative and thoroughly brilliant way to avert the possibility of nuclear holocaust.

Vladimir Putin, slapping himself on the forehead, said, “How could we have missed this? Of course, we will start disarming right away”. Barack Obama didn’t even have to read from the teleprompter as he exclaimed, “After this, I myself am thinking of becoming an Anglican; we have already started shipping our nuclear arsenal to Canada for safe disposal.”

UK: Judge says no to transsexual man who wanted bigger breasts

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The human capacity for unbridled self-mockery knows no bounds:

A transsexual from Reading who wanted the NHS to pay for him to have larger breasts has lost his High Court case.

The man, known only as C for legal reasons, wanted West Berkshire Primary Care Trust (PCT) to pay £2,300 for the surgery.

But today Mr Justice Bean dismissed the case.

The Anglican Church of Canada’s resolution on the Covenant

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This will be discussed at the General Synod in Halifax next week:

A137: Anglican Communion Covenant

Be it resolved that this General Synod:

  1. receive the final text of The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
  2. request that materials be prepared under the auspices of the Anglican Communion Working Group, for parishes and dioceses in order that study and consultation be undertaken on The Covenant for the Anglican Communion;
  3. direct the Council of General Synod, after this period of consultation and study, to bring a recommendation regarding adoption of the Covenant for the Anglican Communion to the General Synod of 2013.

What does the Anglican Church of Canada do when someone tries to pin it down with a wet noodle?

Receive the wet noodle; circulate the wet noodle to parishes for close inspection; shelve the wet noodle for 3 years in the hope that it might become more flaccid. Repeat as necessary.

Obliterating the distinction between men and women

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Dennis Prager has some pertinent things to say on the GLBT letters:

So, why the T in GLBT?

Because the Left seeks to obliterate the distinction between men and women. They consider this distinction to be a social construct. That is why, to this day, despite all the scientific evidence (as if that were needed) proving how different male and female brains are, many left-wing academics still argue that boys play with trucks rather than with dolls because of sexist socialization.

And that is why, on the left, changing the definition of marriage is only worth a shrug. Since there are no inherent differences between men and women, what difference could it possibly make whether a man marries a man or a woman? Or if children have two fathers, two mothers, or a father and a mother?

For those of us who believe that the male-female distinction is vital to civilization, the Left’s attempts to erase this distinction are worth fighting against. For those who see no purpose in maintaining this distinction, its demise is worth no more than a shrug.

It is extraordinary how many otherwise rather staid and sober companies have jumped on this particular bandwagon – not, I think, in order to sell more of their products, but to be seen as supporting what they believe to be a social virtue: diversity.

LGBTQQIP?

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From a technological perspective I am a child of my times: I like gadgets, computers, digital imaging, the Internet (I’m not sure how I coped so long without it) and I may even learn to like the iPad when it starts multi-tasking.

When it comes to language, though, I am more at home with the prose of Trollope than Twitter. So encountering a post-English atrocity like LGBTQQIP, presents the unpalatable temptation to do the opposite of what I occasionally succumbed to in a more colourful if muddled era: turn-off and tune-out.

One can’t dignify “LGBTQQIP” with the attribute of meaning, but it apparently begs to be applied to a person who is Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, and Pansexual. I remain unclear as to whether one must be suffering all these afflictions simultaneously in order to lay claim to the acronym, but I suspect no-one is counting.

Were I allowed the speak at the forthcoming Anglican General Synod in Halifax – where I will be a blogging visitor –  it is a question I would bring up for deliberation in euphoric anticipation that someone would take me seriously.