Where does a priest who doesn't believe in God get invited to preach?

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In an Anglican church, of course; but I expect you already knew that:

DON’T call me Father, says Peter Kennedy.

And it soon becomes clear why the man, who was a serving priest for 45 years before the Catholic Church evicted him from his parish in Brisbane, no longer wants the title.

He doesn’t believe in the priesthood anymore, nor the virgin birth, nor the infallibility of the Pope. In fact, he doubts that Jesus ever existed and although he is the spiritual leader of a 500-strong Christian community, he says he no longer prays because there’s “no one to pray to.”

The controversial and charismatic ex-priest, who made headlines last year when he refused to leave St Mary’s as instructed by his Bishop, will preach tomorrow at All Saints’ Anglican Church in Simpson Street, North Rockhampton.

Welcome home unFather Peter.

And now for something completely different: an ontological argument for God that invokes Rowan Williams

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I have always thought Anselm’s ontological argument for God quite elegant and convincing:

1. God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived

2. God may exist in the understanding.

3. To exist in reality and in the understanding is greater than to exist in the understanding alone.

4. Therefore, God exists in reality.

Those who wish to resist the idea of there being a God declare this to be a circular argument; ironically, the same people have little difficulty accepting the Anthropic Principle, which really is circular:

The Universe (and hence the fundamental parameters on which it depends) must be such as to admit the creation of observers within it at some stage. (this is a version of the Strong Anthropic Principle. There are others, but they are all equally tautological)

Bertrand Russell, having not made out too well in his debate with Frederick C. Copleston, interviews Anselm who drags in Rowan as an example of something more obscure and intrinsically pleonastic than both the ontological argument and anthropic principle combined. Read it all here:

BR: Thank you for being here, Bishop.

Anselm: Glad to be here. Glad to be anywhere after all this time.

BR: Just a few preliminaries: You are the author of this treatise, called Proslogion?

Anselm: Why yes. It’s my best work. Proslogium, please. And I never liked Professor Kant calling my argument “ontological”—it was never called that in my day.

BR: Oh, and what was in called in your day?

Anselm: Anselm’s Argument.

BR: I see. And in this treatise you propose what you call an air-tight and foolproof argument for the existence of God?

[…..]

BR: It’s all very…obscure, isn’t it?

Anselm: You think this is obscure? Thank God we’ll both be dead when Rowan Williams sits in my chair.

A “woman’s right to choose”, brought to you by Adolf Hitler

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Hitler was the first Western leader to support unrestricted abortion, particularly for non-Germans:

“In view of the large families of the Slav native population, it could only suit us if girls and women there had as many abortions as possible. We are not interested in seeing the non-German population multiply…We must use every means to instill in the population the idea that it is harmful to have several children, the expenses that they cause and the dangerous effect on woman’s health… It will be necessary to open special institutions for abortions and doctors must be able to help out there in case there is any question of this being a breach of their professional ethics.”

Planned Parenthood has taken up where Hitler left off: its founder, Margaret Sanger explained her plan this way:

“The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”
Margaret Sanger (editor). The Woman Rebel, Volume I, Number 1. Reprinted in Woman and the New Race. New York: Brentanos Publishers, 1922.

And now, The Polish arm of the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform wants to let Poles know that they can thank Hitler for bringing abortion to their country with this large billboard; it reads, Abortion for Polish women introduced by Hitler on March 9, 1943

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Bring on the airport body scanners

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I was under the impression that airport body scanners were a complete waste of time and that profiling was the answer to ferreting out terrorists. This has changed my mind; about the body scanners, at least:

Airport Body Scanners Violate the Teachings of Islam, Says Muslim Group

A group of Muslim scholars says it supports airline safety, but it is “deeply concerned” about the use of airport scanners that show nude images of the human body.

“The Fiqh Council of North America (FCNA) emphasizes that a general and public use of such scanners is against the teachings of Islam, natural law and all religions and cultures that stand for decency and modesty,” the group said in a Feb. 10 statement posted at Islam Online.

“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women,” FCNA explained. The group noted that Islam emphasizes modesty, considering it part of the faith. “The Qur’an has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts” and to be modest in their dress.

Dr. Mouneer Anis demonstrates integrity

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From here:

The President Bishop of the Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East has quit the Standing Committee of the Anglican Consultative Council, stating he has no faith in its integrity.

In a withering critique released on Jan 30, the Bishop of Egypt Dr. Mouneer Anis said that after having served for three years on the Standing Committee he had come to the belief that his continued presence had “no value whatsoever and my voice is like a useless cry in the wilderness.”

The Bishop of Egypt’s defection comes as a blow to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, who had counted on Dr. Anis as one of his few remaining allies among the global south coalition of primates.

Dr. Williams had attempted to dissuade Dr. Anis from quitting the standing committee after Dr. Anis gave voice to his concerns following its December meeting. He pleaded with Dr. Anis to stand fast, sources close to the Egyptian bishop told The Church of England Newspaper, arguing the Anglican Covenant would soon answer his concerns.

However, Dr. Anis’ Jan 30 letter branding the processes and structures Dr. Williams set in place as flawed, comes as a public rebuke to the archbishop, which further isolates Canterbury from the non-Western primates of the Communion.

Thank you Dr. Mouneer Anis.

Undoubtedly, the reason Rowan Williams wanted Anis to stay was in order to further the illusion of harmony between conservatives and liberals; Anis would have been the token conservative.

A salutary lesson to conservatives who have chosen to remain in the ACoC and TEC: you are being used.

Traces of Dark Matter discovered

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From here:

Scientists may have caught their first ever glimpse of “dark matter” – the mysterious, invisible substance that makes up three quarters of the matter of the universe.

Traces of two “dark matter particles” were picked up by highly sensitive detectors buried 2,000 ft below the ground at the bottom of an old iron mine, researchers report today.

The scientists say there is a three in four chance that the observations are genuine particles of dark matter, rather than just background noise.

Dark matter is one of the big mysteries of physics and its discovery would be one of the greatest scientific breakthroughs of the last 100 years.

In the 1930s astronomers first realised that the stars, gas and dust only made up a fraction of the matter of the universe. They concluded that galaxies would fall apart unless they were held in place by the gravitational pull of some vast, invisible substance.

For more than 80 years, scientists have debated what this dark matter could be and why we can’t see it.

One of the most likely candidates is a tiny object called a “weakly interactive massive particle” or Wimp which bombards the earth from space.

And to prove that even science can be funny:

Researchers have been looking for traces of Wimps for the last nine years at the bottom of a disused Soudan iron mine in Minnesota.

The perfect place for a wimp to hide.

The Lorna Ashworth Church of England Synod motion

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Her original motion before the Church of England Synod was, “that this Synod express the desire that the Church of England be in communion with the Anglican Church in North America.” It was defeated and an amended version passed 309 to 69 with 17 abstentions.

That this Synod, aware of the distress cause by recent divisions within the Anglican churches of the United States of America and Canada,
(a) recognise and affirm the desire of those who have formed the Anglican Church in North America to remain within the Anglican family;
(b) acknowledge that this aspiration, in respect both of relations with the Church of England and membership of the Anglican Communion, raises issues which the relevant authorities of each need to explore further; and
(c) invite the Archbishops to report further to the Synod in 2011.

Lorna Ashworth’s reason for bringing the motion to synod was to “send a strong message of encouragement to people who are practising Biblical historical Anglicanism” – that’s it. The motion was not that the CoE be in communion with the ACNA, only that the synod express the desire that it should be so.

But even that was too much for the synod, so the Anglican-bland amended motion was put forward stating the reverse of the original motion – the desire of the ACNA to be part of the Anglican Communion.

That this is typically Anglican is evidenced by the 1 year delay, the expectation of a report and the fact that it is sufficiently woolly that people on each side of the issue see support or lack thereof depending on what they had for breakfast. For example, some tweets:

eicestercofe @vicardave #synod I’d hate to be on the end of your DIScouraging statements. PH

pastorev Well done Synod! Stick that in your pipe and smoke it USA liberals! 🙂 #synod

frsimon #synod f***s it all up by expressing its desire to join with schismatics. Very very disappointed.

eleysium Thomas Cranmer would be sick #synod

r_rabbit Lke a gun. First you make it safe (the amendment: Bishop of Bristol) and then you decide whether to use it or not. #synod

Lorna Ashworth, before the synod debate, said the heart of her motion was that “we desire to be communion”; the heart was ripped out by the amendment.

Anglican Church facing the threat of extinction

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From the Globe and Mail:

Michael Valpy.

The Anglican Church in Canada – once as powerful in the nation’s secular life as it was in its soul – may be only a generation away from extinction, says a just-published assessment of the church’s future.

The report, prepared for the Anglican Diocese of British Columbia, calls Canada a post-Christian society in which Anglicanism is declining faster than any other denomination. It says the church has been “moved to the far margins of public life.”

According to the report, the diocese – “like most across Canada” – is in crisis. The report repeats, without qualification or question, the results of a controversial study presented to Anglican bishops five years ago that said that at the present rate of decline – a loss of 13,000 members per year – only one Anglican would be left in Canada by 2061.

It points out that just half a century ago, 40 per cent of Vancouver Island’s population was Anglican; now the figure is 1.2 per cent. Nationally, between 1961 and 2001, the church lost 53 per cent of its membership, declining to 642,000 from 1.36 million. Between 1991 and 2001 alone, it declined by 20 per cent.

Regular attendance is declining at all Canadian Christian churches, except for the Roman Catholic Church, whose small increase is attributed to immigration.

The B.C. diocesan report tells Anglicans on Vancouver Island and the adjacent Gulf Islands – which the diocese covers – that 19 of their 54 churches should be closed, with another 11 put on death watch, and that two more should not have their priests replaced when they move on or retire.

The remaining congregations have been told to abandon their sedate, clubby Anglican culture and get their behinds off pews to evangelize in shopping malls, homes and workplaces.

“The status quo is not an option,” the report says. With a preponderance of Anglicans being 60 or older, the church is “one generation away from extinction,” it says.

“The unchurched are not coming to us. Lapsed Anglicans are not coming back in sufficient numbers.”

Two things have caught up with the Anglican Church of Canada and will be the cause of its final undoing:

  1. The ACoC, as this report suggests, is beset by a clubby Anglican culture. This kept people coming back for more bazaars, rummage sales, ladies teas and church dances 50 years ago, but now there are more enticing alternatives. Telling aging congregations to get their behinds off pews to evangelize isn’t going to help much because they have no good news to tell: it has been purged by increasingly liberal and unbelieving clergy.
  2. Those who contribute a substantial amount of money to the church each week are orthodox Christians who believe in giving a percentage of their income back to God. Such people have been thoroughly alienated by the ACoC’s increasingly radical anti-Christian liberalism, so they are leaving either individually or as entire parishes. Soon there will be no-one left willing to give money to the ACoC.

“The status quo is not an option” is being chanted as a remedial mantra in numerous dioceses. In truth, those shouting it the loudest are the ones most determined to continue doing more of what has brought the ACoC to its present sorry state; a contemporary application of Exodus 10:20a; perhaps.

Anglicanism. Now in 3D!

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Rowan Williams, in his Presidential Address, postulates that our Anglican troubles are caused by seeing in only two dimensions; so, put on those polarised lenses, stare at the screen, and prepare to be amazed:

Earlier I mentioned ‘three-dimensionality’.  Seeing something in three dimensions is seeing that I can’t see everything at once: what’s in front of me is not just the surface I see in this particular moment.  So seeing in three dimensions requires us to take time with what we see.

Until Rowan attempted to explain it, I thought I understood seeing in three dimensions; never mind, if Rowan is seeing that I can’t see everything at once it’s probably only because he forgot his 3D glasses. And, of course, seeing in three dimensions requires us to take time with what we see means we have to take time into consideration and see in four dimensions, which will require a tinfoil hat in addition to the 3D glasses  – see?