ROME (Reuters) The pledge at a vespers prayer service came despite challenges to greater unity posed by differences over women priests and gay marriage.
Source: Pope, Anglican leader, vow joint action on poverty and environment | Religion News Service
Here are two men I deeply love and respect.
Friday 8th July 2016
This is ‘not a time to fear’ but a time to trust God, the Archbishop said in the opening speech of Synod’s debate on the EU referendum today.
The Archbishops of Canterbury and York added the item as urgent business to the Synod agenda, with the members’ consent.
Read the full text of the speech:
The length of the EU referendum campaign, the high turnout and the clarity of the result means, it seems to me, that whatever our view of what we would have preferred, we must now deal with the world as it is, and seek not merely survival after Brexit – if we were one of the 48 – but the common good, the flourishing of all our citizens and the seizing of the opportunities offered to our nation; above all to witness to the Kingdom of God. Continue reading “Synod of the Church of England – Archbishop Opens Debate on EU Referendum”
Russell Starr , CoS & Justin Welby, CoE
During the current annual Assembly of the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian), delegates, which included my son, Rev. Daniel Manastireanu, the first ethnically Romanian minister in the CoS, has approved the Columba Declaration, ‘that recognises their longstanding ecumenical partnership and lays the groundwork for future joint projects’ (see HERE). Of the about 850 commissioners to the assembly, 50 voted against this motion and 49 abstained (see HERE). A similar motion was approved by the C of E’s General Synod in February.
Ikon of St Columba, a gift I gave to my son, on his ordination as minister in the CoS, and
St Columba, pictured in a stained glass window at Iona Abbey, which he founded in the sixth century
‘The agreement between the Church of England and the Church of Scotland has been called the Columba Declaration, after Saint Columba [also called Columcille], an Irish abbot and missionary who was credited with spreading Christianity in Scotland. ‘ (see HERE) Continue reading “The Columba Declaration – Ecumenical Agreement Between the Church of Scotland and the Church of England”
Today was the burial service
for my friend Cristi Tepes. May God rest him in peace with the saints.
I though this sermon by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, is really fitting for this occasion. Here is how he introduces it on Facebook.
When someone we love dies we never “get over it”. Instead we learn – ever so slowly – to live with the gap that’s left, and we gradually start to rebuild.
After our first daughter died following a car crash, 32 years ago, when she was less than one year old, we would go to our church in London. There people loved us and looked after us. They helped us to start rebuilding. So it was very special to preach at that church last week at a carol service in support of Child Bereavement UK.
In my sermon I talked about how my wife Caroline and I eventually came back to that great puzzle: the God that so loved the world that he sent his only son to live a risky life among us, and die so unfairly and before time. And how he did this so that all who believe in him should not have that sense of endless death and destruction – but have the hope of life and the knowledge of a future, and the life that’s somehow rebuilt around us by the grace and love of God.
Now every year we spend the anniversary of Johanna’s death together as a family. We have some fun, do something silly. There’s always that bitter reality, and yet there’s now that hope.
So my prayer for those who are in those darkest of dark moments, which I remember so well, is for that hope that heals and strengthens and draws us forward, because that child who was born and risked and died and rose again, and offers life to us and to all we love. Continue reading “Archbishop Justin Welby’s Sermon at the Child Bereavement UK Carol Service”
THis is a very refreshingly natural dialogue.
Thursday 14th May 2015
Sermon preached by Archbishop Justin Welby at the Ascension Day Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square, London.
* * *
Acts 1:1-11, Luke 24:44-53
Ascension is about power and victory, but not as we know it.
If you’re a fan of Star Trek you’ll hear the allusion: “It’s life, Jim, but not as we know it.” Though I’m told no one ever actually said that, any more than Sherlock Holmes said, “Elementary, my dear Watson”. But even though I am not a Trekkie it’s a good line.
Ascension is about power or victory, but not as we know it. The accounts include words like ‘power’, ‘Kingdom’, ‘witness’, ‘proofs’, and ‘promise of the Father’ – such that the disciples, who weren’t any quicker on the uptake after the resurrection than before, ask about the restoration of the Kingdom of Israel. Continue reading “Archbishop of Canterbury’s Ascension Day Sermon”
Justin Welby is Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury.
