The Wenatchee World, the “fiercely independent voice of North Central Washington,” offers up some local wisdom about the Episcopal Church in the form of five bullet-points from the Rev. Patton Boyle of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Wenatchee.
Commentary from USA Today this week posits that mainline megachurches might be the solution to declining mainline churches—or does it? Once you read past the lede, you’ll find the piece takes a closer look at the phenomenon and doesn’t buy the oft-touted explanation that all our mainline people have run away to more conservative havens. In fact, with all the attention raining down on mainline churches as a result of renewed focus on faith on the Democratic side of the political process, signs are pointing to hope for these churches.
The Diocese of Albany convention in June will consider two resolutions on marriage and the priesthood. Featured speakers at the convention include the Coordinating Bishop
In preparation for this year’s Rolling Thunder event, where hundreds of thousands of bikers descend on the nation’s capital in honor of fallen and missing heroes, several thousand strong showed up in New Jersey for the Motorcycle Mass, led by a Catholic priest, Father Mark Giordani. He’s actually been doing this since long before Rolling Thunder, now in its 21st year, began: Giordani, himself a biker, started the tradition 39 years ago.
On Speaking of Faith (whose site won the Religion and Spirituality Webby award, it should be noted) this week, Krista Tippett has repurposed some interviews from 2003, before the program was syndicated nationally through Public Radio International, and used them to create a program that examines prayer as a global phenomenon that takes place in many religious and even nonreligious traditions.
The Washington Post covers a story we’ve discussed earlier. The hearing on the constitutionality of the law in question will be held on Wednesday in Fairfax County.
Jason Byassee, writing for the Christian Century, makes a wry observation about the complexity of Anglican fragmentation. Even at the local level, he writes, “it takes a long memory or a flow chart to keep straight all the Episcopal-Anglican divisions and acronyms that have developed in the well-heeled suburbs of DuPage County, just west of Chicago.” Part of the problem is that most people tuning into the situation are under the impression that homosexuality is the most important issue, but Byassee notes other factors.
One of the greatest challenges to us as church is to go against the culture’s use of time as a commodity, its business model of program evaluation, and its focus on production and consumption. God loves us. God saves us and makes us whole. God rests on the seventh day. If we decide to embody this as church, what will the shape of our time look like? How will we operate differently from the culture around us?
Jackson Kemper’s ministry it tied up with the organization called the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society, which in turn is tied up with the story of Episcopal expansion in areas west of the Alleghenies and north of the Ohio River. As early as 1792, the General Convention considered a proposal to send Episcopal missionaries to the frontiers of the United States.