Jim Naughton – Page 139 – Episcopal Cafe

Reaching out to the “spiritual but not religious”

November 21, 2011 5 Comments

We tend to think our friends and neighbors don’t come here because they’re not interested. It doesn’t occur to us that they stay away because they don’t think we’ll help them attend to the big questions they have to ask. From the outside, we look more interested in organizing taffy pulls than prayer groups. The people who avoid us do so not because we are too spiritual but because they see us as not spiritual enough.

Online evangelism: who does it well?

November 21, 2011 2 Comments

We are wondering what sorts of brief—because brevity is the soul of web-based communications—materials you have seen that effectively introduce Jesus, and our church, to people who aren’t going to sit still for explanations of the substitutionary theory of atonement, or pocket lectures on Richard Hooker and the three-legged stool.

Breaking: Ga. Supreme Court says Christ, Savannah belongs to TEC

November 21, 2011 3 Comments

The First Amendment allows CCS and its members to leave the Episcopal Church and worship as they please, like all other Americans, but it does not allow them to take with them property that has for generations been accumulated and held by a constituent church of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.

HoB chaplain cites faith in backing Occupy Boston

November 21, 2011 No Comments

The Rev. Stephanie Spellers, priest to The Crossing, the emergent worship congregation at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Boston, and chaplain to the House of Bishops,

18 British bishops move to oppose welfare caps

November 19, 2011 No Comments

The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York are among the voices of British bishops who are speaking out against a scheme to cap

Birmingham and Truro vote to reject Anglican Covenant

November 19, 2011 3 Comments

Thinking Anglicans is reporting that the Diocese of Birmingham has become the third English diocese to vote to reject the Anglican Covenant. A later report indicates Truro has voted against the covenant as well.

Crystal Cathedral soon to be Catholic Cathedral

November 19, 2011 1 Comment

The Roman Catholic diocese of Orange in California just found a way to create an iconic cathedral center for its ministry at about 75% off. It bought the financially busted Crystal Cathedral campus created by Robert Shuller back in the heyday of his “Hour of Power” ministry.

The church has left the building

November 15, 2011 3 Comments

The Diocese of Texas spreads the gospel in unconventional places and in unconventional ways.

The new Bishop of Washington seizes media moment

November 14, 2011 No Comments

She is unabashed about the need to rebuild the church. Unlike some of our leaders, she does not theologize our decline. She is also clear in her opinion that the church does not lack a heart for mission. Rather, it lacks capacity because so many of its congregations are weak and struggling simply to keep their doors open.

Susan Russell annoys the religious right

November 14, 2011 7 Comments

You will no doubt be surprised to learn that the Rev. Canon Susan Russell has written something that has annoyed the religion right.

The Archive

Author: Jim Naughton