Jim Naughton – Page 298 – Episcopal Cafe

Feeding the ego, starving the Church

May 12, 2010 4 Comments

No one wants to join a community wringing its hands and navel gazing over its own demise. Nor does anyone want to simply become a number to prop up a flagging institution. The real questions we need to be asking are those like these: Are we endeavoring to be faithful to the Gospel and to our God? Does our institution serve our mission of Christ Jesus to transform hearts and reflect God’s work in the world?

The UCC’s new advertisement

May 11, 2010 8 Comments

https://episcopal.cafe/video/uccad.jpg

Refreshing the parts that prose can’t reach

May 11, 2010 2 Comments

Poetry is able to refresh the parts of our heart and soul that prose cannot reach! Poetry can penetrate and rouse the richest and deepest dimensions of our humanity. And maybe poetry is more important to us now than ever before as we are bombarded with information through the media, most of it utterly banal—clogging our heads, but not reaching the inner springs of feeling and action deep within.

Rejoice in heart

May 11, 2010 No Comments

Destined to fare hence unto His Father’s kingdom, the mighty Prince, the Lord of angels, spoke this word: “Rejoice in heart, never will I forsake you but I will fulfill my love upon you and give you might; and I will dwell with you forever, that by my gift you may never lack any good thing. Fare you well over all the spacious earth, throughout the wide ways.

The MDGs at 10 years old

May 10, 2010 1 Comment

Alexander D. Baumgarten, director of government relations for the Episcopal Church, has written an essay for the web pages of Bonnie Anderson, President of the House of Deputies, which calls our attention back to the fact that the Millennium Development Goals will not be achieved primarily through acts of personal charity, but through vigorous advocacy.

The Vatican’s not very diplomatic ambassador

May 10, 2010 1 Comment

Annie Groer of Politics Daily has a weird story about the snotty comments that the Vatican’s chief diplomat in the United States has made to the sex abuse victim who has kept a longstanding vigil outside of the Vatican embassy.

The foolishness of Franklin Graham

May 10, 2010 5 Comments

All prayers lead to heaven. Or do they? Not if you’re Graham, who lost his place at the Pentagon altar after he mocked other religions, specifically Islam and Hinduism.

Should we be growing? (Do we have to ask?)

May 10, 2010 14 Comments

As a congregation wrestles with the possibility of growth, it is important to create space where leaders and members can explore their own particular desires in this matter and recognize the conflicts that exist even within themselves. Clergy can have an especially tough time admitting their own resistance to growth.

New Zealand uncertain about “punitive’ section of Covenant

May 10, 2010 11 Comments

The first three sections of the proposed Anglican Covenant have been given the green light – in principle – by General Synod/Te Hinota Whanui. Episcopal units will now be asked to consider the entire Covenant over the next two years and report back to General Synod in 2012. That Synod will then decide whether to adopt it.

The boundlessness of God

May 10, 2010 No Comments

God always was and always is, and always will be; or rather, God always is. For was and will be are fragments of our time, and of changeable nature. But he is Eternal Being; and this is the Name he gives himself when giving the oracles to Moses in the Mount.

The Archive

Author: Jim Naughton