Annie Britton was preparing for ordained ministry in the United Methodist Church when she came out to the congregation she was leading in Southwestern Massachusetts; she had been keeping her wedding ring hidden because she was married to a woman. The announcement left her ineligible to continue her ministry at that church and ended her ordination process, or so she thought.
The Houston Chronicle has a piece on the phenomenon of professional musicians who serve multiple houses of worship–even if the houses of worship are of different faiths: “At Congregation Emanu El and Congregation Beth Israel, the city’s two large Reform synagogues, an unexpected combination has proved successful and nurturing for decades. At both, the organist and most of the paid singers are Christians, some of whom also work at big churches.”
Stonewall, a U.K.-based LGBT advocacy organization, has recognized Bishop Gene Robinson with its Hero of the Year award for 2008. The award is voted on by Stonewall supporters and was presented to him at a ceremony in London Thursday night. In a release about the award, Stonewall cited that Robinson “has bravely endured sustained personal attacks in recent months, as church debate on homosexuality has intensified, [and was] recently barred from Lambeth conference.”
At the beginning of the week a statement by the Primates and Standing Committee of CAPA (the Council of Anglican Provinces of Africa) released a statement from their meeting in Nairobi back in early September. There was also an article detailing the views of some of the leadership in GAFCON with the ongoing Anglican Covenant process. Read together, the two statements indicate that there are different groups headed in different directions.
The Lambeth Conference Design Group, meeting one last time to review last summer’s gathering of Anglican bishops, was unanimous in its assessment that the 2008 conference was an overwhelming success, says the Rev. Ian Douglas, the group’s only U.S.-based Episcopal Church member.
The Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Quincy has voted this afternoon to leave the Episcopal Church. They have subsequently voted to transfer to the Province of the Southern Cone.
There are some further developments coming to light about the story of a same-sex liturgy celebrated in London that we’ve been following since this summer. Today the vicar in question insists that he never offered an apology for his actions in leading the liturgy.
There are numerous articles appearing about the reactions around the world to Tuesday’s presidential election results. The Church Times in the UK has collected a number of reactions from African American leaders in the Episcopal Church and other reactions are being shared from around the world. President-elect Obama is featured on the front cover of the issue.
The details of the next Primates meeting are starting to be reported. The Lambeth conversations will apparently be the focus and format of the Primate’s meeting.
Courtney Stewart of the Bible Society of the West Indies talks to Riazat Butt about a project to translate the Bible into Jamaican patois