NPR - Rifts Are Healing

One of the greatest rifts in Christianity — between Catholics and Lutherans — isn't what it used to be. As a sign of those much improved relations, Pope Francis is traveling Monday to Sweden, an overwhelmingly Lutheran country, to kick off a yearlong commemoration of the Protestant Reformation that split the churches 500 years ago.

Source: NPR - National Public Radio, 28 Oct 2016, "The Pope Commemorates The Reformation That Split Western Christianity", http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2016/10/28/499587801/pope-francis-reaches-out-to-honor-the-man-who-splintered-christianity

Pope Francis in Lund

Therefore 2017, the commemorative year of the Reformation, represents for Catholics and Lutherans a privileged occasion to live the faith more authentically, in order to rediscover the Gospel together, and to seek and witness to Christ with renewed vigour. At the conclusion of the day of commemoration in Lund, and looking to the future, we drew inspiration from our common witness to faith before the world, when we committed ourselves to jointly assisting those who suffer, who are in need, and who face persecution and violence. In doing so, as Christians we are no longer divided, but rather united on the journey towards full communion.

Source: Pope Francis - Address to the members of the Ecumenical Delegation from Finland, as quoted in "Pope: Luther’s intention was to renew the Church, not divide her", Vatican Radio, 19 Jan 2017, http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2017/01/19/pope_luther%E2%80%99s_intention_was_to_renew_the_church,_not_divide/1286728

"an angel of repentance was slashing at my heart with his sword"

As for the freedom that comes from owning up to one's faults, Steve, an old friend of mine, says:
… The pivotal experience came inexplicably and unexpectedly: I was suddenly aware what an enormous avalanche of wrongs I had left behind me. Before, this reality had been masked by pride and by my wanting to look good in front of others. But now, memories of everything I had ever done wrong poured out of me like a river of bile. All I wanted was to be free, to have nothing dark and ugly and hidden within me; I wanted to make good, wherever I could, the wrongs I had done. I had no excuses for myself - youth, circumstances or bad peers. I was responsible for what I had done. On one page after another I poured it all out in clear detail. I felt as though an angel of repentance was slashing at my heart with his sword, such was the pain. I wrote dozens of letters to people and organizations I had cheated, stolen from, and lied to. Finally I felt truly free.

Source: Johann Christoph Arnold - Why Forgive?, pp.168-169

World Service (Lutheran) & Caritas (Catholic)

In addition to the ecumenical prayer service Oct. 31 in Lund — the city where the Lutheran World Federation was founded in 1947 — Pope Francis and leaders of the Lutheran World Federation will witness the signing of a cooperation agreement between the federation’s World Service and Caritas Internationalis, the Vatican-based umbrella organization of national Catholic charities.

Source: Catholic News Service - "Sorrow and joy: Marking the Reformation with honesty about the past", 28 October 2016, https://cnstopstories.com/2016/10/28/sorrow-and-joy-marking-the-reformation-with-honesty-about-the-past/

A Word From God ... at the Gas Pump!

It was Andrew's first year of marriage. He was due to leave ~ 10:30 pm to drive to Louisiana and go offshore for a long work assignment. That evening, he and his wife had an argument. As Andrew related it, “I didn’t respond as well as I could have” … and he left the house around 10 pm, 30 minutes early, while they were still arguing. He drove away angry and unresolved with his wife.

As per his usual habit, he first headed to a nearby gas station to fill up the car for the trip. As he was pumping the gas, another vehicle pulled up on the other side of the pump. A man got out and started also filling up his car. Suddenly, the man spoke to Andrew: “You shouldn’t leave like this.” “What?” Andrew replied. The man said again, “I felt led to say to you - you shouldn’t leave like this.”

Wow! A word from the Lord.

Andrew finished filling up his tank, and instead of heading down the road, returned to the house. His wife met him at the door, weeping, and they embraced and reconciled before Andrew left the second time for his work assignment.

Source: Source Withheld - First-hand story told to Thomas Cogdell, name withheld by request

Integrity

(17) Unlike so many people, we do not hustle God’s word to make money. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God’s presence with integrity, as those sent from God.

Source: The Apostle Paul - 2 Corinthians 2:17 (IEB)

"Here's something you don't see every day ..."

Here's something you don't see every day: Catholic priest Frank Ruff was recently given a gift at the 2017 Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting! This was to recognize that Rev. Ruff started attending SBC annual meetings as a Catholic "observer" 50 years ago in 1967! His organization (Glenmary) has been representing the US Catholic Bishops ever since. [Glenmary also sponsors this Facebook page.]
Frank Ruff is well known and well loved by many in the SBC for his deep faith and his longstanding commitment to building relationships across denominational lines.
The award was given at the Executive Committee (EC) meeting. EC membership includes 80 representatives of SBC agencies and regions, including some of its senior leadership. Other guests and interested parties also attend, so that there were a few hundred in attendance. Frank Page, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Executive Committee, spoke for nearly five minutes on Rev. Ruff.
Frank Ruff and Glenmary come to the SBC as ambassadors of goodwill with a message: To give appreciation for the witness of the SBC. While we often hear about the differences and tension between denominations, there is much that we can thank each other for. We come in prayerful solidarity as our fellow Christians have this important annual meeting for their denomination.

Source: John 17:21 - Evangelicals and Catholics - Posted on their FB page, 27 June 2017

Softening Rather Than Stoking Resentment

Now the Ephraimites asked Gideon, “Why have you treated us like this? Why didn’t you call us when you went to fight Midian?” And they challenged him vigorously.

2 But he answered them, “What have I accomplished compared to you? Aren’t the gleanings of Ephraim’s grapes better than the full grape harvest of Abiezer? 3 God gave Oreb and Zeeb, the Midianite leaders, into your hands. What was I able to do compared to you?” At this, their resentment against him subsided.

Source: Samuel - Judges 8:1-3 (NIV)

George Erasmus on "Common Memory"

George Erasmus, a wise aboriginal leader from the Dene Nation says, “Where common memory is lacking, where people do not share in the same past, there can be no real community. Where community is to be formed, common memory must be created.”

This quote gets to the heart of our nation’s problem with race. As a country, we do not share a common memory. White Americans remember a history of discovery, expansion, exceptionalism and opportunity. And people of color, starting with (but not limited to) Natives and African Americans have the lived history of stolen lands, broken treaties, slavery, Jim Crow laws, ethnic cleansing, boarding schools, internments camps, exclusionary immigration laws, segregation, mass incarceration and racial profiling. There is no common memory, and I think pretty much everyone can agree that the sense of community in this country is markedly low.

Source: George Erasmus - (aboriginal leader from the Dene Nation) Quoted by Mark Charles in a blog entry "A Native Perspective on Memorial Day", 2017 June 1, https://wirelesshogan.com/2017/06/01/a-native-perspective-on-memorial-day/

The Alpha Course, Part 2

"…in the mid-1990s another development of major ecumenical significance arose from Evangelical and charismatic roots. The Alpha course, developed especially by Rev. Nicky Gumbel at Holy Trinity Brompton, London, began to be promoted beyond its parish of origin. The Alpha course quickly reached a wide range of local congregations, Anglican and older free church, as well as new charismatic churches, first in Britain and quickly elsewhere. Although Alpha was slow to win acceptance among Catholics in its first phase of expansion from 1994, Gumbel has devoted intensifying efforts to reach the Catholic world in the last fifteen years. The result is that in 2013, the Alpha course is growing fastest among Catholics with an amazingly strong following among Latin Americans. The Catholic welcome has intensified since Pope Benedict XVI's call for a New Evangelization, with Alpha being welcomed by several Vatican officials and many bishops.... Nicky Gumbel was received enthusiastically at the International Eucharistic Congress in Dublin in June 2012."

Source: Fr. Peter Hocken - Pentecost and Parousia, Peter Hocken - p. 68

The Alpha Course, Part 1

While no magisterial statement has been forthcoming, Catholic officials have expressed themselves positively: Nicky Gumbel, an Anglican curate at Holy Trinity, Brompton who functions as a chief spokesman for Alpha, was presented on the strength of his Alpha involvement to the Pope in February 2004, an audience made possible by another senior churchman who is a firm advocate for Alpha – Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, Preacher to the Papal Household. (See Alpha News 2004) In France, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Archbishop of Lyon, recorded remarks on the Alpha introductory video, saying, “For the French church, Alpha is a great opportunity for our time. It is a wonderful gift that we have received from England.” (Ibid) Additionally, Scotland’s Cardinal Keith O’Brien wrote in a brochure for an Alpha conference in Glascow, “I see the Alpha course as an initial and very important tool for … the ‘rechristianization of Scotland.’” (Ibid) In Austria, Salzburg’s Archbishop Dr. Alois Kothgasser observed about Alpha, “I rejoice that this course now also is increasingly spreading within the Catholic Church in Austria and that through it people find a living faith in Jesus Christ.” (Alpha für Katholiken 2003, p. 1) („Ich freue mich, dass dieser Kurs nun auch in der Katholischen Kirche in Österreich immer mehr Verbreitung findet and dass durch ihn Menschen zu einem lebendigen Glauben an Jesus Christus finden.“)

Source: Paul Miller - Footnote 45 of "Evangelicals Cooperatively Evangelising & Discipling with Catholics in Faithfulness to Evangelical Distinctives", by Paul Miller

"Do not call anything impure that God has made clean"

Then a voice from heaven told me, ‘Peter, get up! Kill and eat.’ (8) I said, ‘Lord, I will not! I am a Jew! I have never eaten anything in my life that was impure and unclean according to our food laws.’ (9) The voice from heaven spoke a second time, ‘Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.’ (10) This happened three times, and then the sheet was taken back into heaven.

Source: Peter - As quoted by Luke in Acts 12:8-10 (IEB)

Singing, Dancing, Sculpting

Perhaps, I thought, these good Protestant people could worship like angels, but I could not. Then I realized that they couldn't either. Their ears were using crutches but not their eyes. They used beautiful hymns, for which I would gladly exchange the new, flat, unmusical, wimpy "liturgical responses" no one sings in our masses—their audible imagery is their crutch. I think that in Heaven, Protestants will teach Catholics to sing and Catholics will teach Protestants to dance and sculpt.

Source: Peter Kreeft - Hauled aboard the Ark, http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics/hauled-aboard.htm
http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics/hauled-aboard.htm

Martin Luther

In the 16th century, the founder of the Protestant Reformation Martin Luther said: "The Hebrew language is the best language of all … If I were younger I would want to learn this language, because no one can really understand the Scriptures without it. For although the New Testament is written in Greek, it is full of hebraisms and Hebrew expressions. It has therefore been aptly said that the Hebrews drink from the spring, the Greeks from the stream that flows from it, and the Latins from a downstream puddle."

Source: Martin Luther - As quoted in A Prayer to Our Father, by Nehemia Gordon & Keith Johnson, pp 83-84

"you can't understand your future unless you understand your past"

Robin Young: Does it ever get painful?

Jerome Grant: For me, I haven't taken the time to go through the building fully. It's difficult for me. … I take it time by time. The first time that I really went through the history gallery downstairs, was actually three weeks ago, where I've fully seen a lot of stuff that's really heartbreaking, very difficult to digest.

Robin Young: If you don't mind, like what?

Jerome Grant: I"ve seen some of the slave ship pictures, the railroads, I mean, everything from shackles, the whole nine, it's difficult, you know, it's difficult to live in a world where we are deemed to be free Americans, and then to see that that it was very troubling for a lot of us to ...

Robin Young: How recently!

Jerome Grant: Oh yeah, so it's very difficult. But at the end of the day, you can't understand your future unless you understand your past, and I'm working on it.

Source: Jerome Grant - "African-American Museum Chef Showcases 'Edible Exhibit'", Here & Now, KBUR, 6 Feb 2017, http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2017/02/06/jerome-grant-museum-african-american-history

Lamenting

Second, I believe we need to lament our sad state. We may not have a clue how we can mend the wounds between us. That tells us how desperate things are. It acknowledges that we need an intervention from on high. Lamenting takes us into a place where we realize our desperate need for God, and that to go on in the way we have is increasingly intolerable.

Source: Robert C Trube - rtrube54, "The Scandal of the Church in America: Part Two", Bob on Books, 14 Feb 2017, https://bobonbooks.com/2017/02/14/the-scandal-of-the-church-in-america-part-two/

How Is a Ministry Discredited?

(3) We put no obstacle in anyone’s path, so that our ministry will not be discredited. (4) Rather, as God’s servants we commend ourselves in every way—in great endurance, in troubles, hardships and distresses; (5) in beatings, imprisonments, and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights, and hunger (days without food); (6) in purity, understanding, patience, and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; (7) in truthful speech and in God’s power; with weapons of righteousness in both hands; (8) through honor and dishonor, praise and slander; genuine but treated as impostors; (9) well-known yet regarded as unknown; dying and yet we live on; beaten yet not killed; (10) sorrowful yet always rejoicing; poor yet making many rich; having nothing yet we possess everything.

Source: The Apostle Paul - 2 Corinthians 6:3-10 (IEB)