Johannes Fichtenbauer, advisor to Cardinal Schönborn in Vienna, spoke of a dramatic new step in church unity made at the Pentecost 2017 gathering in Rome last June, on the 50th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic movement. Pope Francis invited Pentecostal and Charismatic church leaders to join Catholic leaders in acknowledgement of these ‘younger brother and sister churches’ as the source of the Catholic renewal movement. The Austrian lay leader said the pope had taken a step no predecessor had done: to declare a goal of unity not based on ‘separated brethren returning to the Mother Church’, but rather a ‘unity in reconciled diversity’, unity through diversity.
This unity required a humility on all sides, the pope had stressed, a recognition that each church missed something that others could offer. Church unity could only happen, he believed, when all moved closer to Christ, not when others ‘returned to Rome’.
Source: Jeff Fountain - Weekly Word, 13 November 2017, "Time to Listen"
https://us9.campaign-archive.com/?e=0b86898e11&u=65605d9dbab0a19355284d8df&id=d1f03dd3fc
Together For Europe
My wife and I have just returned from such a time of dialogue and mutual listening in Vienna, a three-day gathering of 120 representatives of Christian movements, Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant and Charismatic, from Portugal to Russia, and Ireland to Greece. This Together for Europe (TfE) umbrella began with a pact of love 18 years ago between leaders of several movements, including the YMCA, a Lutheran sisterhood, the Focolare movement and the St Egidio community. It has grown to embrace over 200 movements all professing Jesus Christ as Lord.
Source: Jeff Fountain - Weekly Word, 13 November 2017, "Time to Listen"
https://us9.campaign-archive.com/?e=0b86898e11&u=65605d9dbab0a19355284d8df&id=d1f03dd3fc
Betty Pulkingham's Mother
There was a touching moment with my 104-year-old mother the day before she died, when she asked my forgiveness for something. We had found it necessary to put her in respite care over the Christmas holidays For some time she had been having brief spells of dementia, probably linked to an earlier stroke. Now she imagined me to be the enemy, since I was the one who made the decision. But the Spirit of the Lord and of the deep places of her life showed her that she was being harsh in her judgment of me. One of her final acts at the end of a loving life was this: to reach out and ask forgiveness for judging me harshly. She simply said, several times over and over, "I've been wrong; I've been wrong." Would I have had that kind of grace in a moment of such extremity? Could I turn, and ask forgiveness? I hope so. She was still learning to love - right to the end of her remarkable life.
Source: Betty Pulkingham - "This Is My Story, This Is My Song", Ch. 14, p. 131
Trusting a former enemy with your child
I am not sure I fully understood the power of forgiveness and reconciliation until I lived with Florida State Rep. William L. (Bill) Flynn, owner of Flynn's Dixie Ribs, a barbecue restaurant known also for its Key lime pie, in 1980. Flynn represented South Dade County, where my family lived. I met Flynn only a few years before the photo of the men in blackface and a Ku Klux Klan costume appeared on Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam's yearbook page when he was a medical student.
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I learned from my parents that in the 1960s, Flynn didn't let blacks eat in his barbecue restaurant. Two black community leaders said Flynn had even chased them away from the property with a shotgun. But he had since renounced his segregationist ways as a result of the civil rights movement and implored my mother to entrust him with my care.
...
As a young adult, I didn't understand how people could so drastically change or evolve their views, but I knew my parents wanted to give Flynn a chance to prove himself. While my parents' decision was not supported by many in the black community, they still felt it was necessary for reconciliation.
Source: Johnita P. Due - "What a Dixie Ribs joint owner taught me about forgiveness and reconciliation", CNN.com, February 3, 2019
https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/03/opinions/william-flynn-power-forgiveness-reconciliation-johnita-due/index.html
Destructive Energy Vented Through Facebook
I keep you in my prayers as well and follow you on Facebook. I've been using social media much less in the past few months, often finding it a difficult place to be. My own denomination is in the midst of a split, or so it seems. I have friends and colleagues on both sides of this divide and much of their destructive energy is vented through Facebook. It is a deeply disturbing to witness this while feeling so unable to do anything significant to change any of it. Indeed, I feel utterly powerless. A decade ago I would have waded into these waters to do something, whatever that may have been. Now I pray and lament the situation. I continue to serve my congregation, as best I can, while wondering where all of this will go. Thankfully our God is faithful, even when we are not. I hope to see some forms of renewal emerge from this fire of distrust and pain that is burning in my denomination.
Source: Anonymous Pastor - Edited version of email sent to John Armstrong, quoted in John's Friends letter, 9 Sept 2020, and used by permission
Honoring John Armstrong
John, your impact on my life has been transformative and challenging. You started me thinking in terms that have moved beyond my sense of denomination to see the terrible fragmentation (disunity) of the whole body of Christ. This has been unsettling and life-giving. I now hope the congregation I serve will partner with a another congregation to do ministry. The other church is in need of a building and we are in need of partners to do the kingdom work God has given to us. We are a very old urban church but we are not too old to still dream. This is a slow process and the road ahead is not one I would have been able to walk 20 years ago. But when your eyes are opened to a bigger vision of the Kingdom, joined with a richer understanding of the church and the centrality of love for our neighbors, then you know you must be on the right track. For me, much of this started in my classes at a little seminary years ago where you taught me. That experience has produced some amazing and unexpected fruit. I still don't have a real clear sense of where this journey is going even though it will be hard to walk. Thank you brother for speaking into my life when you did. And thank you for your enduring friendship.
Source: Anonymous Pastor - Edited version of email sent to John Armstrong, quoted in John's Friends letter, 9 Sept 2020, and used by permission
Formal Apology from Canada to the Jews
Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau formally apologized on Wednesday for the country’s 1939 refusal to take in a ship carrying more than 900 Jewish refugees, adding that the country would do more to protect Canadian Jews from violence.
The St. Louis left Hamburg in May 1939 in a desperate search for a safe haven from persecution by Nazi Germany. After it was rebuffed by Canada and other nations, it returned to Europe, where historians have estimated that more than 250 of the passengers were murdered in Nazi death camps.
“We apologize to the 907 German Jews aboard the St. Louis, as well as their families,” Trudeau told the House of Commons. “We are sorry for the callousness of Canada’s response. We are sorry for not apologizing sooner.”
Source: Ynet News - "Trudeau apologizes for Canada's 1939 refusal of Jewish refugee ship", 11.08.18
https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5392569,00.html
"I hate lard!"
One Sunday morning in a small Texas church, the new pastor called on one of the older deacons to lead the closing prayer. The deacon came up on the podium, stood by the pastor, bowed his head and said, "Lord, I hate buttermilk!"
The pastor opened one eye and wondered just where this was going...
The deacon continued, "Lord, I hate lard!"
Now, the pastor was totally perplexed...
The deacon continued, "Lord, and I ain't too crazy about plain flour neither, but after you mix em all together and bake em in a hot oven, I just love biscuits!"
Source: Anonymous - Adopted from a joke posted by Steve McFarland on Facebook, 4 Mar 2020
"We can’t heal what we don’t acknowledge"
Lauren Brown, who leads the South Jersey Be the Bridge group, said that her faith motivated her to become involved in reconciliation. That starts with being honest about the racial divides in the country, she said.
“Tasha [LaTasha Morrison, founder of Be The Bridge] has a clear understanding that we can’t heal what we don’t acknowledge and that the only way to heart transformation and bridge building starts with truth and is delivered with grace,” she said.
Source: Nicola A. Menzie - "‘Be the Bridge’ fosters dialogue between black and white Christians", Baptist Standard, March 19, 2019
https://www.baptiststandard.com/news/faith-culture/bridge-fosters-dialogue-black-white-christians/
Austin Suggs
Something I'm incredibly passionate about is dialoguing with those I disagree with and doing my best to learn from them despite our differences. When it comes to branches of Christianity that I disagree with, my passion is even more increased. I simply love learning from Catholics and Eastern Orthodox. While we don't see eye to eye on everything, there is so much that we do agree on that can form the basis of great unity between Catholics, Protestants, and Eastern Orthodox.
Source: Austin Suggs - From the "About" section of "My Experience Going to Catholic Mass as a Protestant", YouTube video on the Gospel Simplicity channel
https://youtu.be/M4nfaPm7NQE
Eberhard Arnold, Germany, 1920s
All the movements of the past decades will one day converge in a radical awakening of the masses that leads the way to social justice and to God's unity. And so we prepare ourselves to set our little community in the midst of this mighty awakening. We must be ready to sacrifice ourselves.
Source: Eberhard Arnold - As quoted by Peter Mommsen in "Homage to a Broken Man", p. 118
Yachad BeYeshua (Together in Jesus)
Yachad BeYeshua (Together in Jesus) is a newly formed international body which seeks to unite Jewish followers of Yeshua from diverse backgrounds in loving fellowship as a witness to God’s eternal faithfulness to Israel and the Church.
Yachad BeYeshua is not a synagogue or a church, nor does it seek to compete with or replace any existing institutions. We respect the genuine differences that distinguish various groups of Jewish disciples of Jesus, and view those differences as an asset rather than a liability.
Yachad BeYeshua is a fellowship—a growing network of friendships. We seek to build relationships of trust that will permit us to learn from one another, and to work together to fulfill a common call: to bear witness to God’s unfailing love for Israel, a love which has become flesh in the Messiah.
To learn more about Yachad BeYeshua, go to yachad-beyeshua.org
Source: Richard Harvey - Posted on Facebook 11 Nov 2020
Hamilton
There are moments that the words don't reach
There is a grace too powerful to name
We push away what we can never understand
We push away the unimaginable
They are standing in the garden
Alexander by Eliza's side
She takes his hand
It's quiet uptown
Forgiveness
Can you imagine?
Forgiveness
Can you imagine?
Source: Lin-Manuel Miranda - "It's Quiet Uptown", from the musical Hamilton, by Lin-Manuel Miranda, Philipa Soo, Renée Elise Goldsberry, and the Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton
Mark Galli
If Galli had one gnawing frustration with Protestant Christianity, it was the ceaseless splintering and divisions. He tried to work toward unity.
It left him exhausted.
Still, Galli takes seriously Jesus’ desire for unity in his farewell prayer.
That left him with a choice, he said — to join the institution that claims to be the one true church.
“True unity requires not just a mental and emotional assent, but actually an agreement to live under a structure, an ethos, a way of doing things together,” he said.
To be sure, the Catholic Church is also beset with factions and theological controversies, but now retired and a layman, he’ll be a step removed from the squabbles.
Source: Religious News Service - "Mark Galli, former Christianity Today editor and Trump critic, to be confirmed a Catholic", Religious News Service, 10 Sept 2020
https://religionnews.com/2020/09/10/mark-galli-former-christianity-today-editor-and-trump-critic-to-be-confirmed-a-catholic/
Alexei Laushkin, Part 2
It wasn’t until my early 30s that I began to re encounter the practices of historic Christian traditions which inform my pursuit of Christ today. Not the form of what seems religious but the living examples and teachings of ordinary people who had given their lives fully to Christ in challenging and complex times.
This rich variety of contribution informs my understanding of the essential unity of the church. Simply that although the stories and witnesses are varied as are their traditions that they unmistakably give witness to a singular Christian experience of Christ made ever more perfect in the life of the believer.
Source: Alexei N. Laushkin - Posted on FB 24 Sept 2020
Alexei Laushkin, Part 1
Why am I an Anglican?
Not so much because of beauty or the stability of the liturgy, but because it puts me in touch or rather opens a window into the historic practices of the saints east and west who like each of us lived into the call to pursue a fully devoted Christian life. Their examples, understandings, and patterns of life past down have strengthened and grounded my own Christian walk.
Source: Alexei N. Laushkin - Posted on FB 24 Sept 2020
Pres + Ang = ?
A few years ago, Bob Ogle, then-pastor of a Presbyterian church, began praying with his church’s leaders that more young people would be drawn into their flock. They occupied a beautiful new building and had a committed core of members, but so far none of their efforts to attract young families seemed to stick.
After months of prayer, Bob met the Rev. Peter Johnson, the rector of a small Anglican church plant in the neighborhood. The two became fast friends and partners in ministry, as Peter’s church began renting the Presbyterian worship space on Sunday mornings for their services. This is nothing terribly new—churches have often used the same space out of need and convenience.
But then something amazing happened. Over time, the two churches began to draw together. Over a summer, they collapsed their two separate services into one shared service. God moved the hearts of the people together and with great humility and diligent prayer, the two churches agreed to become one—Trinity Anglican Church.
Source: David Roseberry - "A Story of Faithfulness from the Bayou: A Presbyterian/Anglican Church Merger", Anglicanpastor.com, 10 January 2019
http://anglicanpastor.com/a-story-of-faithfulness-from-the-bayou-a-presbyterian-anglican-church-merger/
Wisdom from the Early Church Fathers
I realize so much of how I think about relationships is influenced so strongly by Christian formation writers from the 3rd-20th century.
They were writing about how not to let conflict and sin go out of control for centuries and centuries.
It's proven to be such grace, imperfect practitioner that I am.
Source: Alexei N. Laushkin - Posted on FB, 11 Nov 2020
Israelis & Palestinians meet in Turkey
Messianic Jewish and Palestinian Christian disciples of Jesus met in Antalya, Turkey, February 14-17, 2019 for the 5th conference of the Lausanne Initiative on Reconciliation in Israel/Palestine (LIRIP). 27 participants from Israel, the West Bank and Gaza met in Antalya, Turkey, for three days of prayer, study and discussion. Their focus was how to make a difference through practical demonstrations of the reconciling love of Jesus across the boundaries of intractable conflict and the seemingly irreconcilable dividing walls of politicised identities. The group was comprised of Jewish and Arab disciples of Jesus, including participants from Muslim, Orthodox Jewish and Orthodox Christian backgrounds, all committed to working together to achieve peace. Together they affirmed their unity and commitment to work for reconciliation and a just peace in Israel/Palestine.
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Lisa Loden, co-chair of the Initiative, said “We see each other across the walls and barricades of two separated communities. We are divided amongst ourselves and across our communities yet we are here to seek peace and pursue reconciliation. Living in the context of the intractable Israeli –Palestinian conflict, together we are choosing to cross the divides and build bridges of understanding, trust and mutual commitment; to stand together for justice, peace and reconciliation. Our faith in Jesus as Messiah and Saviour of all unites, empowers and calls us to action.”
Source: Lausanne Initiative on Reconciliation in Israel/Palestine (LIRIP) - "Press Release: Reconciled Identities – Israeli and Palestinian Disciples of Jesus Share the Search for Peace", 2 March 2019
https://kehilanews.com/2019/03/02/press-release-reconciled-identities-israeli-and-palestinian-disciples-of-jesus-share-the-search-for-peace/
People of Praise
People of Praise is a charismatic Christian community. We admire the first Christians who were led by the Holy Spirit to form a community. Those early believers put their lives and their possessions in common, and “there were no needy persons among them.”
Jesus desires unity for all people. We live out this unity the best we can, in spite of the divisions within Christianity. We are Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Methodists, Pentecostals, Presbyterians and other denominational and nondenominational Christians. Despite our differences, we are bound together by our Christian baptism. Despite our differences, we worship together. While remaining faithful members of our own churches, we have found a way to live our daily lives together.
Source: People of Praise - From the website of the ecumenical, charismatic community that Amy Coney Barrett belongs to https://peopleofpraise.org/about/who-we-are/