Relational Reconciliation

Tosini wants to be there to celebrate with Pope Francis a new process of what he calls “relational reconciliation,” a process that “is not about doctrinal alignment” or theological differences among Christians. It’s about affirming that in Christ, Christians are brothers and sisters called to love one another, even when they differ like siblings in any family do.

“The scandal of division is completely opposite of what Jesus prayed for,” Tosini said.

“Our challenge is going to be the diversity, the differences that we have,” he said, but the key is to let them be “reconciled in Christ” just like members of a healthy family accept their differences as a natural part of family life.

An important step, Tosini said, is to follow Pope Francis’ example having Catholics and Pentecostals acknowledge each other as Christians and stop treating and speaking of each other as less than Christian.

Source: Joe Tosini - As quoted by Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service, "U.S. Pentecostal promotes what pope calls ‘walking ecumenism’", 17 Oct 2016, https://cnstopstories.com/2016/10/17/u-s-pentecostal-promotes-what-pope-calls-walking-ecumenism/

A Life Review

Lindi heard a Voice [she assumed from Jesus] giving another person a life review, saying, "Let's look at all the things you've done to serve Me, to love other people well; let's look at the relationships in your life and how you've loved them well and therefore served Me through them." Lindi recalls, "What was interesting is it was all about relationships. There was nothing about accomplishments, nothing about our 'successes' - all about how you've loved other people." Then came the part she had feared, but the Voice said, "Let's look at the missed opportunities to love Me better. Let's look at how you could have loved other people better, and the missed relationships and how you could have loved them better and therefore served Me better." Then the Voice said, "Welcome home, thank you for loving me so well throughout your life." She realized there's truly no condemnation, and it motivated her to not miss opportunities. She's since started working to free women from sex trafficking.

Source: John Burke - "Imagine Heaven", Ch. 17, pp. 251-252

Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification

The five signatories of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (JDDJ) looked toward a future “realizing a deeper communion towards the full visible unity of the church and to make manifest the growth in communion which we have already been experiencing.”

“In a broken, violent and fearful world, it is urgent that the church bear witness to the possibility of unity and reconciliation and manifest the courage to stand together in works of proclamation, justice and compassion,” said Anna Case-Winters, a member of the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC) delegation to a consultation of the JDDJ communions, held 26-28 March 2019 on the campus of Notre Dame University (Indiana, USA).

Originally signed by leaders of the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), the JDDJ has since been broadened to include the World Methodist Council, the Anglican Communion and the WCRC, all of which agree on the core message of salvation in and through Christ.
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“The JDDJ has formed the basis of a new orientation to one another. We no longer begin from the place of division, but of unity,” said Case-Winters. “We no longer look for what is lacking in one another but rather look for the distinctive gifts we each bring.”

Source: Phil Tanis - "JDDJ signatories look toward common future", World Communion of Reformed Churches, Posted on April 1, 2019
http://wcrc.ch/news/jddj-signatories-look-toward-common-future

And We're Friends

Now at The Stream I’m working with both Protestants and Roman Catholics here at every level of leadership and production. I still come down firmly on the Reformation side of Christian doctrine, so I think my Catholic friends have got some things wrong. But that’s okay — they think we Protestants have some things wrong, too. And we’re friends.

Above all else, we’re completely in agreement with Christianity’s historic, orthodox creeds. We all believe “in God the Father almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ His only Son Our Lord….” We’re colleagues and partners in this united enterprise providing news, insight and commentary from a creedal Christian perspective.

Source: Tom Gilson - "Tolkien and C.S. Lewis: Catholic and Protestant Changing History Together", The Stream, 4 March 2017, https://stream.org/tolkien-cs-lewis-catholic-protestant-together/

Napalm Pilot

Referencing a Vietnam pilot forgiven by the girl he bombed with napalm:

Reflecting on the way the incident changed his life, John maintain that forgiveness is "neither earned nor even deserved, but a gift." It is also a mystery. He still can't quite grasp how a short conversation could wipe away a twenty-four-year nightmare.


Source: Johann Christoph Arnold - Why Forgive?, pp.162

What if? re: The Reformation

As recounted in From Conflict to Communion, jointly produced by the Lutheran World Federation and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the Reformation was an academic dispute that careened into a division of the church.
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It's hard to read this without thinking what might have been. . . . if everyone had stopped, quieted, breathed, listened, talked, disputed, clarified, taken a decade off to sort through the issues. What then?

Source: Peter Leithart - "Careening Toward Division", First Things, 10 Jan 2017, https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/leithart/2017/01/careening-toward-division

"we don't know what we don't know"

A church book discussion about lynchings piqued Wesley Edwards' curiosity in area hate crimes, leading to Austin Callaway. A longtime African-American friend, Bobbie Hart, confessed ignorance to the lynching, prompting them to form the group "Troup Together." Through archival research and interviews, they pieced together parts of Calloway's story.

The "knowledge deficit" is what worries Edwards. If Callaway's lynching remained a mystery all these years, what else don't they know about?

"If white people have one version of history and African-Americans have a different one, then we don't know what we don't know," he said. "We've got to bridge that gap."

Source: Wesley Edwards - Quoted in "'Justice failed Austin Callaway': Town attempts to atone for 1940 lynching", Emanuella Grinberg, CNN, 28 Jan 2017, http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/26/us/lagrange-georgia-callaway-1940-lynching/index.html

St. John Maximovich of Shanghai and San Francisco

Adam and Eve, before their Fall, were in full accord and of common spirit with one another at all times. Having sinned, alienation was immediately sensed. Justifying himself before God, Adam blamed Eve. Their sin divided them and continues to divide all of mankind. Emancipated from sin, we approach God, and, filled with His grace, we sense our unity with the rest of mankind. Such unity is very imperfect and lacking, since in each person some portion of sin remains. The closer we approach God, the closer we approach each other, just as the closer rays of light are to each other, the closer they are to the Sun. In the coming Kingdom of God there will be unity, mutual love and concord. The Holy Trinity remains eternally unchanging, all-perfect, united in essence and indivisible.

Source: St. John Maximovich of Shanghai and San Francisco - "On the Holy Pentecost", quoted in Orthodox Church Quotes, http://www.orthodoxchurchquotes.com/tag/unity/

Is There Someone You Should Call?

What about you? Is there someone you should call or go to today to seek reconciliation? A parent, a sister, a brother? A former friend or coworker with whom you had an argument long ago and haven’t spoken to in years?

Someone whom God has brought to mind again and again, but you’ve refused to pursue?

Don’t wait. Do it today. Pick up the phone. Write a letter—not an email and certainly not a text!

Better yet, go and meet face to face, just as Jesus commands (Matt. 5:23-24).

Source: Ken Sande - "Reconcile before it's too late", Relational Wisdom 360 blog post, 2017 Jan 8, https://rw360.org/2017/01/08/reconcile-before-its-too-late/

Mike Bickle's Testimony

Mike Bickle shared his testimony with The Tidings while dodging heavy raindrops by standing under the cover of an outdoor kitchen canopy by the greenroom tent.

“When I was in my 20s I was asked to pastor a church and I never officially went back to the Catholic Church, but I also don’t feel like I intentionally left it either. At the House of Prayer, I encourage people to learn the teachings of the Catholic saints, as the experts on contemplative prayer, such as Theresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross,” he said.

“In fact, the idea for 24-hour prayer and musical praise comes from the writings of King David; however, it was first done in the Christian church by the Catholics!” Bickle joyously expressed with his famously contagious grin.

Source: Jennifer Wing Atencio - "Christians pack Coliseum for revival: Catholics join thousands of believers to mark 110th anniversary of Pentecostal Azuza revival", Angelus News, 13 April 2016
https://angelusnews.com/news/christians-pack-coliseum-for-revival-catholics-join-thousands-of-believers-to-mark-110th-anniversary-of-pentecostal-azuza-revival

Defusing Hostility

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)

What does "Where is the music?" mean?

Yet another Christmas event proved to be an eye-opener for me personally. I was asked to be co-director of an ecumenical service. The other director was from Church in the Round, the large Church of God in Christ congregation. We invited all the choirs in town to participate. Those who rallied to the call were St. Titus Roman Catholic Church, Church in the Round, and our folk from Celebration / All Saints [Episcopal]. On the first night of rehearal the Roman Catholics were asking, "So, where is the music?" I was circulating the printed songs as they spoke. The African American folk from Church in the Round were asking, "So, where's the music. Sing us a tune." I realized they could have cared less about what was on a piece [of] paper being passed around. For them, the music was in the air ... Sing it, please. Being all things to all people took on new meaning for me that Christmas. Once again, music seemed to unite where systems failed; people from radically different backgrounds could sing the same song together - to the glory of God. Again NBC showed up to film this ecumenical event.

Source: Betty Pulkingham - "This Is My Story, This Is My Song", Ch. 19, p. 183

To Sign, or Not To Sign?

The administration [of his employer Gordon College] thought [Thomas Howard] couldn’t sign the school’s statement of faith. He thought he could, because he saw his movement into the Church as following to its end the trajectory Evangelicalism had set. He saw himself as a completed Evangelical, while the college saw him as not an Evangelical at all. He eventually came to see that the college had been right, though he never lost his near-reverence for the tradition that formed him and its many great Christians.

Source: David Mills - "RIP Thomas Howard: 1935-2020", Catholic Herald, 15 October 2020
https://catholicherald.co.uk/ch/rip-thomas-howard-1935-2020/

In Jail Together

I heard a story — I'm not sure whether this is literally true or not, but some people say it is — in the early days of the prolife movement, about a dozen Southern Baptists and a dozen Roman Catholics were marching together outside an abortion clinic and they got thrown in jail together (for not observing the bubble zone or something), so they shared a common jail cell, about twenty-four people in the same great big cell. And that night, they didn't sleep; they just prayed and sang hymns together all night. In the morning, the Baptists went home and asked their family, "Why don't we love Mary like the Catholics do?" And the Catholics went home and asked their family, "Do you accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior?" Now that's evangelism of the trenches. I love it.

Source: Peter Kreeft - Conversion to Catholicism, Catholic Education Resource Center, http://www.catholiceducation.org/en/religion-and-philosophy/apologetics/dr-peter-kreeft-s-conversion-to-catholicism-part-2.html

Longing ... Deep Sorrow ... Wholehearted Concern

(6) But God, who comforts the discouraged, comforted us by the coming of Titus from Corinth (probably meeting up with Titus in Philippi), (7) and not only by his coming but also by the comfort you in Corinth had given him. He told us about your longing, deep sorrow, and wholehearted concern for me, so that my joy increased all the more.

Source: The Apostle Paul - 2 Corinthians 7:6-7 (IEB)

Cuthbert the Bridge-Builder

The Lindisfarne Gospels were created on Holy Island by Eadfrith, Bishop of Lindisfarne, 1300 years ago, to honour the memory of Cuthbert, born the year Aidan settled on Holy Island. As Cuthbert grew up and entered monastic life, Aidan sent the brothers Cedd and Chad on successful apostolic missions to the East Saxons (Essex) and the Mercians (the Midlands). Cuthbert became prior at Lindisfarne in 664, the year of the fateful Synod of Whitby when Rome demanded–and acquired–dominance over the independent and decentralised Celtic church.

Cuthbert the bridge-builder accepted the Whitby ruling. He stressed unity with diversity as he worked to reform the community and gained a widespread reputation as a holy man and worker of miracles. When the island was abandoned in face of the Viking threat, Cuthbert’s body and the Gospels crafted in his memory began an eventful journey ending 120 years later in Durham.

The Gospels richly embody Cuthbert’s emphasis on diversity in unity. Breath-taking in detail, colour and ornate design, the Gospels weave elements of book-making, ornamentation, script, illustration, theme and symbolism not only from the Irish Celtic and Roman traditions that were fused at Whitby, or from the scribe’s Anglo-Saxon roots. Experts have also identified elements from Coptic, Byzantine, Oriental and British Celtic sources.

The story of Lindisfarne and of the Gospels inspire many today to pray and strive towards a weaving together of God-given strands of spirituality which over time have become separated.

Source: Jeff Fountain - "The Book That Made Britain", Weekly Word eNewsletter, 27 July 2020
https://us9.campaign-archive.com/?e=0b86898e11&u=65605d9dbab0a19355284d8df&id=f4d0087745

Lewis on Catholicism

CS Lewis once corresponded with a woman who had converted to Catholicism. What Lewis wrote to her, I would like to say to Francis Beckwith:

“It is a little difficult to explain how I feel that though you have taken a way which is not for me, I nevertheless can congratulate you – I suppose because of your faith and joy which are so obviously increased. Naturally, I do not draw from that the same conclusions as you – but there is no need for us to start a controversial correspondence! I believe we are very dear to one another but not because I am at all on the Rome-ward frontier of my own communion. I believe that in the present divided state of Christendom, those who are at the heart of each division are all closer to one another than those who are at the fringes.”

Source: C.S. Lewis - As quoted in “Evangelicals and the Great Tradition” by Timothy George, First Things, Aug/Sept 2007, p. 21