The Alpha Course

"…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

Losing My Memory Was a Very Fine Experience

The whole time he spoke, he was grinning like a happy child. His body was perfectly relaxed, at rest in his Lord. Franziskus had indeed become a living icon to us, his glory almost visible like a halo. Here was a brilliant man who had no fear of losing his mind because he knew Jesus held him in safety. His peace glorified Jesus, challenged us all, and drew us together in love. That morning we all stepped into the mystery of John 17. “I have given them the glory that You have given Me, that they may be one as we are one.”


Source: Amy Cogdell  -  Wittenberg 2017 Biographies: Franziskus, https://cogdellcreative.space/w17chs/app3

Who Won the Peace?

Too often we forget that Hitler’s demise did not automatically guarantee peace to a traumatised and broken Europe. Euphoric scenes of Allied soldiers giving out chocolates, cigarettes and kisses to flag-waving crowds quickly gave way to the daunting reality of rebuilding a devastated and divided Europe. It’s one thing to win a war. But how do you win the peace?

Chaos threatened on all sides. Hatred and bitterness towards the enemy and collaborators poisoned grass-roots attitudes among victor and defeated alike. Families had been separated, divided and destroyed. Deep wounds festered physically, psychologically and spiritually. Hunger, poverty and unemployment added to the miseries of injury and upheaval, totally eclipsing anything we are currently experiencing in Europe today. The Cold War was about to begin. Today’s generations have never known the climate of mistrust and suspicion, crisis and conflict that dominated Europe over the five years following the war.

Reconciliation
Today thoughts of such conflict among EU nations are unthinkable, thank God! Thanks in large part to the story of the stunningly rapid yet lasting Franco-German reconciliation after the Second World War. Central to that story is an unassuming, French lawyer-politician, acknowledged as the ‘Father of Europe’, Robert Schuman. Drawing inspiration from his Christian faith and Catholic social teaching, he searched for an alternative to the old order of competing nation states which had repeatedly led to war. Even while imprisoned by the Nazis early in the war and again after escaping in hiding, he wrote that ‘we French will have to learn to forgive and love the Germans to rebuild post-war Europe’. To many that sounded like treason. After the war, when appointed Foreign Minister, Schuman kept looking for a way to prevent the vicious cycle of war.

Exactly seventy years ago on this Saturday, on May 9, 1950, Schuman announced a plan in a speech lasting a mere three minutes. Surely that was the defining moment of post-war Europe! For that speech laid the foundations of the European House in which today half a billion people in twenty-seven nations live together in peace. From that moment on, there was a plan on the table with the goal, in Schuman’s thinking, of forming a ‘community of peoples deeply rooted in basic Christian values’. These values stemmed directly from the teachings of Jesus, Schuman argued. True democracy was ‘evangelical’, he wrote, rooted in the gospel …

Source: Jeff Fountain  -  "Who Won the Peace?", Weekly Word eNewsletter, 4 May 2020
https://us9.campaign-archive.com/?e=0b86898e11&u=65605d9dbab0a19355284d8df&id=cd6d1b85b2

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/

Admitting the Harm

Nancy Leschke:  Thank you for sharing this. So disturbing. As someone who has always lived in the upper Midwest, I have little familiarity with how history is presented in the south. We definitely have systemic and personal racism up here too, but this type of simultaneous celebration and omission of huge swaths of southern history is important for every US citizen to know about. How can we make progress as a nation if we don't even publicly acknowledge the harm that's part of our history?

Latasha Morrison:  Exactly... admitting the harm is part of the process of healing, solidarity and reconciliation.


Source: Nancy Leschke  -  Posted on Facebook as a comment about the "So This Is America" post, https://jemartisby.com/2017/07/05/so-this-is-america-my-visit-to-the-jefferson-davis-presidential-library/

"Only Jesus can do something like this!"

Only Jesus can do something like this! A Catholic ... who was once the drummer for a Christian punk rock band ... leading worship at a Protestant non-denominational church ... with a team composed of Catholics and Protestants, young and old ... singing a song written by his Protestant friend and co-leader ... that contains the lyrics "I believe in the holy catholic church" ... and all on the anniversary weekend of the Reformation (and of Wittenberg 2017).  What a glorious moment of living out John 17!!

Source: Thomas Cogdell  -  Posted on FB 2 Nov 2020
https://youtu.be/6ELHtJrCsQk?t=1385

The Judensau Debate

Debate has carried on for some time over whether the Judensau should remain. Some Christians and Jews feel it needs to stay there as a potent reminder and warning about anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism. Other Christians and Jews argue that it has no place in a house of worship and, further, that the memorial’s extreme language about the death of God’s name does little to improve matters. A renewed petition for the Judensau’s removal has grown in anticipation of the 2017 celebrations, stating that “it is time to remove this statue and replace it with something more honoring to the God of Israel, respectful of the Jewish people, and bringing dignity to a Christian place of worship instead of retaining a sculpture that is unseemly, obscene, insulting, offensive, defamatory, libelous, blasphemous, anti-Semitic and inflammatory.”

Source: Sarah Hinlicky Wilson  -  "Is the Reformation over? Yes and no.", The Christian Century, 1 March 2017, https://www.christiancentury.org/article/reformation-over-yes-and-no

Go Global

Why not be part of something big?  Remember the wounds of the world we discussed in chapter three?  You can be part of the answer.  During the writing of this journey I took a prayer journey … [Stories from Spanish prayer journey, including the council of Elvira with the 1st anti-semitic decrees by Christian leaders] ... This prayer journey was just the beginning of the "Gates of Iberia" initiative, which in turn is part of a worldwide initiative towards healing the foundational rift between Jew and Gentile in the church, stemming from 140 A.D.  A reconciliation movement has already been launched in Spain, which, while focused on messianic Jews, is already having a profound effect on relationships between Catholic and Protestant.  There will be many more catalyst events and prayer journeys in Spain and throughout the Spanish and Portuguese speaking world.  This will undergird Christian repentance proclamations to the general Jewish communities.  You could be a part of something like this. ... Get connected, join an initiative, be a part of the answer to the prayer of Jesus:  "I in them and You in Me.  May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that You sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved me." (John 17:23 NIV)


Source: John Dawson  -  What Every Christian Should Know About Reconciliation, pp. 52-54

Loving our Neighbor as Ourself

“I do not like to speak of Islamic violence because everyday when I look through the papers, I see violence here in Italy,” the pope told reporters. “And they are baptized Catholics. There are violent Catholics. If I speak of Islamic violence, I also have to speak of Catholic violence,” he added.

Source: Pope Francis  -  Catholic News Service, 31 July 2016, https://cnstopstories.com/2016/07/31/its-not-right-to-equate-islam-with-violence-pope-says/

The Prime Minister's Wife's Plea

The Dutch Reformed people, however, almost lost the prime minister as a communicant at one point, however.  He and his wife were together at the communion service, and an elder approached him.  "Mr. Prime Minister," he said, "with all due respect, sir, your wife will not be permitted to take communion with us because she is [a Pentecostal]."

The old man nearly exploded, and was ready to storm out of the church.  "This is the last time I will ever come into this place or any like it," he said loudly enough to be heard for several pews around him.  But his wife, a truly humble saint, held gently onto his arm, and quieted him.  She appealed with all the power within her for him not to turn his back on the church.  Despite his anger, he honored her plea the rest of his life.


Source: David du Plessis  -  From "A Man Called Mr. Pentecost", as told to Bob Slosser, Ch. 7, pp 46-47

The Hidden Ones

But there were women and men who, in times when this joint commemoration was still unimaginable, already gathered together to pray for unity or to form ecumenical communities. There were theologians, women and men, who already entered in dialogue, seeking to overcome doctrinal and theological differences. There were many, who together offered themselves to serve the poor and the oppressed. There were even some who suffered martyrdom for the sake of the Gospel.

I feel deep gratitude for those bold prophets. As they lived and witnessed together they began to see one another no longer as separated branches but as branches united to Jesus Christ. Even more, they began to see Christ in their midst and to acknowledge that even in those periods of history when dialogue was broken between us, Christ continued talking to us. Jesus never forgot us, even when we seemed to have forgotten him, losing ourselves in violent and hateful actions.


Source: Rev. Dr Martin Junge  -  Rev. Dr Martin Junge, General Secretary of the Lutheran World Federation, Sermon on the occasion of the Joint Commemoration of the Reformation, Lund Cathedral, Sweden, October 31, 2016, https://www.lutheranworld.org/sites/default/files/joint_commemoration_mj_sermon_final_en.pdf

Turning The Hearts

Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord ... Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.

Source: Bible  -  Luke 1:13-17 

Charismatic Ecumenism

Despite the embraces of Karl Rahner and Yves Congar, theologians in the 1980s and 1990s were suspicious that charismatic ecumenism was insufficiently ecclesial and too “emotional,” a fear that only began to disappear after St. John Paul II’s 1999 Ut Unum Sint.

Now, says Hocken, Pope Francis in both word and action “is bringing to an end the lack of connection between official ecumenism and charismatic ecumenism. This is very significant.”


Source: Austen Ivereigh  -  Quoting Fr. Peter Hocken in "Jubilee in Rome highlights charismatic fruits in Francis’s Pentecost papacy", Crux, 3 June 2017, https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2017/06/03/jubilee-rome-highlights-charismatic-fruits-franciss-pentecost-papacy/

"To be Catholic was to be Anti-Protestant ..."

Following the Protestant Reformation, the "Catholic church had to defend itself against Protestant attacks and criticisms, particularly through the development of a Catholic apologetics that refuted the Protestant objections, and provided proof-arguments for distinctive Catholic doctrines. In consequence, Catholic identity between the sixteenth and twentieth centuries was significantly shaped by those elements in Catholic teaching and practice that were rejected by the Protestants. To be Catholic was to be anti-Protestant, especially countries with a significant Protestant population, or regions with a history of antipathy to Catholic power structures....

Source: Fr. Peter Hocken  -  Pentecost and Parousia, Peter Hocken - p. 74-5

Pope Francis in Finland

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

Public Reconciliation for a Lynching

The words echoed through LaGrange's Warren Temple United Methodist Church Thursday night, where more than 200 people crammed into pews and folding chairs to remember Callaway.

It was a rare public reconciliation for a lynching, attended by black and white people, police, civilians and clergy, sitting and standing side by side. Programs ran out as attendance exceeded expectations, forcing people into an overflow room in a building next door.


Source: Emanuella Grinberg, CNN  -  "'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

Matt Maher

We need everybody.  There was a season when we needed Billy Grahams, and we needed individual evangelists and people with platforms.  That's not what we need now.  What we need is everybody, everybody together.  … We need everyone to come together, be together, and I think that's where the beauty shines the most.

Source: Matt Maher  -  Worship Leader Q&A Panel, Catholic/Ecumentical Track, Onething 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_pesyj1nVo

2017

The year 2017 will see the first centennial commemoration of the Reformation to take place during the ecumenical age.  It will also mark fifty years of Lutheran - Roman Catholic dialogue.  As part of the ecumenical movement, praying together, worshipping together, and serving their communities together have enriched Catholics and Lutherans ... The spirituality evident in interconfessional marriages has brought forth new insights and questions.  Lutherans and Catholics have been able to reinterpret their theological traditions and practices, recognizing the influences they have had on each other.  Therefore, they long to commemorate 2017 together.

Source: Lutheran - Roman Catholic Commission on Unity  -  Conflict to Communion:  Report of the Lutheran - Roman Catholic Commission on Unity, p. 12

An Anonymous Pastor

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