500th Anniversary of The Reformation On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther sent a letter to Albrecht (‘Albert’), Archbishop of Mainz and also Archbishop of Magdeburg. There are people (like Andreas Malessa) who think that the story that Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of a church in Wittenberg is “probably nonsense”. I think
It is time to put the ‘Hallow’ back into ‘Halloween’. Halloween, All Saints, and All Souls forms a triduum (three days of liturgical observance). ‘Halloween’ is a contraction of ‘All Hallows’ Eve’ (the ‘eve’, the day before All Hallows – All Saints). This triduum can be a celebration of past, present, and future Eternal Life
Theologians talk about the ‘marks’ of the Church. The ‘mark’ of the Anglican Church is… an obsession with sex. Same-sex to be clear and precise. We have been debating this decade upon decade upon decade. The Very Revd Dr Jonathan Draper recently blogged about the obsession in a post Obsessed about sex?. Do read the
Yes – sometimes people actually disagree. But, often people “talk past each other” – they believe the same thing(s) but express them differently… Or, they may sound like they are answering the same question – appear to be doing so – but they are actually answering different questions. And that is especially the case when
Let us pray (in silence) [that God’s love strengthen us to do God’s will] Pause Almighty everliving God, [or God of holiness] increase within us your gifts of faith, hope, and love, and make us cherish what you command, so that we may obtain what you promise; through Jesus Christ who is alive with you,
A very thorough survey in Great Britain this year (weighted to be demographically representative of all GB adults) has come up with a conclusion that may surprise many: Two-thirds of Christians become Christians between the ages of 0 and 4 years old. So what is the church’s focus on this pre-school age? Are we facilitating
Recently, from the October Full Moon, Jews celebrated the week of Sukkot. In, say, Jesus’ day, you would live in your village and go out to the fields – day by day. At harvest time, you wanted to get the harvest in as quickly as possible and so stayed out in the fields, living in
Many Anglicans say they believe things, but they don’t. They believe the opposite of what they say. Anglicans in positions of responsibility (eg. bishops, others ordained,…) even sign that they believe stuff that they don’t. I will illustrate. Let’s just start on any random day in, say, 1970. The doctrine of NZ Anglicanism (at that
