Jonathan Sacks writes in The Times about the new exhibition at the British Library in The peoples of the Book need to find a new ‘convivencia’.
Christopher Howse writes about a new book Heresies and How to Avoid Them in the Daily Telegraph: Heresy and the good press that now goes with it.
In the Guardian Bishop Paul Richardson writes about links between religion and good health, in Face to Faith.
Giles Fraser writes in the Church Times about Paul v. Jesus — a bid to take over?
Also in the Church Times this week Peter Doll writes about the history of the Episcopal Church in the USA, When a founding myth becomes a weapon.
In the Tablet Peter Kavanagh interviews the Canadian philosopher and Templeton Prize winner Charles Taylor in Called to question.
Writing as one involved with rare books for many years, the British Library’s interactive online exhibition is a wonderful piece of work.
There has always been a tension not just between Paul and Jesus, one who is more univesal to one who is local, but also between Paul and Paul, partly because some in the name of Paul is not Paul (and another point of disagreement between liberals and others). There is Paul the revolutionary, for whom everything has changed, and Paul the patriarchal traditionalist, thanks to some later Church-based correctives. The supernaturalism of both Jesus and Paul present difficulties, however, and its eschatology is something of a lost world. You can see Isaih Berlin in the viewpoint of Charles Taylor, and… Read more »
Ah, the Luttrell Psalter. Funny thing is, though EVERYONE has heard of the Lindisfarne Gospels, the Luttrell Psalter is almost unknown in its home county of Lincolnshire (but we have a facsimile sitting on my wife’s desk. Who needs to eat?). NB the scenes of C14 life.
May I humbly suggest that the Rev.Dr. Doll is knocking over a Straw Man to make his (dubious) point? No knowledgable Episcopalian (least of all the House of Bishops this past March!) argues that TEC hasn’t had/shouldn’t have a relationship of *interdependence* within the Anglican Communion. The question before us—as has been forced upon us w/ increasing frequency since Lambeth ’98—is whether or not TEC should be mandated into a state of unique *dependency* upon (i.e., *subordination* to), specifically, the governance of the Anglican Primates. It is this dependency/subordination to the Primates that we Episcopalians—true to our history (heading north… Read more »
Like JCF, I found some of the Doll[‘s strategies bemusing. I came out of the article feeling like he was talking about oranges whilst contemplating apples. There were comments about the basis foundations of the US Episcopal Church after the American Revolution, which were then compared to the foundations of the original Church of England after the reformation. The error is that he should not have been comparing the US to the UK’s king. The equivalent to the US’s stance of independence against the UK should have been compared to the CoE’s stance against the Church of Rome after the… Read more »
As always, a good selection of articles. Sacks’ was beautiful. Fraser’s made me laugh (the comment about Jung and Mohammad). Paul was selected for his strategic drive, it was needed to get the apostles and early church past a hump. That did not mean Paul was perfect, like the apostles, Paul had his strengths and weaknesses. Unlike the disciples, we don’t have the conversations between Paul and Jesus. Thus Paul’s writings do not contain the educating and disciplining lessons that are contained in the gospels. That gives the impression that the Pauline texts are “better”. But in actual fact, that… Read more »
What I think the Rev. Dr. Doll fails to recall is that there were no Bishops in the US prior to the revolution. Remember, confirmation was (formerly) required to receive the Eucharist and a Bishop was (and is) required for ordinations. The colonial church was under the governance of the Bishop of London from 1609 – 1789. There were no bishops ordained for the sake of the colonies that actually lived in the colonies. The Episcopal Church had a choice. It chose to be democratically governed and to be a church with Bishops. It was both. The foreign prelate comment… Read more »
“What I think the Rev. Dr. Doll fails to recall is that there were no Bishops in the US prior to the revolution. Remember, confirmation was (formerly) required to receive the Eucharist and a Bishop was (and is) required for ordinations.” Particularly in the early days, the hardships and perils of the long sea voyage kept the numbers of priests down in some of the colonies as well. The results are still with us in some places. For example, vestries grew powerful when most small, isolated congregations saw an actual priest 3 or 4 times a year, and vestries in… Read more »
Fr Sean “Perhaps Dr. Doll should like to be ruled by a foreign prelate…” Indeed, I think that is some souls’ aspiration. There is a desire by some to reform the authority of Rome and the Pope, but not with the actual Catholic Church. After all, these elite Anglicans know that the Catholics got Mary and the Saints wrong, so there’s no way Jesus is going to accept them on Judgment Day. It’s blatent dynasty building. I just give thanks to God that their ambition is so strong as is their belief that they have the only theology that their… Read more »
Even Reuters understand this is blatent organisational power plays
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN0737733620070508
Instead of the courtly sycophants sending Daniel to the lions, we have the puritans sending GLBTs and their sympathisers to the wilderness.
Daniel survived by not giving into fear and trusting God. Therein lies the lesson.