"PATIENT TRUST" - PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Patient Trust

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient with everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient with being on the way to something
unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress
that it is made by passing through
some stages of instability -
and that it may take a very long time,
And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually – let them grow,
Let them shape themselves, without undue haste.
as though you could be today what time,
(that is to say, grace and circumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that His hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.

~Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.

Thanks to David@Montreal for sending me the wise and beautiful poem.

LEONARD COHEN - 'THE STRANGER SONG'

I listened to the song the other day.  It is so beautiful, so here it is.

FURTHER COMMENTARY ON CHURCH OF ENGLAND STATEMENT ON SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

Here in PDF format is the Church of England's statement in response to the Home Office Consultation on Equal Civil Marriage, if you'd like to read it all.  The very first paragraph of The Church's understanding of marriage made me smile.

1. In common with almost all other Churches, the Church of England holds, as a matter of doctrine and derived from the teaching of Christ himself, that marriage in general – and not just the marriage of Christians – is, in its nature, a lifelong union of one man with one woman. 

 Well, there's sticky matter of divorce and remarriage, which is permitted by the church despite its understanding of marriage as a "lifelong union of one man with one woman," which seems to me to undermine their case against same-sex civil marriage from the very beginning.

Moving on...

Tim Ellis, Suffragan Bishop of Grantham:

‘...in what way can the statements of the prelates be taken to be the mind of the Church of England in this and other related matters?’ For, in truth, the bishops in the media have not spoken for me or the way in which I understand this thorny matter and, I suspect, they do not speak for a sizeable minority or even majority with the life of the Church. However, it is possible that I will soon be approached by the local media to defend the position taken up by my colleagues and the pressure will be on to ‘toe the line’.

Tobias Haller at In a Godward Direction:

The authors hammer away on the alleged "complementarity" of the sexes as a necessary component of marriage without apparently recognizing either the circular nature of that argument or the dangerous tendency towards Christological heresy inherent in its anthropology. The circular nature of the argument is: “Marriage can only take place between a man and a woman because only a man and a woman are of different sexes.” This is, of course, merely restating the premise. The more dangerous, and heretical, trend of this argument lies in the suggestion that the sex difference implies a different order of being for men and women. This is known as sexism, and it undercuts the orthodox doctrine of the incarnation. One would think the church might be more sensitive to that issue, though one wonders how many English bishops actually believe the doctrine.

Alan Wilson, Suffragan Bishop of Buckingham:

The mightiest act of God is his commandment to love him as we love our crooked neighbour with all our crooked heart. It’s shockingly unconditional. Someone wrote to me last month to say it beggared his belief that a bishop should think that “Love thy neighbour as thyself” applied to homosexuals. It beggars this bishop’s belief that anyone should think that it doesn’t.

Themethatisme at conscientisation:

There is the biological usage of complementarity, (not definition) and 'tis this, that is liberally sprinkled through the document as the Bishops seek a good legalistic euphemism for saying men's bits are designed to fit ladies bits and you shouldn't be doing anything else with that arrangement. Which owes more to the traditional definition of the word in which 'This port complements the stilton' or 'that handbag really complements those shoes'.  The two becoming one and being something else, a new ensemble, a new flavour, a fresh expression.

I've suggested a rather long reading assignment for two reasons: The first is that I believe all four posts are worth reading whole and entire.  The second is that three out of the four bloggers are Church of England, all but Tobias, and the statement claims to speak for the church.  Since the statement was released unsigned, the posts quoted and linked above make it clear that whoever put together the statement does not speak for ALL members of the Church of England.

JESUS AND MO - SONG

Click on the cartoon for the larger view.

From Jesus and Mo.

BRAVO, FR BOB!

An openly gay priest on Sunday urged Catholics to go against the Pope's wishes and vote "no" a November ballot measure that would enshrine Minnesota's same sex marriage ban in the state's Constitution.

 Father Bob Pierson argued that Paragraph 1782 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church allows Catholics to make their own decisions in cases where their conscience is not in agreement with the church's doctrine.

The priest recalled that a "young theologian" named Joseph Ratzinger, who is now Pope, used to teach that people should follow their own inner voice
.
"Our Holy Father taught in 1967 that we must obey our own conscience, even if it puts us at odds with the Pope," Pierson told the crowd of about 200 Catholics at an event in the Minneapolis suburb of Edina. "I doubt that he knew that he was going to be Pope when he said that."

And it's a lovely thing to rebut the argument of one's opponents using the words of their big boss.

Thanks to Paul (A.)

PRAYER TIME

G K Chesterton - Tobias Haller

Some days while praying The Daily Office I am distracted the entire time to the point that right in the middle of the prayer time I think of something I MUST jump up and do right this minute.  Other days I'm middling focused.  God is always waiting for me, always present, but sometimes I am not truly present.  Ah, but today was different.  From the beginning, I was right in the groove with God.  The grace of the felt presence of the loving God is a wonder, but it is not to be counted on, and who knows (only God)  but that prayer in the face of great distraction is more efficacious than the prayer that comes easy.  And so I persevere.

O God of earth and altar, you gave G. K. Chesterton a ready tongue and pen, and inspired him to use them in your service: Mercifully grant that we may be inspired to witness cheerfully to the hope that is in us; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The icon is a selection from “quick ikons” of Holy Women and Holy Men written by Tobias Haller.

CHURCH OF ENGLAND AGAINST SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

Despite the headline, I should rather say a few persons in high places in the Church of England claim to speak for the entire church in the matter.

Introducing same-sex marriage could lead to the church being forced out of its role of conducting weddings on behalf of the state, the church claimed in a potentially explosive submission in response to the government's consultation on gay marriage, which closes on Thursday.

To get the churches out of the marriage business altogether sounds like a good idea rather than an explosion to me.  France does it rather well, with the religious ceremony of blessing (if desired) following the legal marriage in the registry office.  But I digress.

I'll let the English speak.

Giles Fraser is "spitting blood".

The Church of England says it is against gay marriage. Not in my name

I am furious about this ridiculous and unrepresentative statement from the Church of England on gay marriage
....

The church is no more a cartel of moral wisdom. And those of us who still stick with it – though there are days like today when this is increasingly hard – do so in the hope that it can be called back to a deeper moral seriousness that is not in hoc to bourgeois notions of respectability and prejudice.

Read the entire opinion piece.  As you see, Giles does not mince words.

Colin Coward is upset (to say the least!).

I woke this morning to the R4 Today programme’s news headlines about the Church of England’s response to the Government’s equal marriage consultation. I felt so angry. The Church has achieved another set of disastrous headlines thanks to its ill-considered submission. The Church looks like an institution in panic and crisis, terrified that the lesbian and gay hordes are about to breach the defences and destroy marriage in one decisive strategic move.

As you may or may not know the Danish Parliament recently approved same-sex marriages in churches in Denmark.

Layanglicana says, "Bring on the Vikings!" 

I know the first Viking invasion gave them rather a bad name (for raping, looting and pillaging, not to put too fine a point on it).

But that was after they had been cooped up for weeks in a long boat. The 21st century version would, I am sure, choose Easy Jet, and  be only slightly irritable as a result. A pint or two of lager and half a roasted sheep ought to mollify them sufficiently to be able to deal with the powers that be at Lambeth. And after all we don’t want them too amenable, the whole idea is to let them show who is boss.

There you have it - the word from England.

As a humble former colonial, I have a nerve to even think of offering an opinion, much less post on the matter on my wee blog, but here goes.  What in heaven's name does the 13 page document sent to the English Parliament have to do with the Gospel imperative of The Two Great Commandments to love God and love our neighbor and the Golden Rule to do as we would be done to?  Archbishops and senior bishops of the Church of England, answer me that.

UPDATE: Another voice from England - Erika in the comments...

the real disaster is what the publication has said to the members of the CoE itself.

- a small group of us claims the right to make public pronouncements on your behalf.

- we do not have to stick to the truth if it doesn't suit us. You may remember that we strongly opposed civil partnerships, but we will now launch a PR campaign trying to make those who don't remember this believe that we actually love gay people in a very cuddly way.

- we believe that everyone in this land should be bound by our definition of marriage, all the 98% of people who don't go to church but who are included in our elevated idea of ourselves as ministering to everyone in our parishes. And so we reserve the right to define marriage for all other faiths too and for all agnostics and atheists.

- we do not need to make the slightest warm pastoral noise about caring about the spiritual wellbeing of gay people. We can just casually dismiss their relationships as friendships without content. If we really believed that God creates them like this but that for some reason, baby Jesus cries if they hitch up, we would be full of sympathy and we would try what we could to make their God imposed loneliness more bearable. But, actually, we don't give a stuff as long as they don't threaten our order of things and keep quiet in their sinful moral morass.

THAT is what this document is saying and it's saying it to its own members.
Which is why I, for one, have had enough and have now left the church. I shall watch it with mild interest from the sidelines to see if it ever joins civilised society again.

Hear, hear!  

STORY OF THE DAY - FAIRY PRINCESS

looking for a slinky black dress for later 
on which is how you can tell this is a 
fairy princess with an edge

Not about me, certainly, but I do love a fairy princess with an edge.

From StoryPeople.

SIGNS - READ CLOSELY

HOLY TENSION

Bro John Anthony

10:24am Jun 10

Most of us prefer easy answers. But here we are invited to live in a place of holy tension, depending on God’s grace to show us when tolerance and patience towards others is called for, and when we are being called to noncooperation and resistance in the face of evil.

-Br. David Vryhof
Society of Saint John the Evangelist

Bro John Anthony posted in St. Cuthbert's Cottage