Colleagues List II, November 27th, 2016
Vol. XII. No. 12
*****
GLOBAL AND ECUMENICAL IN SCOPE
CANADIAN IN PERSPECTIVE
GLOBAL AND ECUMENICAL IN SCOPE
CANADIAN IN PERSPECTIVE
Wayne A. Holst, Editor
My E-Mail Address:
waholst@telus.net
Colleagues List Web Site:
http://colleagueslistii.blogspot.com
*****
Dear Colleagues;
This is first full blog letter since the crash of
my computer and other related vicissitudes
at the middle of October.
At least I am back to creating Colleagues List
as I want it to be!
Except, of course for some technical glitches
that take time to work out - like links that are
too small, etc. please bear with me as I learn
a new program thanks to my teaching associate
Jock McTavish.
To begin, I want to acknowledge the passing
of Dr. Mathew Zachariah, professor emeritus
in the Faculty of Education, U. of Calgary. He
died on October 25th, and he will be missed.
My thoughts and prayers are extended to
his wife Saro and their children.
The big news items since mid-October clustered
around the US election and the 500th anniversary
of the Reformation - as far as I am concerned!
So quite a number of items, below, are related to
these stories.
First, however, is my book notice for University
of Calgary colleague and friend, Clara Joseph.
We have known each other for at least 20 years.
I hope you like what she publishes as a poet
in “The Face of the Other.”
Thanks to those who have written to comment
on my return to weekly blogging, and about
the new format I am trying to master.
Wayne
****
SPECIAL ITEM
Book Notice:
THE FACE OF THE OTHER
by Clara Joseph,
Interactive Press,
Carindale, Queensland, Australia
2016. 70 pages. $11.50 CAD
ISBN #978-1-925-23135-9
Publishers Promo:
An evocative and thought-provoking collection
of poetry that reveals more to the reader with
each reread. Clara Joseph covers a wide range of
themes and ideas whilst tying them all together
under the repeating image of the face, seen from
many different angles and in different guises.
The author seamlessly transitions between personal
poems of change, transition, or personal philosophizing,
to more public issues of justice and injustice, violation
and destruction, all the while returning – unblinking –
to the perception of the other within the world.
Ultimately, this book is about what it means to meet
the other person.
--
Intelligent, thoughtful, and provocative, this sensual
work ranges from the sacred to the profane in language
that mixes the philosophical and the vernacular. With
“The Face of the Other,” the well published Clara Joseph
makes a stunning debut as a poet.
– Ken McGoogan, author of Lady Franklin's Revenge
--
Authors Bio:
Clara A. B. Joseph was born in Kerala State, India
and she earned a PhD. in English from York University,
Toronto, ON. She is an associate professor of English
and an adjunct associate professor of Religious Studies
at the University of Calgary.
--
My Thoughts:
I attended the launch for this book in Calgary some
weeks ago at the author's invitation. The experience
was both enticing and troubling for me.
Clara Joseph has been a friend for twenty years and
I thought I knew her quite well. But the poems in
this attractive book of 70 pages brought to my
attention another side of her. The lines reveal
things about Clara I had not appreciated previously.
Reading her poetry is like attending a gallery of
impressionist paintings. Only in this case, the
imagery is verbal.
The settings for these reflections cover a range of
territory in her mind and through her pen, even as
the events that prompted them come from many
places.
I was particularly attracted to those settings I
suspect were from her native India. Even though
Clara is quite thoroughly Canadian, she has not
lost appealing characteristics of her native
formation.
She writes of her perception of “the other” within
the world. In the end her book is about what it
means to meet that person. Sometimes, that
discovery is attractive, and sometime scary.
Much depends on that is going on in one's own
mind at the time, it seems.
Enjoy an untitled example:
The air is eager though all too wet
when stubborn fig trees spread their skirts
this side of the highway wall. I watch in awe
yet cannot speak to you who own this wonderland.
The wind is scolding when all was still
until some pleats are pushed off this side of
the highway wall; the trains that warmed
those trims now pass us both; they pass us by.
The silence has spread, the pines have pierced
the contours of our mutual fear, have turned
to dust for wind and air both sides of the highway wall,
I lick my lips with your fame. Do you know
my name ?
--
I found that what was happening to Clara drew
me into the ambiguities of my own mind and heart
when encountering other people - some of whom
I am drawn to; and others who repulsed me.
Here are poems you will return to, and each time
you will experience something new and different.
Thanks for this gift, Clara.
--
On a somewhat similar theme, but differently focused,
I recall a prose book by another colleague, written
five years ago:
“The Other Face of God,” by Mary Jo Leddy
http://tinyurl.com/zluv4q5
---
Buy the book from Amazon.ca:
http://tinyurl.com/hzt6noz
*****
COLLEAGUE COMMUNICATIONS
John Everard Griffith,
Calgary, AB.
October 15th, 2016
Hi Wayne, this is the first I have heard of
this initiative to discover what characterizes
a flourishing church in Canada.
Instead of copying the article I thought
it would be easier to sent it to you. It is
the short article entitled:
“Flourishing Amongst Decline”
John
http://tinyurl.com/zhtyzwk
*****
COLLEAGUE CONTRIBUTIONS
Philip Jenkins,
University Park PA, and Waco TX
“White Christian Apocalypse?”
The American Conservative
November 17th, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/zeyoytg
For background to this article see:
“The Last Hurrah of White Christian America”
Religion News Service,
November 14th, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/jn67448
--
Martin Marty,
Chicago, IL
Sightings,
October 31st, 2016
“Reformation Jostlings”
http://tinyurl.com/zbo9abk
--
Thomas Ryan,
Boston, MA
Koinonia,
October 31st, 2016
“Looking Beyond 2017:
A New Catholic View of Luther”
http://tinyurl.com/jfxhrn2
--
John Stackhouse Jr.
Moncton, NB
Personal Blog
November 2nd, 2016
“American Evangelicals and the US Election”
http://tinyurl.com/zhmb3t3
*****
NET NOTES
TRUMP AND THE TRANSFORMATION
OF WHITE AMERICAN EVANGELICALS
Their Support for Him Demonstrates
a Significant Shift in Their Moral Values
Ideas - Politics
November 19th, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/jk49gs7
--
ANGLICAN-UNITED CHURCH DIALOGUE
Seeking Greater Collaboration in Mission
Anglican Journal
November 23rd, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/j6xvk8j
--
PAPAL VISIT TO SWEDEN SHOWS
FRANCIS AS ECUMENICAL TRAILBLAZER
He is Willing to Go Over to the Other Side
The Tablet, UK
November 3rd, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/jqfcucl
--
DOES PROTESTANTISM STILL MATTER?
After 500 Years Does It Serve a Purpose?
Religion News Service
October 30th, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/j8pjjve
--
CATHOLIC WOMEN SEEMINGLY POWERLESS
Recent Statement by Francis Distresses Many
UCA News
November 2nd, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/j23undy
--
CANADIAN STUDY FINDS THAT
CONSERVATIVE CHURCHES STILL GROWING
Literal Approach More Popular as Biblical Stance
Religion News Service
November 21st, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/zyqmhvk
--
WHAT OBAMA GOT RIGHT
Assessing His Stewardship
The Atlantic Online
December, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/gqjx8v3
--
HOW LEONARD COHEN
TAUGHT JUDAISM TO THE WORLD
Canadian Singer-Songwriter, Also Religious
Religion News Service
November 11th, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/gvdy7t6
--
CRYPT BELIEVED TO BE JESUS TOMB OPENED
Special Search for the First Time in Centuries
New York Times
November 3rd, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/hspbxbv
*****
WISDOM OF THE WEEK
Lying is done with words, and also with silence.
- Adrienne Rich
--
They say every bigot was once a child without prejudice.
- Elliott Ashby
--
You must live life with the full knowledge that your actions
will remain. We are creatures of consequence.
- Zadie Smith
--
To be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live
in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.
- Nelson Mandela
--
One of the things Jesus did was to step aside from the
organized religion of his time because it had become
more corrupt and bogged down with rules.
Rules became more important than feeding the hungry.
- Corita Kent
--
If you are reading this ... you have some kind of privilege.
It may be hard to hear that, I know, but if you cannot recognize
your privilege, you have a lot of work to do; get started.
- Roxane Gay
--
We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a
big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can
make which, over time, add up to big differences that
we often cannot foresee.
- Marian Wright Edelman
--
Our love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth,
and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love.
- John Stott
--
I think people often come to the synagogue, mosque, the
church looking for God, and what we give them is religion.
- Bishop Gene Robinson
--
Maybe some – or maybe many of you – think that you
don’t have any religion or faith. The truth is, we are and
we will be with Christ even though we don’t know it, and
even though we seem not to want it. For he will be with
us, to the degree that our hunger and thirst for justice,
truth, and love is honest.
- Dom Helder Camara
--
Try walking around with a child who’s going, “Wow, wow!
Look at that dirty dog! Look at that burned-down house!
Look at that red sky!” And the child points and you look,
and you see, and you start going, “Wow! Look at that huge
crazy hedge! Look at that teeny little baby! Look at the scary
dark cloud!”
I think this is how we are supposed to be in the world –
present and in awe.”
- Anne Lamott
***
ON THIS DAY
From the archives of the New York Times
Indira Gandhi Assassinated
http://tinyurl.com/c82lhwh
Thomas Edison Invents Workable Electric Light
http://tinyurl.com/mxn27c2
***
CLOSING THOUGHT - Henri J. M. Nouwen
Gratitude is not a simple emotion or an obvious attitude.
It is a difficult discipline to constantly reclaim my whole
past as the concrete way in which God has led me to
this moment and is sending me into the future. It is hard
precisely because it challenges me to face the painful
moments – experiences of rejection and abandonment,
feelings of loss and failure – and gradually to discover
in them the pruning hands of God purifying my heart for
deeper love, stronger hope, and broader faith.
(end)
For Those Interested
ST.DAVID'S SPIRITUAL TRAVEL PROJECT, 2017
We have selected South Africa as our location!
We plan a nineteen-day trip that combines a
focus on faith, culture, and nature, and it will
happen the month of October 2017.
many helpful travel hints will be published soon.
Follow these notices for weekly updates.
*****
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