Vol. XII No. 34
GLOBAL AND ECUMENICAL IN SCOPE
CANADIAN IN PERSPECTIVE
Wayne A. Holst, Editor
My E-Mail Address:
waholst@telus.net
Colleagues List Web Site
http//colleagueslist2.bogspot.com
*****
Dear Friends:
My Special Item this week focuses on the
the devastating fire, the morning of May 22nd,
that left in ruins the McDougall Stoney Mission
Church just west of Calgary.
Thanks to colleague contributors in this issue.
Please enjoy my collection of net notes, wisdom
of the week and historical items.
Thanks for joining me again this week.
Wayne
*****
SPECIAL ITEM
Early Monday morning of this past week, fire
destroyed an ancient landmark in Southern
Alberta, west of Calgary and near the town of
Morley (originally named Morleyville) on the
Stoney First Nation reserve.
Long considered a sacred place by Indigenous
and Non-Indigenous people alike, the McDougall
Stoney Mission Church was first constructed, then
utilized 142 years ago from 1875, by Canadian
Methodist missionaries George and John McDougall.
The current structure, now destroyed, was the result
of a rebuilding campaign 50-60 years ago by McDougal
descendants and Native/Non-Native supporters. Stoney
chief Tatanga Mani (Walking Buffalo) was a strong
and visible participant in the project.
Here is a current newspaper story, with pictures:
142 YEAR OLD HISTORIC ALBERTA CHURCH
DESTROYED IN WEEKEND BLAZE
"A Devastating Loss" - Some Staff Suspect Arson
But Officials Question This
Official Report is Pending
National Post, May 23rd, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/y9ntadya
My Thoughts:
I have been a member of the McDougall Stoney
Mission Society Board for several decades. The news
came as a blow to all board members and the hundreds
of on-lookers who have visited the devastation over
the past days. The general public is now quite aware
of the disaster and it is an important time for us.
Several years ago, the story of the mission since
its founding was posted on our web site:
The McDougall Morleyville Mission Story:
https://tinyurl.com/y86tglpm
For more information about our society -
McDougall Stoney Mission Society Website:
http://tinyurl.com/yaz6ohtn
During the past days our board has been making
special plans for our annual commemorative services
(always held on the second Sundays of June and
September - this year, the 11th and 10th respectively,
at 3:00PM).
Stoney Elder JR Twoyoungman will give the main
presentation in June but others will be invited to
share their thoughts. The service will be held on site
and special facilities are being constructed.
***
COLLEAGUE CONTRIBUTIONS
Jim Taylor,
Okanagan, BC
Personal Web Log
May 21st and 24th, 2017
"The Two-Edged Sword
of Cultural Appropriation"
http://tinyurl.com/yd4uctta
"Something Bigger Than Ourselves"
http://tinyurl.com/ybptbhx2
--
Ron Rolheiser,
San Antonio, TX
Personal Web Site
May 22nd, 2017
"When Does Faith Disappear?"
http://tinyurl.com/y7s933dw
--
Philip Yancey,
Colorado
Personal Blog
May 23rd, 2017
"A View from Abroad"
http://tinyurl.com/y7jopg22
****
NET NOTES
LUTHER - FATHER OF PROTEST SONGS
He Continues to Influence Modern Times
BBC News
May 24th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/k6ewhcq
--
TRUMP RECONSEPTUALIZES ISLAM
"That Was Then, This Is Now"
Religion News Service
May 22nd, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mnpxe65
--
"GOD NO WARLORD CLAIMING VICTORY"
SAYS POPE TO TRUMP
Truth Spoken to Power
UCA News,
May 25th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/k4fhhvn
"I Won't Forget What You Said," says the President
America Magazine,
May 24th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/km8bo64
--
THE SECOND COMING OF U.S.
TELEVANGELIST JIM BAKKER
Back from Past Scandals
Buzzfeed,
May 19th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kxtff6a
--
SOME AMERICAN CATHOLICS RESPECT POPE
BUT ALSO LOVE TRUMP - How So?
The Atlantic,
May 23rd, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kuhjbr3
--
SIX QUESTIONS ON RAMADAN ANSWERED
Islamic Holy Days Begin this Weekend
Religion News Service,
May 23rd, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mu385l6
--
ANOTHER ATTACK ON CHRISTIANS IN EGYPT
Gunmen Kill 26 Copts North of Cairo
Religion News Service,
May 26th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/yb7jscoq
"Egypt's Persecuted Christians Persevere"
A Canadian Evangelical Christian Perspective
Christian Week Online
May 22nd, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kc7h6ej
--
UNDERSTANDING THE WHITE AMERICAN
EVANGELICAL MOVEMENT
Millennials are Changing It's Face
Publishers Weekly,
May 18th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mu4ctka
"Franklin Graham is the Evangelical Id - as He
Embodies all the Contradictions of Trump's America"
The Atlantic Online
May 21st, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/l3dqdro
--
AUSTRALIA ABORIGINAL LEADERS
MEET FOR HISTORIC SUMMIT
Recognition Demanded
BBC News
May 24th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mjfquzt
--
JUSTICE ABELLA USES U.S. SPEECH
TO TAKE AIM AT "NARCISSISTIC POPULISM"
She Draws from Her Family's Experience as European Jews
Globe and Mail,
May 23rd, 2017
Canadian Supreme Court Justice Rosalie Abella was in the U.S. this past
weekend and publicly denounced “narcissistic populism.” Justice Abella drew on her own family’s experiences surviving the Holocaust in a commencement speech to graduates at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, in which she targeted what she sees as dangerous trends across the world. Although she did not mention any world leaders by name or any countries in particular, many observers thought that her comments were a veiled critique of U.S. President Trump.
--
IN A DARKENING WORLD, IT'S TIME
FOR CANADA TO MOVE BEYOND FEAR
Globe and Mail Editorial
May 24th, 2017
“How should our country position itself in this anxious age?
The world has changed fundamentally since Canada’s internationalist heyday under Lester B. Pearson. Much of it is a mess: the Middle East, obviously, but also Europe, as it struggles with mass migration and right-wing extremism. …
Meanwhile, globalization has prompted economic changes that eliminate or downgrade the jobs of many workers. … If we build sets of alliances among a wider group of states and other global actors to promote carefully considered and well-targeted objectives, Canada can be one of a handful of countries that helps to steer the world through a deeply troubling period. To do so, we must take current anxieties seriously, and open up our political and economic deliberations to those who have rightly felt excluded from the benefits of globalization.”
*****
WISDOM OF THE WEEK
From the Bruderhof and Sojourners Online:
Charity is the live wire along which the power of God, indwelling
our finite spirits, can and does act on other souls and other things,
rescuing, healing, giving support and light.
- Evelyn Underhill
--
The goal of fasting is inner unity. This means hearing, but not with
the ear; hearing, but not with the understanding; it is hearing with
the spirit, with your whole being.
- Thomas Merton
--
Christianity is a life, not a doctrine ... I'm not saying never doubt or question. The Lord gave you a mind so that you would make honest use of it. I'm saying you must be sure that the doubts and questions are your own.
- Marilynne Robinson
--
If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor,
either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are,
or we've got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor
and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just
don't want to do it.
- Stephen Colbert
--
Fling wide your doors; give your wealth free passage everywhere!
As a great river flows by a thousand channels through fertile country,
so let your wealth run through many conduits to the homes of the poor.
Wells that are drawn from flow the better; left unused, they go foul.… Money kept standing idle is worthless; but moving and changing
hands it benefits the community and brings increase.
- Basil of Caesarea
--
How often we children have been unwilling: unwilling to listen to each other,unwilling to hear words we do not expect. But on that first Pentecost the Holy Spirit truly called people together in understanding and forgiveness and utter, wondrous joy. The early Christians, then, were known by how they loved one another. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if people could say that of us again? Not an exclusive love, shutting out the rest of the world, but love so powerful, so brilliant, so aflame that it lights the entire planet – nay, the entire universe!
- Madeleine L’Engle
--
It is striking how the earliest Christians, like mainstream rabbis of the period, clung to the twin doctrines of creation and judgment:
God made the world and made it good, and one day he will come and sort it all out. Take away the goodness of creation, and you have a judgment where the world is thrown away as so much garbage, leaving us sitting on a disembodied cloud playing disembodied harps. Take away judgment, and you have this world rumbling on with no hope except the pantheist one of endless cycles of being and history.
Put creation and judgment together, and you get new heavens and new earth, created not ex nihilo but ex vetere, not out of nothing but out of the old one, the existing one.
- N. T. Wright
--
We should be as our Lord told us: “You should be like those who at all
times watch and wait for their Lord” (Luke 12:36). Truly, such vigilant
people are alert and on the watch for the Lord for whom they wait; they
look to see if he is not by chance concealed in what befalls them,
however strange it may be to them. So we too should consciously look
out for our Lord in all things. This demands much effort, and must cost
us all that our senses and faculties are capable of. But this is the right
thing for us to do, so that we grasp God in the same way in all things
and find him equally everywhere.
- Meister Eckhart
***
MOMENT IN TIME
Globe and Mail
May 26th, 2017
Oil discovered in the Middle East
May 26, 1908: London mining magnate William Knox D’Arcy was running out of money and patience, and had sent a telegram to halt the seven-year search for crude in the Persian desert. But at the 11th hour, a gusher from the wooden derrick at Masjid-i-Suleiman spurted oil 15 metres high – setting off the oil age in the Middle East and later establishing Iran as a global petroleum power. Right away, the find created the Anglo-Persian Oil Co., a precursor to BP, and powered the Royal Navy’s transition to oil from coal as Europe descended into war. The battle for control of the resource would eventually motivate U.K. and U.S. meddling in Iran, helping to sow the seeds of the 1979 Revolution. But that May morning, after enduring disease outbreaks, clashes with bandits and warlords, and temperatures that soared above 50 C, workers took off their hats and rubbed oil over their faces to revel in their fossil-fuel prize. – Kelly Cryderman
--
ON THIS DAY
From the Archives of the New York Times:
"Jawaharlal Nehru, First Prime Minister of Modern India, Dies"
http://tinyurl.com/lrqs6h3
*****
CLOSING THOUGHT - Jane Bowdler
Some good we all can do; and if we do all that is in our power,
however little that power may be, we have performed our part, and
may be as near perfection as those whose influences extends over
kingdoms, and whose good actions are felt and applauded by thousands.
(end)
*****
For Those Interested -
ST.DAVID'S SPIRITUAL TRAVELERS EVENT, 2017
South Africa has been chosen as our destination!
We plan a nineteen-day tour that combines a focus
on spirituality, social justice, culture, and nature,
and it will run October 21st thru November 8th.
A beautiful brochure with trip cost, itinerary, and
many helpful travel hints has been published.
http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Our optimal group size for maximum trip meaning
and value is 28-29 persons.
To date, twenty-six persons have put down deposits
to claim a special saving.
WE ARE CLOSE TO REACHING OUR DEPARTURE GOAL.
YOU CAN STILL REGISTER. After we have 29 deposits
you will be added to a waiting list and still join us
in the event someone has to drop out.
We have installed a South Africa Spiritual Travelers
discussion list group to begin building community
amongst the participants, and to share news and
resources.
We hope to name a tour reporter who will report
back home each day's activities so everyone can
enjoy the experience, if not directly, then indirectly.
Six months from now we leave for South Africa!
Contact Rostad Tours: http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Follow these notices for weekly updates.
*****
Vol. XII No. 33
GLOBAL AND ECUMENICAL IN SCOPE
CANADIAN IN PERSPECTIVE
Wayne A. Holst, Editor
My E-Mail Address:
waholst@telus.net
Colleagues List Web Site
http//colleagueslist2.bogspot.com
*****
Dear Friends:
This week's Special Item is a book about science and spirituality.
Because I am not ready to evaluate the book, I am cheating a bit by including a review from the Amazon.ca website.
I hope you deem it helpful - as I hope you will find other parts
of this weekly letter to you.
Hopefully, next week, I will be a better steward of my time.
Wayne
*****
SPECIAL ITEM
Book Notice -
A GOD THAT COULD BE REAL:
Spirituality, Science and the
Future of Our Planet,
by Nancy Ellen Abrams
Beacon Press. Paperback. 2016.
200 pages. $19.82 CAD.
ISBN # 978-0807073391.
Publisher's Promo:
A paradigm-shifting blend of science, religion, and philosophy for agnostic, spiritual-but-not-religious, and scientifically minded readers
Many people are fed up with the way traditional religion alienates them: too easily it can perpetuate conflict, vilify science, and undermine reason. Nancy Abrams, a philosopher of science, lawyer, and lifelong atheist, is among them. And yet, when she turned to the recovery community to face a personal struggle, she found that imagining a higher power gave her a new freedom. Intellectually, this was quite surprising.
Meanwhile her husband, famed astrophysicist Joel Primack, was helping create a new theory of the universe based on dark matter and dark energy, and Abrams was collaborating with him on two books that put the new scientific picture into a social and political context. She wondered, “Could anything actually exist in this strange new universe that is worthy of the name ‘God?’”
In A God That Could Be Real, Abrams explores a radically new way of thinking about God. She dismantles several common assumptions about God and shows why an omniscient, omnipotent God that created the universe and plans what happens is incompatible with science—but that this doesn’t preclude a God that can comfort and empower us.
Moving away from traditional arguments for God, Abrams finds something worthy of the name “God” in the new science of emergence: just as a complex ant hill emerges from the collective behavior of individually clueless ants, and just as the global economy emerges from the interactions of billions of individuals’ choices, God, she argues, is an “emergent phenomenon” that arises from the staggering complexity of humanity’s collective aspirations and is in dialogue with every individual. This God did not create the universe—it created the meaning of the universe. It’s not universal—it’s planetary. It can’t change the world, but it helps us change the world. A God that could be real, Abrams shows us, is what humanity needs to inspire us to collectively cooperate to protect our warming planet and create a long-term civilization.
--
Author's Bio:
Nancy Ellen Abrams is coauthor with Joel R. Primack, of The View from the Center of the Universe and The New Universe and the Human Future.
--
My Thoughts:
I have decided not to add my thoughts about this book because of
time constraints this week, and also because I do not feel adequate at this point to give it an honest appraisal.
However, a scientist-friend suggested I consider the book, and I plan to do so. In the meantime, I am offering a review made available on the
Amazon.ca website and hope you might consider it, since Bishop Desmond Tutu lends his support at the end of this selection.
--
Reviewed on the Amazon.ca site by "the Dean Family" -
This is a difficult book to review. It is also a hard book to get through.
The subject matter is both lofty and dense. If you are going to do more
than skim it, you will probably have to read parts, put it aside, chew on it, and then return for another session. And if it is difficult to read and review,
I can only imagine how terrifically much harder it must have been to write! For the effort alone, I would give it four stars. What a task to take on: to set out not only to define what God is, based on (the author's grasp of) the most recent scientific understanding of the nature of the universe -- and then to infuse this with her personal experience of a Higher Power encountered through her 12-Step program!
I found this read (and find, since I am not finished with it) to be stimulating, exasperating, disturbing, overwhelming, inspirational, headache-making, breakthrough, bewildering and finally (even grudgingly), elucidating.
I will say first, in case I lose you along the way, if you are serious in your contemplation of the nature of God, you will want to read Nancy Abrams' book.
To begin, it helps to look at the roots on which the book grew. There are many, but four I find fundamental to understanding:
One: Nancy Abrams is the wife of cosmologist Joel Primack, one of the
promulgators of the theory that our universe is not composed primarily of atoms, as you and I were taught, but instead, of invisible and mysterious "cold dark matter" and "dark energy." Together, these two form the "double dark" theory, that, according to Nancy, are "the foundation of the modern picture of the universe." Her idea of God had to fit, first and foremost, with that and the current take on the laws of physics and thermodynamics.
Two: when Nancy was 15, she told her rabbi, "God didn't create us; we
created God." While she explains how she came to refine that immature
idea, nevertheless, that the seed grew into her ultimate theory.
Three: Ms. Abrams was a successful intellectual, lawyer, and philosopher. Yet she developed an eating disorder that eventually drove her to a 12-Step Program (which, you may know, began when two alcoholics banded together in their attempt to remain sober. It was part of the Christian temperance movement of the 20th Century, and grew into a worldwide spiritual program of recovery for addicts of many kinds). Nancy believes that her Higher Power, or God, has a reality outside herself. God is not merely a projection, as many philosophers and theologians have said, of the better part of human nature. Nancy found a God who, unlike the title of her book, not only "Could Be Real" but Is.
The fourth key to Ms. Abrams' concept of God is the Theory (or phenomenon) of "emergence." Cells have individual life, but when billions are gathered together in a certain form, what emerges is greater than the sum of the parts: it is (or can be) a human being. Humans themselves have individual life, but when millions focus their efforts in certain ways, other realities emerge. One might be called "the stock market," which exists and has definite rules and characteristics. Another is "the media," and so on.
Therefore, Ms. Abrams tells us, God is an emergent phenomenon. He (or it) is not the omnipotent, omnipresent Creator of all things that many religions claim. Instead, she says, God is an emergent reality from humanity. However, God is not just a projection. God is a reality humans can know, pray to, hear, and embrace. Millions upon millions of the world's inhabitants would reject Nancy Abrams' version of God, of course. In some cultures today, she could be executed for blasphemy.
In more tolerant, reasonable systems, she would still be branded a heretic, or dismissed as a kook. The first possibility is a lot of what is wrong with our world today - a narrow and violent view of existence that would return humanity to some new version of the Dark Ages. Even the last two would do this deep thinker a disservice. I have thought about the nature of God and reality a lot in my life, but I approach the spiritual being and force that powers a universe with more of a sense of humility and awe, and the sense that the tiny human speck of awareness I am should not and cannot define a God within and behind all things. I am forced to admit, I have never approached the idea of God with Ms. Abrams' rigor, or depth of research.
Reading her book has required me to question everything I held true about both science and God. I am not saying in the end that I agree with all or even most of what the author is so boldly willing to declare.
I stand with Desmond Tutu, who wrote one of the forewords to her book. "I do not agree with everything that Nancy Abrams says about the scientific understanding of God," the Archbishop writes. But "..The God I believe in...wants us to keep learning and discovering and exploring every inch...of creation.... This book will help you clarify your own personal understanding of God.... I recommend it highly to all, religious or secular, believer or atheist, who are ready to explore honestly their understanding of the divine in our beautiful, expanding universe."
Amen, brother Tutu. And bravo, Nancy Abrams.
____
Buy the book from Amazon.ca:
http://tinyurl.com/m7gxvjw
*****
COLLEAGUE CONTRIBUTIONS
Rob Fennell,
Halifax, NS
May 13th, 2017
Wayne:
Please announce this event on Colleagues List. Thanks.
Rob
"God and Godly Consequences"
A theological Symposium presented by Touchstone Journal
1:00-5:00 p.m.
June 1st, 2017
St. Andrew's United Church
117 Bloor Street East, Toronto
Free of charge
Touchstone invites you to a rousing symposium focusing
on the theme of the doctrine of God and the implications
of that doctrine (e.g. providence, theodicy, prayer).
Who is this God of whom we speak?
Is this God active in the world – and how?
All are welcome to attend! Laypersons, ministry personnel,
academics, and students will all find this to be a congenial
and stimulating afternoon of presentations and conversation.
There is no admission fee, but we would be grateful to know
if you plan to attend so that our preparations for snacks and
seating will be suitable.
To register for the symposium as an attendee, please email
Rob Fennell at rfennell@astheology.ns.ca
For more information and to see the symposium paper titles
and schedule, go to: http://touchstonecanada.ca
--
Angus Reid,
Vancouver, BC
Angus Reid Institute Surveys
May 17th, 2017
" Most Canadians Say Spirituality is Significant in Their Lives,
Half Say Religion Important in Helping Them Make Life Decisions"
http://tinyurl.com/lasdyvn
--
Lorna Dueck,
Toronto, ON
Context Newsletter
May 12th, 2017
"Changing Our Relationship With Housing"
http://tinyurl.com/k23pco9
--
Martin Marty,
Chicago, IL.
Sightings,
May 15th, 2017
"Taking the Unitarian-Universalist
Diversity Crisis Seriously"
http://tinyurl.com/l39lq5a
--
Jim Taylor,
Okanagan, BC
Personal Web Log,
May 17th, 20127
"Don't Know, Know, Don't Need to Know"
http://tinyurl.com/kydnumz
--
Ron Rolheiser,
San Antonio,TX
Personal Web Site,
May 15th, 2017
"Coming Full Circle -
From Storybooks to Spirituality"
http://tinyurl.com/kw59yvt
*****
NET NOTES
THE CHANGING FACE OF CANADA
From 150 Years Ago Until Today
Global News.ca
May 15th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/lm7mtm4
--
LUTHER'S CONTRIBUTION TO LITERACY
At the 500th Reformation Anniversary
Religion News Service,
May 16th, 2017
https://tinyurl.com/l96f3bu
--
HALF OF BRITISH POPULATION
CLAIMS NO RELIGION
A Quarter of Those
Raised in Church Have Left It
The Guardian,
May 14th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/lvrkm5y
--
MANY CONSERVATIVE U.S.
EVANGELICALS LOVE TRUMP
Why? It's the Prosperity Gospel
He Represents
The Economist,
May 17th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/m4copeq
"Black Clergy Decry Trump Policies"
Religion News Service
May 15th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/k7hmsfz
--
FIVE IMPORTANT WAYS
EVANGELISM IS SHIFTNG
In Our Post-Christian World
Christian Week Online
May 15th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kr2caae
--
ANTI-CHRISTIAN VIOLENCE
ON THE RISE IN INDIA
Religious Nationalism a Caustic Mix
UCA News
May 18th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/n7xkmk3
--
DANCING FOR FERTILITY
IN THE NORTHERN PHILIPPINES
Spiritual Devotees Seek Offspring
Religion News Service,
May 17th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mztqtdm
--
REFORMATION ANNIVERSARY
A CALL TO ECUMENISM IN KOREA
Korea's Churches are Challenged
to Work Together More Closely
UCA News,
May 19th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/n48x36j
--
EVEN IN CANADA CONSERVATIVE
CHURCHES ARE GROWING
This is Also True for Mainline Churches
With Evangelical Theology
Christianity Today,
April 21st, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/md7fhot
--
OP-EDITORIAL COMMENT ON RACISM IN CANADA
Look twice before judging an Indigenous person
Globe and Mail, May19th, 2017
“Everything we think we know is contained in the stories we tell ourselves. The paradigm we occupy, our reality, is merely the confluence of multiple histories. One of those stories is the lazy, dirty, drunken Indian story. It has been around since first contact. We were told it during the colonial period. It was repeated to us during the residential-school era and is repeated today in the media. … The story doesn’t just impact non-aboriginal people."
"It is heard and understood by aboriginal peoples as well. It affects how we see the world. … I have to challenge myself over and over again in order to see what is actually in front of my face. Anyone who claims not to be racist – who doesn’t check their stories with every encounter – fails themselves as well as others. We owe it to ourselves to look twice. It’s a matter of respect.”
– Harold Johnson, Indigenous lawyer and writer
*****
WISDOM OF THE WEEK
From the Bruderhof Online
Motherhood is not only biological maternity. It is spiritual maternity.
There are hundreds of people all around who are desperately looking
for a mother. A number of people have come to me to tell me about
their problems. I listen to them. And I love them. And I say very little.
But they know that I care for them. In this sense,
I have become their mother.
- Alice von Hildebrand
--
Worry about making a living, or not making a living, is a snare.
In actuality, it is the snare. No external power, no actual circumstance,
can trap a person. If we choose to be our own providence, then we will
go quite ingenuously into our own trap, the wealthy as well as the poor.
If we want to entrench ourselves in our own plot of ground that is not
under God’s care, then we are living, though we do not acknowledge
it, in a prison
- Søren Kierkegaard
--
Without your wounds where would your power be?…The very angels
themselves cannot persuade the wretched and blundering children on
earth as can one human being broken on the wheels of living. In love’s
service, only the wounded soldiers can serve.
- Thornton Wilder
--
There once was a time when Thoreau wrote, “I have great faith in a seed. Convince me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders.”
By the power vested in everything living, let us keep to that faith. I’m a scientist who thinks it wise to enter the doors of creation not with a lion tamer’s whip and chair, but with the reverence humankind has
traditionally summoned for entering places of worship: a temple, a mosque, or a cathedral. A sacred grove, as ancient as time.
- Barbara Kingsolver
--
Many believe that they need company at any cost, and certainly if a thing is desired at any cost, it will be obtained at all costs. We need to remember and to teach our children that solitude can be a much-to-be-desired condition.
Not only is it acceptable to be alone, at times it is positively to be wished for. It is in the interludes between being in company that we talk to ourselves. In the silence we listen to ourselves. Then we ask questions of ourselves. We describe ourselves, and in the quietude we may even hear the voice of God.
- Maya Angelou
--
Jesus gave us a new norm of greatness. If you want to be important, wonderful. If you want to be recognized, wonderful. If you want to be great, wonderful. But recognize that he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. That’s your new definition of greatness. And this morning, the thing that I like about it, by giving that definition of greatness, it means that everybody can be great.
Because everybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don’t have to know Einstein’s theory of relativity to serve. You don’t have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.
And you can be that servant.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
*****
MOMENT IN TIME
Globe and Mail,
May 15th, 2017
Jefferson Davis heads to Montreal
May 15, 1867: Jefferson Davis served as president of the Confederate
States of America from 1861 to 1865, until the collapse of the confederacy with the end of the Civil War. Captured by Northern troops, he was jailed for two years in Fort Monroe in Virginia, then released in mid-May, 1867, after posting bail of $100,000 (U.S.). He travelled by steamer to New York, then headed to Montreal, where his family was living.
Canada had welcomed many Confederate supporters, and Davis was
treated as a celebrity, despite his association with slavery and the disastrous effort to make the U.S. South independent. The Globe described Davis as “the redoubtable chieftain of the late rebellion,” but also decried his “violent arrogance.” Black Americans, who Davis had “wished to consign to perpetual bondage,” now stood on a “better political footing than he and his active coadjutors in the rebellion,” the paper noted. Richard Blackwell
*****
ON THIS DAY
"T.E. Lawrence - Lawrence of Arabia Dies in England"
https://tinyurl.com/oxpxnca
"Israel Declares Itself an Independent State In Palestine"
http://tinyurl.com/a4eqxjm
*****
CLOSING THOUGHT - Lynn Nottage
"Replace judgment with curiosity"
*****
For Those Interested -
ST.DAVID'S SPIRITUAL TRAVELERS EVENT, 2017
South Africa has been chosen as our destination!
We plan a nineteen-day tour that combines a focus
on spirituality, social justice, culture, and nature,
and it will run October 21st thru November 8th.
A beautiful brochure with trip cost, itinerary, and
many helpful travel hints has been published.
http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Our optimal group size for maximum trip meaning
and value is 28-29 persons.
To date, twenty-six persons have put down deposits
to claim a special saving.
WE ARE CLOSE TO REACHING OUR DEPARTURE GOAL.
YOU CAN STILL REGISTER. After we have 29 deposits
you will be added to a waiting list and still join us
in the event someone has to drop out.
We have installed a South Africa Spiritual Travelers
discussion list group to begin building community
amongst the participants, and to share news and
resources.
We hope to name a tour reporter who will report
back home each day's activities so everyone can
enjoy the experience, if not directly, then indirectly.
Six months from now we leave for South Africa!
Contact Rostad Tours: http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Follow these notices for weekly updates.
*****
Vol. XII No. 32
GLOBAL AND ECUMENICAL IN SCOPE
CANADIAN IN PERSPECTIVE
Wayne A. Holst, Editor
My E-Mail Address:
waholst@telus.net
Colleagues List Web Site
http//colleagueslist2.bogspot.com
*****
Dear Friends
Welcome to the latest issue of Colleagues List!
I hope you will enjoy and benefit from at least
some of the items of this issue.
My Special Item this week is a book notice from
colleague Richard Rohr, whose latest book is
The Divine Dance. Thanks, Richard!
The Colleague Contributions are quite interesting.
I spent some time locating what I hope are helpful
Net Notes, Wisdom of the Week, Moment in Time,
and On This Day selections.
Please feel free to share your thoughts with me,
and send me your suggestions for future issues.
I hope you have a good week.
Wayne
*****
SPECIAL ITEM
Book Notice for -
THE DIVINE DANCE:
The Trinity and Your Transformation
by Richard Rohr and Mike Morrell.
Whitaker House (2016) Hardcover.
220 pages. $29.46 CAD
ISBN #10: 1629117293
Trinity is supposed to be the central, foundational doctrine of our
entire Christian belief system, yet we're often told that we shouldn't attempt to understand it because it is a "mystery".
Should we presume to try to breach this mystery?
If we could, how would it transform our relationship with God and
renew our lives? The word Trinity is not found in the New Testament
- it wasn't until the third century that early Christian father Tertullian
coined it - but the idea of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit was present in
Jesus' life and teachings and from the very beginning of the Christian
experience. In the pages of this book, internationally recognized teacher Richard Rohr circles around this most paradoxical idea as he explores the nature of God - circling around being an apt metaphor for this mystery we're trying to apprehend. Early Christians who came to be known as the "Desert Mothers and Fathers" applied the Greek verb perichoresis to the mystery of the Trinity.
The best translation of this odd-sounding word is dancing.
Our word choreography comes from the same root. Although these early Christians gave us some highly conceptualized thinking on the life of the Trinity, the best they could say, again and again, was, Whatever is going on in God is a flow - it's like a dance. But God is not a dancer - He is the dance itself.
That idea might sound novel, but it is about as traditional as you can get. God is the dance itself, and He invites you to be a part of that dance. Are you ready to join in?
About the Author
Fr. Richard Rohr is a globally recognized teacher and the founder of the
Center for Action and Contemplation (CAC.org) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. His teaching is grounded in the Franciscan alternative orthodox practices of contemplation and self–emptying, expressing themselves in radical compassion, particularly for the socially marginalized. He is also the academic dean of the Living School for Action and Contemplation.
Drawing upon Christianity's place within the Perennial Tradition, the
mission of the Living School is to produce compassionate and powerful learned individuals who will work for positive change in the world based on awareness of our common union with God and all created beings.
Fr. Richard is the author of numerous books, including Everything Belongs, Adam's Return, The Naked Now, Breathing Under Water, Falling Upward, Immortal Diamond, and Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi.
--
My Thoughts:
As secularization continues to strongly influence our political, social
and religious ethos in Canada, people of faith need to work hard at
finding new language, imagery and experiences to help us grow in that
faith. Many of the classic teachings need to be expressed in ways that can be understood by people today. Otherwise they are lost to them.
The Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity - Father, Son and Holy Spirit - is a case in point. I, for example, was formed spiritually in an environment where I regularly confessed my faith using the words of the ecumenical creeds (Nicene and Apostles). But as time and experience evolved for me, some of the hard-fought meanings in those words were lost to me - a situation I know very well. Probably you do too.
I began to learn from a notable Canadian philosopher like Charles Taylor of McGill, that a secular age prompts us to formulate new thoughts, models and expressions to help us live the classic Christian way in circumstances very different from the times when those traditional faith formulations were developed. God is very much a part of modernity, says Taylor, but we need to be creative in how we discover God today.
For one attempt to describe the development of the Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity click: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity
--
A helpful mentor and model for our quest for renewed meaning is the
author and our colleague Richard Rohr, an articulate and much-published Franciscan living in Arizona. His recent book The Divine Dance: The Trinity and Your Transformation is a case in point.
Here is a book infused with the kind of new awareness we very much need.
Choreography, rather than rational dogma, is a better way of describing the Trinity - the source of a well-lived Christian life, says Rohr, who seeks to liberate our understanding of the classic faith while remaining orthodox and true to it.
A helpful way to read Rohr is to note the paradoxes to which he alludes.
He links reason and mystery, action and contemplation, faith and real life - by transcending the meaning of both. His thoughts are clear-headed, provocative, inspiring, challenging and infused with the spirit.
Many years ago, as a graduate student in Europe, I first encountered
a hymn that had just emerged. It was entitled: Lord of the Dance.
Do you remember it? Rohr's book enhances that hymn with new meaning and value for me as I sing it to myself now.
I think that reading The Divine Dance, might do the same for you.
--
Buy the book from Amazon.ca:
http://tinyurl.com/ky2bmat
*****
COLLEAGUE CONTRIBUTIONS
Jim Taylor,
Okanagan, BC
Personal Web Log
May 7th, 2017
"Who Decides What a Life is Worth?"
http://tinyurl.com/kzgnblz
--
Martin Marty,
Chicago, IL
Sightings
May 8th, 2017
"How Life Should End "
http://tinyurl.com/n52jabp
--
Ron Rolheiser,
San Antonio, TX
Personal Web Site
May 8th, 2017
"Despair as Weakness Rather Than Sin"
http://tinyurl.com/l7zvd32
In addition -
A note from colleague Harry Winter about
a special honour for colleague Ron Rolheiser:
May 8th, 2017
Wayne
Ron Rolheiser's column "500 Years of Misunderstanding,"
(Colleagues List April 23rd, 2017) got a lot of attention:
http://tinyurl.com/kc437op
I received it from our regional councilor for North America,
Warren Brown, OMI, a few days before you posted it.
It's great the Catholic Theological Union (Chicago) is honoring
Ron with an honorary doctorate (see link below).
Harry
Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate - United States Province http://tinyurl.com/lgvlyne
*****
NET NOTES
IN SEARCH OF RACHEL
The Tangled Reality of the Holy Land -
Israel and the Occupied Territories Today
United Church Observer,
May, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/k9jghvf
--
MISSING AT MOTHER'S DAY WORSHIP
Women Wishing to be Moms
Religion News Service
May 11th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mceqkkd
--
WILL THERE BE A NEXT BILLY GRAHAM?
At 98, Famous Evangelist Lacks a Successor
The Charotte Observer,
May 10th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kyfbbjz
--
A MONUMENT TO JESUS IN THE CITY OF MAO
Majority of Citizens Seem Unconcerned About It
New York Times,
May 7th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/l7acbyy
--
IS AN OPEN MARRIAGE A HAPPIER MARRIAGE?
What We Learn About Jealousy, Love, Desire, Trust.
New York Times Magazine
May 11th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mw8vf3g
--
WHY GOD MAY NOT BE CAUSING YOUR SUFFERING
God May Just be There With You in It
Christian Week Online
May 9th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/mdoe3e5
--
ANTI-SEMITIC INCIDENTS IN CANADA
SET RECORD DURING 2016
Study Sees Racial Hatred Growing
The Jerusalem Post,
May 10th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/makytxd
--
INDONESIAN CHRISTIAN GOVERNOR SENTENCED
TO TWO YEARS FOR BLASPHEMING QU'RAN
Ruling Challenges Reputation as Moderate Islamic State
America Magazine,
May 9th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kjy8492
--
WHEATON COLLEGE WOULD LIKE TO BELIEVE
LGBTQ STUDENTS DO NOT EXIST THERE
School In Denial; Gay Keeps Cropping Up
Religion Dispatches,
May 11th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/maxleza
--
WHY THE 1980s "ANNE OF GREEN GABLES"
IS SUCH A HARD ACT TO FOLLOW
How Anne Shaped a Generation of Young Women
Vanity Fair,
May 10th, 2017
http://tinyurl.com/kwrkeht
*****
WISDOM OF THE WEEK
From the Bruderhof and Sojourners Online:
Peace is not the product of terror or fear. Peace is not the silence
of cemeteries. Peace is not the silent result of violent repression.
Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all.
Peace is dynamism. Peace is generosity. It is right and it is duty.
- Archbishop Oscar Romero
--
I was called a terrorist yesterday, but when I came out of jail,
many people embraced me, including my enemies, and that is
what I normally tell other people who say those who are struggling
for liberation in their country are terrorists. I tell them that I was
also a terrorist yesterday, but, today, I am admired by the very
people who said I was one.
- President Nelson Mandela
--
... the harm that you do to others if the harm that you do to yourself.
And you cannot think, then, that you can cause wars in other parts of
the world and destroy people and drone them, without this having a
terrible impact on your own soul and your own consciousness.
- Alice Walker
--
When faith and hope fail, as they do sometimes, we must try charity,
which is love in action. We must speculate no more on our duty, but
simply do it. When we have done it, however blindly, perhaps
Heaven will show us why.
- Dinah Craik
--
Silence is the measure of the power to act; that is, a person never has
more power to act than he has silence. Anyone can understand that to
do something is far greater than to talk about doing it. If, therefore, a
person has a plan or idea and is fully resolved to carry it out, he does
not need to talk about it. What he talks about in connection with the
proposed action is what he is most unsure of and most unwilling to do.
- Søren Kierkegaard
--
A plea on behalf of respect for the here and now, for today: How can
we assure a child’s life in the future if we have not yet learned how to
live consciously and responsibly in the present? Do not trample, hold
in contempt, or sell the future into bondage. Do not stifle it, rush, or
force it. Respect every single moment, as it will pass and will never
again be repeated. After all, when tomorrow finally does arrive, we
start waiting for the next tomorrow
- Janusz Korczak
--
Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt
There remains a precious jewel in every person, which is stronger
than any outward pressure in their lives. It remains inviolable,
even in those who feel that they are lost in their rottenness.
No matter how badly they have ruined their lives, this jewel remains
in them; it is as certain as that God was reconciling the world to
himself in Jesus Christ.
There is something in each person that will never be lost, something that can always be resurrected. That is the gospel.
*****
MOMENT IN TIME
From the Globe and Mail,, May 12th, 2017
Archeologists unearth ruins of Alexandria library
May 12, 2004: Stories of the destruction of the ancient library of Alexandria are as much myth as history. The library – established in 288 BC by Ptolemy I – had the ambitious goal of containing all the world’s knowledge.
Historians believe it housed half a million scrolls and hosted 100 scholars at a time, including Euclid of geometry fame. On this date(2004), archeologists announced they had discovered its ruins (a modern incarnation of the great library now stands close to the site). The team excavated 13 lecture halls reported to hold as many as 5,000 students. But they still don’t know how the library disappeared.
Were the scrolls burnt by Julius Caesar? Were they destroyed by Christian mobs? Did the Muslim Caliph Omar use them as tinder for the city’s bathhouses?
Whoever the culprit, the loss of the library’s scrolls came to symbolize the destruction of knowledge. – Jessica Caparini
--
ON THIS DAY
From the Archives of the New York Times
Nelson Mandela Elected First Black President of South Africa
The Era of Apartheid is Over
http://tinyurl.com/n57cbar
*****
CLOSING THOUGHT - Lan Samantha Chang
For it is through humility ... that holiness - and poetry -
find entrance to the human soul.
(end)
*****
For Those Interested -
ST.DAVID'S SPIRITUAL TRAVELERS EVENT, 2017
South Africa has been chosen as our destination!
We plan a nineteen-day tour that combines a focus
on spirituality, social justice, culture, and nature,
and it will run October 21st thru November 8th.
A beautiful brochure with trip cost, itinerary, and
many helpful travel hints has been published.
http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Our optimal group size for maximum trip meaning
and value is 28-29 persons.
To date, twenty-six persons have put down deposits
to claim a special saving.
WE ARE CLOSE TO REACHING OUR DEPARTURE GOAL.
YOU CAN STILL REGISTER. After we have 29 deposits
you will be added to a waiting list and still join us
in the event someone has to drop out.
We have installed a South Africa Spiritual Travelers
discussion list group to begin building community
amongst the participants, and to share news and
resources.
We hope to name a tour reporter who will report
back home each day's activities so everyone can
enjoy the experience, if not directly, then indirectly.
Six months from now we leave for South Africa!
Contact Rostad Tours: http://tinyurl.com/hucsaf7
Follow these notices for weekly updates.
*****
