Glenstal intercommunion ban – Leading US magazine asks is the Catholic church really serious about unity; New Church Army evangelists commissioned; New live album from Keith and Kristyn Getty; Stormont backs motion criticising Parades Commission
Leading US magazine asks is the Catholic church really serious about unity.
Robert McClory writes in National Catholic Reporter – NCR ran a story last week about an ecumenical group in Ireland that sought to have an intercommunion Eucharist service to celebrate the organization’s 50th anniversary. But Dermot Clifford, the archbishop of the local Catholic diocese, Cashel and Emly, told the Glenstal Ecumenical Conference, “I do not have the authority to grant the request you made.”
So Fr. Mark Patrick Hederman, the abbot of the Glenstal Abbey, where the group meets, approached Ireland’s apostolic nuncio, but the nuncio said he agreed with the bishop’s blunt response. Next, the abbot appealed to the secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in Rome, who also concurred with the bishop but recommended the Glenstal conference appeal again to the Cashel and Emly bishop. This the abbot did, only to get the same answer as before.
As I read this story, my question was: Why didn’t the Glenstal folks go ahead and have their intercommunion service without all this appealing and reappealing to the hierarchy? After all, we are told, this determined ecumenical body, which consists of Roman Catholics, Church of Ireland members, Methodists and Presbyterians, had, in fact, celebrated an intercommunion service once before in 1985 with the blessing of the Cashel and Emly bishop at that time. He had given permission for a shared Eucharist based on a text of belief agreed on by all the participants. So it seemed to me there was something like a precedent here for this long-standing, responsible organization to proceed.
But the story revealed that the abbot intentionally got the hierarchy involved because the organizers “wanted to rattle the bars and test the boundaries and at least find out what the official position was about Eucharistic-sharing.”
They found out.
On the surface, the conference members reacted with a stiff upper lip. Abbot Hederman declined to criticize the hierarchy’s blunt reactions. He even praised Clifford for being “very good friend to this community for the 25 years he has been Archbishop of our diocese.” However, there was evidence that not everyone was at ease. Following a “lengthy debate,” the Glenstal community decided the yearly conference will not be held in 2014 so members could reflect on the conference’s relevance and role in Ireland’s multicultural and increasingly secularized society. Some worried a year off could lead to the disintegration of the Glenstal conference itself and its half-century of ecumenical effort. In the end, this story raises for me three questions, the first of which Hederman asked after the discussion concluded: Is the Roman Catholic church really serious about church unity?
How long is it going to take for large numbers of small interfaith communities to follow the movement of the Spirit and act on their own initiative in good conscience?
When will theologians (and some bishops, perhaps) speak up about the right of church members to state their dissent and disagreement with certain church restrictions and teachings and even support instances of Holy Disobedience when they see them?
New Church Army evangelists commissioned
Four new evangelists including one from Northern Ireland are celebrating after being admitted and commissioned from Church Army’s Mission-Based Training Course.
Gordon Lamb, Karen Webb, Dawn Hudson and Nicholas Lebey have successfully completed the four-year course, which is made up of academic study and practical placements. This has led to them being awarded a Foundation Degree in Evangelism by York St John University, which is approved by the Church of England Ministry Division.
More than 170 people gathered at the Wilson Carlile Centre in Sheffield for the occasion, including a service led by the Bishop of Chelmsford and Church Army’s Chair, Stephen Cottrell and Church Army Chief Executive, Mark Russell.
When asked about her Mission-Based Training highlights, Dawn, who’s been based at the Warwick Gates Centre of Mission, said: “One of my most memorable moments has to be leading someone to faith in a mobile phone shop! Also, as part of the Pentecost Celebration in the town centre of Leamington Spa, I was handed a microphone and asked to preach and share my testimony in the open air.
“It was perhaps one of the most exciting and scary things I’ve done. But as I was speaking I could see that the words God was giving me were connecting with people. It was brilliant!”
Nicholas Lebey, who has been working with non-churched young people as part of the Sorted Project at the Bradford Centre of Mission, said: “It has been a privilege seeing so many young people coming to faith, being baptised and then going on to serve in the Sorted church as young leaders.
“A special time that stands out was when I took 12 young people on a retreat to Ingleton in the Yorkshire Dales. One of the days we walked up a nearby hill and when we reached the top we stopped and spent some time looking at Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. It was a really amazing time.”
The four new evangelists will now begin their first posts. Gordon will be based at Trinity Churches in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, Karen will continue to work at the Lisburn Centre of Mission in Northern Ireland, Dawn will work as a Pioneer Evangelist in Sheffield with a focus on people experiencing mental illness and Nicholas will join the team at the Greenwich Centre of Mission in London.
New live album from Keith and Kristyn Getty
Getty Music has announced the release of the first live album from Keith and Kristyn Getty, which was recorded at The Gospel Coalition in Orlando, Florida, this past spring.
Keith and Kristyn Getty Live at The Gospel Coalition is produced by Ed Cash and features 13 previously-released songs that are heard live on a recording for the first time, along with a new tune, Lift High the Name of Jesus (co-written by the Gettys and Cash), and some of the Getty’s favorite traditional hymns.
According to a news release, the project will be available at all retail and digital music outlets on September 10, 2013, and will be distributed in North America by Capitol Christian Distribution and elsewhere by Kingsway Music. ”Working with Keith and Kristyn has been one of the great joys of my career,” says Cash. “First and foremost, their songs are packed full of theological truth, but their commitment to musical excellence and great melodies with respect to church tradition is unparalleled. This album is a fabulous collection of songs recorded in a live atmosphere with a real congregation exalting the Almighty. I tend to crave authenticity, especially with live records, and this project is chock-full of it.
“At the same time, the album has a professionalism due to the extremely high caliber nature of the players, and of course the driving excellence of Keith’s piano playing and Kristyn’s voice.”
Keith and Kristyn Getty Live at The Gospel Coalition is comprised of several performances occurring during the 5-day conference that included sermons from such well-known speakers as Tim Keller, Senior Pastor of Redeemer Church in New York City/Author; John Piper, Founder/Teacher of www.desiringGod.org; and Don Carson, Research Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.
Keller adds, “The 2013 Gospel Coalition National Conference blended the spoken Word and the sung Word in an unforgettable way. Substantive expositions of the Biblical text were interwoven with the Gettys’ theologically-rich worship hymns. Together they truly did ‘tune our hearts to sing His grace.'”
The Gettys are in their homeland of Northern Ireland spending time on a songwriting sabbatical and reconnecting with family and friends. When they return to the States in late August, they will begin rehearsals for a fall tour in support of the new project that will run September-November and crisscross the country. For continued updates for Keith and Kristyn Getty please visit online at www.gettymusic.com.
Stormont backs motion criticising Parades Commission
RTE News – The Stormont Assembly has voted in favour of a motion criticising a recent decision by Northern Ireland’s Parades Commission as “lawful but illogical.”
Out of Assembly’s 108 members, 85 participated in the vote on the motion proposed by the DUP and it was carried by a single vote, 43 votes to 42.
The motion was proposed by the DUP, the largest party in the Assembly, and it also had the backing of the Ulster Unionist party.
The Parades Commission had been criticised by unionists after it stipulated that Orange Order bands could not march home past national streets in Ardoyne on 12 July.
A total of 71 police officers were injured in four nights of rioting in Northern Ireland linked to the banning of the contentious parade.
There have been 60 arrests since trouble first flared on Friday night.
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