Bolivian woman visits Beaches to thank those who changed her life

From Florida-

At an age when many children around the world are in kindergarten, 6-year-old Amalia Soliz ran away from home.

It hadn’t been her home for long, but it was unbearable. Her godfather, who was also her guardian, was violent and abusive. Her parents had recently divorced, and her mother had sent her to live with him. Soliz’s five older siblings stayed with their mother, and their father disappeared.

Feeling abandoned and filled with terror, Soliz chose to fend for herself in the streets, a common plight of many children in Bolivia, one of the world’s poorest nations. But police officers soon found her and took her to a state-run orphanage, one of many in the city of Cochabamba, where she lived. That, too, was a horror — an overcrowded place where many babies shared the same crib, with few adults to care for them.

Soliz was shy, and was picked on by the older children, who stole her food. She made one good friend, a girl her age named Claudia, who stuck up for her. Together, they fed the babies and changed their diapers, and were rewarded with crusts of bread.

More here-

http://jacksonville.com/community/shorelines/2012-10-12/story/bolivian-woman-visits-beaches-thank-those-who-changed-her-life

Presiding bishop writes to presidential candidates

From ENS-

Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has written to the presidential candidates, urging President Barack Obama and the Hon. Mitt Romney “to use the debate forum to articulate strong support for a just and peaceful resolution to the Arab-Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as well as a clear plan for how you would work to support that goal in the next four years.”

Dear Mr. President and Governor Romney,
As each of you prepares for the two remaining presidential debates, I write to urge you to use the debate forum to articulate strong support for a just and peaceful resolution to the Arab-Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as well as a clear plan for how you would work to support that goal in the next four years.

While the volatile political nature across the Middle East has emerged as a key theme in this year’s campaign, I am concerned by the relative absence of discussion of a conflict that is central to that region’s future.  This week Palestinian leaders have signaled their willingness to consider a return to the negotiating table, and it will be vital for the next President to prioritize the re-launch of the peace process and to articulate a clear vision for how American diplomatic leadership can assist and encourage negotiations.

More here-

http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2012/10/12/presiding-bishop-writes-to-presidential-candidates/

140 years for the Episcopal Church in DL

From Minnesota-

It’s been 140 years since the Right Rev. Henry H. Whipple, Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Minnesota, established St. Luke’s Church in Detroit Lakes — and the congregation is getting ready to celebrate.

This Thursday, Oct. 18 at 7 p.m., the church will host a special evening prayer service, followed by a reception where the 140th anniversary cake and refreshments will be served. The service is being held in conjunction with the Feast Day of St. Luke, the church’s namesake.

But Thursday’s celebration is just the culmination of months of preparation. New windows were created for the sanctuary and stairwell, courtesy of designer Stacy Asp from Michael Orchard Studios in Fargo.

A new Celtic Cross was also installed on the lawn of the church, recreated by Lund Signs from the original designs composed by members of the St. Luke’s church youth group back in 1996.

The dedication of the new cross and church windows took place in August.

According to Rev. Dana Emery, a member of the church’s Total Ministry Team, “there is an intimate connection between liturgical art and theology,” and the symbolism contained in the designs of the new windows and cross are no exception.

More here-

http://www.dl-online.com/event/article/id/70509/

Wright becomes first African-American Episcopal bishop for Atlanta diocese

From Atlanta-

The Rev. Robert C. Wright will be ordained as the 10th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta in a ceremony Saturday at the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel at Morehouse College.
The ceremony, which begins at 10:30 a.m., will be held at the chapel, 830 Westview Dr. S.W.

Wright, 48, a Howard University and Virginia Theological Seminary graduate, will become the first African-American bishop to lead the diocese, which is among the largest in the world. The Atlanta diocese, which covers middle and north Georgia, has 96 parishes and 56,000 members.

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, will perform the ordination. Former Atlanta mayor Andrew Young will preach during the service, which is expected to draw more than 2,000 people.

“God’s invitation is to draw the circle wide and invite people to into that circle,” said Wright, who has led St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta. “I’m talking about a God that is big and loving and wise and I’m going to talk about that God as often as I can.”

The service is open to the public.

More here-

http://www.ajc.com/news/news/wright-becomes-first-african-american-episcopal-bi/nSb3P/

If not a woman Archbishop, at least an Archbishop for women, please

From The Telegraph-

These days, almost all executive teams or job shortlists will include at least one woman. Amongst the six Metropolitan police commissioners there is one woman; four out of 22 cabinet ministers are female; and even the committee tasked with selecting the new Anglican leader (the Crown Nominations Commission) has ensured that three of the 16 voting individuals are women. Let’s hope this is more than mere tokenism.

Yet the line-up of potential candidates to become the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury at the end of this year comprises of men, men and more men. Nor is this something that’s about to change either; without such thing as a female bishop (the rung below) there won’t be an Arch one any time soon.

The issue of whether to consecrate women bishops has dogged the beleaguered Rowan Williams throughout his tenure and will be lying in wait for his replacement: one of his very first tasks will be managing the fallout from the General Synod’s final vote on the matter in November.

With the reformers poised for victory, it’s fairly certain that the new Archbishop will sooner or later welcome the first lucky lady to join the 99 men in the House of Bishops. The candidate favoured by the progressive churchwoman then, is the one willing to make life as easy as possible for the said ‘bishopess’ when she arrives; the one prepared to overhaul an Episcopal system designed by men for men.

More here-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/9598573/If-not-a-woman-Archbishop-at-least-an-Archbishop-for-women-please.html

‘Contemplation is the answer’ Dr Williams tells RC bishops

From The Church Times-

CONTEMPLATION is not "just one kind of thing that Christians do", the Archbishop of Canterbury said in Rome on Wednesday.

"To put it boldly, contemplation is the only ultimate answer to the unreal and insane world that our financial systems and our advertising culture and our chaotic and unexamined emotions encourage us to inhabit."

Dr Williams was addressing the Synod of Bishops in Rome, at the invitation of Pope Benedict XVI. The Synod's task is to examine a "new evangelisation" in response to the rise in secularism.

Dr Williams suggested that "to be converted to the faith does not mean simply acquiring a new set of beliefs, but becoming a new person - a person in communion with God, and with others, through Jesus Christ."

An intrinsic element in this process was contemplation, he said. "To learn to look to God without regard to my own instant satisfaction, to learn to scrutinise and to relativise the cravings and fantasies that arise in me - this is to allow God to be God, and thus to allow the prayer of Christ, God's own relation to God, to come alive in me."

Such prayer was not an alternative to what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called "righteous action", Dr Williams said; rather, it provided the clarity and energy needed in the pursuit of justice. "True prayer purifies the motive; true justice is the necessary work of sharing and liberating in others the humanity we have discovered in our contemplative encounter."

More here-

http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2012/12-october/news/uk/‘contemplation-is-the-answer’-dr-williams-tells-rc-bishops

Episcopal diocese settlement gives Uptown parish full title to properties

From Pittsburgh-

The Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh has reached a settlement with Shepherd's Heart Fellowship in Uptown, a parish of the rival Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh that functions primarily as a ministry to the homeless, especially homeless veterans.

The agreement, which must be approved by the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas, gives Shepherd's Heart clear title to all of its property and assets.
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It is the first time since a 2008 schism that the Episcopal diocese has allowed a breakaway parish to keep all of its property as well as its affiliation with the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh.

Half the property was titled to the Episcopal diocese, the other half deeded in the name of Shepherd's Heart.

A joint statement from the Episcopal diocese and Shepherd's Heart stressed that its ministry to the poor was unique and that "this agreement should not be interpreted as a model for resolving other property disputes."

The Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh split in 2008, with the majority of its parishes leaving the Episcopal Church for the theologically conservative Anglican Church in North America.
Read more:

http://old.post-gazette.com/pg/12285/1268470-53.stm#ixzz295MnnG7z

Atlanta Diocese of the Episcopal Church to have first black leader

From Atlanta-

For the first time ever, a man of color will take the reins of the Atlanta Diocese of the Episcopal Church.

Reverend Rob Wright will be ordained as Bishop in a ceremony at Morehouse College King Chapel Saturday.

In an interview with WSB’s Pete Combs, Wright said he is convinced the Episcopal Church is awakening, as if from a long sleep.

“An old theologian once said, ‘From time to time, the Church forgets who she is. But every once in a while, we remember and we begin to act like a church,” Wright said. Now, he continued, is such a time of remembrance.

As for being the first African-American to lead this Diocese, Wright called it “a sign of real hope.”
“People are finally moving into this notion of character content versus color,” he said.

More here-

http://www.wsbradio.com/news/news/atlanta-diocese-episcopal-church-have-first-black-/nSbXB/

Church bans funeral services for uncommitted Christians

From Uganda-

A  Church in Gulu town has announced that it will no longer conduct funeral services for uncommitted Christians and those who are not known by the churches in their respective areas.
   
The Vicar for Christ Church, Godfrey Luwum, made the announcement during the service on Sunday. He said the decision was arrived at during a meeting of the top management of the Church of Uganda.

“Top leaders of the Church of Uganda have come to a decision that the Church will no longer hold funerals or send-off prayers for unserious Christians. These are people who never attend church services and do not generally participate in church-related activities,” Luwum said.

However, the Archbishop- elect of the Church of Uganda, Stanley Ntagali said: “That is not true, it is not the position of the Church. Maybe, it is a statement from an individual.”

Luwum said the decision follows several disturbing incidences where funeral services have been conducted believing the deceased were followers of Jesus Christ, only to discover they practised witchcraft.

More here-

http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/636286-church-bans-funerals-for-uncommitted-christians.html

Anglican head's speech on the New Evangelization to the Synod of Bishops

From Rome (with video)

Your Holiness,
Reverend Fathers,
brothers and sisters in Christ
dear Friends

I am deeply honoured by the Holy Father's invitation to speak in this gathering: as the Psalmist says, “Ecce quam bonum et quam jucundum habitare fratres in unum”. The gathering of bishops in Synod for the good of all Christ's people is one of those disciplines that sustain the health of Christ's Church. And today especially we cannot forget that great gathering of “fratres in unum” that was the Second Vatican Council, which did so much for the health of the Church and helped the Church to recover so much of the energy needed to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ effectively in our age. For so many of my own generation, even beyond the boundaries of the Roman Catholic Church, that Council was a sign of great promise, a sign that the Church was strong enough to ask itself some demanding questions about whether its culture and structures were adequate to the task of sharing the Gospel with the complex, often rebellious, always restless mind of the modern world.

The Council was, in so many ways, a rediscovery of evangelistic concern and passion, focused not only on the renewal of the Church's own life but on its credibility in the world. Texts such as Lumen gentium and Gaudium et spes laid out a fresh and joyful vision of how the unchanging reality of Christ living in his Body on earth through the gift of the Holy Spirit might speak in new words to the society of our age and even to those of other faiths. It is not surprising that we are still, fifty years later, struggling with many of the same questions and with the implications of the Council; and I take it that this Synod's concern with the new evangelization is part of that continuing exploration of the Council's legacy.

More here-

http://www.romereports.com/palio/anglican-heads-speech-on-the-new-evangelization-to-the-synod-of-bishops-english-7930.html#.UHaqikK-gTw

Vatican II, 50 Years Later

From The National Review-

The modern history of the Catholic Church has rarely followed the historical arc imagined for it.

In the early 19th century, the Church in France was awash in Jacobin-drawn blood, and the Church throughout Europe was reeling from two papal kidnappings by Napoleon. No one imagined that, in the decades just ahead, Catholicism would flourish in the new United States and that the Church’s mission to sub-Saharan Africa would begin in earnest, led by new religious orders founded in the aftermath of the French Revolution.

In 1870, when Piux IX retreated behind the Leonine Wall and became the “prisoner of the Vatican,” Europe’s great and good thought the papacy a spent force in world affairs. Eight years later, Leo XIII, Pius IX’s successor, elected as an elderly placeholder, redefined the papacy as an office of moral persuasion and gave it new salience during the third-longest reign in recorded history.

When Pius XII died on October 9, 1958, the character and practice of Catholicism seemed fixed, permanent, even immutable. Less than three months later, Pius’s successor, John XXIII, announced his intention to summon a new ecumenical council. That council would, among other things, unleash decades of instability in Catholic life unimaginable in the mid-1950s.

More here-

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/329938/vatican-ii-50-years-later-george-weigel

Episcopal priest helps nab suspected copper thieves in Haddonfield

From Philadelphia / New Jersey -

Thanks to a sharp-eyed Episcopal priest, Haddonfield police have arrested and charged a pair of suspected copper thieves.
"Don't mess with a priest," the Rev. Patrick Close of Grace Church on Kings Highway posted on his Facebook page Tuesday.

Close saw two young men the previous day in an area of the church grounds not open to the public and went out to question them, he reported.

They departed, but when he left that night, Close noticed the rectory's copper downspouts were gone.

He filed a police report, including a detailed description of the men, on Tuesday morning, and, by afternoon, officers returned to report they had made the arrests.

"Wow! Almost as fast as NCIS!" Close wrote.

Police Lt. Ed Wiley said borough detectives traced the men to Camden and one admitted the theft.

Anthony Marchione Jr., 34, who is homeless, and Patrick Duross-Malloy, 27, of Blackwood, were charged with theft and criminal mischief, Wiley said.

Marchione was jailed in Camden County with bail set at $1,000 bail. Duross-Malloy was turned over to Gloucester County for outstanding warrants there.

More here-

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/new_jersey/20121011_Episcopal_priest_helps_nab_suspected_copper_thieves_in_Haddonfield.html

Is British monarch ‘Defender of the Faith’ or ‘Faiths’?

From The Washington Post-

As Britain awaits the appointment of the next archbishop of Canterbury to lead both the Church of England and the far-flung Anglican Communion, there’s renewed attention on the woman who officially gets the final say: Queen Elizabeth II, the “Defender of the Faith.”

The current archbishop, Rowan Williams, ends his 10-year tenure in December. A Church of England committee is sifting through candidates — two of whom will be submitted to Prime Minister David Cameron, whose top choice will be submitted to the queen for final approval.

When he announced his retirement last March, Williams, 62, famously said his successor will need “the constitution of an ox and the skin of a rhinoceros.”

Politicians and religious leaders say the next archbishop will need those qualities and more to handle deep divisions in the British church over female bishops and North/South divisions among his 77 million-member global flock over sexuality.
More here-

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-faith/is-british-monarch-defender-of-the-faith-or-faiths/2012/10/09/f222b72e-124b-11e2-9a39-1f5a7f6fe945_story.html

Holy Innocents’ opens expansion, chapel

From Atlanta-

After nearly two years of construction, Holy Innocents’ Episcopal Church this month opens its new, $8 million expansion, including a towering, glass-walled chapel.

The 30,000-square-foot building includes meeting spaces, offices, event facilities and the chapel. It also includes a gallery that will feature work by local artists, the church said in a press release.

Atlanta architect Thomas W. Ventulett III, a member of the Holy Innocents’ parish, designed the building and the 1,245-square-foot chapel.

Holy Innocents’ Rector Michael Sullivan said the chapel combines stone, wood and glass, and creates “a beautiful space.”

More here-

http://www.reporternewspapers.net/2012/10/10/holy-innocents-opens-expansion-chapel/

Jeff W. Fisher ordained and consecrated as Texas bishop suffragan

From ENS-

The Rev. Jeff W. Fisher, former rector of St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Waco, Tex., was ordained and consecrated bishop in Tyler on Oct. 6 with a combined choir of 50 voices, brass and timpani. More than 350 attended the festival Eucharist in Caldwell Auditorium decorated with profuse arrangements of yellow roses, just a week before Tyler prepares for its annual Rose Festival.

Fisher was elected bishop suffragan at Christ Church Cathedral, Houston, on June 2, 2012. Fisher will serve in the eastern region of the Diocese of Texas and will be located in Tyler. In addition to his regular episcopal visits, Fisher will have oversight of clergy pastoral care and renewal and prison ministries.

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, presiding bishop was the chief consecrator, joined by current Bishop of Texas C. Andrew Doyle and his two predecessors, the Rt. Rev. Don A. Wimberly and the Rt. Rev. Claude E. Payne; Texas Bishop Suffragan Dena Harrison and Texas Bishop Suffragan Rayford High (ret).

High has been nominated to become provisional bishop of Fort Worth upon approval of the diocesan convention November 3.

More here-

http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2012/10/09/jeff-w-fisher-ordained-and-consecrated-texas-bishop-suffragan/

Episcopal bishop says he’ll retire at year’s end

From Philadelphia-

Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania said Tuesday that he would retire at the end of the year.

Bennison, 68, a supporter of gay clergy and same-sex marriage, was elevated to his position in 1998. His tenure has been marked by many controversies over his support of gay rights and disputes over church property. He was suspended for mishandling his brother's sex abuse of a teen girl in the 1970s, but was reinstated.

A church official said a provisional bishop, to serve until a replacement for Bennison is selected, would be elected early next year. 

http://articles.philly.com/2012-10-09/news/34343881_1_episcopal-bishop-bishop-charles-e-bennison-he-ll

God's way smarter than Sinatra's, says Jensen

From Australia-

THE popularity of I Did It My Way as a funeral song shows a ''vulgar egotism'' exists in society, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Peter Jensen, says.

In his last presidential speech before retirement, Dr Jensen said society's shift towards ''deadly individualism'' had been driven by material wealth and technological mastery.
The cost of individualism, and the shift to self-love, had consequences for the quality of our community, family life and how we treat death. That was evident in the choice of ''our swan song of this generation'', Frank Sinatra's classic I Did It My Way, Dr Jensen said in his speech, titled ''Last Words''.

''It seems that we do not need each other as once we did. Nor do we need God. To think that a person is so proud of the phrase 'I did it my way' that they would use it as a summary of their life's achievement reveals an astounding moral ineptitude, a sort of vulgar egotism.''

Read more:

 http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/gods-way-smarter-than-sinatras-says-jensen-20121008-279nb.html#ixzz28nbObYXz

Fleeing from genocide to South Sudan

From ENS-

Yida, the largest refugee camp in South Sudan, stretches for miles. It is home to more than 64,000 of the 206,000 refugees from the Republic of Sudan who have fled the bombing and violent attacks against civilians by the Khartoum government since June 2011. Yida camp itself was bombed Nov. 10, 2011, killing 12 refugees.

Only 20 kilometers from the volatile border between Sudan and South Sudan, Yida camp sees a constant stream of nearly 200 new refugees a day, coming from the Nuba Mountains region (South Kordofan State) in Sudan. Rebel groups in Darfur, South Kordofan, and Blue Nile states have united against the Khartoum government’s army, Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), which indiscriminately attacks rebels and civilians in those areas.

“They kill everybody, Christians and Muslims. They burn houses, churches, and schools. They kill people. They drop bombs. Just two days ago soldiers came to my area [in the Nuba Mountains] and killed one person and burned houses,” said the Rev. Ameka Yousif, a pastor who has lived in Yida camp since February. “[In the Nuba Mountains] when people see the planes, they run and hide. Bombing is happening almost every day.”

More here-

http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2012/10/08/fleeing-from-genocide-to-yida-refugee-camp-south-sudan/

Omaha's St. Barnabas parish weighs order to surrender its church

From Nebraska-

An Omaha congregation that left the Episcopal Church over issues of doctrine and homosexuality now faces a tough decision about its midtown church: Should congregants stay or should they go?

A judge ruled last week that the people of St. Barnabas Church must surrender the 97-year-old church building, with all its artwork and other trappings, plus its rectory and other property to the Episcopal Diocese of Nebraska.

The ruling by Douglas County District Court Judge Joseph Troia came more than three years after the diocese sued St. Barnabas' priest and leaders for the church and rectory at 129 N. 40th St. It is one of many such property disputes around the nation between the Episcopal Church and disaffected congregations.

The judge's order gives the St. Barnabas congregation, which is moving toward joining the Roman Catholic Church, until late October to hand over the keys. But the diocese's lawyer, D.C. “Woody” Bradford, said it won't push to enforce that deadline.

People on both sides said they hope for negotiations that could lead to the congregation's staying in its current home, though not as an Episcopal church. St. Barnabas leaders also are considering an appeal.

More here-

http://www.omaha.com/article/20121009/NEWS/710099939/1707

Better Together

From The Living Church-

For the past six years the youth groups of San Andres, Yonkers (Iglesia Memorial de San Andres), and Christ Church, Bronxville, have found that we are better together. Our young people meet every Monday night. We have traveled to the monastery at Taizé in the spirit of reconciliation and trust. We have met and worked with those in need in New York City and across the nation. Our kids long to be challenged and tested. They want to engage their faith. They want love to be active, not passive.

The Rt. Rev. Griselda Delgado Del Carpio, Bishop of Cuba, invited us in August to expand our understanding of “better together.” This was a gift greater than any of us could have imagined. As a mixed group, ranging from ardent capitalists to crypto-communists, the young people had high hopes for the trip. They wanted to see American cars from the 1940s and ’50s and experience the culture of the Buena Vista Social Club. They wanted to pose in front of Che Guevara murals and step back into the world of Hemingway. They wanted to ask about universal medical care and the education system in Cuba. And they were able to do it all. But what most profoundly affected them was the extraordinary generosity and spirit of the Cuban people.

More here-

http://www.livingchurch.org/better-together

Anglican Archbishop Tells The Judiciary To Uphold Truth And Justice

From Ghana-

The Most Reverend Dr Justice O. Akrofi, Primate and Archbishop of the Church of the Province of West Africa, Anglican Church, has asked the judiciary to uphold justice and truth at all times, especially in their adjudication in the election year.

“The learned society needs justice. Truth is also ever so sacred that it cannot be negotiated-not the same as playing fast and loose with it. The role of justice for instance is very relevant in ensuring peace at this year’s election”, Rev Akrofi said in a sermon to open the 55th Legal Year of the Judicial Service.

The legal year is marked annually in October with a church service after members of the bench and bar return from their two months vacation.

This year’s theme was: “Access to Justice- A Tool for Peace and Stability”.

Rev Akrofi, who is also the Anglican Bishop of Accra, said since much of the laws inherited from colonial masters run through the ideology of Christendom, and as such discriminated against non-Christians and sometimes intolerant of non-Christian cultures and religions, there was the need for the judiciary to ensure that all, irrespective of creed, gender and tribe get equal justice.

More here-

http://www.ghana.gov.gh/index.php/news/general-news/16687-anglican-archbishop-tells-the-judiciary-to-uphold-truth-and-justice-

“Fever Season”: Revelations of a plague year

From Salon-

“The panic is fearful today,” wrote an Episcopal nun from Memphis, Tenn., in the summer of 1878. “Eighty deaths reported and half the doctors refuse to report at all. We found one of our nurses lying on the floor in her patient’s room down with the fever, another is sickening. I really believe that Dr. Harris and I and the two negro nurses are the only well persons anywhere near here.”

With more than half the city’s population fled and most of those remaining stricken by the virus known as Yellow Jack, Bronze John and “the Stranger’s Disease” — yellow fever — Memphis resembled a post-apocalyptic landscape to rival that in any zombie film. At the peak of the epidemic, corpses lay in the streets as overburdened work crews struggled to convey them to mass graves. Looters rampaged through the posher homes in the only major urban center between St. Louis and New Orleans, guzzling their victims’ liquor and collapsing with the fever at the scene of their crimes. At one point, a single man remained of the staff at the Western Union telegraph office, which was the sole, fragile information conduit between the quarantined city and an outside world looking on in horror and pity.

As Jeanette Keith describes it in her new history of the 1878 plague, “Fever Season: The Story of a Terrifying Epidemic and the People Who Saved a City,” yellow fever’s grisly reign over Memphis that summer forged the city’s identity for generations to come. It was a saga that capsized conventional 19th-century American views of heroism. All but one of the city’s white Protestant ministers left the city.

More here-

http://www.salon.com/2012/10/07/fever_season_revelations_of_a_plague_year/singleton/

Gardens help fill shelves at food banks

From Washington-

Three-year-old Laird Bowser was logging community service hours Saturday at the Grace Episcopal Church gardens. He just didn't know it.

Laird spent the sunny morning helping his mother harvest cucumbers, shuffling handfuls of vegetables to a 5-gallon bucket at the end of the row. The Bowsers weren't taking the bucket home at the end of the day. Instead, every potato, bean and squash picked at the Day Road East church is donated to the Helpine House food bank.

Grace Church's plot produced more than 1,300 pounds of vegetables for Helpline this season. It's the largest contributing garden to the island food bank, but there are many more like it.

Helpline volunteer services manager Marilyn Gremse said the food bank has enjoyed a recent surge in donations from island gardeners. Contributions come from small farms, community pea patches and backyard planting boxes.

Read more:

 http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2012/oct/07/community-gardens-help-fill-shelves-at-food/#ixzz28hmtPi49

Worshipers offer heartfelt goodbye as Springfield Episcopal Bishop Gordon P. Scruton retires

From Western Mass.-

In his final service at Christ Church Cathedral, retiring Episcopal Bishop, the Rt. Rev. Gordon P. Scruton, told worshipers it had been a privilege to serve as their pastoral leader for the past 16 years.

Worshipers from Episcopal churches across the state gathered for Scruton’s last mass at the cathedral as the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Western Massachusetts, the bishop and his wife, Rebecca, greeted each member of the church for a heartfelt goodbye.

“It was a joy to share with people who we came to love and share our life and ministry,” Scruton said. “It was a joy to be able to say ‘Thank you.’”

Scruton described Sunday’s service at the Cathedral as a more intimate service, where some of the most devout followers came to say farewell. 

More here-

http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2012/10/worshipers_offer_heartfelt_goo.html

The 16 people selecting the next Archbishop of Canterbury

From The Telegraph- (Can't tell the players without a scorecard) -

These are the 16 members of the Crown Nominations Commission, the panel selected to appoint Dr Rowan Williams's successor as Archbishop of Canterbury.

More here-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9591600/The-16-people-selecting-the-next-Archbishop-of-Canterbury.html

Archbishop panel split over Church's future

From The Telegraph-

It is the decision that 77 million Anglicans around the world are waiting for: who will become the next Archbishop of Canterbury.

But nine days after the successor to Dr Rowan Williams was expected to have been named, the Crown Nominations Commission remains silent.

Its work is shrouded in secrecy, but a Sunday Telegraph investigation can reveal that its 16 members are split, not over women bishops or same sex marriages, but the future of the Church itself.
A substantial number of people on the panel would like a man who will reform the structures, finance and strategies of the Church of England and help “re-imagine” it for the modern age.

Their favourite is the Rt Rev Justin Welby, Bishop of Durham, a 56-year-old former oil company executive, who is seen as the front-runner.

More here-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9591565/Archbishop-panel-split-over-Churchs-future.html

At 120 years old, St Mark's Church plans growth

From Central Florida-

St. Mark's Episcopal Church is planning a week-long celebration of its 120th anniversary, ending Oct. 14 when Bishop Gregory O. Brewer will celebrate a 4 p.m. Mass in honor of the occasion.

Immediately following is a ground-breaking ceremony for "A Bigger That" -- a new sanctuary to be built on the property to accommodate the growing parish.

The "little white church on the hill," 102 N. Ninth St., was founded in 1892 as a monument to peace, a published church history said.

It was named to the National Register of Historic Places in 1994, which means the original church cannot be modified.

More here-

http://www.newschief.com/article/20121006/NEWS/210065035

Episcopal convention will vote on anti-casino resolution

From Massachusetts-

The Episcopal Diocese of Western Massachusetts will hold its 2012 Diocesan Convention on Oct. 19 and 20 at the Sheraton Springfield Monarch Place Hotel. Business will include a vote on a resolution protesting casinos in Western Massachusetts.

The convention will be called to order on Oct. 19 with the Right Rev. Gordon P. Scruton, diocesan bishop, extending a welcome to all delegates and declaring the convention organized for business. The Rev. Douglas John Fisher, bishop-elect of the diocese, will also address the convention.

Other speakers will include the Rev. Laura Everett, executive director of the Massachusetts Council of Churches; the Rev. Deacon Jane Griesbach, of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Worcester; and the Rev. Jill Williams, diocesan missioner for Christian formation.

More here-

http://www.masslive.com/living/index.ssf/2012/10/episcopal_convention_will_vote_on_anti-casino_resolution.html