Bishop Jonathan Blake

Modern Prayer Resources

2012-01-13T06:56:00.000-08:00

Inclusive prayers, psalms and canticles
Written by Archbishop Jonathan Blake

A modern 'Lord's Prayer'

May Love be revered
May Unity come
Good will be done
That earth may evolve into heaven
May we work hard today for our daily bread
And may our sins be forgiven
As we forgive those
Who have sinned against us
And may we not fall into temptation
But be delivered from evil
For we believe in justice, truth and peace
For ever and ever
Amen

A modern 'Gloria'

Glory to Love in the purest
And peace to all forms of life
We praise
We bless
We adore
We glorify
We give thanks for all that is good
Love, justice, truth and peace
Kindness and mercy
Good people, from all ages
Faiths and cultures
Our inspiration and our light
You take away the sins of the world
Embolden us
You take away the sins of the world
Guide us
You are held in the greatest respect
Inspire us
For you are to be revered
Honoured and remembered
Shining lights, urging goodness on
Through every generation.
Amen.

Controversy!

2011-12-13T06:50:00.000-08:00

I am working on my next book.....which will ruffle some feathers I suspect. My son suggested a title 'Please don't bomb our house after reading'.

I have tried to re-assure him that I survived publication of my last book, 'For God's Sake Don't Go To Church'. Someone pointed out to me that it was selling on Amazon today for £147! http://amzn.to/sgwCHx

OEC LAUNCHES £10,000 OF AWARDS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

2011-12-07T09:10:00.000-08:00

THE OEC KITE AWARDS 2012

Kind Intent Towards Everyone

Awarding up to £10,000

The OEC KITE awards are for young people who are working hard to achieve one or more of the following: peace, reconciliation, justice, a fair distribution of resources, care for the poor - the homeless - refugees, care for the sick - the elderly - the housebound, care for animals and the environment, good relations between those of different faiths - cultures - ethnic groups - persuasions - circumstances, care for those who suffer discrimination, a positive effect in their community, inclusivity.

This may be in their local community, at their school or college or beyond.
Each recipient will receive an award towards the work or project for which they are responsible, as well as being featured on the KITE award page of this web site. Applicants can either nominate themselves or be nominated They must be aged between 10 and 18 at the time of the application

A description of themselves and their work must be submitted The value of the award will depend on the age of the applicant and the work/project/scheme with which they are involved.Â Exceptional OEC KITE awards of greater value, will be issued for work/projects that are viewed as having had and/or going to have the greatest positive effect.

The Awards will be presented on Remembrance Sunday 2012, in the hope that they will encourage young people to contribute towards communities and a world of peace, justice and harmony.

The Open Episcopal Church wishes to recognise, honour and inspire young people whose goals and aspirations are selfless and to re-awaken in society the virtue of a life spent in the service of others.

The Open Episcopal Church is a member of The International Council of Community Churches and so the World Council of Churches

Terms and conditions apply

1. Applications must provide the following details: The person's name, address, telephone number and where applicable, mobile number and email address.Â The school or college the person attends or their employment status.Â A description of the project of not less than 250 words. All these details can be sent by post to The OEC Kite Awards, Bishops Haven, 105 Danson Crescent, Welling, DA162ASÂ or by email to OEC KITE AWARDS

2.TheÂ awards will be made on Remembrance DayÂ 2012. The decision of the Archbishop's Council of the Open Episcopal Church will be final.

3.The Open Episcopal Church and any sponsors of the awards may publicise details of the recipients of the awards and the work for which they have gained their awards.

4.The Open Episcopal Church expects the recipients of the awards to provide a progress report about their work after 6 months and a description of how they have used the award.

PRESS RELEASE

2011-11-28T15:37:00.000-08:00

The Archbishop's Council of the Open Episcopal Church, meeting in London on Tuesday, November 22nd has elected unanimously Revd Helen Hamilton M.A. to be the first woman bishop to be consecrated in Scotland to serve as the bishop of the Diocese of Scotland for the Open Episcopal Church. The Open Episcopal Church consecrated the first woman bishop in England in 2003, Bishop Professor Elizabeth Stuart, the Senior Pro-Vice- Chancellor at the University of Winchester. The Church then consecrated the first woman bishop for Wales in 2007, Bishop Shelley Harstad-Smith and now will consecrate Bishop Elect Hamilton for Scotland in 2012. Bishop Elect Hamilton, a qualified teacher with post graduate degrees from London and Cambridge Universities, worked as a prison governor and inspector before becoming an Anglican religious sister for 12 years. She served as the warden of the Cathedral and the College on the Isle of Cumbrae for three years before serving as a locum minister for the Church of Scotland. She was ordained a priest at St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall in 2010. Clergy and laity from the Open Episcopal Church will travel to Scotland for the consecration and will hold their annual church Congress on the Isle of Luing. Meanwhile the third Anglican priest to leave the Anglican Church to join the Open Episcopal Church will be ordained (sub-conditione) in Norfolk on December 11th. Further details concerning the consecration will follow. Contact numbers: The Press Office: 0208 304 7605 or 07767 687711 Bishop Elect Hamilton: 01852 314007 www.openepiscopalchurch.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Episcopal_Church

Robert Mugabe's assault upon the late Pope's memory

2011-05-01T16:00:00.000-07:00

It was the opportunity for 1.5 million people, including the representatives of five royal families, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, 15 heads of state, the Pope, the Vatican and Cardinals to honour the memory of John Paul II, by protesting at the presence of Robert Mugabe.

Instead they, by condoning his attendance, colluded with the oppression meted out by this violator of Zimbabwe's people.

Far from repairing the church's image and restoring morale among Christians, such an act bears the hallmarks of the corruption and political expediency which is stripping the church of its moral credibility and public standing.

When Hitler marched into Vienna on March 14th 1938, the Cardinal ordered the bells of Austria to ring. By the end of the war 65,000 Jews in Austria had been slaughtered, 6 million Jews had died across Europe and 60 million people overall.

In 1998, John Paul apologised that the church did not speak out against the Nazi holocaust.

How is it possible, to honour the memory of this very man, by welcoming at the ceremony a present day dictator, responsible for torture and mass murder?

CELEBRATING TEN YEARS

2011-01-26T05:04:00.000-08:00

The Open Episcopal Church is celebrating it's tenth year.

In that time we have ministered to hundreds of thousands of people across the United Kingdom, bringing them the Gospel of Love.

Our ministry is inclusive, ecumenical, loving, knowing no boundaries or exclusions and reaching out to all.

We have over 20,000 members. Our clerics are based in Scotland, Wales and England. We have more applicants for the priesthood than ever before.

Our desire is to make the life of Jesus Christ and the sacraments of Christ's Church available to everyone in an accessible manner and related to the realities and pressures of modern life.

While some of our ministers are based in one community and offer worship from various local centres and churches, many are itinerant and minister within groups, over a wide area.

This tenth year will see the Open Episcopal Church exhibit for the first time at the Christian Resources Exhibition at Esher in May and launch the Open Episcopal Church KITE Awards for young people, aged 10-18, who are promoting peace, reconciliation and good relations between those of different faiths, cultures, ethnic groups, persuasions etc.

Our vision is to model and work towards the building of a community that has no walls, in which everyone has their rightful and equal place and all enjoy equal respect and resource.

Dr Jeffery John

2010-07-07T16:03:00.000-07:00

Dr Jeffrey John, the obvious choice to be the next Bishop of Southwark has been kicked into touch because he is gay.

The clerics of the Anglican church should rise up in indignation.

How much more humiliation and prejudice will they allow to be poured upon the gay and lesbian community and the inclusive Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Homosexuality is a God given blessing. Homosexual and heterosexual love, sexuality and marriage should have exactly the same status in law, in society and in the church.

Jon Venables and Robert Thompson

2010-03-10T15:15:00.000-08:00

Mr Justice Morland, after the trial, laid the moral responsibility for Venables and Thompson's heinous crime with the parents. Should they not have been sent to prison?

Conveniently now for the lynch mob, the boys have grown up and so are fair target, in their opinion, for our opprobrium or worse.

However the truth is rather different.

Two boys suffered abusive backgrounds and were left to roam unsupervised. 28 adults saw them with a toddler and did nothing. They have been subject to years of our penal rehabilitation programme and at the end of this we are left it seems with broken lives.

Somehow it seems you can punish an abused child yet excuse the abusive parents. Then you can seek vengeance on the abused child when he becomes a man yet excuse the rehabilitaters.

Further, you can excuse even encourage the public level of violent language and vengeful intentions towards Venables and Thompson on the basis of horror at their 10 year old deeds.

Is there anyone brave enough out there to face the fact that evil is in all of us and is all around us? Venables and Thompson made visible what the adults had tried to hide. They acted out explicity the evil that others had done to them. Society is appalled at what they did but not at what was done to them.

Members of the public, who have nothing to do with the trauma of the killing, are baying for their blood because they feel horrified at what they did. Isn't this the same sense of outrage that led the boys to do what they did?

However, instead of satisfying this blood lust and further fragmenting society, we could unite in our horror at all that abuses and degrades and destroys and work together to overcome the power of evil.

That requires the monumental challenge of working to restore and rehabilitate everyone affected in the Bulger catastrophe.

THE GOSPEL OF AVATAR

2010-03-02T07:00:00.000-08:00

The problem with Pandora, the Na'vi and Eywa is that we can use them to delude and denude ourselves.

So many have been entranced by Avatar's graces and have plummeted into depression realising that life is rather more mundane on exiting Cineworld.

Others have 'seen the light' and have left determined to regard their world anew.

Avatar is an extraordinary film with considerable value. It shows as a modern day gospel, a religious narrative and a prophetic call to conversion.

There are irritating anachronisms and contradictions - a medieval call to arms and mustering of the troops, a smoking scientist, linear characterisation and salvation mediated via the traditional hero.

There are also the classic ingredients. The innocents, the serpents and the divine and no return to Eden. Humanity is superceded, returning to their inferiority while the 'hero' evolves into a Na'vi, within his resurrected body, fit for paradise. Pandora isn't that, merely a staging post in our ability to conceive of that which might be, but it delights nevertheless.

The problems though rest in the modern habit of being 'entertained' by a gospel rather than transformed by it. The idea that cineworld is a church and many films are sermons is lost on most. Amidst coke and popcorn, we gape and leave, rating the film but not our lives.

We marvel at floating mountains and exotic creatures and proceed to destroy our natural wonders and drive further species towards extinction. We weep at the destruction of the Hometree, the habitation of the Na'vi people, but watch while the Amazon is deforested and the indigenous tribes are displaced. We detest the ruthlessness of the RDA Mining corporation and Sec-Ops, their private military force, but then happily eat chocolate and listen to our ipods without a thought for who or what has been devastated in the process.

It seems the snake hangs a long way away and whispers in the ears of others. We are able to tuck into the crates of apples with impunity. That sense of disconnection is replicated in our conception of the divine.

Millions have either relinquished traditional forms of religion or espoused their fundamentalist versions. Both choices present a crisis, for we have not found a pure source of inspiration which delivers. All earthly dogmas and belief systems are flawed.

A myriad of alternatives are advertised and loom on screen and in print and Cameron's take is appealing. When the disabled former marine prays to Eywa for help in winning the battle, Neytiri corrects him that the divine does not take sides rather maintains the balance. Cameron can't quite translate that into a novel resolution of conflict and so Eywa is shown to be partisan after all.

The humans are defeated and exiled, only presumably for them to re-arm and return to continue the cyclical violence that haunts civilisation.

It is understandable that we feel we need to ring fence our concepts of divinity placing them out of harm's way, but when it panders to film makers and humanity's desire for an easy fix solution coming from afar, it does us few favours.

I am left with the following musings.

We live on Pandora and are in the process of destroying it with ruthless disregard for the vulnerable who find themselves in our way. We also exhibit the ability to conceive of something far better and the desire to apsire after it.

It is time to come of age. We must own the darkness which broods within us as well as the potential for a connectedness which prevents a violation of the balance.

Cameron's visionary film is a modern day gospel which takes us to the boundaries. It is for us to pioneer further. Perhaps away from the cult of the super hero God and the super hero human, away from the stereotypes of good and evil, away from combative techniques of conflict resolution, away from the tendency of religion to divest us of the belief that we can work for our redemption, away from the colonial belief of what constitutes superiority.

SEPP BLATTER'S MISTAKE

2010-02-11T15:02:00.000-08:00

Sepp Blatter may well mock our reproachful attitude to John Terry's alleged infidelity, but in doing so he disconnects himself from the heartache that such choices cause.

A cavalier male attitude may be to see such playing away as fair game for the potent sportsman, but in our more enlightened times, the consequences of action are always kept in view.

A wife may have been betrayed, the children's security placed under threat, trust compromised, embarrassment brought upon family and friends, unwelcome headlines distracting from his job and leadership and his own heart left torn in loyalty, mired in deceit and confused in direction.

Affairs may be joked about with bravado but on reflection, it is clear that an affair is more often, nothing other than a disaster for all involved.

SIKH DAGGERS

2010-02-08T03:14:00.000-08:00

The problem with Sir Mota Singh Q.C.'s argument is that it promotes the unenlightened subservience of reason to tradition in matters of religion.

The minority communities have been allowed to muddle archaic views with race relations and get away, at times, with the possibility of murder.

As a young priest I promoted good inter-faith relations in the parish and established a group which hosted a variety of events.

It was a shock when the news broke that one Sikh priest had stabbed the other priest with his Kirpan.

It defies logic for our modern society to contemplate permitting the wearing of the Kirpan yet to legislate continually to restrict our way of life for health and safety reasons, the latest insane example of which is that our children are no longer allowed to run in the playground if the ground is wet.

Europe is divided. In France they are considering a ban on wearing the burka whereas in England, Judge Singh's logic would allow a judge to be wearing one in court.

Politicians working for equality must resist allowing religion to bully the secular agenda to permit their traditions and practices if they offend, oppress and endanger.

O MOURN FOR MEDINE MEMI

2010-02-05T05:51:00.000-08:00

Medine Memi's murder at the hands of her family is chilling. A 16 year old girl with hands tied, forced to sit in a hole while her relatives buried her alive. One of the 200 'honour' killings that take place in Turkey every year.

Her crime was to talk to boys.

My sons returned from school this week having heard two priests tell them that the Pope regarded all people equally. The next morning they spotted a headline about the Pope's criticism about Labour's equality legislation.

'Huh, one of them said, so much for the Pope treating everyone the same'.

Thankfully they appear to have minds able to distinguish between the claims and reality of religion and philosophy.

I pray my children will never become ensnared within the straight jackets that others would have them don or be buried alive in the holes dug by religion or philosophy and will walk free and work in their lives for that liberty to be enjoyed by all.

WHIPPING YOURSELF IS NOT A MARK OF SAINTHOOD

2010-01-26T14:27:00.000-08:00

The previous Pope, Karol Wojtyla, used to flagellate himself, we are told by Monsignor Slawomir Oder. The nuns used to hear the sounds as he beat himself with a belt that he kept tucked between his robes in his wardrobe.

This we are encouraged to believe is a sign, that will accelerate him towards sainthood.

However, research has shown the relationship between repressed sexuality and sado-masochism.

Please Christians, put away your belts and whipping paraphernalia and enter the twenty-first century. Let the path to sainthood not be tainted with violence, even if directed against oneself.

A BRIGHTER TOMORROW

2010-01-03T15:23:00.000-08:00

Radio 5 Live asked me this evening to discuss whether optimism or despair were more appropriate for the new decade. I was sharing the discussion alongside Bishop Stephen Lowe, the fomer suffragan bishop of Hulme in the Diocese of Manchester of the Anglican Church.

I shared my view that we lived in a blessed age of achievement.

International dialogue and cooperation are on an unprecedented scale. There have been major advances in health and social care. We have been delighted with progressive and inclusive legislation. Our society has become ever more pluralist. Great developments have been made in biomedical engineering and embryonic research.

We live in an astonishing, enterprising and aspirational age.

On a personal front. It may seem to many that traditional norms of behaviour are giving way to an insolent and fragmented approach. However often those norms were straight jackets which constrained people's rights and were the symbols of a coercive and authoritarian pattern of governance.

There was a facade of respectability and order, but behind closed doors all manner of abuse and chaos reigned as research and reports have shockingly revealed.

This is the age of emancipation, of questioning and an undeniable grass root momentum towards equality, jutsice and freedom. Respect has to be earned.

We will no longer tolerate the corruption found in politicians, priests, the police and social workers. It is our coming of age.

Of course, at times we grow giddy and reckless with our new found freedoms as we press the boundaries of experience and knowledge, but this is a passing hour that will give way to a more mature, cohesive and well balanced society.

There are massive challenges ahead. The environment, the rich/poor divide, the ethics and politics of immortality and Christian/Muslim fundamentalism and terrorism to mention just a few.

The world community will not settle for platitudes, will not be fobbed off with religion and will not be patted on the head by governments. People require honesty and integrity and we expect our leaders and leading institutions to deliver.

The church used to be at the forefront of social change. Monastic communities spearheaded research and were centres of learning. Now the established churches have become often a reactionary voice more associated with prejudice and the past than with enlightenment and progressive social policies.

Yet people yearn for spiritual resources and the Open Episcopal Church and the Society for Independent Christian Ministry are among the modern expresions of new church ready to provide them.

Here's to the new decade. I'm eager and hopeful.

TESCO'S EASTER EGGS AT NEW YEAR

2010-01-02T12:20:00.000-08:00

The Sun asked for my reaction on New Year' Eve and such was the national interest I was on Radio 5 live the next day!

My initial thoughts were that while the public would regard it strange to be barely out of Christmas before being buffeted with Easter produce, yet such merchandising by the supermarkets allowed cash strapped families to put an egg aside each week and so spread the necessary costs.

Then it seemed a good opportunity to have the potent symbol of new life and resurrection visible throughout the early months of the year.

On further reflection, religious opposition seemed rather out of place anyway. Easter and eggs reflect more the traditions of the Zoroastrians and the Saxon goddess Eostre than the Christians.

However, my own inclusive approach celebrates the combining of all our aspirations; thus the symbol of the egg, which interweaves so many cultural and religious elements, as well as commercial and recreational ones, provides a happy item to find on the shelves, even at New Year.

ROUGH SLEEPING

2009-12-23T04:44:00.000-08:00

Strange thought that I might have been offering help to Prince William!

On these coldest of nights, as I trekked the streets, offering whatever help I could to the homeless, I encountered the array of complex and confusing social, emotional and personal life stories that comprise London's cardboard sleepers.

The extremes of courage, depravity, hope and resignation, all tumbled into the unpredictable reality that the Prince found, almost being mangled by a street cleaning machine.

Susan ( name changed ) was the saddest. After years of abuse in childhood and local authority care homes she had spent 15 years on the homeless circuit. Her body was wasted, her teeth gone, her skin sore covered and heading towards that horrific statistic that the average life expectancy of a rough sleeper is 45.

She was desperate for food and a warm drink and we made our way along the strand towards Macdonalds. Every so often she would spy a discarded but of a cigarrette, still glowing and retrieve it for the last few puffs.

Christmas, in the bleak mid winter. We must remember that the babe is still homeless.

CHRISTIANS OUTRAGED BY A POSTER!

2009-12-17T08:56:00.000-08:00

Its a pity that New Zealanders are shocked at the poster outside St Matthew's in the City in central Auckland - ( 'Poor Joseph. God was a hard act to follow'). At last a church gets real.

Please can churches in the UK stop serving us up the asinine texts that make us all moan and ridicule their establishments and follow the NZ lead.

Stir us up, make us think, challenge our assumptions and connect us with reality and hope.

OBAMA CONTINUES WAR GAMES

2009-12-03T06:49:00.000-08:00

Obama has taken a considerable time deciding what could become probably the memorial of his presidency. Whether the delay was due to the gathering of advice or dithering we won't know for some time, however his eagerly awaited policy announcement has seen his administration commit further to the Afghan conflict.

It needed bold leadership to do otherwise but it seems what could have been his distinct contribution may be sinking amidst the clamour of political pressures.

90% of the Afghan army are illiterate. 60% of the officers cannot read. Many are drug addicted. From such as these Obama's exit strategy from and brave new world for Afghanistan is to come.

They are poor and vulnerable and available to the highest bidder and Obama reckons that £4.5 billion may bribe them into conformity.

How many American families has he doomed to tragedy?

Will their blood be wasted in yet another Vietnamesque foreign policy disaster?

What seems inevitable is that when all the soldiers have left, Afghanistan will return to be prey to Islamic militancy and fundamentalism and the necessary, messy and probably bloody process of political evolution upon which developed societies are based.

If only America could find £4.5 billion to provide the incentive to their 'enemies' to take the path to constructive dialogue rather than ensuring their hatred becomes ever more entrenched.

NEW MOON AND THE VATICAN

2009-11-20T15:03:00.000-08:00

The Vatican has condemned the film New Moon.

However, this comes as yet another example of the myopic approach taken by the Church which alienates the young and those who are at the forefront of wrestling with the complex and confusing issues of our day.

Meyer is an American Mormon. She comes from a strict traditionalist culture ,which for instance resists gay and lesbian rights and relationships. Yet in the Twilight series, while not being able to cope with the modern accomodation of homosexuality, she explores the unconventional relationship between a human and a vampire.

Culture often incorporates and reflects the paradoxes and philosophical conundrums that society faces.

It was illustrated starkly in the recent Batman movie which gave greater precedence to the characterisation of evil and left the force for God reeling in self pity and doubt.

The Twilight series is an exploration of the classic themes of love, loyalty, life, death, good , evil, rescue and redemption in a comic book fantasy landscape.

What is notable though, is that while the Church has removed itself from the modern narrative by dehumanising the figure of Jesus and the saints, Meyer forges ahead, exploring the contours of such issues across the stereotypical boundaries.

Just as we know of former IRA bombers who are now in government, and hear Karzai's call for talks with the Taliban and read that Al Quaeda operatives are now blogging, former clear depictions of good and evil are now blurring.

People of the new society are being called to address the evil and good within themselves as well as in others and to quest together to identify common themes that lead to love and life rather than hate and death.

Five British soldiers

2009-11-04T06:07:00.000-08:00

Gulbuddin cuts down 5 friends of Afghanistan. Five young men, torn from their families to try and impose order and democracy on an unwilling land. Deaths adding to the hundreds that have been slain in the desert hell that is the final taste of life for these young hearts.

Gordon Brown, the ferment is growing, the ranks are breaking, the political experiment has failed and the spin is over.

Bring our soldiers home.

The need for inclusive marriage legislation

2009-10-26T16:10:00.000-07:00

I was invited to open the debate in support of a motion for gay and lesbian rights at The University Philosophical Society of Trinity College Dublin on October 15th.

I delivered extracts from the following:

I am assuming I can be bold.

I am hoping that before me are those who are at the threshold of inaugurating a new Society.

I am believing that you are not in the grip of anyone, or any philosophy, religious teaching or cultural presupposition.

I am expecting that open minds can fly above the past mistakes and cobbled compromises and at least in thought and vision aspire after the best.

That is why my proposal is that this house should not only approve of Marriage legislation for the gay and lesbian community but legislation that would accommodate any relationship commitment between adults.

This because the only legislation that is fit for a modern inclusive society is that which affords equal access to the state of marriage and its concomitant rights to any people who wish to express or have already expressed a relationship commitment to each other.

Their commitment may or may not involve sexual intimacy.

This will apply in the main to couples and will include heterosexual couples, gay and lesbian couples, bisexual, transgender and transsexual couples, transvestite couples, sibling couples, platonic friendship couples, and any form of cohabiting couple.

Additionally it may also include more than two adults, committed to living faithfully together.

My argument rests on six factors.

1. That society benefits from securing stability in the practice of relationships and encouraging their longevity.
2. That sexual intimacy is not an essential ingredient.
3. That procreation is no longer an obligation or expectation of marriage.
4. That committed relationships create a family unit.
5. That children thrive where people are committed to each other and to them.
6. That children are often raised by adults other than their birth parents.

Any legislation that falls short of incorporating these factors enshrines discrimination within the law at the very time we are attempting to eradicate it.

Of course, some may gasp at the audacity of such a proposal particularly from a Bishop, but then again this whole journey since 1993, when homosexual sex was decriminalised, has been one of gasps.

Ireland has astonished the world. Having been imprisoned by the church into reactionary models of thinking, in under two decades it has undergone an extraordinary transformation.

There have been significant milestones:

Mary Coughlan’s social welfare legislation in 2004 that caused a storm over the definition of the word spouse.

Franco Frattini’s statement the same year that EU states were obliged to recognise the family life of couples in non marital relationships.

In 2006, the reform of the EU residency rules that included the right of gay couples to reside anywhere and have their relationships ‘facilitated’.

In December of that year the Kal case.

The years have seen political parties scrambling to be first to present avant garde approaches and proposals.

Campaigning groups have arisen such as MarriagEquality, Glen, Glue and Noise.

And what has taken the world’s breath away is the overwhelming support that has been indicated within Ireland for reform.

The survey in 2008 that indicated that 84% of Irish people supported Civil Partnerships.

Then the Irish Times poll that 63% of people favoured same sex marriage.

That 58% of those polled under 50 agreed with same sex adoption.

Ireland has shaken free of many of the shackles of the church and is coming to terms with a new identity.

In 1949 it had been one of the poorest countries in Western Europe.

It joined the EU in 1973 and is now the 31st economic power, has the 6th highest GDP and is ranked as having the highest quality of life in the world.

The economic boom has attracted international companies to invest bringing with them good equality and discrimination policies.

People have become empowered to make their own choices and be honest and go public about them.

Divorce was legalised in 1995.

In the 2006 Census cohabiting couples rose from 77,000 4 years before to 121,000.

Same sex couples from 1,300 to 2090.

The rise of the super pub and gay venues has helped to make minority communities visible.

In September there was the biggest ever gay pride march in Dublin.

Even the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Martin, has indicated that he has no problem with providing legal rights for same sex couples, but not by being brave enough to lead on the issue. His argument being that society should be protective of any couple in a caring situation where issues of dependency have arisen.

Against this though there has been the Article 41 backlash. ‘That the State pledges itself to guard with special care the institution of marriage, on which the family is founded, and to protect it against attack.’

And Cardinal Sean Brady has spearheaded the manipulative attempt to halt this push for equal rights with the remark ‘Stand clearly on the side of Christ or depart from him’

Ironical as Christ never once said anything about Gay and Lesbian issues.

So I’d like to turn the Cardinal’s words on their head and claim them as our moral imperative. Christ is the reforming radical requiring us to aspire to the resurrection vision that society must be structured so that there are no walls or barriers, no exclusions or discriminations, that all are equal in the sight of God and must be afforded equal rights.

And if I may deal swiftly with one area of potential criticism. The Bible Brigade.

Lets be clear that anyone suggesting the Bible provides a marriage blueprint has to be intellectually challenged. King Solomon had 700 wives and co-habited with 300 other women for his additional pleasure.

King David appears to have been bi-sexual as well as polygamous.

Jesus never disclosed his sexuality but from the accounts could have been bisexual, with intimate references to John and Mary Magdalene.

The nature of how the community recognised commitment in relationships evolved over the centuries of biblical tradition and there is no one divinely favoured model.

Just as we don’t barbeque bulls for God anymore. ( Lev 1.9) .

We don’t sell our daughters into slavery Exodus 21.7)

Tampons and Sanitary Towels mean we continually have contact with women the bible warns us are unclean (Lev 15 19-24).

We don’t take up God’s offer of buying slaves from other nations. (Lev 25.44)

We don’t put the staff at Tesco’s to death for working on the Sabbath, even though the Bible says we should, and they sell shellfish too and that is an ‘abomination’ (Ex 35.2) –(Lev 11.10)

We don’t believe in a prejudiced God who doesn’t want the wheelchair bound or even those with contact lenses to be priests. (Lev 21.20)

These are some of the admonitions made by this Bible that is often quoted at us.

But we have moved on.

In the past what the priest said was law and you quaked at their rebuke. Not so any more. Their control over our lives has been broken. There is no easy set of religious answers to roll off the tongue at the pressing social issues of the day. We have to think for ourselves, aspire after the mind of God particularly as we are made in God’s image and God’s Holy Spirit abides is us.

What God’s mind and God’s Holy Spirit in me tells me is that the present legislation is flawed, is second rate.

Yes it may be a historic step in the right direction, a stepping-stone towards equality but Amnesty International’s Ireland Executive Director Colm O’Gorman expresses it well ‘ It will create a second class form of marriage for what the government clearly feel is a second class group of people.’

So let me pause a moment.

The word marriage includes among its meanings ‘any close or intimate association or union’.

The word family includes among its meanings ‘ a group of persons who form a household.’

The definition used by the United Nations is:

Any combination of two or more persons who are bound together by ties of mutual consent, birth and/or adoption or placement and who, together, assume responsibility for, inter alia, the care and maintenance of group members, the addition of new members through procreation or adoption, the socialisation of children, and the social control of members.

Article 16.3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that:

The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

The United Nations accepts that the concept of family is not restricted to that of the traditional family based upon marriage.

It is claimed that because Article 41 connects family to marriage it precludes reform.

Not though if the legislation broadens these definitions to include all unions.

NOISE reminds us that the majority in Ireland are calling for same sex marriage rites.

The founder of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Kadar Asmal supports the right to marry irrespective of sexual orientation.

However, the mistake of many campaigning groups is that they push their own agenda but leave out the agenda of other affected groups, though the issues are the same.

Hence the principle of partiality is allowed.

The Civil Partnership Bill does not apply to opposite sex couples or siblings or friends or dependents who are living together.

There can be little progress if some couples are protected but others not.

Additionally, a much more profound problem with the legislation involves children.

By creating a separate legal status for Gay and Lesbian Partnerships, children born within and raised by such relationships are left in limbo with no constitutional or legal protection.

Amnesty International has branded the failure to legislate for the children of gay and lesbian couples as ‘cowardly’.

This issue must also be broadened, because it may be that a single parent has a child and moves to live with a friend or their sibling and together they raise the child.

It may be that a number of people form a household or a commune and share sexual relations and raise children in the community.

A law which is not to enshrine discrimination recognizes and accommodates every identified benign form of domestic choice made within society.

So, in my submission, people, whoever they may be, who have pledged to live together should be able to apply to the State for Marriage.

Some may wish to undergo a secular or religious ceremony of Marriage, some ( cohabitees – as they are described ) may rather that their commitment demonstrated over more than say a three year period is recognized as Marriage, without any such ceremony.

It would be important to protect the Prohibited Degrees that prohibit marriage for those with a close blood relationship.

However this could easily be done by noting that those seeking marriage with co-sanguinity had by law to be non sexual relationships.

Across the country the State would be encouraging and resourcing stable relationship units and stable family units and the children raised within them would be protected.

I understand it was the Greens back in 2002 who were the only party to refer to rights for gay and lesbian couples.

By 2004 all had taken up the issue with Fine Gael the first to launch an explicit policy document.

By 2007 all parties supporting same sex unions with only the Greens and Sinn Fein supporting full civil marriage.

But despite such activity, the path to political reform has been littered with broken promises, snail like progress and now a weak and dissatisfying Bill is being considered.

Why can’t Ireland, with its bold emergent identity, do better than this?

Why can’t you make history and give the world a moral and visionary lead into how to become a truly inclusive modern society?

Why instead are you grubbing about trying to catch up with the other EU states, but doings so with further discriminatory legislation that will have to be changed.

I don’t say this from just a theoretical background.

In 1994 I became the first priest in the United Kingdom to announce my willingness to provide Marriage ceremonies for the Gay, Lesbian, bisexual, transsexual and transgendered Community.

Awhile later I became the first priest to put an advertisment in the Gay and Lesbian Press offering such marriages.

I travelled the country taking hundreds of such services providing communities of family and friends with the experience of how normal, everyday and proper such ceremonies were and what a positive influence they had upon all involved.

The Media were fascinated by this innovative and groundbreaking approach from within the ranks of the Church. Finally a cleric was helping to spearhead a revolution instead of lagging grudgingly behind.

Many articles and broadcasts covered my work.

The most notable of which was my conducting the first gay wedding to be broadcast on the UK’s most popular morning TV show ‘Richard and Judy’ on Valentine’s Day, 2001.

It created a furore and has come to be regarded as one among the most controversial pieces of Television. The criticisms of it were dismissed by the Television Standards Commission and it advanced significantly the moves towards Civil Partnerships.

Since being consecrated a Bishop and founding the Open Episcopal Church I have worked hard to secure within the Canons of the Church the facility for the Sacrament of Marriage not to be reserved for heterosexuals but for adults pledging themselves in Marriage.

Wherever true, unconditional and unselfish love is to be found, there is the presence of God, there is a window to heaven.

All this has been something of a miraculous journey but this is the age of miracles.

Ireland believes in miracles.

Ireland is a miracle.

I urge you to be bold enough to add non discriminatory marriage legislation to the list.

Don’t settle for the starched clothes of prejudice and philosophical poverty.

Don’t become ensnared by the squabbles of yesterday’s world and the power broking of church and state.

Strive for a new world, a heavenly world, where justice and equality reign, where peace and harmony prevail and where people are free to live and to love and to care for others, enjoying equally the protection of the State.

Please support the motion.

The Motion was carried overwhelmingly.

Fr Ed Tomlinson's views on funerals

2009-10-20T02:32:00.000-07:00

The last thing most families want or need at a funeral is religious dogma, stylised prayers and archaic biblical readings. People can choose their particular diet of such things during their lifetime, but taking advantage of these intensely vulnerable moments of grief to do some bible bashing or religious promotion is offensive and distasteful.

The funeral service is a time to concentrate on the life of the deceased and the emotional needs of the mourners. It is a time to accompany family and friends through this rite of passage sensitively and with a desire to serve them rather than dictate to them.

The idea that certain prayers have to be said or rituals performed to aid the deceased into the arms of God is so much stuff and nonsense. If God were to open heaven on such an arbitary and vindictive basis we should dismiss such a deity outright.

The only things that are important are the wishes of the family. I go with the flow, wherever it leads. In the course of my ministry this has involved some mourners dancing around the coffin, putting beer upon it, wishing the deceased to be baptised, having the funeral at home, in the garden, around a bonfire, sifting the ashes through their hands, climbing into the grave plot, releasing doves, balloons, fireworks, singing, every sort of music, atheist services, requiem masses, Jewish funerals, just music, just silence. When the family ask can we, I always reply, ' Its your service, you may have or do whatever you want'.

Most of the time though, their requests are modest. Music that has meaning for them and a eulogy that honours and celebrates the life of the deceased with a few personal prayers to bring comfort. In contrast, I listen sometimes at the door of the crematorium as the cleric, just drones out the set prayers with scant reference to the bereaved.

Tomlinson suggests that the main aim of other celebrants is to make money. Doesn't he realise that the main aim of the Church of England in trying to protect their monopoly of the funerals in this country is financial. As one undertaker put it to me recently, the Anglican Church is in crisis. Whereas most funerals were once taken by their clergy, in the Diocese to which he was referring, the rate had now fallen to under 50%.

Why? Because most people regard the repetitive funeral liturgy peddled by the churches as babble and as an insult to their loved one.

Tomlinson gets a thrill from high church religion and its practices. No problem, as long as he keeps his wishes for himself. What is despicable is mocking the choices of others and forcing upon them his subjective pleasures; that is what the Churches have done for too long and that is why they are emptying rapidly.

BISHOP JOHN SHELBY SPONG

2009-10-18T10:32:00.000-07:00

October 15, 2009
A Manifesto! The Time Has Come! Bishop Spong writes:
I have made a decision. I will no longer debate the issue of homosexuality in the church with anyone. I will no longer engage the biblical ignorance that emanates from so many right-wing Christians about how the Bible condemns homosexuality, as if that point of view still has any credibility. I will no longer discuss with them or listen to them tell me how homosexuality is "an abomination to God," about how homosexuality is a "chosen lifestyle," or about how through prayer and "spiritual counseling" homosexual persons can be "cured." Those arguments are no longer worthy of my time or energy. I will no longer dignify by listening to the thoughts of those who advocate "reparative therapy," as if homosexual persons are somehow broken and need to be repaired. I will no longer talk to those who believe that the unity of the church can or should be achieved by rejecting the presence of, or at least at the expense of, gay and lesbian people. I will no longer take the time to refute the unlearned and undocumentable claims of certain world religious leaders who call homosexuality "deviant." I will no longer listen to that pious sentimentality that certain Christian leaders continue to employ, which suggests some version of that strange and overtly dishonest phrase that "we love the sinner but hate the sin." That statement is, I have concluded, nothing more than a self-serving lie designed to cover the fact that these people hate homosexual persons and fear homosexuality itself, but somehow know that hatred is incompatible with the Christ they claim to profess, so they adopt this face-saving and absolutely false statement. I will no longer temper my understanding of truth in order to pretend that I have even a tiny smidgen of respect for the appalling negativity that continues to emanate from religious circles where the church has for centuries conveniently perfumed its ongoing prejudices against blacks, Jews, women and homosexual persons with what it assumes is "high-sounding, pious rhetoric." The day for that mentality has quite simply come to an end for me. I will personally neither tolerate it nor listen to it any longer. The world has moved on, leaving these elements of the Christian Church that cannot adjust to new knowledge or a new consciousness lost in a sea of their own irrelevance. They no longer talk to anyone but themselves. I will no longer seek to slow down the witness to inclusiveness by pretending that there is some middle ground between prejudice and oppression. There isn't. Justice postponed is justice denied. That can be a resting place no longer for anyone. An old civil rights song proclaimed that the only choice awaiting those who cannot adjust to a new understanding was to "Roll on over or we'll roll on over you!" Time waits for no one.
I will particularly ignore those members of my own Episcopal Church who seek to break away from this body to form a "new church," claiming that this new and bigoted instrument alone now represents the Anglican Communion. Such a new ecclesiastical body is designed to allow these pathetic human beings, who are so deeply locked into a world that no longer exists, to form a community in which they can continue to hate gay people, distort gay people with their hopeless rhetoric and to be part of a religious fellowship in which they can continue to feel justified in their homophobic prejudices for the rest of their tortured lives. Church unity can never be a virtue that is preserved by allowing injustice, oppression and psychological tyranny to go unchallenged.
In my personal life, I will no longer listen to televised debates conducted by "fair-minded" channels that seek to give "both sides" of this issue "equal time." I am aware that these stations no longer give equal time to the advocates of treating women as if they are the property of men or to the advocates of reinstating either segregation or slavery, despite the fact that when these evil institutions were coming to an end the Bible was still being quoted frequently on each of these subjects. It is time for the media to announce that there are no longer two sides to the issue of full humanity for gay and lesbian people. There is no way that justice for homosexual people can be compromised any longer.
I will no longer act as if the Papal office is to be respected if the present occupant of that office is either not willing or not able to inform and educate himself on public issues on which he dares to speak with embarrassing ineptitude. I will no longer be respectful of the leadership of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who seems to believe that rude behavior, intolerance and even killing prejudice is somehow acceptable, so long as it comes from third-world religious leaders, who more than anything else reveal in themselves the price that colonial oppression has required of the minds and hearts of so many of our world's population. I see no way that ignorance and truth can be placed side by side, nor do I believe that evil is somehow less evil if the Bible is quoted to justify it. I will dismiss as unworthy of any more of my attention the wild, false and uninformed opinions of such would-be religious leaders as Pat Robertson, James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Jimmy Swaggart, Albert Mohler, and Robert Duncan. My country and my church have both already spent too much time, energy and money trying to accommodate these backward points of view when they are no longer even tolerable.
I make these statements because it is time to move on. The battle is over. The victory has been won. There is no reasonable doubt as to what the final outcome of this struggle will be. Homosexual people will be accepted as equal, full human beings, who have a legitimate claim on every right that both church and society have to offer any of us. Homosexual marriages will become legal, recognized by the state and pronounced holy by the church. "Don't ask, don't tell" will be dismantled as the policy of our armed forces. We will and we must learn that equality of citizenship is not something that should ever be submitted to a referendum. Equality under and before the law is a solemn promise conveyed to all our citizens in the Constitution itself. Can any of us imagine having a public referendum on whether slavery should continue, whether segregation should be dismantled, whether voting privileges should be offered to women? The time has come for politicians to stop hiding behind unjust laws that they themselves helped to enact, and to abandon that convenient shield of demanding a vote on the rights of full citizenship because they do not understand the difference between a constitutional democracy, which this nation has, and a "mobocracy," which this nation rejected when it adopted its constitution. We do not put the civil rights of a minority to the vote of a plebiscite.
I will also no longer act as if I need a majority vote of some ecclesiastical body in order to bless, ordain, recognize and celebrate the lives and gifts of gay and lesbian people in the life of the church. No one should ever again be forced to submit the privilege of citizenship in this nation or membership in the Christian Church to the will of a majority vote.
The battle in both our culture and our church to rid our souls of this dying prejudice is finished. A new consciousness has arisen. A decision has quite clearly been made. Inequality for gay and lesbian people is no longer a debatable issue in either church or state. Therefore, I will from this moment on refuse to dignify the continued public expression of ignorant prejudice by engaging it. I do not tolerate racism or sexism any longer. From this moment on, I will no longer tolerate our culture's various forms of homophobia. I do not care who it is who articulates these attitudes or who tries to make them sound holy with religious jargon.
I have been part of this debate for years, but things do get settled and this issue is now settled for me. I do not debate any longer with members of the "Flat Earth Society" either. I do not debate with people who think we should treat epilepsy by casting demons out of the epileptic person; I do not waste time engaging those medical opinions that suggest that bleeding the patient might release the infection. I do not converse with people who think that Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans as punishment for the sin of being the birthplace of Ellen DeGeneres or that the terrorists hit the United Sates on 9/11 because we tolerated homosexual people, abortions, feminism or the American Civil Liberties Union. I am tired of being embarrassed by so much of my church's participation in causes that are quite unworthy of the Christ I serve or the God whose mystery and wonder I appreciate more each day. Indeed I feel the Christian Church should not only apologize, but do public penance for the way we have treated people of color, women, adherents of other religions and those we designated heretics, as well as gay and lesbian people.
Life moves on. As the poet James Russell Lowell once put it more than a century ago: "New occasions teach new duties, Time makes ancient good uncouth." I am ready now to claim the victory. I will from now on assume it and live into it. I am unwilling to argue about it or to discuss it as if there are two equally valid, competing positions any longer. The day for that mentality has simply gone forever.
This is my manifesto and my creed. I proclaim it today. I invite others to join me in this public declaration. I believe that such a public outpouring will help cleanse both the church and this nation of its own distorting past. It will restore integrity and honor to both church and state. It will signal that a new day has dawned and we are ready not just to embrace it, but also to rejoice in it and to celebrate it.

DIGNITY CLINICS

2009-09-23T16:06:00.000-07:00

Keir Starmer's announcement today does not go far enough.

Assisted suicide still remains a criminal offence with the danger of prosecution lurking to deter and haunt loved ones. The consideration of financial gain excludes every potential benefactor of a will - that would normally encompass all loved ones. Additionally, the criteria for suffering would not have included the tragedy of Daniel James's situation.

However, all of these matters play around the foothills of the Everestian challenge society faces in having to tackle the issue that lies ahead.

Nanotechnology according to Ray Kurzweil will make us 'immortal' in twenty years. Whether this is an inflated claim or not, the fact is we are living longer, with hopes that our longevity will only improve. The problems of an overpopulated planet will only increase and if scientific advances hold the promise of our regeneration then the issue of our organised termination will become essential.

This is no surprise to me as I predicted the same over 15 years ago.

Put clearly, the planet will not allow for our immortality, so if the gift of a healthy passage in this world becomes commonplace, governments will have to decide how many years a person can sojourn here.

Then at the required age of 75, 105, 135 whatever, people will have to plan their chosen and manner of exiting this life.

Meanwhile, we have intervened comprehensively in the natural process from birth to death already and are now petitioned to do so more thoroughly around death itself, particularly for those who are infirm or suffering a terminal or unchangeable state of acute physical or mental trauma.

At the moment we have to suffer the indignity of a cruel and humiliating degeneration into infirmity and incapacity in old age or illness and see our loved ones tortured in their grief at our demise. We show much greater compassion and consideration in relation to animals and their owners in such a situation, but not to our own.

This final taboo must be broken and we must come of age and take responsibility for the manner of our dying.

Society must facilitate the provision of a variety of clinics that offer an access to death in an aesthetic and spiritually comforting way for the person dying and their loved ones.

The Christian moralists who keep the keys to death close to their chests peddle a 'God of the gaps' theology. As the gaps grow narrower they claim that we can't interfere with the time of our death. They have conceded intervention in all other areas but not this last holy place. There is no logic or rationale to justify this approach, only the conservatism that regards all development as suspect.

In contrast, let me proclaim the resurrection belief that this world is just the beginning and that death provides a door way to the next experience of life.

As God has required us to be wise stewards of creation so we must proceed now to venture into the mystery of this interface between worlds and make the crossing one filled with hope, joy and dignity.

The medical profession also act as guards to the gates, relying upon their interpretation of the Hippocratic oath. In truth they practice an undisclosed form of euthanasia in their administration of morphine already. However, they have no right to usurp our own right to choose to die.

The Nanny State too polices the gates, denying the public access to the necessary drugs for a pain free and dignified end. This intrusion of government into our personal lives may seem benign, but not when you witness the grotesque degradation a loved one has to suffer through age or illness into death. What right have politicians to torture us in this way?

We are not babes in arms nor infants and should not shirk the challenge of a mature engagement with the immense matter of death.

Allow us to find a way of happily saying our goodbyes and then lying on a bed, in a boat, on a rollercoaster, in a bath, listening to a symphony, on a mountain top, at home, in a dignity clinic - wherever, drinking the anti-emetic and then the elixir of life (Sodium Pentobarbital) and moving on happily and peacefully to the paradise beyond and the adventures that lie ahead.

RELIGIOUS HOCUS POCUS?

2009-09-17T01:56:00.000-07:00

The Daily Telegraph reports it to be 'one of the most important events for British Roman Catholics since the visit of Pope John Paul'. The Church of England are involved too with a viewing at York Minster.

This event of great significance centres around the dismemberment of a woman, Therese, and the gathering of the 'faithful' to worship her thigh and foot bones.

Any wonder that most view religion as hocus pocus, humbug and superstition. It indeed may prove to be a 'most important event'; putting another nail in the coffin of religious adherence in this country.

Foot and thigh worship contrast with the Gospel message in which we remember, seek to exemplify and share in the resurrection life of Jesus Christ, who was careful to leave no bones, no relics and no personal fragments for material obsession and cult adoration.

AMERICA'S INHUMANITY?

2009-09-16T15:12:00.000-07:00

How can we read of the gruesome act of clinical torture of Romell Broom in Ohio lasting two hours and not question America's tolerance of the death penalty.

Combine this with the Allies orchestration of Iraqi justice in which the heads of the hanged are at times severed from their bodies before nauseous journalists and our sense of moral purity is under scrutiny.

We must resolve these issues which compromise our more noble aims.

GOD SAVE US FROM 'BACK TO CHURCH SUNDAY'

2009-09-15T05:30:00.000-07:00

An advertising campaign for 'Back to Church Sunday' has begun.

But people have no interest in church attendance anymore. It is part of yesterday's world, a bygone culture, a redundant resource.

The church comunities which still thrive represent rarified practices or origins, but by and large, churches are empty and their clerics in crisis.

The Open Episcopal Church has pioneered a radical response to this taking worship, the sacraments and the Gospel out in to the community and our ministry is sought after and appreciated. Unless the main denominations are willing to learn from our experiences, their future is bleak.

BRING OUR SOLDIERS HOME

2009-08-27T16:45:00.000-07:00

Launching a plea to bring our brave soldiers home from Afghanistan.

Enough is enough.

Inadequate equipment, a confused strategy, a discredited electoral process, a corrupt political system, a sham of democracy, opium production undented, rivers of our young people's blood and the tears of the bereaved.

It is time to jettison the bullish talk, the bravado and the pretence of safer shores with the battle overseas.

We must aspire after a new world order, in which truth replaces hypocrisy, justice replaces corruption and love resists extortion and greed.

Janet Daley's neo colonialism

2009-08-23T12:52:00.000-07:00

The problem with Janet Daley's critique is that the brave voters she cites have not yet brought about the necessary indigenous change to support a democratic political system. Instead under the shelter of our guns and our encouragement they have crept out in response to the financial and cultural inducements of the West.

Daley recognises the flaws in our political and judicial systems. They are all too evident with deaths at the hands of the police, miscarriages of justice, political corruption and the basic fact that our voting system elects a government that only represents a minority of the country.

We overlook and tolerate our flaws but are impatient and moralistic over others.

Rather than seeing our role as the international police, invading and slaughtering to encourage democracy, we could instead stay within our borders and work to establish just international relations, fair trade agreements and wealth/resource distribution that would foster peace and encourage social and political development.

KARZAI'S QUESTIONABLE VICTORY

2009-08-23T12:27:00.000-07:00

Our soldiers are dying in the chaos and incompetence of war, because of political and economic shortcomings, because of a speculative ideology, because of a confused rationale that is built on a paper foundation.

Meanwhile the opium trade blossoms, corruption is rife and Karzai pardons 5 drug smugglers because of personal interests and Mafia style pressures.

His victory seems empty. The grief of the bereaved replete.

For how long will voters in the U.K. tolerate the squandering of our youth to the desert sands of Afghanistan?

ALLELUIA, THE QUAKERS FOLLOW OUR EXAMPLE

2009-08-08T02:37:00.000-07:00

The Open Episcopal Church was the first church to extend the sacrament of marriage to homosexual couples as well as heterosexual couples. Now the Quakers and the Church of Sweden, which is formally linked to the Church of England, are following our lead.

With 13 groups petitioning the Archbishop of Canterbury this week for the Church of England to become an inclusive church, good things are at work.

DISGRACEFUL PRISONS

2009-08-07T15:21:00.000-07:00

This country has 84,000 prisoners now with a projected increase of capacity to 96,000 by 2014.

My most recent visit to a prison last week confirmed my view that there is a dire malaise at the heart of the penal system in this country.

The inmates are denied their basic human rights, are subject to an unaccountable prison service, are victims of abuse, bullying and various forms of psychological torture. Their families and friends are abused and humiliated when in contact with the prison and when visits are made.

Politically correct posters and language, educational courses and questionnaires are all used to create a smoke screen behind which people are treated inhumanely.

No wonder that re-offending rates are so high, that suicides are frequent, that prisoner morale is low and that so little remedial work is achieved.

It is time that a thorough, transparent and independent review was carried out and this serious injustice within our national life was addressed.

CELIBACY

2009-08-05T15:08:00.000-07:00

So the article in the Daily Telegraph re my previous blog caused reaction from this country, the States and as far as Australia. Not quite death threats but violence and personal abuse from faithful Christians!

My crime in part? Suggesting that requiring celibacy as a condition of Holy Orders and the existence of closed Orders of Monks and Nuns is life denying.

My critics have protested that people have a free choice. Yes. However, is it not the vulnerable that are drawn towards such artificial and unnatural constructs created by the Church which prevent human beings from experiencing intimacy in their earthly lives? Is it not a denial of the Incarnation and an affront to the God of Love to wrest people from their families and loved ones and to exclude them from the opportunity of marital intimacy?

The sexual and physical abuse of the young which has disgraced the ministry of the church is one vivid indicator of the distortion in human relationships that the celibate priesthood and Orders of Monks and Nuns have produced.

If the Church is to begin criticising modern experiments in community and relationships it needs to put its own house in order, and there is no sign as yet of that happening.

VINCENT NICHOLS, GEORGE PITCHER AND FACEBOOK

2009-08-03T05:47:00.000-07:00

So the Archbishop of Westminster and George Pitcher both warn about the dangers of electronic isolation and relationships mediated through the keyboard.

Of course there are dangers and wise parents and balanced adults will guard against them.

However, there may be greater dangers to relationships in religion. I have counselled those heartbroken that a member of their family had been snatched from them into a closed order of Nuns, others sucked into the lonliness of the celibate priesthood, many more isolated into religious fanaticism, others damaged by the homophobia, authoritarianism and sexism enshrined in church policy.

Religious bigotry has fuelled the fragmentation of societies, the increase in prejudice and reactionary thinking.

Strange, because the Sacrament of the Mass is all about Holy Communication.

So when Facebook and other social networking sites allow people to communicate, to reconnect, to discover the thrill of friendships and to provide the resources to maintain them and explore them , perhaps the church should be encouraging and supportive.

CANNABIS

2009-07-28T14:17:00.000-07:00

Finally we have a finding that Skunk Cannabis can cause psychotic illnesses. I have encountered a number of people, who have smoked cannabis 'recreationally', whose psychological states have undergone irreparable damage leading them to dysfunctional lifestyles and social isolation, even death.
While ever government, parents or friends send out a soft or liberal message re cannabis, they are complicit with the devastating effects this has upon others. I want to encourage all those who have a damaging material addiction to replace it with the reception of the Body of Christ. Carry consecrated Hosts with you at all times and pop them as many times as you need. You will retain your health and maximise your life experience.

FOLLOWING OUR LEAD

2009-07-24T11:51:00.001-07:00

The dear old Church of England announces that it is guiding their clerics to offer services of marriage with the chance of having the children of the relationship baptised as well.

I was offering this when I was a curate in the Church of England in 1984 and have regularly celebrated such services throughout my ministerial years since.

SOUND BITE SOLDIERS

2009-07-14T14:44:00.000-07:00

It is chilling to hear our government accept that fatalities will increase in Afghanistan and know that our troops are under-equipped.

We are shocked by the history of those who ordered our forces over the trenches to meet almost certain death. I had thought the idea that soldiers were expendable and their deaths part of the budget of war had long been buried.

Instead, young soldiers are being ordered out in inadequate armoured vehicles across roads which their superiors know will result in certain death for some. This is intolerable.

Yes, fatalities will occur on the battle-field in engaged combat, but to squander soldiers mindlessly in a roulette game of roadside bombs is nonsensical and inexcusable.

That the Prime Minister rebuffs such criticism with sound bites about keeping the battle away from our shores is invidious. The battle is on home ground as each body is repatriated.

CHRIST SO SMALL, SO POTENT

2009-07-13T05:16:00.001-07:00

Sent from someone who has received the consecrated Hosts:

As I told you in my previous mail I had to meditate a considerable time before asking you. But then I received the bible verse Proverbs 30: 25 in my heart. When I spoke to Jesus about my postbox and that a possible fall of the parcel in my corridor seemed to me to be a dishonour for Him that was too great to bear, I heard the majestic and yet so warm voice in my heart: Why do you think that I have made Me that small? The day before the parcels came, I reveived Proverbs 31: 14 which was very moving for me.

I met a gifted inventor from an East-European country when I was doing volunteer work among the homeless. He had fled from his country because his family wanted him in an psychiatric hospital for his mental symtoms. There was also political disagreement betweed him and his very influential family. He had a lot of official papers and parts of newspapers with him to prove his story.No country wanted to give him a right to stay and this is how he came fleeing to my house. We gave him shelter. Because of his growing psychosis I feared for his life. I decided to have a time of prayer together and give him a host. If I could not reach him from the outside, the Lord could from the inside. When he received the host he said after some time: "This must be a most holy thing. He stopped my (psychotic) mind. It is calm in my mind. No one has ever been able to do so."

Questions for a fundamentalist?

2009-07-06T15:23:00.000-07:00

A reader's letter to a paper...

1 When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odour for the Lord (Lev. 1:9). The problem is my neighbours. They claim the odour is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
2 I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. What would be a fair price for her?
3 I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness (Lev. 15:19-24). The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offence.
4 Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighbouring nations. A friend of mine says that this applies to the Scottish, but not the Welsh. Why can't I own Welsh people?
5 I have a neighbour who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Is this a good defence in court?
6 A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination (Lev. 11:10), it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality (Leviticus 18:22). I don't agree. What is the correct position?
7 Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some room for negotiation here?
8 Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev.19:27. How should they die?
9 My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? (Lev.24:10-16) Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

Reactionary or progressive church?

2009-07-04T16:44:00.000-07:00

Many, it seems, wish to lead the church backwards into the fundamentalist and rigid dogmatic approach that has become the scourge of the world. In many of the great faiths, there is this resurgent drive to speak in absolutes and to present as objective what is clearly subjective.

Perhaps it is a personality disposition to flee from the real and complex world into simplistic and brutal platitudes that fragment under intellectual scrutiny and inter-disciplinary analysis.

Traditional Church is collapsing. Congregations are being wiped out. Churches are closing. The sexism, racism and homophobia of the church are just some of the indicators of a church out of touch with modern life, peddling outdated ideas in an embarrassingly reactionary spirit.

However Christ is incarnate in today's new and more wholesome age, where tolerance and acceptance, pioneering research and social integration are the fruits that secularism and liberal religion has borne.

There are signs of hope in brave avant-garde initiatives like Inclusive Church, like Post the Host, like the outbreak of Flash Mob worship experiences, like the burgeoning grass root liquid church projects, like the thousands of sacramental services that the Open Episcopal Church and the Society for Independent Christian Ministry have taken all over the country in people’s homes and gardens and community centres.

Faith and spirituality are alive and well in our land. The last thing the church needs are Christians who try to conceive how to replicate the indoctrinating nature of the Islamic Madrasahs.

THE MALIGN TUMOUR IN THE LAND OF THE FREE

2009-07-02T15:34:00.000-07:00

Death Row remains the contradiction and denial of America's claim to inhabit the high moral ground of the world. The Human Face of the Death Penalty by British portraitist Claire Phillips is at the.gallery@oxo , Oxo Tower, London, from July 1 to July 5.

TWO ARCHBISHOPS AND THE CHIEF RABBI

2009-07-02T11:04:00.000-07:00

Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury; Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster, and Sir Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi, have come together for the first time to urge peers to reject proposals that would allow families to help loved ones to die abroad free from the threat of prosecution. They have written "We do not believe that such a fundamental change in the law should be sought by way of an amendment to an already complex Bill."

They are right that such a sensitive matter requires its own Bill , so that the issues can be addressed properly.

Christians have to think carefully. It is essential that the vulnerable are protected. It is also necessary that people are able, in certain acute situations, to arrange their death with dignity.

HOLY TRINITY ANGLICAN CHURCH - BISHOP'S STORTFORD

2009-07-01T07:11:00.000-07:00

Mr David Brown ordered from Post the Host and wrote a positive article about his experience on the church web site. Kindly, he sent me a copy.

It included: “ My seven year old son, Gabriel , was very interested and wanted to join in. Gabriel is not confirmed and does not normally receive communion, but considering the highly inclusive nature of this new ministry, I didn’t feel that I should deny him. So we suggled up together with a laptop and watched the “Singing Mass”. After about 8 minutes ++Jonathan tells us “please now receive the consecrated Host”. So we did –it was a lovely moment.” In response Jon Durrant comments about Post the Host. “ Brilliant. Great idea to bring innovation to the Church”

THE MYSTERY WORSHIPPER

2009-06-25T07:35:00.000-07:00

Oh you who can drop in to worship anytime, anywhere to rate the latest design techniques and marketing ploys of a church to try and nudge them into becoming the ecclesiastical equivalents of Claridges, Harvester or Macdonalds consider this.

You are part of the system; comfortable, well fed and at ease with Christianity, so much so, you can poke fun and parody. What about those who languish far from home and food, who trudge in the deserts of this world, who have no time to indulge in the luxury of cynicism and misrepresentations, who are trapped and for whom Christ came to rescue and redeem.

The Open Episcopal Church exists, in contradiction to what you say, to reach out to all and to make all the sacraments available to all, as the primary resources of outreach and redemption. Post the Host is just a small part of all that we do.

Join us in our evangelistic mission and divert the time you spend at present in trying to enhance the church into providing savvy, posh and fast food outlets and instead help make the bread of life available to the poor, most of whom are not to be found anywhere near church worship.

Neda Agha Soltan

2009-06-24T07:42:00.000-07:00

We shall not forget you, nor your family, nor your friends, nor their tears nor their pain.

You will inhabit our prayers. You will join the pilgrim martyrs leading us to the promised land.

You will inpsire us in the darkness to apsire to the light.

You have paid the supreme price, as did Christ, for your noble beliefs and hopes.

May you be blessed in heaven and your loved ones comforted on earth.

CONTACTS FROM AROUND THE WORLD

2009-06-24T07:07:00.001-07:00

Its typical that the UK media have been afraid of Post the Host so far, leaving the Guardian and the World Service to carry the news far and wide.

The cynicism of the British Press, their obsession with celebrity and their lack of ease with sincere religious innovation renders them incapable, it seems, of understanding how extraordinary Post the Host is in the history of Christendom.

As Bishops, priests and the general public reel around the world at this new provision and as people contact us in horror or in excited support, the tabloids and broadsheets are lost in the forest of MP's expenses or Jordan's failed marriage etc...

Meanwhile, the landscape of the Christian church has altered for good. Alleluia.

THE REVOLUTION BEGINS - WITH UPDATES

2009-06-17T14:34:00.000-07:00

Over 400 hosts have now been posted out.

The first order was for an elderly person facing surgery this week and wanting to receive the Host before entering hospital.

Two international orders have been placed from Germany and Canada.

Sceptics and critics, see the miracles that Christ will work and be brave enough to set him free yourselves.

POST THE HOST HITS THE WORLD

2009-06-10T05:10:00.001-07:00

Yesterday the Guardian covered www.postthehost.net. Then LBC, Premier Christian Radio, Italian TV and the BBC World Service.

Never before has the consecrated host been made available by post to all that desire to receive.

The gift of God, the living presence of Jesus, the power of the Holy Spirit, the unconditional love of the Trinity arriving through your door, by the special ministers of the sacrament, the postmen and postwomen. Alleluia. A new era has dawned.

IN REPLY TO ALLISON RUOFF

2009-06-09T15:49:00.000-07:00

We share, I believe the passion to make Christ known. You want Christians to get out of church buildings and onto the streets and into the community. You will be heartened to know that that is the core vision which has inspired me since 1994 when I began ministering outside the traditional denominational structures. It is the core vision of the Open Episcopal Church which since 2001 has sought to make Christian ministry available to everyone outside the confines of church buildings. We have been involved in front line evangelism and have thus been able to build up a community of 16,000 members and many tens of thousands more who have attended our services.

Post the Host continues this drive to liberate Christ from the clutch of the professional priesthood and the rigidity of church structures.

You were worried that the Host should only be food for the faithful few. Can I ask you to to examine the ministry of Jesus who continually thought outside the box, who reinterpreted the traditions of old so they were unrecognisable from the ways the people of his day were practicising them, who lavished upon the people the treasures and grace of God.

Christ did not come to start a cosy club with treats for the few. He came to redeem the world and to that end , to give his life for the world.

Its a strange irony for you to believe that he would make himself fully available during his lifetime and be willing to die for us all but then want us to keep him under lock and key and away from the majority of the world.

You said that the word is the primary resource in evangelism. We agree perhaps, for Jesus is the Word, the Logos of God. That is why he goes before us to lead us to the lost and the lonely. He wants to stand at the door of the hearts of all the estranged and knock for entry.

Post the Host enables this to happen in a sacramental way. Support this bold and inspired work of God rather than try to make the walls higher still around the exclusive Christian community.

GUANTANAMO

2009-06-08T15:24:00.000-07:00

Please no. The possibility contained in draft legislation to go before Congress to permit Guantánamo's suspected terrorists, who are facing the death penalty to plead guilty and so avoid full trial has sent a shiver down my spine.

The aberration of justice that Guantanamo has been would only be mired further by this move towards an expedient solution that is willing to be careless with life.

Our values and our democracy are based upon the sanctity of life, irrespective of the detainees actions. A full and fair trial must be at the basis of any final verdict that could result in a death penalty being passed, though the death penalty itself is also an aberration.

IRAN - THE SPECTRE OF WAR

2009-06-08T15:13:00.000-07:00

Apparently month by month, experts chart how Iran installs more centrifuges inside its underground plant in Natanz, where these machines are used to enrich uranium. This highly sensitive process, which breaches five UN Resolutions, could be used either to produce fuel for nuclear power stations – or the essential material for an atomic bomb.

The nuclear issue here as in North Korea is threatening to destabilise world peace, either directly or through the development of the terrorist's capacity to devastate.

However we must be clear about what the volatile elements are. Thankfully Barak Obama is continuing his reconciliatory rhetoric. There is a great need for sensitive and respectful diplomacy and the requirement to understand the cultural and historical differences that exist between nations and their peoples.

Only then will we progress towards peace and overcome the darkness that looms only too near.

IN REPLY TO MICHAEL.

2009-06-07T14:08:00.000-07:00

In response to Michael otherwise presenting himself as Cyprian.

Thank you for your recent meaningful contribution to the debate. Post the Host seeks to encourage those receiving to pray, to read the scriptures and to encounter and receive the Body of Christ. By so doing our missionary hope is that people can be drawn into deeper and closer relationship with those around them in whom the Spirit of God dwells.Post the Host does not seek to encourage dismembered reception, anymore than those receiving in hospitals or at home, rather to find ways to bring into closer contact those who are at present estranged.The internet and video resources are not to replace other more personal forms of ministry and worship but to lead to them or supplement them. As such they are evangelistic. Post the Host takes its ministerial responsibilities to those with whom we have contact very seriously as does the Open Episcopal Church. That is the very reason for our ministry outside the traditional church structures, to reach out and draw alongside the lost and the lonely.

SHIP OF FOOLS

2009-06-07T01:05:00.000-07:00

Having read the thread discussion re Post the Host on the Ship of Fools web site I am disappointed. The quality of contribution meanders from the crass, erroneous and infantile to falling beneath any supposed standard of christian discussion. ( Damian Thompson's thread discussion is better, but not by much. )
Post the Host is one of the most important modern developments in the provision of christian ministry to have taken place and if all that Ship of Fools can produce is drivel, it is a sad indictment.
We would welcome informed and intelligent comments.

WESTMINSTER MELT DOWN

2009-06-03T16:04:00.000-07:00

This is becoming very serious. If every MP who has fleeced the nation resigned how many would be left?

Away with their paltry excuses and weak explanations. A scam is a scam, a ride is a ride, a gravy train is a gravy train and all those aboard need to leave the train at the next station.

It may be few are left. It may be that politics needs to change for ever. It may be that revolution is the order of the day. It may be that radical means that which is beyond the sticking plasters that are being bandied around at present.

Wake up Parliament. A new era must begin.

BEACHY HEAD -In memory of the Putticks.

2009-06-02T16:04:00.000-07:00

Oh glorious and beautiful land and seascape that makes us breathless in wonder yet chills us with its capacity to swallow us in our grief and despair.

The suffering of some knows no bounds, making this world a viscious and life denying place and it may be from that state of wretchedness that the decision to jump was taken.

However, it may have been a more determined though regrettable choice. Three family members, bound together in love who cannot conceive of life without each other and refusing to be swallowed, find in this awesome setting a doorway through which they can take the ultimate journey beyond our shores in the hope of arriving safely in the promised land.

I believe they have.

SUSAN BOYLE

2009-06-02T15:35:00.000-07:00

Oh dear. The great and the good are now pontificating about the propriety of allowing Susan Boyle to have appeared on Britain's Got Talent. Even Nicci Gerrard's otherwise thoughtful article fails to avoid the trap of being infected by celebrititus.

It seems, in these latest minds, to be only those who are 'perfect' that will be allowed to appear on our screens. The ones with the myriad of human foibles and frailities will be brushed off stage.

Find me these perfect specimens who are not affected adversely by mass public exposure? Find me these stable personalities that have a right to perform their art because they and their families will live unscathed by the consequences?

The experience of celebrity is potent and dangerous but for the advantaged to seek to exclude others from it is disingenuous.

ON TWITTER

2009-06-02T09:07:00.001-07:00

For any who are interested or want to dialogue:

www.twitter.com/bishopjonathan

MP'S EXPENSES

2009-06-01T15:25:00.000-07:00

When we hear the promises being made about sweeping reform and the shock being expressed by some politicians, including the Prime Minister and Chancellor, about the corruption that has been unearthed, let us urge the journalists to keep asking the same revealing questions.

When the freedom of information request about MP's expenses was submitted years ago, did you campaign for disclosure and full transparency or were you one of those resisting to the end or keeping silent in the hope that only minimal details would emerge? If either of the latter could you do the honourable thing and resign immediately?

DR GEORGE TILLER

2009-05-31T14:27:00.000-07:00

Should he be demonised or canonised?

I suggest the latter. Not because all of his decisions may have been worthy, though whose are, but because he was one of those brave individuals who was willing to work and provide care for those in desperate circumstances despite the knowledge that this placed his life in constant danger.

God protect us from those who tuck themsleves into neat boxes of ready provided answers to life's dilemmas and then try and force them on everyone else. Such an approach is a delusion which costs the individuals dear. However it costs others dearer, in Dr Tiller's case, his life.

God support those, like Jesus, who went out of his way to spend time with prostitutes and the sinners of his day, not to shoot them or be shot by them, but to love them and be loved by them.

LAUNCH OF FOUR FINGER CAMPAIGN

2009-05-31T08:16:00.000-07:00

Bishop Jonathan and others will gather outside Scotland Yard at 4 p.m. on June 1st to launch the www.whennooneswatching.org national four finger campaign.

We are asking people to hold the four fingers of their right hand high, palm facing out, with the thumb tucked across the palm, whenever they encounter the police. The gesture offers an invitation to the police to respond making the same sign back to indicate their agreement.

The four fingers signify the four words, When No One’s Watching and the four aims of the WNOW campaign.

These are:

1. That all police officers must have body-worn video devices switched on while engaged with members of the public.
2. That all police vehicles must have video devices switched on when carrying members of the public.
3.That all custody suites and cells must have video devices switched on when members of the public are present.
4.That all video device content that relates to members of the public must be made available to them on request.

These aims seek to protect the public and the police by providing an independent evidential record upon which all involved can rely.

The campaign is not based on an ‘us and them’ attitude, nor is it against the police, it is against violence and those patterns of behaviour and practices that undermine human dignity and human rights. However, as the police bear statutory power with inadequate monitoring, this poses a more potent threat to the public.

Nevertheless the sign should not be used as an act of aggression. It is a symbol of that which would lead to the highest standards and the most positive relations between the public and the police.

NEW VIDEO FOR PENTECOST

2009-05-30T15:09:00.000-07:00

Video for Pentecost:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdcuQWfm0io

ABU GHRAIB RAPE

2009-05-27T16:09:00.000-07:00

The horrifying photographs are to be kept from public view because of the damage they will do. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/5395830/Abu-Ghraib-abuse-photos-show-rape.html
Give anyone power over another and allow that power to be exercised without comprehensive scrutiny then God protect those at the receiving end. We must live our lives as though a video was running 24/7 which others will see and we must ensure now that we take steps to video all the power brokers in our society.

CHRIST'S PRISON DOORS ARE OPENED

2009-05-27T14:13:00.000-07:00

Damian Thompson's blog http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/damian_thompson/blog/2009/05/25/post_the_host
_bishop_who_blessed_jade_goodys_wedding_offers_consecrated_wafers_by_mail ( if entering this you will have to paste the two lines as one )
and the Ship of Fools discussion http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=6;t=005914;p=1#000031 demonstrate the horror rippling through ecclesiastical corridoors at the thought that Jesus may be on the loose.

The content of many of the comments is lamentable.

Jesus is at large, as he has always been, but now the edifice of institutionalised religion is crumbling as did the temple and the Holy Spirit is at work. Alleluia.

UTUBE

2009-05-26T10:21:00.001-07:00

www.postthehost.net is almost ready for launch. I have been busy preparing a range of videos to accompany the on-line availability of conscecrated hosts. You can view the videos by searching for Post the Host on u tube or click below:

1. This is a FORMAL ORNATE MASS – Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPH7b8nQuAA

2. This is an OPEN AIR MASS – Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vY5orZvpVQY

3. This is a MEDITATIVE MASS held in the open air - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_InDCj2mD2o

4. This is an INCLUSIVE MASS celebrated in a simple manner- Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TofHeGL62Cg

5. This is a SINGING MASS - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxdXuyEtt3M

6. This is a STREET MASS - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7KCKNlJNIc

7. This is a RADICAL MASS - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug6Hi1iiF70

8. This is a LATIN MASS - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XryrMegQjQ

9. This is a CATHOLIC MASS - Bishop Jonathan Blake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh66b7XZ4mc

These are just the first.

STREET JESUS - STREET MASS

2009-05-13T16:57:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to the Our Lady Immaculate and St Philip Neri Catholic church in Uckfield that has just unveiled a seven-foot high bronze statue of Christ wearing baggy jeans and a shirt billowing in the wind while his hair and beard are neatly and fashionably trimmed.

Can I commend our Street Mass to them:

Alright God,
Sorry if we messed up.
Trying 2 sort things out
but cummon, give us a break

Absolution: OK. Hang on in there.

JC said. ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever eats this bread will live 4ever.’

JC if u can do that, then i wanna get involved, yea I believe in the real stuff. The inventing, rescuing, empowering God and the blood.
Nailed on a cross, banged in a tomb + then popping up all over the gaff.
The jet wash 2 + life beyond.
So here I am God, giving some respect to the guy on the donkey and all that
shizzle with the poor and the pushed over.
u were on the street, u know what
it was like, thats mad.

Then the party that hit the crap, with crumbs as torn flesh + wine lost blood.
But this time not water 2 wine but death 2 life.
So this is u now 4 me.
This host. Its power, life + love.

Our Guardian
Respect
U rule
Yr way
On the street as beyond
Give us r daily bread
+ cut us some slack
+ we’ll do the same
+ no set ups
+ no evil
4 u r it
now + 4 ever.

Receive the Host

Thumbs up. I’m home. I’m safe. I’m alive. I’m free. I’m yours. I’m ready. I’m on the move. Watch this space.

AN INCARNATE POPE

2009-05-11T09:03:00.000-07:00

At Ben Gurion airport the Pope has stated "I plead with all those responsible to explore every possible avenue in the search for a just resolution of the outstanding difficulties so that both people may live in peace in a homeland of their own within secure and internationally recognised borders.''

As God's Word in Christ came to earth to redeem us, would it not be a potent demonstration of the Gospel if the Pope, as one of those 'responsible', left the Vatican to devote himself to helping bring about the peace of his plea?

GEORGE PITCHER, THE POPE, CONDOMS AND THE MIDDLE EAST.

2009-05-10T16:50:00.000-07:00

Mr Pitcher, in the Telegraph today, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/georgepitcher/5304596/The-Pope-brings-the-Truth-to-the-Middle-East---not-a-peace-plan.html, lauds the Pope as the bringer of Catholic Truth. His task 'to remind the faithful of the will of God to which humankind should aspire'.

In Africa that meant saying that condoms were not the answer to the blight of aids. Re the Middle East that involved rehabilitating Bishop Williamson and his enthusiasm for the beatification of Pius XII, known in some Jewish quarter's as "Hitler's Pope". Thankfully the Pope has moved his position now on some of these areas.

Mr Pitcher takes a swipe at Tony Blair who he carps has made a negligible mark as a Middle East envoy and Cherie Blair who raised the plight of women with the Pontiff. These are just 'heel snappers' in contrast the Pope who 'walks the Holy Lands as part of a far greater and timeless apostolic mission.'

I'm not convinced.

Tony Blair has incarnated himself in the Middle East into much of the painstaking nitty gritty and tiresome diplomatic work from which peace can be the fruit. Cherie Blair used her access to the Pope to remind him of Christ's championing of women's rights and the condom distributors in Africa are perhaps offering the true sacrament of the Body of Christ in seeking to protect life and live in the truth.

MPs' Expenses

2009-05-09T15:24:00.000-07:00

The financial arrangements at Westminster are shocking.

The chasm is vast between the ability of so many MPs to claim that their expenses are all justifiable under parliamentary rules and the incredulity speading across the nation at this brazen gravy train.

Of course, now all has to be revealed, prudence and restraint will flourish.

Into how many more corners must the light of truth shine?

MEDWAY OR HOLLYWOOD

2009-05-07T07:10:00.000-07:00

The Medway valley provides a visual and experiential delight having driven along the dreary A2 to escape London and its seemingly endless conurbations.

Please save us from the Council's prosaic plan to scar the presenting hillside with white letters spelling out MEDWAY.

Our European partners outdo us with art works adorning their highways. So prompted we have our own Angel of the North and most recently the Dream sculpture in Merseyside. In Kent discussions are still underway for a white horse.

Please aim higher Medway, otherwise your choice will achieve the opposite of your intentions.

THE BODY OF CHRIST FOR YOU

2009-05-04T15:05:00.000-07:00

The Open Episcopal Church is launching a radical but we believe God given and God inspired work on June 14th.

The web site is http://www.postthehost.net/.

The Body of Christ, we believe, is not in the control of the Church, or the priests and should not be kept under lock and key in altar tabernacles.

Jesus is here for everyone. Of course he is available directly to everyone at all times, however the consecrated host is the most potent sacrament used by the church of his Body and we believe God is calling us to make that sacrament available to all as Jesus is available to all.

DELARA DARABI

2009-05-02T14:58:00.000-07:00

What is this obsession we have with murder?

This sanitising by a State of the most heinous act of removing a human being from the earth.

The hanging noose, crude and barbaric used to snatch away the complex, intricate and unique miracle of a life.

In Iraq, its vulgarity was demonstrated when Barzan Ibrahim was unintentionally beheaded in 2007 by the noose.

Thankfully the death penalty no longer exists in the U.K. Shame on all those States including the U.S. who still succumb to its evil overtures.

BASRA

2009-04-30T14:15:00.000-07:00

179 UK troop deaths has been the human cost and £6.44 bn has been the financial cost of the UK military operation in Iraq as well as approximately 3500 Iraqi civilian deaths according to the BBC. Others claim that the lowest estimates of the Iraqi death toll are around 100000, the highest more than one million. Then there are the 4266 deaths in the U.S. armed forces.

I have great respect for those who have served our country and great sympathy for all those families in the U.K., the U.S. and Iraq who now bear the agony of having lost their loved ones.

In our modern and developed age communication has been found to be at the forefront of progress. Al Jazeera has pioneered a new front in bridging the information gulf between the Christian and Muslim world and between the Democratic and Terrorist communities. This drive to have access to a comprehensive and multicultural perspective on world issues is essential in our pursuit of peace.

We must now open up channels of communication between all groups, however unpalatable that may seem and we must explore a proactive foreign policy that looks to invest £6.44bn or more in goodwill initiatives over the next six years in areas of conflict to try to preempt future hostilities.

Then there may be a hope that deaths will not form part of the budget for future operations.

THE TALIBAN TERROR

2009-04-27T16:20:00.000-07:00

The Taliban have executed a man and a woman in Hangu district, about two hours drive from the regional capital Peshawar in Pakistan for an act of adultery.

It behoves us to remember the response of Jesus when a woman was brought before him for the same act and the presenting crowd bayed for her blood.

He reminded them that everyone is imperfect, no one has the right to condemn and our focus must be to improve our own behaviour.

It would be timely for the Media to refer the public to this instructive event which lies at the root of our culture and the evolution of our exemplary national tolerance and understanding of others and their predicaments.

BISHOP JONATHAN'S GOD-WAGON

2009-04-24T15:26:00.000-07:00

So Lost in Showbiz wants to know more about my 15 year old 'God-Wagon' and what constitutes a crisis.

Does the story of the Good Samaritan come to mind. It did for me one rain lashed night in the early hours when driving home and I passed stranded motorists but was unable to stop as my car was not marked and I had no supplies to assist. I realised I had to get prepared.

As a cleric I am on duty 24/7 to help those in need and not just spiritually or emotionally but practically too if I can.

And Lost in Showbiz asks what constitutes a crisis?

Well, lets give a few examples of those I have helped. A teenager in the process of being mugged by two assailants. A young Mum in tears stranded on the first lane of a dual carriageway having run out of petrol and desperately worried about the children she had to pick up from school. A motorcyclist knocked off his bike. A drunk man, lying semi conscious on a street verge who needed taking home. A homeless elderly woman on the streets who needed accomodation. A Mum with her baby stranded with a puncture on an icy day and no mobile phone. A young 8 year old lad with learning difficulties who was wandering on the street lost and needed to be taken home to his Grandparents. A couple whose car had spun off the road into a ditch.

Yes, clerics should be the fourth emergency service!

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

2009-04-20T17:02:00.000-07:00

Democracy thrives on debate. So much has been achieved in the development of our political and cultural life because we have aspired to obtain and then cherished the freedom of speech. The verbal battlefield nudges us towards discovery and possibility. What sense is there then for British and other European diplomats to walk out of the UN Racism Conference? Refusing to talk takes us one step nearer to violence. Further, the points President Ahmadinejad made need to be addressed. We may have clear answers for many of them. Some though may cause us more difficulty, which adds to the impression that the reason for the walk out may be less than worthy.

NICOLA FISHER

2009-04-18T14:38:00.000-07:00

A shocking bruise, a shocking cause, a shocking indictment on all of us.

Why does society continually find scapegoats?

Violence, as all manner of good and evil is found within everyone. The choice to put Fisher's treatment down to the good cop/bad cop syndrome is a poor one.

Of course there will be differences in human behaviour but the exercise of power cannot rely upon such variables. Rather any system that distributes power must also contstantly monitor its use. The greatest taboo is to be discovered.

Constant surveillance of all police is now the only possible solution.

THE NEW HIGH PRIEST OF SHOWBIZ

2009-04-18T12:23:00.000-07:00

So Marina Hyde's article depicts me. http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/lostinshowbiz/2009/apr/17/marina-hyde-bishop-jonathan-blake
This celebrity world is a strange one which has a life of its own and one so often divorced from reality. I should remind readers that I did not ask to take Jade's marriage blessing, I was asked. Why, because along the way of my everyday ministry last year I was taking a Baptism for an 'ordinary' family in a garden in Harlow. Kevin Adams, Jade's personal trainer was there unbeknown to me and was moved at the way I conducted the service. When the plans for Jade's wedding arose, he spoke about me and Jade chose me.

My ministry, as that of every cleric, is about helping people. Every person has equal dignity. So whether I am helping a homeless person, an employed person or a celebrity person makes no difference. The significance of the act of human care and christian ministry is the same.

What reality TV has the power to communicate to the public repeatedly is that all life is extraordinary. The moment of metamorphosis comes when a person realises its time to switch off and live their own.

So caustic and sarcastic commentators can continue to jibe and speculate about this cleric caught in the whirlpool of alluring celebrity. However, the truth is that the media circus, fame, money and any recent attention means nothing to me. That's why I happily arrived at Jade's wedding in our clapped out Previa stuck together with duct tape.

I was called by God to be a cleric to serve all people when I was 17. My passion and desire to fulfill that calling only grows stronger with every passing year.

I have a busy year ahead continuing to minister among everyday people and every wedding, every funeral, every baptism, every service I take will mean as much to me and as much to God.

LAMENT FOR IAN TOMLINSON

2009-04-07T15:39:00.000-07:00

PC Thug has struck again.

Another family is grieving at the hands of the police.

If it wasn't for a fund manager from New York who happened to be videoing the events, there would have been no independent evidence to resist the whitewash the police had effected in their report.

The video evidence appears to show unprovoked violence by the police upon a member of the public who had his back to them, was walking away from them and had his hands in his pockets.

In 2006 Plymouth Police Station, Devon and Cornwall Police ran a successful trial on the use of Body Worn Videos. As a result of that trial the Home Office, made available an amount of money for all 42 Police forces to enable each to conduct their own trial on the use of these cameras.

The Metropolitan Police are currently running a Body Worn Video trial at Bromley and Camden Boroughs. The cameras are worn by both police officers and police community support officers.

However the massive flaw in this trial is that the camera is switched on to capture evidence, as the officer considers appropriate. It is not continuously filming. It is switched on at the officer's discretion.

So our money is being used not to protect us but to protect the police. The camera would not be switched on, rather switched off if the police decided to be corrupt or violent.

Additionally, at the moment, under Section 30 of the Freedom of Information Act, the video evidence kept by the police is not available to the public because it is classified as exempt information. This is clearly disadvantageous to the public and undermines the right to the objective information upon which they can protect themselves.

Our campaigning organisation, When No One's Watching.org believes:

-That all police officers must have web cams switched on while in contact with the public.
-That all police vehicles must have web cams switched on when carrying any member of the public.
-That all custody suites and cells must have web cams switched on when any member of the public is present.
-That all web cam content that relates to a member of the public must be made available to that person on request.

THE RELEASE OF BALLOONS BEARING MESSAGES OF LOVE AT JADE'S FUNERAL

2009-04-04T15:15:00.000-07:00

Jackiey has asked me to say some words before we release the balloons.
We’ve just said goodbye to Jade’s poorly body, for which she has no further use.
But she’s not dead and we’ve not left her at the cemetery and these balloons are for her.
So if I may, I’d like these words to be to her.
**
Beautiful Jade, thank you for all you’ve given us,
Your love and laughter
and the magic you’ve woven, as golden thread, into all our lives.
Now your spirit is free,
You’ve soared high through the wide blue expanse of sky
Into the sun’s warmth and the wind’s breath
Past the dance of the stars and the planets.

You’ve crossed the bridge of dreams,
Been reclothed in a new body and fallen
Into the arms of loved ones waiting upon that golden shore

You’re safe
in paradise
and watching with us now.

And oh, how we miss you,
But our love is ever with you
And we know that we will see you, hold you and be together with you again.

So until that halcyon day, our eyes will caress you by night, our ‘brightest star’
Our memories will warm us by day.

And upon these balloons, we’ve written our tear stained jottings

That express our heartfelt and eternal love for you.
*
They bear the kisses of our love to you in heaven
as now we release them.

THE WEDDING BLESSING OF JADE GOODY AND JACK TWEED

2009-04-04T14:54:00.000-07:00

God is love and those who live in Love live in God and God lives in them. ( I John)

It was a casual look across a nightclub, a meandering walk to a piano bar,
jugs of drink and a special song; just those fragile and whimsical happenings, that let stardust settle upon your two hearts to change your world.

And so not for you both, on earth alone, do you wish this wedding to be blessed, but in heaven too.

So, hush awhile, and lets create that rainbow bridge; lets cut through with a subtle knife,
by prayer, by grace, to that other world, Oh so near and radiant with light, brimming with love
a paradise awaiting:

Song:

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in his wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow
strangely dim
In the light of his glory and grace.
( Helen Lemmel 1922 )

Jade, Jack, let me bear you some romantic words, for you to each other:

I love you ever and ever and without reserve. The more I have known you the more I have loved you.
(John Keats)

When I see you, then I feel well again; When you open your eyes, my body is whole again.
(Ancient Egyptian)

I am never away from you. In another world I shall still be the one who loves you, loves you beyond measure, beyond….
(Edmond Rostand)

YOUR WORDS

We chatted together this week. But of all the reasons you shared with me as to why you love each other, none spoke more eloquently than this one. That when you are with each other
you feel complete, you feel safe.

As though the half of you had met its whole. As though that illusive missing part had been discovered. As though, at last, you had found your way home.

READING

So these words are for you, unique special people, as you give your all to each other today.

The life that I have
Is all that I have
The life that I have is yours
The love that I have
Of the life that I have is yours and
yours and yours
A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death it will be but a pause
For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours
( By Leo Marks: 1943 )

ROY TEN READ FROM 1 CORINTHIANS 13

A READING FROM KEVIN ADAMS

Being with you this week, watching you gaze at one another, vulnerable, tender, giggling, teasing, cheeky; THAT you love one another deeply was vivid, tangible.
So let here then become for you an oasis, a mountain height, a sacred space, a healing garden, a songbird’s theme, within which now to give your hearts.

JACK’S VOW

No-one
has touched my life
like you
No-one
can compare
with you
No-one else
has made my heart leap
and my soul dance
Nor set my mind
alight with joy
In your presence
I have found my rest,
My home and my self.
In your arms,
I have known such peace.
Today I give myself to you
I am yours
And ever shall it be.

JADE’S VOW

You are so handsome to me.
You are my life,
My light,
My hope
And my joy.
I will treasure you.
I will cherish you.
I will be
utterly devoted to you
Through the laughter
and the tears
Through the darkness
and the light
I will be
your eternal love
Your constant companion
Your closest friend
Pledging to you
my deepest commitment
And this is
my solemn vow.

RINGS –

O God of Heaven
By your blessing let these
bands of gold, be to Jade and Jack
symbols of unending love, always to
encircle and enfold their lives.

- Jack give Jade her ring and say whatever you choose.

- Jade give Jack his ring and say whatever you choose.

PLACING OF THE STOLE

Let these hands, as your hearts, as your lives, that God this day has joined together, never be put asunder.

CANDLE LIGHTING

Each of you is a single light shining within this world
(and your light Jade has scattered the darkness and sent the shadows fleeing)
Light then these your candles
Today these lives now joined create a torch of love, burning bright. Let it be symbolised here in the lighting of this wedding candle.And let this flame be rekindled each year, every anniversary, a hand on earth, a hand from heaven; one light, one everlasting love.

PRAYER

O God of love; the one who creates, rescues and empowers, hold now Jade and Jack, Freddy and Bobby in your everlasting care. Be their light, their comfort, their faith and their hope. May each dawn be precious, each day intimate, every moment savoured. May each sunset only ever harbour the promise of another day, on this or a more golden shore, and may, the blessing of
the all loving God, rest upon you, embrace you, and infill you, now and for evermore. Amen

DECLARATION

Here before us, Jade and Jack have embarked upon a unique journey. Their love will take them beyond the borders, across unknown continents, to whole new worlds beyond, but today we are with them, a whole nation and far beyond, beside them and loving them. So now is the time of joy and celebration, laughter, affection and of dreams come true.

For today Jade and Jack have been blessed by God as Husband and Wife.

You may kiss one another.

Copyright: Bishop Jonathan Blake

NATIONAL PRAYER FOR JADE

2009-03-26T00:54:00.000-07:00

Dear God of Love
Thank you for Jade
Bless her in Paradise
Our 'brightest star'.
Be with Jackiey, Jack, Bobby and Freddy
And all her family and friends in their grief.
Comfort all those who mourn
And may the example of Jade’s courage in adversity,
Humour in the face of suffering and sheer love of life
Turn our sorrow into joy and our tears into laughter.Amen.

JADE - THE PEOPLE'S SAINT

2009-03-23T08:29:00.001-07:00

Some have decried the idea of Jade as a Saint yet she has become an inspirational figure for so many.

She overcame the immense difficulties of her childhood. She displayed a raw genius, surprising us with her disarming personal honesty, broad grin and mischievous humour. Her vivacity, zest for life and originality have entertained and energised millions. In difficulty, when accused of racism she gave the most heartfelt apology ever seen in modern public life and set about making reparation.

Jade stands out as an iconic figure in our cynical age of how, irrespective of the circumstances, one can avoid replicating the worst and instead aspire to and achieve the best.

She demonstrated a holiness that was real and accessible and that has touched so many lives for good. Now tens of thousands of women across this country will have smear tests and thousands, with early treatment, will eradicate their cancer; hundreds of destitute and orphaned 'railway children' in India have received her charitable help; she lit a torch, visible across the world, of hope, resilience and faith, even amidst the gathering darkness of her imminent death; she did her utmost to provide for her children's well being in the future, providing them with opportunities she never had; she laughed in the face of death and gave all those who are battling cancer an example of how best to make the most of their final days; she broke the final taboo and prompted us all to think and speak about dying and death; she confessed her faith and was confident of heaven and promised to stay close to her loved ones beyond the grave.

Some have carped that Jade wasn't perfect. No one is. St Peregrine, the Patron Saint of those with Cancer wasn't perfect. He was born in Italy around 1265, a hot headed political activist, who resorted to violence but then made good and became a faithful though eccentric Christian. Those who have prayed for his help have been hepled.

I think that Jade's grave also will become a shrine and that many with Cancer and other troubles will pray to her, as well as to St Peregrine, for help and be comforted.

May God bless Jade as she has blessed us.

THE STOLEN YEARS - Sean Hodges

2009-03-20T07:24:00.000-07:00

How can 27 years be replaced? Who has the right to remove a man's life, deny him his children and grandchildren and send his parent's to the grave knowing their son is in prison for murder?

Is it the police, the judiciary, the forensic science service or some other toxic mix of officials making mistakes that cost others their lives?

I shudder each time I read that someone has been sentenced, because while it may appear superficially that justice has been done and society is a safer place, my doubts remain. Am I witness to another murder, the resolution of which will only be achieved in an appeal court's decision 27 years hence?

Except with this murder, no one is charged. The police, the judges, the forensic science service and others can play with their children and grandchildren and nostalgically recall their life's memories. After all, do they muse, a large compensation award will make up for their mistakes?

Our 'civilised' society can no longer tolerate these aberrations.

Perhaps there needs to be an independent appeal body set up to scrutinise routinely every sentence. Then those which are unsafe may be detected sooner and those who may have played their part in a miscarriage of justice might face penalties themselves.

THE GREAT BANK ROBBERY

2009-02-13T15:59:00.000-08:00

Sir David Ramsbottom and Anne Widdecombe MP agreed on Radio 4 this week that those who populate our prisons come from the most deprived, abused and impoverished sections of our Society.

The statistics and research papers make clear that in prison they suffer further abuse, learn criminality and most re-offend.

Hearing that HBOS slumped to a loss of £10bn last year and becoming ever incredulous about the wanton greed of those who brought about the international financial crisis one ponders on how it can be that not a single banker is facing charges in this robbery that has taken place.

Could it be that the prisons and judicial system exist to keep in order the fall out from the poorest and the weakest members of society, to prevent the inconvenience of the rich and powerful?

If not, how can a civilised democratic nation continue to allow the degrading treatment of those incarcerated within our prisons and police cells. It is time for change.

FAILING OUR CHILDREN

2009-02-09T16:21:00.000-08:00

Sir Cyril Taylor has criticised the existing school policy of "one size fits all" for resigning millions of bright pupils to educational failure as they are dragged down by weaker classmates. It represents the experience of many local parents who watch while extra resources are made available to children with special needs but who see clever children neglected and made to endure teaching well below their ability.

In memory of Tom Collister

2009-02-09T07:42:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, February 7th 2009, Tom Collister, a 23yr old man from West Wickam was found hanging in his cell in the prison on the Isle of Wight. His friend has described him as polite, intelligent and with many gifts.

How is it possible for our Society to take a young man, whose crime was graffiti and wrest him from his family and place him in a prison out of reach and contact from loved ones and so expose him to the degrading and inhuman treatment at the hands of the prison service that his fledgling life ends abruptly? Who will answer, who will pay and who will be held accountable?

SPIRITUAL ECSTASY

2009-02-07T15:37:00.000-08:00

So we are playing on the ABC roundabouts with Ecstasy and Cannabis.

Issue for the politicians, researchers and ACMD and devastating for the loved ones who watch their own change beyond reach and tumble into early graves.

I've buried too many young ones and had my shoulder dampened by two many tears.

There is only one ecstasy worth seeking. The most potent of them all. It comes through faith and prayer yet today is classified by those in power as Class A.

INCORRECT POLITICAL CORRECTNESS

2009-02-06T15:15:00.000-08:00

Automated individual responses, dehumanised social interactions and mind numbing decisions by corporations. We have become terrified to exist. The untidy, unpredictable genius of the human psyche that in essence refuses to be boxed, slowly being nudged along the conveyor belt of mass social control.

So we have Thatcher, Clarkson, Petrie, Ross and Brand under the microscope.

Here is to all those who stand against the tide, whose wings spread wide, who soar while others grub, who quest while others obsequiously submit to the machine while secretly maintaining their inner world of shadows.

Not to condone though or condemn any particular acts, rather that they be, what they are, expressions of that unique wonder which is human life in all its complex curiosities.

PRESS RELEASE FEBRUARY 5TH 1.54 P.M.

2009-02-05T05:52:00.000-08:00