Church news out and about

Interesting statistic heard during the 8:15 service (traditional with liturgy, creed, confession, organ, hymns) this morning. Our service has the lowest numbers, but the best attendance. If we were in church today, chances are we were there last week and the week before.

They announced in church today that Dolly Denman had died. Oh my! Heaven is in for some fun, bright colors and singing. Until a few months ago when she was diagnosed with cancer she was singing in the UALC choir and another community choir. She was no longer driving, but Curt and Barbara, her neighbors, brought her to church faithfully. It doesn't seem all that long ago I remember her riding her bike to church--which probably wasn't safe even for a teen-ager let alone a senior citizen considering the distance and busy route. I figure her death has freed up the angels that must have stopped traffic or sat on the fender guiding her. Dolly and her husband Chuck who died a few years ago were so enthusiastic about Marriage Encounter they must have brought hundreds into the movement back in the 1980s. Their Christmas letters were worthy of the archives. We'll see you later, old friend.

DENMAN Dolly Denman has completed her journey through this mortal life and stepped into eternity with Jesus. Remaining are daughter, Diana; sister, Sandy; nephews, nieces, and friends. Memorial service May 14, 10 a.m., Upper Arlington Lutheran Church, 2300 Lytham Road.

Congregational meeting for Upper Arlington Lutheran Church (UALC) at 12:30 today at the Mill Run campus (Hilliard, Ohio); light lunch. We have a slate of nominees for Council and Nominating Committee to consider and will vote on recommended amendments to the North American Lutheran Church (NALC)'s constitution and full communion relationship with the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus, the largest Lutheran church denomination in Africa.

Heard on Catholic radio yesterday morning (no source given): "The third largest religious group in America is "fallen away" Catholics." In fourth spot must be "fallen away" Protestants (Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutheran, Brethren). Maybe they're all just trading places?

The Armenian Genocide--1.5 million

BEIRUT: On the 97th anniversary (April 24) of the Armenian Genocide, 5,000 people are expected to protest Tuesday in front of the Turkish Embassy in Beirut against Ankara’s refusal to recognize the mass killings as genocide.

The commemoration will kick off with a Mass at the Armenian Orthodox Catholicosate in Antelias, north of Beirut, at 9:30 a.m. Following the Mass, which is expected to gather around 10,000 people, a prayer will be said for the souls of those who were killed in the tragic events.

Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Local-News/2012/Apr-22/171002-5000-to-protest-on-97-anniversary-of-armenian-genocide.ashx#ixzz1snkpUnXE

As Hitler was planning to invade Poland:

Our strength consists in our speed and in our brutality. Genghis Khan led millions of women and children to slaughter—with premeditation and a happy heart. History sees in him solely the founder of a state. It’s a matter of indifference to me what a weak western European civilization will say about me. I have issued the command—and I’ll have anybody who utters but one word of criticism executed by a firing squad—that our war aim does not consist in reaching certain lines, but in the physical destruction of the enemy. Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formation in readiness—for the present only in the East—with orders to them to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space (Lebensraum) which we need. Who, after all, speaks to-day of the annihilation of the Armenians? —p. 11–12 What about Germany?

The abortion that didn't happen

His mother was a professional basketball player who was scheduled for an abortion, then prayed to God for guidance, got a pretty clear answer the next day in a sermon at church and cancelled her appointment at the abortion clinic.

“JaVale McGee is 7 feet, with a 7'6½" wingspan and a 31½-inch vertical leap, unfathomable for a man his size. At 24, he can tap the front of the rim with his forehead. He can slap the top of the square with his palm. He can dunk a cookie in a bowl of milk 11 feet off the ground. When McGee was at the University of Nevada, an opposing player once explained to his coach why he couldn't guard him: "He jumped over me."

Read the whole story and how she told JaVale.

Bonhoeffer at Union Seminary 80 years ago

Accustomed to the rigors of German scholarship and theology, the visiting young student Dietrich Bonhoeffer not yet 25 writes in 1930 about his colleagues—faculty and students—at Union:

“The theological atmosphere of the Union Theological Seminary is accelerating the process of the secularization of Christianity in America. Its criticism is directed essentially against the fundamentalists and to a certain extent also against the radical humanists in Chicago; it is healthy and necessary. But there is no sound basis on which one can rebuild after demolition. It is carried away with the general collapse. A seminary in which it can come about that a large number of students laugh out loud in a public lecture at the quoting of a passage from Luther’s De servo arbitrio on sin and forgiveness because it seems to them to be comic has evidently completely forgotten what Christian theology by its very nature stands for.”

“Things [outside the seminary] are not much different in the church. The sermon has been reduced to parenthetical church remarks about newspaper events. As long as I’ve been here, I have heard only one sermon in which you could hear something like a genuine proclamation, and that was delivered by a negro. . . One big question continually attracting my attention in view of these facts is whether one here really can still speak about Christianity. . . There’s no sense to expect the fruits where the Word really is no longer being preached. But then what becomes of Christianity per se?”

The American seminaries had, of course, taken their lead from the 19th century German theologians, even though as Bonhoeffer noted they were not even up to the level of the fundamentalists they ridiculed. America had long since lost the fervor of the “awakenings” that had shaped it, at least in the seminaries. At that time, Hitler’s small party was gaining ground in Germany. Germany has since recovered from that disastrous time—at least politically and economically. I’m not sure the American mainline churches have been able to expunge the demons of the liberal seminaries.

From p. 105-6 of Bonhoeffer by Eric Metaxas

Cross posted at Collecting my thoughts

Do couples still get married in churches?

                        

Recently at our Faith of our Fathers group (FOOF) at the UALC Mill Run church we were discussing the removal of most religious/Christian content from public education textbooks and courses despite its inclusion in the founding documents. But maybe we should be looking closer to home.

Today I picked up (free) a copy of Columbus Bride at Giant Eagle. You'd be hard pressed to find any religious content in the wedding photos--hardly even a church or cathedral. Lots of country clubs, old barns, the Atheneum (which has sort of a faux chapel), Franklin Park Conservatory, old wineries, city streets, parks, and party barns. Maybe it's the interior of the modern churches which look like theaters and party houses--so why not just rent one or take the photos outside?

When we were in Russia in 2006 we saw so many weddings in the public square--in front of government buildings, fountains, parks etc. They had 70 years of Communism. What's our excuse?

                

Cross posted at Collecting my thoughts

Wash my dirty feet, Lord

Jesus, my feet are dirty. Come even as a slave to me, pour water into your bowl, come and wash my feet. In asking such a thing I know I am overbold, but I dread what was threatened when you said to me, “If I do not wash your feet I have no fellowship with you.” Wash my feet then, because I long for your companionship.

—Origen (c. 185–254)

Yoga and Christians

“As we know, yoga is the Hindu theistic philosophy teaching the suppression of all activity of body, mind and will or a system of exercises for attaining bodily or mental control and wellbeing.“ Urban Zen Foundation

“Yoga is a spiritual practice, and can be a pathway to good physical health but has nothing to do with giving up one’s own religion.” Wexner Medical Center, Ohio State University

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind," Jesus

Science and the Bible

"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." John 1:1. "Quantum physics is based on the idea that information can be created completely spontaneously, namely without any preexisting information." Sometimes these scientists try too hard to explain things.

Soapbox Science

Who is your neighbor?

In the Lutheran liturgy each Sunday we confess: "We have not loved you [God] with our whole heart: we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves." Most Christians abstractly realize the woman they meet on the street who is mentally ill or unemployed or selling her body is their "neighbor" and they know they have a responsibility toward her whether or not they act on it or ignore her. And if the woman is obviously 8 months pregnant, they may even figure out the baby is their neighbor too. But what if the baby isn't so visible--say, the disheveled woman or college student or well-dressed lawyer is only 4 months pregnant. When do the unborn lose their "neighbor" status in Jesus' command?

When the news came out about the HHS mandate to religious institutions to cover "reproductive health" in their health insurance plans, I began asking some questions about Christian churches and organizations that already go far beyond the Obama mandate--all the way to abortion for any reason, even gender selection, which is the policy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

Then I began wondering about our donations to the organizations that help the poor and afflicted, like Lutheran Social Services of Central Ohio. So I contacted them, and much to my dismay learned that yes, it does include abortion in its employee health insurance. So today I sent a note to a prominent Lutheran:

Dr. Kurt Senske serves as Chief Executive Officer of Lutheran Social Services of the South (LSSS) and as Chair of the Board of Directors of Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, a Fortune 500 financial services organization. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Lutheran Services in America, which has more than 300 member organizations and a combined budget of over $8 billion.

"Dear Dr. Senske--I see you are CEO of LSSS and on the Board of Directors of Thrivent and Lutheran Services in America. What is the abortion coverage for your employee health insurance? Here in Ohio LSS covers abortion. The ELCA mandates it for its synod churches' employee insurance. To what extent are you personally involved in this?"

U.S. Catholic Bishops letter against Obamacare mandate

By googling today, I found out that ELCA, the former synod of UALC, 1988-2010 (we are now North American Lutheran Church) also mandates insurance coverage for its employees (and I’m assuming the member churches) that includes abortion for any reason, even gender selection and coverage of same sex partners. We Lutherans in the pew were not told that, although it may have been discussed when the merger took place in the 1980s. So I shouldn't be surprised that the average Catholic who attends Mass and maybe occasionally goes to confession is clueless about the contraception mandate that was included in Obamacare and now being forced on Roman Catholic employers.

I think that would have been a better reason to leave ELCA than the non-celebate gay pastors who were defying their ordination agreement induced sexual statement that the synod rammed through.

The usual wordy gobble-de-gook from ELCA which seems to be brevity-challenged
Exposing the ELCA by a very unhappy former member, but it does address the abortion/insurance issue
Catholic Phoenix
Pregnant Pause

James study by Beth Moore

Some in our Beth Moore class [James] have sighed, "Ah, vintage Beth Moore." Not in my opinion. It is Beth Moore mixed with higher criticism. Her daughter Melissa, who now has a divinity degree is helping her with the writing. See pp. 80-81 of the workbook where she says the Jewish Christians didn't have the canon and therefore use of "Word" in James was referring to Mosaic Law. Huh? They had eye witnesses (including James, the brother of Jesus), they had the Holy Spirit. God's Word travelled a missionary journal all the way to the British Isles without an official canon--I think it's probable that James knew which Word he was talking about. God's revealed Word of Scripture doesn't depend on writing it down any more than the revealed Word in Creation or the revealed Word in the Incarnation did. She's so close to teaching that our pitiful good works added to Jesus' perfect work is what transforms us, I can hardly keep my coffee from spilling on the page!

Here's where the Lutheran liturgy is a helpful reminder. After confessing we haven't loved God with our whole heart or our neighbors as ourselves, the pastor reminds us that in his mercy, God gave his son, AND FOR HIS SAKE, forgives us.

Damping down the appetites

Recently I was looking at a "commitment" leaders in public ministry were to sign at an Illinois church. It covered everything from eating/shopping addictions to illegal drugs to abuse and lying. 8 of the 10 were concerned with physical appetite. Although it was to be used for scheduling "counseling," I can't even imagine how it could be used against a volunteer or employee. What would the pastor do if someone actually signed the statement that he used illegal drugs, or had fondled a child? The pastor obviously felt a duty to open someone else's eyes and conscience. Shoddy workmanship, falsifying time sheets, bank robbery, embezzlement, copyright violation, etc. weren't listed, but could be included I hope under "other sins that compromise your Christian walk." I wonder if they had a lawyer look it over.

Hymn singing

On hymns: "The birth of Jesus was announced in song, and the last act of worship of our Lord and his disciples was the singing of a hymn. Sacred song, rooted in the Hebrew tradition, occupied from the first a preeminent position in Christian worship. The earliest hymns were psalms and canticles. Initially the people sang them, though by the fourth century in the East, and by the seventh in the West, they had become part of the liturgy and a matter for the clergy and the choirs. Not again until the time of the Reformation was the hymn restored to the people as their rightful heritage in worship." From Service Book and Hymnal (Lutheran), music edition, 1958, p. 285

Work on this hymnal began almost 70 years ago--Lutherans were from many traditions, languages and ethnicities, but they managed to include nearly 80 American authors. Explanations and history in old hymnals are very interesting. It's a tremendous loss to just use words cast on a screen. You miss so much information.

Advent Meditations from the writings of Henri Nouwen

I can't imagine a Roman Catholic congregation, say St. Agatha's or St. Andrew's located near-by in Upper Arlington, selecting an advent devotional booklet prepared from the writings of Martin Luther or John Calvin, but Upper Arlington Lutheran Church distributed "Advent Meditations from the writings of Henri Nouwen," a prominent Roman Catholic priest who died in 1996. Even if he weren't Catholic, when his writings are sliced and diced and packaged like this, they make no sense. For example:

"Patient living means to live actively in the present and wait there." What does that say? What does it mean? Could you rephrase it? Could you apply it?

"Christian community is the place where we keep the flame of hope alive among us and take it seriously so that it can grow and become stronger in us." I don't know where your hope is, but mine isn't in the Christian community. My Christian community isn't why I can "live with courage" or "live without surrendering to powerful forces seducing me toward despair." Huh?

After observing that Mary, Elizabeth and Zechariah were all waiting, Nouwen says, "We too can wait only if what we are waiting for has already begun for us." I think I understand all the components of this essay on waiting, seed, growing, nurture, promise, but why does the actual Bible make more sense than the meditation on it?

The problem here, is the problem I have with most writing by Catholics. It's very pretty; it's devotional; it's awe inspiring; some is even powerful. But there's no gospel. That's where the power is; that's our hope.

The clarity of Luther's voice is surely apparent in his Advent and Christmas preaching - the Lord's Palm Sunday entry into Jerusalem, the preaching of John the Baptist, the annunciation, and the nativity. Showing remarkable theological insight and pastoral warmth, Luther crafts vivid and graphic pictures of the meanness and misery of the biblical stories of the Lord's birth. All the great themes of Luther's theology - incarnation, justification, the "happy exchange," sacraments, the theology of the cross - are present in these sermons. Advent and Christmas evoke the best in Luther's preaching as he proclaims Bethlehem's crib in light of the cross. Ulrich Asendorf rightly notes that "Luther's Advent sermons are a microcosm of his spiritual world."
Ulrich Asendorf, "Luther's Sermons on Advent as a Summary of His Theology," in A Lively Legacy: Essays in Honor of Robert Preus, edited by Kurt Marquart, John Stephenson, and Bjarne W. Teigen (Fort Wayne: Concordia Theological Seminary, 1985), 13.

St. Basil the Great and St. Gregory Nazianzen

St Basil the Great (330 - 379)
Basil was born in 330 at Caesarea in Cappadocia, of a Christian family. A brilliant scholar and a virtuous man, he started by becoming a hermit but was made bishop of Caesarea in 370. He fought against the Arians and wrote many notable works, in particular the monastic rule that bears his name and which many monks in the East follow to this day. He was also generous to the poor. He died on 1 January 379.

"The Longer Rules and The Shorter Rules," pp 99-103 of Masterpieces of Christian Literature

St Gregory Nazianzen (330 - 389)
He was born in 330, near Nazianzus. He travelled widely in search of knowledge. He followed his friend Basil into the wilderness, but he too was ordained and later made a bishop. He was elected Bishop of Constantinople in 381 but because of the factional fighting within the Church he retired to Nazianzus, where he died on 25 January 389 or 390. He is known as “Gregory the Theologian” in honour of his learning and eloquence.

"Five Theological Orations," pp 113-117 Masterpieces of Christian Literature

See also "The Cappadocian fathers" in The Story of Christian Spirituality, pp 130-

Stalin's 'Railroad of Death'

Bringing the Gospel to Siberia

The Form of Prayer for the Ordination of a Deaconess

Book 8, Section III, XX of Apostolic Constitutions

XX . O Eternal God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Creator of man and of woman, who replenished with the Spirit Miriam, and Deborah, and Anna, and Huldah; who did not disdain that Your only begotten Son should be born of a woman; who also in the tabernacle of the testimony, and in the temple, ordained women to be keepers of Your holy gates—do Thou now also look down upon this Your servant, who is to be ordained to the office of a deaconess, and grant her Your Holy Spirit, and cleanse her from all filthiness of flesh and spirit, 2 Corinthians 7:1 that she may worthily discharge the work which is committed to her to Your glory, and the praise of Your Christ, with whom glory and adoration be to You and the Holy Spirit for ever. Amen.

Issue 101 of Christian History is on Healthcare and hospitals in the mission of the church. There is a small article on Deaconesses on the front lines of care in the early church. Other women mentioned in this issue are Margery Kempe, an English lay-woman who wept for Christ's passion, and was known for devotion and intercession for the sick and her charitable acts; Paula and her daughter Eustochium who spent their wealth founding monasteries and helping the poor, and Fabiola, a Christian widow who founded the first Christian hospital.

I'm pro-life, but. . .

This just doesn't sound like good holiday table talk to me.

The holiday dinner table offers a natural forum for congenial (hopefully!) conversation about current events and issues. Defenders of unborn human life should be prepared to take advantage of opportunities when they arise. Here are some suggestions to help you effectively discuss abortion with family members and friends who may not share the pro-life view.

I don't know anyone who doesn't have a pretty firm idea on where they stand on abortion. That said, the ideas presented in this article are good for discussions--with strangers.

A pro-life conversation guide.

Haiti's national holiday

November 18th is a major national holiday in Haiti (my husband has been on 5 mission trips and loves the people), commemorating the Battle of Vertières, in which the army of the escaped slaves conquered the last remnant of the French army. Dave Mann, our pastor who serves there, says it's the only enduring successful slave revolt in the history of the world, and it was against one of the strongest military forces of the world at the time, that of Napoleon Bonaparte.

And look at Haiti today, compared to countries whose governments or colonial powers which freed their slaves or serfs due to moral outrage or pressure from Christians and folded them into the economy. The Haitian slaves knew they wanted something elusive, like "freedom." However, they didn't have much cooperation of powerful forces in other countries which also had slaves and feared revolts--like the United States, Mexico, Brazil, etc.

And even if they had, they didn't know how to run the plantations or cities or schools or the government and army. They soon occupied the mansions and consumed the wealth of their former masters, put brutal dictators (lighter skinned than the masses, but still African) in charge who again stole their much reduced wealth, and sunk into poverty that exists to this day. Even so, the faith in God of the Haitian
people would put their wealthier neighbors in the U.S. to shame.

This moment in history brings to my mind today's "Occupiers," vague on the concept of freedom, naive about economics, offending all forces around them that might be more reasonable, and consuming their movement from the inside, but unlike the devout Haitians, they have no faith in anything higher than themselves.

Dave Mann with student choir, 2007, at Institution Univers, Ouanaminthe, a private Christian school.

Getting the Bible into Heart Languages

Yesterday I received mailings from two Christian organizations I support, The World Mission Prayer League, and Lutheran Bible Translators. What amazing people and ministries! Just a few stats to illustrate their importance: There are 6,800+ languages in the world. There are about 340 million people who speak the 2,000 languages where there are no translation projects yet. 1,211 language communities have access to the New Testament, and 457 language communities have the entire Bible in their "heart language." It's very difficult. Imagine Psalm 23 in languages with no word for sheep, or the message of Jesus with no word for forgiveness!

My friend Anna Wan told me something Communism and Chairman Mao did for Christ. He standardized the language--Mandarin. That made the Bible much more accessible and Christianity is growing quickly in China, although they are still a persecuted minority. However, there are almost 36 million Chinese whose heart language is Xiang and there is no Scripture in that language.