Vladimir Horowitz plays Two Not-So-Easy Pieces

Fireworks on a Piano:
Bizet - Fantasie on a theme from Carmen

 
Wonderful interpretation throughout; dazzling technique around 3:30 and 7:30 to the end.
Chopin - Ballade #1

 

Tearing Down the Rumor Mill - Sunday morning worship at Nashotah House

"There’s an element of gossip present in every social enterprise. And while light office gossip and a few comments here and there probably won’t hurt anyone, a pervasive culture of rumor-mongering and trash-talking is detrimental to everyone." So begins an article by Margot Carmichael Lester, on the Monster.com job website.

The article continues:

“Gossip destroys morale, creates negative energy and stops coworkers from becoming a united team...” says Judith Orloff, MD, the author of Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself from Negative Emotions....

But in the world of office politics, gossip is prevalent, particularly in times of uncertainty, because people are scared and insecure. The folks feeling the greatest anxiety often tend to be the most fervent gossips.

I have had experiences with the rumor mill at various times in my life; but perhaps none more vexing than the episode in which I am enmeshed at present.

Nashotah House has had a daily celebration of the Eucharist (including Sundays) since time immemorial. It is one of the very fine aspects of being an Anglo-Catholic institution. Sometimes in the long history of the House the Sunday Eucharist has been in the morning; sometimes it has been in the evening.

In the 1970's and 1980's, when Fr. Louis Weil was Liturgics professor, there was a congregation named St. Silvanus, because it met in the historic Red Chapel also named for that saint. A few years ago, we moved the Sunday Eucharist to the morning and held it in St. Mary's Chapel, but the service never developed a sizeable congregation; so, after several months, we moved it back to the evening.

This semester we tried another experiment with having a Eucharist on Sunday morning. Some friends, trustees, and supporters of the House said they would be interested in worshiping with us if we had a Sunday morning service. We talked about it over a period of a few months, assessed the strength of the interest, and began to make plans. We saw some real advantages for Nashotah House as well as those who might wish to attend worship here.

Going all the way back to its founding in 1842, Nashotah House has always been as much a spiritual community as an educational institution. But one of the difficulties of being a seminary is that the student body turns over by 1/3 to 1/2 each year. This means that our devotional societies (Society of Mary, Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament, Guild of All Souls) as well as our chapters of the Brotherhood of St. Andrew (evangelism among men and boys), the Order of St. Luke (healing ministry), and Daughters of the King (prayer and devotional society for women) all wax and wane as the student body turns over. In addition, Nashotah House has had a youth ministry which has served not only the youth of our community, but the youth from surrounding parishes that did not have enough youth to have their own youth group. Sometimes these ministries would die and have to be reborn because of the turn over in the student body. Opening the ministries of the House to a worshiping community of the seminary's friends and supporters could mean that these ministries might be maintained with continuity. The integration of the practical dimensions of a worshiping community with the academic side of our life would also move the House away from the "ivory tower" image of which seminaries are all too often accused. As we looked at the benefits both for Nashotah House and for those who might attend worship here, it looked like a "win-win" situation.

There is one other piece to the story you have to understand. While the Diocese of Milwaukee has been a moderate to conservative diocese and not a part of the divisive actions that have occurred in other parts of the Episcopal Church, the Diocese does not exist in a vacuum. The tensions in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion have not gone unfelt in the Milwaukee area. Some people, unsettled by these tensions, look to Nashotah House as both a lighthouse and an oasis.

A few of the people who said they would be interested in attending worship at Nashotah House might well have preferred to leave the Episcopal Church. As we talked over a period of many weeks, those of us who represented Nashotah House made it clear that the seminary could not be a part of establishing a congregation of another entity. This is true because: (1) While the seminary may receive students from a variety of traditions, including other Anglican bodies, the Trustees, administration, and faculty of Nashotah House have no interest in changing the historic relationship of Nashotah House to the Episcopal Church. (2) Those of us on the faculty who are clergy of the Episcopal Church could not celebrate the Eucharist or function canonically at a worship service of another denomination. (3) The Sunday morning service, like any other worship service of Nashotah House, occurs under the authority of the Dean, who is designated by the Statutes of Nashotah House as the Ordinary, who himself functions under the authority of the Statutes and the Board of Trustees. (4) The Sunday morning worship service and those who attend it (even if they take a name, like St. Silvanus, St. Mary, St. Michael, Christ Church, etc.) do not constitute a congregation in the canonical sense, since Nashotah House, while it has always performed baptisms, weddings, funerals, and invited bishops to hold confirmations, does not receive or issue letters of membership, or function in any other way as a congregation, as defined by the Canons of the Episcopal Church.

So, on April 18, for the fifth or sixth time in Nashotah House's history (according to research done by some of our Trustees), we began Sunday morning services.

And the rumor mill began its work. Before the day was over, one attendee (who was unaware of the painstaking lengths to which we had gone to discuss what this service could and could not be) had e-mailed some old friends that Nashotah House was starting an ACNA congregation. The Southeast Wisconsin chapter of the American Anglican Council (SEWAAC) mischaracterized what we were doing in their newsletter. And the rector of a nearby Episcopal congregation (a graduate of Nashotah House) sent an e-mail to fellow alumni stating that we had started an ACNA congregation and provided the e-mail addresses of the bishops on our Board of Trustees and encouraged alumni to contact them with their concerns. This e-mail "went viral" and has spread all over the Episcopal Church, reaching students in our distance education and graduate programs and distressing them about the future of the House.

The rumors came full circle and upset current students at the House. To paraphrase the article I mentioned at the beginning of this piece: "particularly in times of uncertainty... people are scared and insecure. The folks feeling the greatest anxiety often tend to be the most fervent gossips." No one ever started rumors about the other times Nashotah House had held Sunday morning worship, including the previous attempt during my deanship to hold a Sunday morning Eucharist. But the current political tensions in the Episcopal Church mean that none of us, even in an oasis like Nashotah House, can count on doing "business as usual."

Today, I received an e-mail newsletter from an organization I had never heard of called "Wisconsin Anglican." (This link is to their website, which unfortunately does not contain the newsletter to which I am referring.) The newsletter heading says this issue is "Volume I, Issue 4." (I never saw issues #1, 2, or 3.) The newsletter claims to be "The Voice of Orthodox Anglicanism in the Badger State." I called the leaders of SEWAAC, who are certainly orthodox Anglicans living in the Badger State, and they never heard of this organization either, but they had received the same newsletter I did. We don't know who is behind this.

This newsletter has a large article about my being nominated for bishop in the Diocese of Springfield, obviously picked up from other news sources. It mentions Nashotah House's Commencement last week, in a story obviously taken from Nashotah House's own website. But, in a sidebar about "Impact in Wisconsin" it states: "In addition, the Rev. William Beasley, a priest of AMiA serves the new outreach meeting at Nashotah House Episcopal Seminary, St. Michael’s at the Mission."

Did these people bother to call to check their information? Of course not. The rumor mill is running, who has time to stop and check the facts? The Rev. William Beasley is a very fine priest from the Chicago area who loves Nashotah House and has spoken at SEWAAC meetings several times. But he has absolutely nothing to do with Sunday morning worship or any other "outreach" at Nashotah House.

The rumor mill is running—and it's out of control! To quote Lester's article again: "Gossip destroys morale, creates negative energy at work and stops coworkers from becoming a united team..." says Judith Orloff, MD, the author of Emotional Freedom: Liberate Yourself from Negative Emotions. "It impacts productivity by taking a worker's mind off the task at hand." Yeah, tell me about it!

So what am I going to do? Well, first of all, I am not going to give up the things I am doing that are "right and a good and joyful thing" for many people. And I am going to continue telling the truth about what we are doing at Nashotah House until we tear down the rumor mill.

We will celebrate the Eucharist at Nashotah House on Sunday, just as we do every other day. The service is at 10:00 a.m. Everyone is welcome!
 

Sunday afternoon Palate Cleanser: Bach, Sinfonia from Cantata #29

A great tribute to a great organist (and fellow Illinois native) Virgil Fox:

Why I never liked Bono (U2)

It could be that wailing, over-the-top vocal style. It could be that rock-star-aspiring-for-sainthood image. Or it could be:

"For love of money, money, money, 
money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, 
And the fever getting higher
Desire

As Minyanville columnist Jeff Macke writes: "Goldman Sachs shouldn't be the only thing we're angry at."

According to Macke, Bono...

The pious rocker, African Debt Reliever, One-plugging hipster/poet (“don’t believe in riches but you should see where I live”) used some of the downtime he had from saving the world to co-found Elevation Partners with a long-time Silicon Valley stallion, Roger MacNamee. According to BusinessWeek and Bloomberg, Elevation raised $1.9 billion then sunk about 25% of that into Palm (PALM). But only suckers and Germans buy controlling interest in a failing phone company via common shares, not rock gods and one-time stock gods like Bono and MacNamee.

The result of this investment into Palm preferred shares, while suckers were putting their money into ordinary shares, is that the ordinary investors lost 65% of their investment, while Elevation partners and Bono "paid themselves hugely, and made $25 million."

Macke continues:

"Does that make Bono Satan? Yes. It’s also a ridiculously sleazy, poorly executed, self-serving financial deal that victimized pension funds and shareholders (some of whom may have lost their house! as a result) to the benefit of a self-righteous pop star and his super rich buddy. But it took place thousands and thousands of miles from Wall Street. That means one thing -- the hatred directed toward Wall Street must be redirected toward the real enemy: everyone with more than $50, but especially pompous rock stars whose next album is rumored to be a spoken-word acceptance speech for his long-expected Nobel Peace Prize.

She's the dollars, she's my protection
Yeah, she's a promise in the year of election
Oh sister, I can't let you go
Like a preacher stealing hearts at a traveling show
For love of money, money, money, 
money, money, money, money, money, money, money, money, 
And the fever getting higher

Desire (Yeah!)
Desire
Desire
Desire
Alright

Money
Desire
Desire
Alright

And you thought it was a woman he was singing about?
 

Are you ready for a $50 light bulb?

I am amazed at the number of Americans I know who remain totally unaware that the inexpensive, incandescent light bulbs that we have known for generations are about to disappear. The only currently available alternatives are compact florescent light bulbs (which can't even be manufactured in the United States because of their mercury content). Now comes news of this little LED jobber which currently runs $50 for a 40-watt equivalent. The critical sentence in the article is this one:

GE's product launch actually arrives in the shadow of U.S. Federal lighting efficiency standards, due to come into effect in 2012, which mandate a gradual phasing out of incandescent bulbs over a two-year span. Kiss 100-watt incandescent bulbs goodbye first, with 75-watt bulbs scheduled for a 2013 phase-out. The 60- and 40-watt bulbs leave last in 2014.

Read it all.

Enjoy that warm, flicker-free light from a 100-watt incandescent bulb while you are working or reading? Stock up while you still can! Or better yet, write your Representatives and Senators and tell them to stop this nonsense until we develop a safe (mercury free), inexpensive, functional (easy on the eyes) replacement. Is that too much to ask?
 

Lent and Lawsuits, Part 3 - Homeless in Binghamton

In my previous installment of "Lent and Lawsuits" (Part 2, March 7, 2010), I made reference to:

The Diocese of Central New York, where the church building of St. Andrew's Church, in Vestal, was taken over by the Episcopal diocese shortly before Christmas of 2007 and is now vacant and for sale, while St. Andrew's congregation is worshiping elsewhere and thriving. The Church of the Good Shepherd, in Binghamton, also had its building taken in a lawsuit by the diocese. That building also sits vacant while the Anglican Church of the Good Shepherd continues to worship and grow in a new location.

There has been a further development with regard to the former church building of the Church of the Good Shepherd in Binghamton: FrontPage Magazine today published the news that the building the Episcopal Diocese refused to sell to the departing Anglican congregation, and instead sued them for, has now been sold to a Dawah—an Islamic Awareness Center.

Faith J. H. McDonnell, of the Institute for Religion and Democracy, writes in the article:

It was not as if the people of Good Shepherd had been expecting to keep their church building at no cost. Before the legal proceedings began, Good Shepherd offered to purchase the church building and rectory from the diocese. The diocese refused to sell, and during litigation told the court that the parish was no longer using the property for the purposes for which it had been intended by the Episcopalians who built it in 1879 and who had spent money to maintain it over the years. The Episcopal Church has at various times declared that it will sue every congregation that departs from the denomination in order to preserve the “devotion and witness of Episcopalians of the past for Episcopalians of the future.” That has not quite turned out to be the case in Binghamton, though, unless the “Episcopalians of the future” are part of the Ummah, the Muslim world. Which, come to think of it, does not seem all that far-fetched.

Although the Diocese of Central New York refused to sell the Church of the Good Shepherd to the Anglicans for whom it had been home, they were happy to sell it to a Muslim group for $50,000, a third of the amount that Good Shepherd had offered. According to the Rev. Tony Seel, the Diocese even added a legal caveat to the sale stating that the new owners of the property could never re-sell the building to the original congregation (emphasis added).

The property had been standing vacant and padlocked for many months, when on March 17, 2010, Kennedy passed by his former church building. He saw a crane removing the cross from the bell tower. The former Good Shepherd Church had red doors, symbolizing the blood of Christ as well as the blood of the martyrs. Now the doors had been painted green, and the new owners had covered over the glass that had formed the horizontal arms of a cross-shaped window on the church door. Over the back door was a new sign that said “Islamic Awareness Center.”

That's right, folks. The Episcopal Church would rather have a church building become a night club, an antique store, or a mosque than to allow it to be used by a group of Christians with whom they disagree.

Am I the only one who is thoroughly, righteously indignant that the so-called leadership of the Episcopal Church is spending the tithes and offerings of God's people to wage a jihad of litigation against fellow Christians? I don't think so.

 

Can our sexual mores make us sick?

Can our sexual mores make us sick? Anyone who sat through the "VD" (venereal disease) films that we saw in my junior-high health classes might well answer, "DUH!" to a question like that. This was in the era before HIV-AIDS came on the scene, and Syphilis and Gonorrhea were the the two main diseases those films warned us against. Since then, we've become used to hearing about more common diseases, such as genital herpes, more deadly ones such as HIV-AIDS and various forms of viral Hepatitis, and less well-known diseases such as Chlamydia.

But these two recent news articles from England suggest that sexual promiscuity (for which I will use Wikipedia's definition: "sex with relatively many partners") may be the cause of another newly discovered and potentially deadly complication:

Sex virus blamed for rise in head and neck cancers

The number of head and neck cancers linked to a virus spread by oral sex is rising rapidly and suggests boys as well as girls should be offered protection through vaccination, doctors said Friday.

Despite an overall slight decline in head and neck cancers in recent years, cases of a particular form called oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) have increased sharply, particularly in the developed world.

This growth seems to be linked to cancers caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV), scientists said in a report in the British Medical Journal.

[...]

A recent study found the risk of developing oropharyngeal carcinoma was linked to a history of six or more lifetime sexual partners, four or more lifetime oral sex partners, and, for men, an earlier age at first sexual intercourse.

[Read it all.]

Swinging 60s had nothing on the Noughties: sex study

Young women today are nearly three times more sexually active than those of their grandmothers' generation in the liberal heyday of the "Swinging 60s," according to a survey on Tuesday.

The study found that women in the so-called Noughties between 2000 and 2009 had an average of 5.65 different sexual partners by the time they were 24.

Almost one in 10 of those asked claimed to have slept with more than 10 different partners.

By contrast, women who were in their early twenties in the 1960s had an average of 1.67 partners, and women of their mothers' generation, aged 24 in the 1970s, had 3.72 sexual partners by the same age.

[...]

[The study] also found that although women's sex life has increased [sic], sexual health is not improving.

Cancer Research UK statistics show that incidence rates of cervical cancer in women under the age of 25 have not fallen, despite better screening.

Its figures also reveal that although the number of cervical cancer cases in older women has fallen significantly in the last 10 years, diagnoses of the infection in women under the age of 25 have not followed the same trend.

The increase in the number of sexual partners could be one reason, says Lloyds Pharmacy.

"Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) infections are very common, especially in younger people," said Clare Kerr, Lloyds Pharmacy's head of sexual health, who warned that HPV is one of the major causes of cervical cancer.

[Read it all.]

The case for "abstinence before marriage, fidelity afterward" continues to stand.
 

Healthcare hurts

From here.

AT&T Inc. announced today that it will take a $1 billion non-cash accounting charge in the first quarter because of the health care overhaul and may cut benefits it offers to current and retired workers.

The charge is the largest disclosed so far. Earlier this week, AK Steel Corp., Caterpillar Inc., Deere & Co. and Valero Energy announced similar accounting charges, saying the health care law that President Barack Obama signed Tuesday will raise their expenses.

[...]

AT&T also said Friday that it is looking into changing the health care benefits it offers because of the new law. Analysts say retirees could lose the prescription drug coverage provided by their former employers as a result of the overhaul.

Read it all.

And this is only the beginning. Are we loving that change yet?

 

Shock: Stupak Shot Down Last-Ditch Attempt to Include Own Abortion Funding Ban

Of all the disappointments in Congress' debate and vote on the health care bill, none has been worse than the distressing flip-flop of Representative Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) who has sold the pro-life cause he once championed for thirty pieces of silver.

Shock: Stupak Shot Down Last-Ditch Attempt to Include Own Abortion Funding Ban

Pro-life leaders unanimous: abortion executive order meaningless

By Kathleen Gilbert
Updated 3:32 pm EST

WASHINGTON, D.C., March 22, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a baffling about-face, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) on Sunday fought against a last-ditch effort to insert his own abortion-funding ban in the reconciliation "fix" package for the Senate health care bill, which passed Sunday night.

The House subsequently struck down Rep. Dave Camp's (R-Mich.) attempt to pass Stupak’s language 232-199.

While Camp referred to his proposal as the "Stupak-Pitts amendment," Stupak himself spoke against his Republican colleague's effort, saying it was an attempt to "politicize life" that merely "purports to be a right -to-life amendment." "This is nothing more than an opportunity to continue to deny 32 million Americans health insurance," he said.

"This motion does not promote life," declared Stupak. "It is the Democrats who have stood up for the principle of no public funding for abortions. ... The executive order ensures that the sanctity of life will be protected."

Angry shouts, including one of "baby killer," were heard on the House floor as Stupak argued against the amendment. Rep. Randy Neugebauer, R-Texas, has identified himself as the heckler who shouted "baby killer," though he claims his remark was not directed at Stupak personally.

Stupak had already reached an 11th-hour agreement with the White House earlier in the day to vote for the Senate health care bill - which pro-life leaders have called the largest abortion expansion since Roe v. Wade - in exchange for an executive order from President Obama upholding the Hyde amendment.

It had been widely acknowledged that, without at least two votes from Stupak's group of Democrats holding out for an abortion funding ban, the bill could not have passed. The House voted 219-212 to pass the measure.

Planned Parenthood called the passage of the bill a "huge victory" that would "significantly increase insurance coverage of reproductive health care, including family planning." "Thanks to supporters like you, we were able to keep the Stupak abortion ban out of the final legislation and President Obama did not include the Stupak language in his Executive Order," stated the organization.

Pro-life leaders expressed shock at Stupak's about-face hours before the final vote, after months of holding out for a true Hyde-amendment ban on abortion funding under extreme pressure from party leaders. The Susan B. Anthony list immediately rescinded a "Defender of Life" award slated to go to the Democrat lawmaker.

"The President's disregard for the unborn is no surprise. It is the betrayal from those who have fought for life within his party that is the biggest shock," stated Family Research Council president Tony Perkins on Sunday. "Especially Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) who had fought so valiantly in this debate, but folded when it really mattered."

"Some Democratic Members who have had good pro-life records in the past turned away from those principles today, instead putting their trust in the most pro-abortion President in history and his equally pro-abortion Health and Human Services Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius," said Perkins.

Several top pro-life legal analysts immediately concluded that the executive order would do little to actually fix the glaring pro-life concerns in the Democrats' health care overhaul.

Richard Doerflinger of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said in a March 21 memo to congressional aides that it was the "unanimous view of our legal advisers" that the executive order was meaningless, thanks to decades of federal court precedent that apply the principles of Roe v. Wade to federal health legislation.

"According to these rulings, such health legislation creates a statutory requirement for abortion funding, unless Congress clearly forbids such funding," wrote Doerflinger. "That is why the Hyde amendment was needed in 1976, to stop Medicaid from funding 300,000 abortions a year. The statutory mandate construed by the courts would override any executive order or regulation."

In addition, William Saunders, senior vice president of Americans United for Life Action, pointed out Supreme Court precedent demonstrating that "a statute cannot be undone by an executive order or regulation."

"For example, an Executive Order cannot prevent insurance plans that pay for abortions and participate in the newly-created exchanges from receiving federal subsidies, because this allowance is explicitly written in the bill," wrote Saunders in a Washington Examiner column Sunday.

The National Right to Life Committee confirmed that the executive order "does not truly correct any of the seven objectionable pro-abortion provisions" in the bill.

"The executive order promised by President Obama was issued for political effect. It changes nothing," stated NRLC. "The president cannot amend a bill by issuing an order, and the federal courts will enforce what the law says."

Read the article and other pro-life updates here.

 

WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE?

Anglican Mainstream comments on the deafening silence from church leaders and the media following the massacre of 500 Christians in Nigeria:

The evil, despicable massacre in Nigeria of some 500 Christian men, women and children has excited remarkably little international comment. This despite the fact that three villages were attacked near Jos by Muslim gangs who trapped women, children and the elderly — those who couldn’t run fast enough to escape — then cut them to pieces.

Archbishop Ben Kwashi described the scenes: “I could see kids from age zero to teenagers, all butchered from the back, macheted in their necks, their heads. Deep cuts in the mouths of babies. The stench. People wailing and crying.” Times (‘500 butchered in Nigeria killing fields’, Tuesday March 9, 2010) entire families were killed to the chants of ‘Allahu Akbar’. Muslim inhabitants of the villages were evacuated before the attackers came in an area which is under a military curfew. Archbishop Kwashi believed a powerful, well-connected grouping must have been responsible. Where are the statements from the Archbishop of Canterbury or the Pope in condemning this violence that has been meted out to Christian communities in Nigeria time and time again? [Emphasis added.] Similarly mealy-mouthed has been the media describing such events as ‘inter- community' is equally responsible for the aggression. Yet there is no equivalence, the vast number of lives claimed over the years have been Christian. Churches have been attacked repeatedly and the triumphant killing slogan ‘God is Greatest’ (‘Allahu Akbar’) has brought shame upon Islam repeatedly.

Lent and Lawsuits, Part 2

As I said in my last post, according to budget figures analyzed by Attorney A.S. Haley (a must read), the Episcopal Church has spent $2.2 million more than was budgeted in 2009 on "Legal Assistance to Dioceses" (i.e., lawsuits against departing parishes) resulting in a projected operating loss for the year of $ 1,708,283.

Keep in mind that this is not the only amount being spent on lawsuits. The Diocese of Virginia has been involved in a multi-year, multi-million dollar suit against departing parishes that has now gone to the Virginia Supreme Court. A similar suit in South Carolina was won by the local parish, but is being appealed to the US Supreme Court.

It is important to remember that the Diocese of Virginia had negotiated and drawn up settlements with departing parishes in northern Virginia prior to the election and enthronement of Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. But the PB, upon taking office, made (who knows how?) the Diocese of Virginia renege on those negotiations.

A Tale of Two Churches

What does the Episcopal Church stand to gain from these suits? Let's at look at the statistics for two churches.

St. John's Church Huntingdon Valley, PA (Diocese of Pennsylvania) walked away from their property in 2003. The parish, which had an average Sunday attendance of around 250 and offerings of around $350,000 before the departure of the majority of the congregation, now has an average Sunday attendance of less than 50 and offering receipts of around $50,000! It doesn't take a genius to realize that you can't keep a congregation in that situation open without generous subsidies. The property alone needs more than $50,000 per year for utilities and maintenance, not to mention compensation for a priest. Meanwhile, the 85-90% majority of the congregation that departed is flourishing in another Philadelphia suburb.

The Falls Church, Falls Church, VA (Diocese of Virginia) is one of the congregations with which the Diocese of Virginia would have settled had not the Presiding Bishop ordered a U-turn on that deal. The overwhelming majority has become part of the Anglican District of Virginia, affiliated with CANA and the Anglican Church in Nigeria and currently retains possession of their building, based on a lower court ruling that is being appealed. A remnant who wanted to remain in TEC meets almost across the street from their former church. How are they doing?

In 2005, the Falls Church had a membership of 2800, with average Sunday attendance running around 1900, and annual offerings totaling $4.5 million. In the past two years, statistics for the remnant TEC congregation show a membership of under 100. The average Sunday attendance is around 50, and income is somewhere less than $100,000. (In fact, it is hard to tell the current "plate and pledge" amount, because the graph that is calibrated to deal with previous year's incomes in the millions doesn't afford the level of detail to peg the current amount very precisely.) The Anglican Falls Church has continued to grow and now has an average attendance of well over 2000.

The sizable attendance the Falls Church has experienced is a direct reflection of the nature and quality of the ministry that has gone on there in recent decades. Just as the example of St. John's, Huntingdon Valley, PA demonstrates (above), the Episcopal Church would have to be seriously deluded to think that any ministry they would conduct there would draw enough people to pay the utility bills.

So, in essence, the Presiding Bishop has forced (again, how?) the Diocese of Virginia to spend several million dollars to fight for property they can't use if they win it. The same is true for Truro Church, in Fairfax, VA, and several other northern Virginia congregations where there is no remaining Episcopal congregation that even wants the property.

The reality is that dioceses of the Episcopal Church where property is at issue could have reaped millions of dollars in settlements through negotiations over the property instead of spending millions of dollars in legal fees by suing departing congregations. If we accept that national church and diocesan leaders have a "fiduciary responsibility" to maintain the assets of the Episcopal Church, then could they not have met that responsibility more effectively by seeking settlements, wherever possible, with departing congregations instead of suing them? It could well be argued that national and diocesan leaders have violated their fiduciary responsibility by recklessly engaging in lawsuits where out-of court settlements might have been possible.

Two cases in point: 1. The Diocese of Colorado where "unrestricted reserves fell from nearly $5 million in 2006, to $750,000 today, due mainly to litigation over Grace Church in Colorado Springs. This represents not only a deep decline in money available to the diocese, but in investment income generated by those reserves."

2. The Diocese of Central New York, where the church building of St. Andrew's Church, in Vestal, was taken over by the Episcopal diocese shortly before Christmas of 2007 and is now vacant and for sale, while St. Andrew's congregation is worshiping elsewhere and thriving. The Church of the Good Shepherd, in Binghamton, also had its building taken in a lawsuit by the diocese. That building also sits vacant while the Anglican Church of the Good Shepherd continues to worship and grow in a new location.

From a January 2010 article in Christianity Today, entitled "Land and Building Wars":

Valerie J. Munson, who runs a religion and law center at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis, has counseled a dozen U.S. Anglican parishes and finds all the litigation unfortunate.

"A lot of money is being spent by the Episcopal Church to litigate cases that could very easily be settled," says Munson, a PC(USA) elder. "In a justice system where over 90 percent of cases are settled, it's a bit of a mystery as to why a Christian denomination would choose to spend its resources on every dispute that comes up."

"...a mystery as to why a Christian denomination would choose to spend its resources on every dispute that comes up." Indeed.

So why is the Episcopal Church engaging in costly lawsuits with such abandon? The following quotations from an article that originally appeared in The Washington Times (fortunately preserved by Stand Firm) give a clue:

In video taped testimony presented to the Fairfax County Circuit Court, Bishop Schori said she ordered Virginia Bishop Peter Lee to break a verbal agreement allowing the 11 parishes to withdraw from the diocese so as to prevent “incursions by foreign bishops.”

"I told Bishop Lee I could not support negotiations for sale if the congregations intended to set up as other parts of the Anglican Communion," Bishop Jefferts Schori said."

[...]

Under further questioning by attorneys for CANA, she said that had the property been sold to a Methodist or Baptist congregation, she would not have objected.

But, "the Episcopal Church, for matters of its own integrity, cannot encourage other parts of the Anglican Communion to set up shop within its jurisdiction," she said in her deposition."

So it appears that the Episcopal Church's pursuit of litigation has more to do with denying property to departing congregations that wish to remain Anglican than with exercising a fiduciary responsibility for church assets.

Indeed rather than preserving Episcopal Church assets, the chief motivation seems to be to deny (seemingly at any cost) resources to anyone who would dare call himself or herself an Anglican apart from the Episcopal Church. In the process Episcopalians are being encouraged to view departing brothers and sisters as enemies, with the litigation resulting in acrimony and spiritual damage of the sort that the Church is supposed to exist to heal.

There is only one word for such an endeavor that is conducted without regard for cost or consequences: obsession. But I would submit that, whether one is speaking of the material or spiritual cost, it is an obsession that the Episcopal Church cannot afford.

Loyal Episcopalians who are concerned about the spiritual and financial well-being of their Church need to hold the leadership responsible for these overexpenditures and demand a halt to the litigation now.


Postscript

(1) There will undoubtedly be those who object to what I have said here. But it needs to be noted that I am not taking sides in the matter of who owns church properties, I am simply arguing against the path the Episcopal Church is taking in resolving property disputes.

(2) It will be alleged by some on "the other side" that legal victories by the Episcopal Church justify these lawsuits. (a.) Any thinking person knows that there is always a danger in "the end justifies the means" kind of rationalization. (b.) One only has to look at Plessy v. Ferguson, the Dred Scott decision, or Roe v. Wade to see that a legal right and a moral right are not always the same thing.

(3) I remain a priest of the Episcopal Church. There are those (chiefly among those who claim to want an "inclusive" Church) who would say I am being disloyal and that there isn't any room in the Episcopal Church for anyone who opposes its litigious stance. These same individuals need to ask themselves if someone can still be a loyal American while opposing the war in Iraq (or the administration's policies on a whole range of subjects). Obviously, loyalty and dissent are not mutually exclusive.
 

Lent and Lawsuits

I was struck and powerfully convicted regarding the current state of the Episcopal Church by this reading from today's Daily Office Lectionary:

When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers, but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers? To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? But you yourselves wrong and defraud—even your own brothers! (1 Corinthians 6:1-8)

Coincidentally, The Living Church recently ran an editorial dealing with this same subject: http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2010/2/25/editorial-lent-and-lawsuits. I do not agree with all of The Living Church's editorial, but they are right to question the recklessness with which supposed followers of Christ are engaging a type of conduct expressly condemned in the New Testament.

The editorial begins by mentioning the intervention of the Presiding Bishop in affairs of the Diocese of South Carolina by retaining legal counsel without consulting with (and possibly with the intention of legal action against) the Bishop of South Carolina because of concerns that a handful of parishes in South Carolina might be taking action to distance themselves from the Episcopal Church.

As the Presiding Bishop described Bishop Lawrence’s actions, her tone departed from the proposed discipline of Lent. “He’s telling the world that he is offended that I think it’s important that people who want to stay Episcopalians there have some representation on behalf of the larger church,” she said in remarks to the Episcopal Church’s Executive Council on Feb. 19.

No, Presiding Bishop, it could be that the Bishop of South Carolina is offended that your first response to the thought that a congregation might be distancing itself from the Episcopal Church is to hire lawyers. Or it could be that, as the Living Church editorial opines, "neither do we believe that filing lawsuits against fellow Christians is a matter of good stewardship."

As I read 1 Corinthians 6, it is more serious than a matter of good stewardship. But, if we look at the issue of stewardship as it pertains to the Episcopal Church's litigation, it might pay to ask how that is working out?

Attorney A.S. Haley, who blogs under the name "The Anglican Curmudgeon" has been following the Episcopal Church's budget problems and expenditures on litigation in a series of posts, entitled ECUSA's Finances, the latest installment of which was posted yesterday: http://accurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2010/03/ecusas-finances-updated.html. Mr. Haley notes that the line item labelled Legal Assistance to Dioceses (paying for the cost of dozens of major lawsuits), the amount budgeted for 2009 is $100,000. The amount spent during 2009 was $2,346,347—an overexpenditure of $2,246,347. Consequently, even in the face of excess receipts from the Federal Government for Episcopal Migration Ministries of $1,118,023, the Episcopal Church still ran a deficit for 2009 in excess of $2.2 million. You must read A.S. Haley's article in it's entirely to get the complete picture.

So how is the Episcopal Church making up for these deficits? As Haley puts it, "by slashing to the bone its entire raison d'être at the national level," in other words, by underspending virtually every aspect of the Church's budget for programs and ministries. As a fiscal conservative, I am not normally opposed to economizing or underspending budgets. But when we are talking about the ministry of the Church, the ministry for which church members give their tithes and offerings as unto the Lord, the diversion of those funds into unbudgeted expenditures not approved by church members is inexcusable.

(To be continued.)
 

Daily Telegraph (UK): The Church of England does lack testosterone

The February 9, Daily Telegraph, had an interesting bit of social commentary by columnist Ed West. You should read the whole thing to get the context, but the critical paragraphs are these:

But it’s only in recent years that the mainstream churches – and the Catholics have this problem to a lesser extent – have become virtual male-free zones. And the fact is that Christianity has been feminised. All the things that used to inspire young men – the sense of honour, camaraderie, sacrifice and patriotism, the rugged Victorian Christianity – have been sucked out of the Anglican Church. What man in his rightful mind wants to get up on a Sunday morning to be lectured to about climate change and social justice by Harriet Harman’s sister? My father, a lifelong Anglican, went to his last service a couple of years ago when the lady vicar started her sermon with: “I read an interesting piece in the Guardian yesterday…”

Where’s the leadership and inspiration that young men crave? Can you imagine many of the C of E’s leaders today as Gene Hackman’s character from The Poseidon Adventure, leading his flock to safety at the cost of his own life, and looking damned cool at the same time, rather than mouthing platitudes about inter-faith dialogue while the ship goes down?

Read it all.

The comments that follow are rich, too. Such as this one from "DominicJ" who is obviously disillusioned with what he sees in current Church of England clergy:

"Can't argue, I haven't been to church ages.
I’m allowed to have a decade long crisis of faith, my bloody priest isnt!"

That's a good one, Dominic!

Is is possible to say, "Ouch!" and "Amen!" at the same time?

 

What Sergey Brin Knows that Rupert Murdoch Doesn't

I don't read the Wall Street Journal as often as I used to. Oh, I still pick up an occasional copy if I pass a newsstand and notice an interesting headline. But, online (which is where I get most of my news), I am reading it a lot less. The reason: Most of the WSJ's online content consists of teasers, followed by the announcement: "Subscribe to the Wall Street Journal to read the rest of the article." Nowadays, when I see that a link points to a Wall Street Journal article, I don't even waste time going there.

Rupert Murdoch, the publishing and broadcast magnate who owns the WSJ and other media outlets, has the idea that, if the WSJ locks its content into a subscription-only website, people will pay to read it. In contrast, take Sergey Brin, who, in a mere 12 years, has built one of the world's richest companies (Google) on the idea of "making all the world’s information universally accessible and useful" and funding this idea with ad revenue.

It is not that Murdoch is a stranger to advertising supported media: He owns the Fox television network and the highly profitable Fox News Network. Imagine if people had to pay for a subscription to watch Fox News, in addition to the price they pay for cable or satellite television. How many viewers would Fox News have? Murdoch needs to forget that people read newspaper articles on websites. People tend to view the internet more like television than newspapers. There is a reason for the similarity between "channel surfing" and "web surfing."

Murdoch's subscription approach is part of a foolish, short-sighted, but growing trend among newspaper publishers who simply don't get it. The result, I predict, is that readers will ultimately get less and less of their news from newspaper websites. Brand recognition of these news outlets will fall. And the hard times being experienced by print media in the digital age will get worse.

The trend began years ago as newspaper managers, (stupidly) believing it was a bad idea for readers to be able to find their articles using search engines, began locking their content away and taking elaborate measures to de-list their published content from search engines.

Now let's think about this for a minute: Suppose I want to read the latest news from the Winter Olympics. I search Google and see a link to an article from the Sacramento Bee (just to pull a name out of the air). I click on the link and read the article. I see another article that interests me and continue to read articles from the Sacramento Bee—all the time viewing advertising. I decide the Sacramento Bee is a pretty good news source, bookmark it, and come back regularly, each time viewing more ads in the process.

But let's suppose the Sacramento Bee locks up its content. No longer can I find articles in it using Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. (I hate Bing, but that's another story.) Only those who already know of the existence of the Sacramento Bee (mainly local residents) and who have some reason to think they might find what they are looking for will go there. The result: diminished readership and a lot of effort put into a website that very few people will actually visit. A second result: instead of reaching a larger audience with its journalism and advertising, the website, only viewed by local residents, ends up competing with the print version for the same readership. So instead of expanding their base, they end up competing with themselves for the diminishing base they already have.

Major newspapers that have a national reputation, like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post might (and I only say might) be able to get away with a subscription model. But that is only because of the existence of a generation that has some regard for the historic reputation of these newspapers' print versions.

Fast forward one generation: If the Wall Street Journal has been locked up behind a subscription model, and you now have a generation that has grown up thinking of it as a rarefied, niche publication for those who are willing and able to pay for it (if they even know of it at all)—a generation that has grown accustomed to getting their information from more accessible, more customizable news sources—is the WSJ's revenue going to be greater or smaller?

30% of the population over age 40 read a daily newspaper, only 15% of those under age 40 do so. Increasingly, people want to absorb news of what is happening around them as they go, as effortlessly as they breathe air or drink water.

So when I search for news online and find that the newspapers whose names I might be familiar with have locked their content up behind a subscription, and other newspapers have de-listed their content so it doesn't even show up in the search engines, what am I going to do?

I am going to continue to do what I have for the past 15 years. I am going to use a portal as my internet start page, where I can view news headlines for categories I choose; and, in most cases, I can read the same AP or Reuters stories I would get by going to a subscription website. I can read all sorts of feature stories that may not be the same as one can find in the New York Times, they may be even better! I can click on through to all sorts of sources for business, sports, technology, and other stories from a variety of sources. PLUS, I can get the weather forecast for as many cities as I choose, view stock reports, sports scores, television schedules, local movies showtimes, and lots of other information in categories that I choose and in a format that I can customize.

So, if newspapers want to disappear from the scene entirely, they can continue to lock up their content and charge for subscriptions. If they actually want to reach more people (and make more money) they should start customizable portals, run ads, and let the search engines drive as many people their way as possible.

It's ironic, but the Wall Street Journal's online edition is right now running a story entitled What Newspapers Can Learn From Craigslist:
Craig Newmark did one simple thing: He thought about what his users truly wanted. (Perhaps the publishers of the Wall Street Journal should read their own articles.) Of course, after seven lines of the story, you'll read: "To continue reading, subscribe now." No, thanks.

In short, I'm willing to bet Sergey Brin and Craig Newmark know more than Rupert Murdoch about how we'll be getting our information in the years to come.
 

[Off Topic:] Beware the Tuna Tartare!

I have never cared very much for sushi, being of the opinion that if God wanted us to eat our food raw, he wouldn't have given us fire. But last night, in Dallas, I was treated to one of the most delectable meals of my life—multiple courses with palate cleansers between the courses, that included an orange-raspberry sorbet between the appetizer and entrée and an orange crème brûlée between the main course and dessert. (Heck, I thought dessert was supposed to be the palate cleanser!)

So we began with an apéritif (that's a French word that means having a snort before dinner). Notice how the French come up with such elegant-sounding words for ordinary and, sometimes, even repulsive things: like Escargot, which is French for "slimy garden pests simmered in butter."

With our apéritif we were served an appetizer before our appetizer—I am sure the French have a word for that too, but I don't know what it is. Our Italian server described in painstaking detail each French concoction we were being served. And somewhere in the description of the appetizer before our appetizer I catch the words "Tuna Tartare."

Being no stranger to things gastronomical, I know that Tartare is French for "cold, raw, dead meat, finely chopped." But if the mention of Tuna conjures an image in your mind of Star-Kist-in-a-can, forget it. Before me appears this tiny, walnut-sized delicacy of fine, pink sushi tuna, mixed with amazing seasonings, accompanied by fresh greens, drizzled in varied streaks of sauce, and looking like a work of modern art. Setting aside my aforementioned prejudice against sushi, I take the plunge.

Fast forward a few hours: I awake after a night of all-too-little sleep, rising early to catch "The Best Care in the Air" back to the Frozen North. Lingering in bed is not an option, as I suddenly find myself setting a new world's record for the 25-foot dash from the bed to the bathroom. Charlie the Tuna has his revenge.

Well, as I have often said—especially following a good 5-alarm Chili cook-off: People who aren't willing to suffer a little pain don't deserve to eat good food.
 

Blessed Are the Gadgets, For They Shall Inherit the Earth

Gotta love those Anglicans!

(P.S., There are nine slides in the series.)
 

A Song for the New Year - "Stand by Me"

This cover of Stand By Me was recorded by completely unknown artists all around the world. It all started with a base track—vocals and guitar—recorded on the streets of Santa Monica, California, by a street musician called Roger Ridley. The base track was then taken to New Orleans, Louisiana, where Grandpa Elliott—a blind singer from the French Quarter—added vocals and harmonica while listening to Ridley's base track on headphones. In the same city, Washboard Chaz's added some metal percussion to it.

The producers took the resulting mix all through Europe, Africa, and South America, adding new tracks with multiple instruments and vocals that were assembled in the final version you are seeing in this video. I don't know about you, but it blew me away.

The video was among the first in a series of musical videos made by Playing for Change, a movement to promote international understanding through music (no endorsement intended).

(You may want to click on through to You Tube or Playing for Change and watch the High Quality version.)

Please Pass the Mayo

Joseph Ashby writes in The American Thinker about this latest consequence of the coming disaster if government succeeds in taking the larger role in health care that is mandated in the House and Senate bills. These bills have yet to be reconciled and approved in their final form. In other words, there is still time to stop this train wreck. Write and call your Representatives and Senators.

The train wreck that is Obamacare just added another stop on its route. Bloomberg is reporting on a Mayo Clinic announcement that the medical care provider will drop thousands of Medicare patients from its Glendale Arizona clinic.

More than 3,000 patients eligible for Medicare, the government’s largest health-insurance program, will be forced to pay cash if they want to continue seeing their doctors at a Mayo family clinic in Glendale, northwest of Phoenix, said Michael Yardley, a Mayo spokesman. The decision, which Yardley called a two-year pilot project, won’t affect other Mayo facilities in Arizona, Florida and Minnesota.

Obama in June cited the nonprofit Rochester, Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio for offering “the highest quality care at costs well below the national norm.”

The article goes on to explain that the Mayo’s nationwide operation lost $840 million in 2008 treating Medicare patients. All this before Obamacare takes hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare funding.

The point is not that Medicare is underfunded per se, but rather that government intervention into the insurance and medical care markets has been disastrous. As each year passes, the magnitude of that disaster increases. Obama’s health care overhaul will accelerate the process exponentially.

Read it all.
 

Happy 2010!

What do you worry about?

"Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 4:6-7)