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CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE ZONES By Mary Ann Mueller VOL Special Correspondent www.virtueonline.org January 9, 2025   St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Altadena — GONE! Altadena Community Church in Altadena — GONE! Altadena United Methodist Church in Altadena — GONE! Community United Methodist Church in Pacific Palisades — Gone! Pasadena Jewish Temple in Pasadena — GONE! Corpus Christi Catholic Church in Pacific Palisades — GONE! Kinneloa Church of Christ in Pasadena — GONE! Masjid Al Taqwa Mosque in Altadena — GONE! St. Matthew’s Episcopal School in Pacific Palisades — GONE! St. Mark's Episcopal School in Altadena — GONE! St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church twin rectories in Pacific Palisades — GONE! St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church in Pacific Palisades — Damaged! Pacific Palisades Presbyterian Church in Pacific Palisades — Damaged! Corpus Christi Catholic School in Pacific Palisades — Damaged! Thomas the Apostle Episcopal Church in  Hollywood — Threatened! St. Stephen’s Episcopal  Church in Hollywood — Threatened! St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Studio City — Threatened! All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena — Evacuation Center! St. Paul’s Commons Episcopal Retreat Center in Echo Park — Evacuation Center! It all started at 10:30 Tuesday (Jan. 7) morning with a small fire on Palisades Drive in Pacific Palisades. The fire department was not able to contain it quickly enough as the Santa Ana winds whipped up spreading hot embers across the street and across town.   Twenty-four hours later one fire had become five separate ongoing fires chewing through thousands of acres destroying everything in their paths — homes, multimillion dollar mansions, historic landmarks, businesses, stores, eateries, libraries, retirement centers, schools and even houses of worship:  Catholic … Protestant … Jewish … Islamic …   One of the fire-destroyed churches is St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Altadena.  The Episcopal church building made it unscathed through Tuesday night.  But it did not survive Wednesday.  Fire surrounded it before dawn broke.   “It is with a broken heart that I share with you the news that our church building is lost,” St. Mark's rector the Rev. Carri Grindon posted on Facebook Wednesday. “It caught fire at around 6:30 this morning, and is gone.”   She also noted that several members of her congregation also lost their homes to the  raging out of control fire.   The Palisades Fire, fueled by 100 mph Santa Ana wind gusts, shot hot embers into the air that were sometimes blown miles away thus seeding new blazes. The Eaton Fire started at 6 pm Tuesday evening followed by the Hurst Fire at 10 pm.   The explosion of the Palisades Fire prompted immediate evacuations. Residents fled the flames choking the escape routes creating gridlock. People left their cars in the streets and ran for their lives, many with just the clothes on their backs.  To clear a path for fire equipment to get in, fire officials brought in bulldozers to push the abandoned cars out of the way to make room for emergency crews to get through.   By nightfall power was out.  It was the leaping yellow and orange flames which lit up the night sky not street lamps or porch lights.   The Woodley Fire started just before dawn on Wednesday (Jan. 8) with the Lidia Fire being torched by 1 pm.   Along the way blowing sparks were igniting other fires but they were quickly suppressed so that they could not get a foothold and spread. Those small ember brush fires were: the Bert Fire, the Gulch Fire, the Olivas Fire, the Tyler Fire, and the Riverbed Fire.   By daybreak Wednesday officials were finally able to get enough natural light to see what was burned, is still burning, what was left standing, and what was in the fire’s path.   The early Wednesday morning tally showed that more than one thousand buildings were either reduced to rubble and smoldering ruins, or heavily fire damaged. At least two were dead and others injured.  So much damage was wrought in less than 24 hours. The death toll increased to five by nightfall.  Los Angeles County is the most populated county in the United States with 9.6 million people. More than 100,000 Californians had to out run the encroaching flames including several residents of retirement or assisted living communities. One such community which executed its predawn evacuation plan was the MonteCedre, an Episcopal facility in Altadena.   Two hundred residents safely fled the encroaching flames. However, the historic Scripps Home Gloria Cottage, located on MonteCedre's property,  succumbed to the blaze. Yet it seems the primary MonteCedre structures survived.   The MonteCedro is managed by Episcopal Community and Services for Seniors (ECS) which has been serving the church since 1923.   MonteCedro is one of four ECS senior communities. The other three are: the Canterbury in Rancho Palos Verdes; the Covington in Aliso Viejo; and Twelve Oaks in Glendale, which is currently undergoing redevelopment and is scheduled to reopen for residents in 2028.   By 7 pm Wednesday evening, as the Santa Ana winds again picked up, the Sunset Fire had started and was heading to the Hollywood Hills. It would be another long agonizing night of firefighting, fear, worry, escape, and prayer.   “God of the sun and the sea, the rains and the winds, bear all our neighbors through this stormy night and throw a veil of protection over those battling these wildfires under the worst possible conditions. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” Bishop John Taylor (VII Los Angeles) posted on Facebook Tuesday. “May our God in Christ be with you, tonight and always.” In the deepening darkness another overnight fire was sparked, the Sunswept Fire, but firefighters were able to quell that blaze before it spread.   When the sun rose for a second time on Thursday (Jan. 9) the runaway wildfires had destroyed more than 2,000 — and counting — structures.   Thursday morning weary firefighters were still in a losing battle against the unrelenting forces of nature — wind and fire. Reinforcements are being sent in from neighboring states and the California National Guard has been activated to join the fight.   Thursday as the Santa Ana winds died down there was some suppression progress being made on the smaller fires. However, the area is still under red flag warnings on into the weekend. But for the most part there is zero percent containment of the largest and still growing fires.   Mary Ann Mueller is a journalist living in Texas.  She is a regular contributor to VirtueOnline

By Campbell Campbell-Jack https://possil.wordpress.com/2024/12/30/we-christians-are-exiles-in-a-collapsing-world/ January 6, 2025 Christianity was fundamental to the development of the West. It provided the forms of thought without which those institutions defining the West would likely never have emerged. Those institutions such as the rule of law, democracy, capitalism, science, education and the family, are  being undermined by the progressive left today.   The Enlightenment and its commitment to bare rationality which did so much to undermine Christianity is now being undermined by the deconstruction of post-modernism and its successors. As a consequence, the West is adrift without a coherent guiding principle.   Britain was once a country based, however imperfectly, on Christian principles, those principles have been deliberately abandoned in favour of secular ideals. At present we are in the uncomfortable transition period between a consciously Christian nation and a consciously pagan one which will be totally unable to resist the demands of an increasingly confident and aggressive Islam.   We increasingly speak of broken Britain. Wherever we look we see our institutions floundering and social cohesion fracturing. The police have lost their way. A police force with an abysmal record in crime fighting focuses on the language used in tweets. Obedient to our progressive politicians the police have initiated anti-thought-crime strategies against people who, concerned by the mass murder of babies, have the temerity to pray silently near abortion clinics   The NHS supposedly the envy of the world and employing nearly 1.5 million people, demands a higher proportion of government spending than anything else and delivers sub-standard medical results. Typical of progressive priorities the Guardian boasted that the NHS  ‘performed better than its counterparts on fairness, ease of access and administrative efficiency’ before admitting that ‘outcomes for people with potentially fatal diseases fell short of those in western Europe and Australia.’   A two tier judiciary is destroying trust in law and order. David Spring, a 61-year-old retired train driver was sentenced to eighteen months imprisonment for nothing more than making ‘gestures’ at the police and chanting ribald songs about ‘Who the [expletive] is Allah’. Meanwhile Gabriel Abdullah who terrorised staff at a kosher supermarket in Golders Green demanding to know their views on Israel and Palestine as he threatened them with a large knife, was given a suspended sentence.   The harshness with which the Southport rioters were treated demonstrates the establishment’s fear of the white working class. The establishment refused to acknowledge that they were facing a genuinely spontaneous and uncoordinated reaction from people who had had enough of having their concerns over uncontrolled immigration being ignored by the political class. The anger of the white indigenous working class was blamed on a fictional far-right. There is no organised political far right, yet the bogy man of the English Defence League which ceased to exist ten years previously was trotted out by a complicit mainstream media.   These examples illustrate the social consequences flowing from an absence of political and spiritual leadership. Our political parties and churches fly under false colours. The Conservatives conserve nothing, Labour are interested in the workers only at election time, and the Liberal Democrats are anything but liberal or democratic.   The leadership of the mainstream churches has been taken over by progressives who are frankly embarrassed by the claims of Christ. He is too divisive, saying you must be born again (John 3:3) and making claims to be the only way of salvation (John 14:4). As for the apostle’s saying there is no other name given by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12), that politically incorrect preaching is seen as insulting to other faiths. For the mainstream church hierarchies the bureaucratic management of institutional decline has replaced evangelism as a priority.   The mainstream denominations have reduced the once omnipotent and compassionate Lord God Almighty of the Bible to the level of a political activist, moralising self-help guru, or doddering grandfather existing only to approve of whatever his grandchildren get up to. Is it any wonder that people refuse to listen to such churches.   It is doubtful that the man in the street would be able to recognise Christianity as the single most important element in the creation of Western civilisation. Due to the abject failure of the church people today are dangerously ignorant about their own heritage. Just as fish cannot see the water in which they swim, so Westerners cannot see and value their Christian heritage and its benefits.   The West does not have the stomach or the self-belief to defeat that which is now in our midst. It will be a long, slow crumbling, but the West will fall. It might take 50 years or 100 years but the trends are clear; it is inevitable. One day decent unbelievers will regret their complacency when they find themselves getting what they wanted: a new age unhampered by Christianity.   Christians in the West are a rapidly shrinking minority. To face the future we must accept that Christians are outsiders and stop caring about what others think of us. The norms of secular society are not our norms. We must accept that we Christians are living as exiles in this world (I Peter 1:1), and that means we must live with far greater spiritual discipline.   This involves more than praying and immersing ourselves in Scripture, although these are vital. Spiritual discipline means radically reordering our lives, being a creative minority who centre their lives on Christ alone. This entails going it on our own, networking to create our own responses to need, all the way from education of the young to care of the elderly. Creative Christian response to need must surely be better than reliance on a faceless bureaucracy.   Christians need to live in such a way that we preserve the faith for future generations, or our great- grandchildren will despise us. Despite a grim immediate prognosis we can look forward with confidence, Christianity has a God who knew the way out of the grave. First published in TCW Defending Freedom

By Bill Muehlenberg https://billmuehlenberg.com/ 4, 2025 What we must know about harmful gender ideology: Whenever you want to dehumanise and control groups of people, a major tactic is to get them out of sight and out of mind. Make them invisible, in other words. We have certainly done that with the unborn as we kill them in the millions.   We have done it with Blacks in the past. More recently we do it with groups that we want to pretend just don’t exist. Ex-homosexuals is a classic case in point. And now, hot on their heels, ex-trans people (detransitioners) is the latest group that we want to keep invisible.   So many of our progressive elites, politicians, media outlets, academics and others want to pretend that there is no such thing as a person who once transitioned but now deeply regrets it. The mantra of our leftist overlords is that transition is always good, and there can be no other direction to take. They have fully bought the lies of the trans lobby, and countless people are now suffering as a result, including so many grieving mothers and fathers.   The truth is, de-transitioning is now a major growth area. More and more people who first thought that the trans agenda would solve all their problems are realising that it was all an appalling lie, and it simply has made matters worse.   But still, countless kids are being led down this garden path, a one-way-ticket to a life of turmoil and misery – for child and parent alike. One of the latest resources discussing all this is the new book edited by Kirralie Smith, Devastated: How Gender Ideology is Tearing Australian Families Apart (Gender Awareness Australia, 2024).   Smith heads up Binary, an Australian-based ministry devoted to taking on the trans behemoth and helping people who are being harmed by it. The book features nine moving personal stories of those who have been so very badly damaged by trans ideology.   She introduces the issue, presents the stories, and then offers some concluding chapters. A slim book – just 164 pages – it packs a punch. Because most our leaders and elites, along with most of the mainstream media, do not want you to hear stories like this, it is so very important that Kirralie has put this book together.   As she says in the Introduction:   Already transgender regret is a growing phenomenon. As children captured by the ideology become adults they realise how deficient they are due to medicalized interventions that have stunted their growth and left them scarred and life-long medical dependents.   It is criminal and sad beyond words.   The growing number of devastated and abandoned young adults must cause us to sit up and take notice. There will only be more as the years pass and more children reach adulthood.   Lying to children or to anyone in fact, is not kind. It is cruel to deceive already confused people into believing they can achieve the impossible. Pronouns and name changes will not change a person’s sex. Costumes, makeup and hairstyles are simply appropriations of stereotypes. Becoming a lifelong medical patient, reliance on drugs and very risky surgical procedures will not turn the male into a female or a female into a male.   It is devastating to families and children that activists have succeeded in convincing legislators that these lies will result in freedom. They never will. Only the truth will set them free. (p. 10)   Devastated, How gender ideology is tearing Australian families apart by Smith, Kirralie (Author) Amazon logo The stories she shares are utterly heartbreaking. How we as a society could have allowed our children to be abused and harmed for life is something we should never have allowed.   Tara’s story is representative of so many devastated parents. She says, “both my daughters have fallen victim to the modern mania of transgenderism. The last three years have been a plodding kind of hell lit by spotlights of hope.” (p. 63)   She also writes:   Scared and confused though we were, my husband and I did our best to keep our heads and to be supportive. In the privacy of our bedroom, we held each other and whispered our confused theories. What was happening to Grace? A lovely young girl who had been luxuriating in the sun in a gingham one-piece bathing suit only a few months earlier.   Grace shaved off her long blonde hair and adopted a skater-boi style. She tore everything out of her room and threw away almost all records of herself as a child. She sought to lay a fresh path in the future by destroying evidence of her past. She declared her birth name to be a ‘dead name’. She threw out all her clothes and replaced them with men’s clothes. She adopted a deep voice and would swagger about. She would man-spread when she sat down…. (p. 66)   She concludes her piece this way:   Activists are pushing a narrative that failing to affirm a child’s brand-new gender identity constitutes child abuse. This narrative is being used as grounds by trans-activists (who have infiltrated Social Services) to seize confused children from loving homes.   And so, unfortunately, you must minimally affirm your daughter lest you lose her entirely.    I use my daughters’ chosen names when addressing them and do my best with the linguistic gymnastics that are their chosen pronouns. In return, my daughters have agreed not to pursue chemical or surgical gender transition while living at home.   These boundaries take away the grounds for the State to seize them. They concede enough ground to my daughters to keep them safe, and give them time to think.   Once again, self-appointed experts working for the State are deeming mothers ‘unfit’ and seizing their children.   Please help us keep our kids safe from harm. Radical gender theory confers no benefits on vulnerable children and poses huge risks to their mental health. (p. 71)   The first story found in the book, and the longest, involves someone I happen to know. Her story has been featured elsewhere, and what she says needs to be heard. Tess and her husband lived a normal life with their daughter and son, but things went off the rails early on in the daughter’s teen years.   First, she revealed that she had been raped by a boy she was hanging around with; then she announced that she was a lesbian; and then she declared that she was really a boy, not a girl, and transitioning was the way forward. All this occurred in a relatively short period of time.   You really have to read the entire 44-page story. The hell this family has been through seems unimaginable to most of us. The entire family was turned upside down. And then there were the police and other authorities continuously siding with the confused daughter against the parents.   At one point the police confiscated the daughter’s diary which described the initial rape, and when the father tried to get it back, he was told it was destroyed! Just one brief quote from Tess: “I couldn’t believe what he was telling me! How could the police destroy evidence into the rape of a minor…? A wave of emotions coursed through me that I just couldn’t control. I started sobbing…” (p. 41)   The whole thing was an utter nightmare, with tears and anguish almost a daily outcome of this diabolical situation. The chapter ends with these tragic words:   It’s been almost 4 years since I spoke to my daughter. I miss her every day. I missed the person she was and the relationship we had. I mourn for the loss of the relationship with her sibling, I mourn for the experiences she has missed and will never get back and I worry constantly for her health and mental wellbeing. I ache to hug her. I ache to listen to her laugh. Parenting was never meant to be this difficult or this crazy. What I do know is that I’ll never stop fighting to protect all the people being harmed by this dreadful agenda. What the professionals, activists, and the children themselves forget is to never get between a mother and her young (regardless of age, our protective instincts will always be there), and that when hopefully these lost youth realise they’ve made a massive mistake, it won’t be the medical professionals or the activists or their glitter families that will be there to help them. It will be the mums and dads waiting to help them heal. (pp. 60-61)   Closing chapters written by Kirralie examine various issues, including how so much of the media is complicit in pushing radical trans activism. The penultimate chapter speaks about “Resources for families”. In it she says this:   Despite the pressure and misinformation, its vital parents understand that having compassion doesn’t have to mean 100 per cent agreeing with their beliefs, or condoning their behaviour.   Many de-transitioners (former trans-identifying people) caution parents of gender dysphoric children against simply presenting scientific facts and arguments about biological sex. While truth is certainly on your side, there are complex layers underlying the gender issue meaning a guns-blazing approach is likely to drive them further down the ideological hole.   It’s important to prioritise building a quality relationship with your child and moving the conversation away from gender and transitioning as much as it’s possible. Remember that studies show around 90 per cent of children will grow out of their gender dysphoria if left to go through normal puberty.   Many young women who were caught up in the transgender craze in their teenage years describe body image issues, unrealistic expectations of womanhood, and the hypersexualized culture as contributing factors that led to their trans identity. Parents play an important role in combating these negative cultural messages and engaging in constructive conversations around some of these damaging lies they may be believing. Flaunting your body and liking ‘girly things’ do not make a woman, nor do muscles and cars make a man. Gender ideology is purely based on stereotypes and denies the beautiful diversity of character and temperament of males and females. (pp. 153-154)   Her closing words in her final chapter are also worth sharing:   We must offer support, compassion and hope to those impacted by gender ideology. Nearly everyone has a story of someone they know who has been captured by gender ideology. So many sad stories based on false narratives and promises that cannot possibly be realised.   We can all be a part of the change and influence our culture for good. Anytime someone tries to silence you, remember these stories. Stand firm, speak up and speak loudly for those whose voice has been stolen from them.   Truth, reality and evidence-based science will prevail. It is just a matter of time and a commitment from each one of us to stay the course. (p. 164)

Welby’s tenure as Archbishop of Canterbury will end after an evensong service in Lambeth Palace By Kaya Burgess, Religious Affairs Correspondent THE TIMES January 05 2025 Justin Welby will lay down his crozier to bring his tenure as archbishop to a close Justin Welby will not be able to officiate as a priest after he steps down as Archbishop of Canterbury on Monday unless he seeks special permission from a bishop, under church rules. Welby’s tenure as the 105th archbishop formally comes to a close at the end of Monday, the feast of Epiphany in the Christian calendar. On Tuesday his duties will pass to the Archbishop of York, the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell, who will act as a caretaker. The outgoing archbishop, who was forced to resign after criticism over his handling of abuse allegations, will spend Monday privately at Lambeth Palace. He is due to attend a lunchtime Eucharist at the palace chapel and will take part in an evensong service at the end of the day. At this service, he will lay down his crozier, the hooked staff carried by bishops, a symbolic gesture that will bring his 11-year tenure to an end. Welby spent his final Christmas as archbishop privately with family, and did not deliver his usual Christmas Day sermon in Canterbury Cathedral or broadcast his usual New Year’s Day message via the BBC. Most of his archiepiscopal duties will pass to Cottrell while some will be taken on by the Bishop of London, the Right Rev Sarah Mullally. His duties in the Diocese of Canterbury will pass to the Bishop of Dover, the Right Rev Rose Hudson-Wilkin. They will also take up these duties on Tuesday. When a priest leaves office or retires, they may not officiate at services or act as a priest unless they have been granted permission to officiate by a bishop. This allows them to carry out priestly duties in that bishop’s diocese. Welby will therefore not be able to officiate as a priest after Monday. A source said that he would not “immediately or automatically” be granted permission to officiate, but could apply “following a period of discernment … in conjunction with a diocesan bishop”. Welby was criticised for how he dealt with allegations of abuse by John Smyth, who beat boys It remains to be seen whether any bishop would grant Welby this permission so soon after his resignation over a safeguarding scandal. Welby’s resignation came after he faced criticism in a report by Keith Makin, a former social services director, over how he and other senior church leaders handled allegations of abuse against John Smyth, a Christian barrister who beat boys. Welby was assured by colleagues that police had been informed, but was criticised for not doing more to ensure Smyth was being robustly investigated and brought to justice. The report alleged that a number of other priests, not including Welby, knew a significant amount about Smyth’s abuse for decades but did not report him. Many of these individuals have since had their permission to officiate suspended pending further investigations. It is not known where Welby and his family will live after leaving Lambeth Palace, though they are understood to have a home in France. Cottrell will still be based as Bishopthorpe Palace in York. Stephen Cottrell, the Archbishop of York, will take over Welby’s duties until a replacement is appointed The process to appoint his successor has already begun, with members set to be elected to the highly confidential Crown Nominations Commission. Its 17-strong committee, led by a former head of MI5, will draw up a longlist and a shortlist, and conduct interviews, all behind closed doors. A name is not due to be announced until the autumn. Cottrell will perform the duties of the Archbishop of Canterbury until then, but at 66 he is considered too close to the retirement age of 70 to be in the running for the job permanently. He has so far ridden out a storm of calls for his own resignation, after fierce criticism over his own handling of sexual and domestic abuse cases that were brought to his attention in the past. Gavin Drake, a former General Synod member who has campaigned for the church to overhaul its safeguarding policies, said: “Victims and survivors of church-related abuse, and those who advocate for them, know all too well just how deeply involved Cottrell is in the mismanagement of safeguarding fiascos.” Welby was not considered a frontrunner to be Archbishop of Canterbury when Lord Williams of Oystermouth announced his retirement in 2012, meaning that the next appointee may also be a surprise. The Bishop of Leicester, the Right Rev Martyn Snow, and the Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham, the Right Rev Paul Williams, have been touted as possible candidates. Both hail from the more conservative wing of the church. The Iranian-born Bishop of Chelmsford, the Right Rev Guli Francis-Dehqani, has also been hailed as a possible first female archbishop, though it is feared that some parts of the global communion would not welcome a woman as the spiritual head of the world’s 85 million Anglicans. Mullally has also been touted as a potential candidate, as has the Bishop of Norwich, the Right Rev Graham Usher

By Chuck Collins www.virtueonline.org January 6, 2025 Twelve-year old Princess Elizabeth gave her stepmother, Katherine Parr, an extraordinary new year’s present December 30, 1545. It was a small book covered in blue silk that she hand-embroidered with two red and silver initials: HR and KP (Henry Rex and Katherine Parr). The book was a long letter that she wrote in French to Katherine along with her own translation of the first chapter of John Calvin’s Institutes of Christian Religion.   This was the first translation of the 1541 French edition of the Institutes, and only one of two translations of any of Calvin’s writings known in England before the end of the reign of King Henry VIII in 1547. The year before her new year’s gift to Katherine was her translation of Marguerite d’Angoulême’s A Godly Medytacyon of the Christian Sowle , what propagandist John Bale called: “a godly Protestant manifesto.” Young Elizabeth’s tutors were humanist evangelicals, so it was no accident that her studies included languages and the new religion that was gaining popularity in England. But translating the Swiss reformer into English as a gift for her queen mother in the last years of King Henry’s life was daring and tricky. She wanted to show her love and appreciation to Katherine who had supported her and who was a quiet evangelical (Protestant) herself, without raising the ire of her Catholic and intractable father.   Walking this delicate road, Elizabeth didn’t mention Calvin or the title of his work anywhere in her letter or in the translation, describing him only as “my author,” and near the end of her letter she described the translation as “a little book whose thesis or subject, Saint Paul said, surpasses the capacity of every creature.” Clearly this gift was more than a classroom assignment; it shows Elizabeth’s incredible intellect and her sympathetic leanings towards Protestantism.   When that twelve-year old grew up, Elizabeth developed a discrete and sometimes undefined view of Protestantism. As Queen of England and Ireland for 44 years, Elizabeth was mostly interested in keeping peace in the realm between moderate Protestants who supported the 1559 Prayer Book and the more vociferous nonconformist Puritans who were sure that its reforms didn’t go far enough. In 1550 the Protestant Bishop John Hooper wrote the Swiss reformer Heinrich Bullinger that Elizabeth was “inflamed with the same zeal for the religion of Christ” as that of her brother Edward VI.   In her personal Bible the queen inscribed in the flyleaf: “I walke many times in the pleasaunt fieldes of the holye scriptures, Where I plucke up the goodlie greene herbes of sentences by pruning: Eate the[m] by reading: Chawe the[m] by musing.” Her appointment of three decidedly Protestant Archbishops of Canterbury shows her commitment to a church that is thoroughly biblical, theologically reformed and confessional, pastorally generous, and liturgically beautiful. There is no reason to doubt Elizabeth’s essential and unwavering Protestantism, and her personal commitment to the historic Anglican formularies: the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion (1571), the Book of Common Prayer (1559 and 1662), and the Edwardian and Elizabethan books of Homilies. This became known as the the famous “Elizabethan Settlement.” On the other hand she was religiously complicated; she said and did some things that had some Protestants scratching their heads. For example, she strongly believed that clergy should remain celibate (although she never enforced this), she kept a crucifix in her private chapel for devotion, ordered the use of the prescribed homilies (written sermons) and forbade the popular “exercises of prophesying” where clergy gathered to hear sermons and pray for one another, and she opposed the Calvinistic Lambeth Articles (1595), either because her view on predestination was more moderate (like Article 17 of the Thirty-nine Articles) or because she was upset with Archbishop Whitgift for introducing them without her approval. Commenting on Elizabeth’s religion as Queen and Supreme Governor of the Church of England, historian Diarmaid MacCulloch said: “Sometimes she has been seen as a Henrician Catholic, pushed into a more Protestant settlement by those around her. This is a clear mistake. Elizabeth was an evangelical, but of a distinctive and (in the conditions of the late 1550s) an extremely old-fashion variety. She disliked the marriage of clergy and enjoyed more ceremonial and decoration in worship than her half-brother would have considered tolerable. If we want to place her beliefs, we should do so not at the court of Edward, but at the court of Henry VIII and Catherine Parr in the mid-1540s. This was the era when Elizabeth had first been given a role of dignity, when she became one of the elite of children who enjoyed an exceptional rich and privileged education."   Reformation scholar Roland Bainton wrote, “If there be any who doubt the sincerity of her religious sentiment let them ponder this her private prayer”: “This God of my life and life of my soul, the King of all comfort, is my only refuge. For his sake therefore, to who thou hast given all power, and wilt deny no petition, hear my prayers. Turn thy face from my sins (O Lord) and thine eyes to they handiwork. Create a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me. Order my steps in thy word, that no wickedness have dominion over me, make me obedient to thy will, and delight in thy law. Grant me grace to live godly and to govern justly: that so living to please thee and reigning to serve thee I may even glorify thee, the Father of all goodness and mercy.”   Dean Chuck Collins is a Reform theologian and blogger

COMMENTARY By David W. Virtue, DD www.virtueonline.org   January 1, 2025   Amichai Chikli, minister of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism, publicly reprimanded Pope Francis for his part in a recent display portraying Jesus as a Palestinian Arab and lectured the pope on the Jewishness of Jesus.   There is no other way to understand the decision to present his image in a cradle, wrapped in a keffiyeh,” Chikli chided. “Had this been a one-time matter, I would not have written. However, just a few weeks before this strange and false homage, in a more severe expression, you echoed the new blood libel, insinuating that the State of Israel ‘might be’ committing genocide in Gaza.”   “It is a well-known fact that Jesus was born to a Jewish mother, lived as a Jew, and died as a Jew,” Chikli wrote in a three-page missive. He cited Matthew’s gospel, reminding Francis of the “well-known fact” that “Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea.”   Increasingly Francis is coming across as a liberal Protestant wrapped in papal garb stuck in a literal and theological wheelchair. His comments about other religions of equal standing with Christianity and downplaying the uniqueness of Christ shocked conservative Catholics, while the growing infiltration of homosexuality in the Vatican is equally shocking to millions of orthodox Catholics, especially at a time when sexual abuse is so rampant. Increasingly homosexuality in the Vatican is dominating the headlines.   Chikli quotes other biblical texts reiterating to Francis the significance of “Bethlehem” and “Judah” in Jewish history. He notes that Bethlehem is both the city of Rachel’s death and David’s birth, explaining that Rachel is Israel’s matriarch and David is Israel’s archetypal king.   “It is also a well-known fact that the term ‘Jew’ originates from Judah, the fourth son of Leah, from whom the Tribe of Judah descended,” the minister pointed out.   Chikli proceeded to give the pope a lesson in Roman history and the empire’s attempts “to eradicate the connection between the Jews and Judah; one of the most prominent of these was Emperor Hadrian.” He records details of Titus’s destruction of the Second Temple and the Bar Kokhba Revolt, which resulted in the massacre of 580,000 Jews.   “Hadrian was not satisfied with the physical destruction of the Jewish settlement; he anticipated the future, to the day when the Jews would seek to return to Judea. Therefore, he renamed the province of Judea ‘Syria Palestina,’ after the Philistines, the arch-enemy of Israel,” he writes, explaining the origin of the name “Palestine.”   In a dig at Francis, Chikli also notes that the pope can verify the evidence for himself by driving just “13 minutes by car from St. Peter’s Basilica” and examining the Arch of Titus with its depiction of Israel’s conquest and humiliation by the Romans.   Perhaps Francis should take a course in Biblical history and theology to freshen up these embarrassing moments.   THE GENOCIDE BLOOD LIBEL   Referring to the pope’s recent comments calling for an investigation into the alleged genocide in Gaza, reported by The Stream, the minister contends: “This is a desperate and disgusting attempt to rewrite history.”   “As a nation that lost six million of its sons and daughters in the Holocaust, we are especially sensitive to the trivialization of the term ‘genocide’ — a trivialization that is dangerously close to Holocaust denial,” he notes.   Chikli details how the term “genocide” can be aptly applied to Nazi Germany, which “for the first time in the history of nations, set as its ultimate goal the complete annihilation of an unarmed people with whom it had no conflict, and most of whom were not even living in its territory.   “Let us recall that between the Jews, who made up less than 1% of the population of Germany in the 1930s, and the Germans, there had been no prior violent, territorial, religious, or political conflict,” he notes. Recalling the “sickening strategy” of the “Final Solution,” the minister cites as one example the Treblinka death camp, where 845,000 Jews from Poland, including children and elderly people, were murdered in gas chambers and then dumped into execution pits, concluding: “This is what genocide looks like.”    “The Vatican’s silence during those dark days of the Shoah is still deafening,” he writes, asking Francis to “clarify your stand regarding the genocide blood libel against the Jewish state,” a “new blood libel” recently promoted against Israel by the human rights organization Amnesty International.   Chikli concludes by drawing Francis’s attention to the 60th anniversary of the Nostra Aetate Declaration from the Second Vatican Council, which will be celebrated in 2025. The declaration announced that God's eternal covenant with the Jewish people is still in force: "God holds the Jews most dear for the sake of their Fathers; He does not repent of the gifts He makes or of the calls He issues-such is the witness of the Apostle".  This marked a “significant milestone in the relationship between the Jewish people and Christianity,” he maintains, noting that Francis is known to be “a close friend of the Jewish people.”   The Vatican has maintained a diplomatic silence on the minister’s letter, with neither Vatican News nor Avvenire, the Italian bishops’ media, reporting on it.   In response, the pope has doubled down on Israel since Chikli’s letter, twice in public remarks last weekend accusing the Jewish state of massacring children in Gaza.   From this writer’s perspective, the so-called Vicar of Christ on earth is little more than a failed cleric falling for all the prejudiced statements of the UN and its antisemitic secretary-general.   Dr. Jules Gomes of The Stream contributed to this story.

COMMENTARY   By David W. Virtue DD www.virtueonline.org December 31, 2024   They have healed the wound of my people lightly - Jer. 8:11   Globally, evangelicals in the Anglican communion have taken a huge beating. They have been scorned and derided as lacking diversity and inclusion. Progressives charge them with using Scripture to “gay-bash” while steadfastly refusing to believe that God has changed his mind to “widen His mercy” to include “committed” same-sex relationships which now meet His approval.   God has finally flipped the bird to straight white and black marriages and installed a new sexual sheriff with more inclusive views.   Evangelicals get bad press from the MSM because of their stand, whether it’s a Christian baker who refuses to bake a cake for two queers who want to get married, or African archbishops who believe the Bible, brought to them by Anglican missionaries a century ago, definitively repudiates both homosexuality and polygamy.   Before he fell from grace, Archbishop Justin Welby was well known for phoning African primates when he thought their nations were showing a jaundiced eye to sodomy, only to discover that in many cases their culture had no known word for “homosexuality.” All the while the West was buying African leaders’ acquiescence on the issue.   The Evangelical Fellowship in the Anglican Communion (EFAC) leaders note two things in their response to the IASCUFO Nairobi-Cairo proposals. The first was the anachronism of colonial era structures for the Anglican Communion when the vast majority of active members are now found in the Global South; and secondly the broken and impaired relationships of communion which have arisen due to doctrinal differences, especially having to do with biblical anthropology and marriage.   The unspoken aspect to all this (though it was blurted out by the late  Bishop of Newark John Shelby Spong at Lambeth ‘98,) is that Africans have a primitive form of religion that is superstitious, defying both science and modern scholarship.   The EFAC leaders noted that while the issue has been in contention for several decades it has heightened since the Bishops and General Synod of the Church of England opened the way for the blessing of same sex relationships in 2023.   All this makes clear that earlier attempts to reform the Instruments by seeking moratoria, repentance, and renewed covenantal affirmations and commitments have not succeeded.   The American Episcopal Church paved the way for this rebellion against the moral order resulting in a split in that church and the formation of the Anglican Church in North America, with some 30 dioceses having their own archbishop, whom Justin Welby steadfastly refused to recognize.   Recognizing the tragic failure in theology and discipline, the EFAC leaders say they welcome the work of GSFA and GAFCON to reset the Communion and create structures which can enable full communion to continue between churches and faithful Anglicans based on Catholic and Apostolic faith and order.   A new twist will only heighten tensions. The Church’s evangelicals are seeking their own archbishops over a “de facto parallel province” to prevent a split over the blessing of same-sex partnerships. That may be the only way to preserve the fig-leaf of community.   The Rev Canon John Dunnett, director of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC), an influential conservative group, is among those calling for a “de facto parallel province” to be created within the church, grouping together parishes that oppose last year’s move to allow priests to bless the unions of gay couples.   If it were legally enshrined as an official province, it “would have to have an archbishop” to oversee it, Dunnett said.   This would be in addition to the archbishoprics of Canterbury and York, whose provinces cover southern and northern England.   Divisions over gay rights extend to the highest levels of the church. Twelve dissenting bishops went public last year to declare they were “unable to support the collective decision” made by the House of Bishops to approve blessing gay couples who are married or are in civil partnerships.   The CEEC forms part of a conservative umbrella group called the Alliance, which counts 2,000 priests as supporters.   The Alliance, consisting of 2,000 priests as supporters issued a warning that if there is “further departure from the church’s doctrine” on sex and marriage, they “will have no choice but rapidly to establish what would in effect be a new de facto ‘parallel province’ within the Church of England”, which would require “oversight from bishops who remain faithful to orthodox teaching on marriage and sexuality”.   As EFAC leaders bishops Stephen Hale and Keith Sinclair noted; “it is vital that in ongoing reflection on our calling as the Church, the state of the Communion, and the report’s proposals to find a new way forward, that we are not found to come under the Lord’s judgment through the prophet Jeremiah: ‘they have healed the wound of my people lightly’ (8:11).   END

THE CITY OF MAN AGAINST THE CITY OF GOD   by David G. Duggan ©  Special to Virtueonline www.virtueonline.org December 26, 2024   Though I live in a city housing millions of souls, the pandemic, its crime and politics of unmatched corruption have largely robbed it of the vibe of city life. Crowds are shunning the downtown, remote workers don’t pack the public transit, and despite the holiday lights, the art, shopping, sports and entertainment venues don’t draw the suburbanites from their manicured lawns. It doesn’t help that its sports teams are beyond lousy.   For thousands of years, Christians and Jews have worshiped in cities. Perhaps not a requirement of the faith, cities create the critical mass and stark contrast of wealth and poverty, aloneness and congestion, sacred and profane. Mere blocks from cathedrals lie red-light districts, mere steps from high-end retailers beggars stick their hands out, and pickpockets are always prowling the streets and subways.   Though raised in rural Judea, Jesus spent about a third of his ministry in cities, principally Jerusalem, but also Capernaum and the Decapolis. He used cities as examples of places of sin worthy of redemption as a hen gathers her brood. Sometimes the crowds in the cities Jesus visited were so packed that the lame and the halt hoped simply to touch his garment to be healed. Their faith was rewarded.    Why God has chosen cities as recipients of His grace may seem incongruous. His initial call was to Abram to leave Ur, the largest city of Mesopotamia, and go to the Canaan wilderness, some 700 miles to the west. God later appeared to Moses in the wilderness and He used Moses to lead His people into the desert. After Nebuchadnezzar had leveled Jerusalem, the Israelites were exiled to Babylon where they were a religious minority. One might think that God was telling His people: “Forget this fascination with crowds and temples, walled enclosures and sentries. Stick to your roots as farmers and shepherds. There you will see my abundance and mercy.”   Yet the Israelites rebuilt the holy city when they were released from exile, and for 2,500 years ever since then, through the destruction of Jerusalem, the sack of Rome, the Black Death and plagues and pandemics, the faith has persisted in cities. Despite the crime and the grime, the poverty and the alienation, cities create the means of God’s mercy to shine through the winter darkness.    David Duggan is a retired attorney living in Chicago.

By Chuck Collins www.virtueonline.org January 14, 2025 Anglicans can’t avoid the 16th century Reformation. It’s more than the elephant in the room; it’s the room! Ashley Null wrote this about the man who composed the Book of Common Prayer, the confession for the Church of England (The Articles of Religion), and the compiler of the Homilies library: “Thomas Cranmer devoted the full powers of his position as Primate of All England to inculcating the Protestant faith into every fibre of English life.” Whether or not he was successful is the question that literally colors our view of English church history, and quite literally determines Anglican worship and the way we think about God and his church. Anglican identity, the perennial crisis facing us, hinges on how we see the elephant room. There are three big-picture ways Anglicans have dealt with the Protestant Reformation. The most prevalent group today sees the Reformation as a mistake, an unfortunate distraction from the true catholic church. They see it as a temporary historical deviation from some amorphous “great tradition.” The great tradition, or some sense of common consensual Christianity (usually described as the church fathers, creeds and councils), took a leave-of-absence in the period from Archbishop Cranmer to Archbishop William Laud to clean up a few obvious Medieval mistakes, so that the Caroline divines could pick up where the church left off before King Edward VI.   This group views Scripture as the birth-child of the church and therefore it is a co-equal authority with tradition, they prefer the altar to the pulpit, see salvation as a cooperative venture between God and man, and they consider the sacraments (they usually identify seven in number) as automatic purveyors of God’s grace whether or not faith is present. Some will hang out the banner of “catholic and reformed” borrowing the phrase from William Perkins, without any reference to Perkins, and as a euphemism for “catholic.” Many in this group identify with the Anglo-catholic preferences for high church ceremonial and “the beauty of holiness.” They almost always introduce themselves as “father,” and they are unusually fond of putting a “+” before or after their names when writing emails. This group will eventually consider Roman Catholicism, and they would convert if it wasn’t for the pope and the pesky sex abuse scandals. A second group speaks of a long Reformation: beginning with Wycliffe, Tyndale and Cranmer, but continues along the road of history picking up the Caroline divines and anyone else they fancy, up to our own day. They reference the English reformers who spoke of the church always reforming herself (ecclesia semper reformanda est), but in a completely different context from what the reformers intended. These folks see Scripture as a co-equal authority with reason, a Schleirmacherian marriage of convenience between the Enlightenment and traditional Protestantism. They consider Anglican theology as a buffet of attractive choices to pick and choose from: theologians, movements, sweet pickle relish from the state of Washington, and whatever else tickles their fancy. These folks emphasize the generosity of our Anglican heritage over any particularities or distinctives. This second group makes plenty of room for such aberrations as the three-legged stool (Scripture, tradition and reason), Instruments of Unity over biblical and theological definitions of identity, and three-streams (catholic, protestant and pentecostal). In this way, the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) has in some places become its parent, the Episcopal Church, without a few of the nastier sins which where adopted as the cause of the Episcopal Church. The last group considers the English Reformation as determinative for our Anglican identity. They see the reigns of King Edward VI and Queen Elizabeth as critical for what is called “the Settlement” or “the Elizabethan Settlement.” The Settlement is based on the supreme authority of Holy Scripture as understood and explicated in the Book of Common Prayer (1662), the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion (1571), and the Edwardian and Elizabethan collections of Homilies. These came to be known as Anglican formularies because they have served to varying degrees as place markers for the elephant room. The formularies unambiguously value the Bible as uniquely inspired and the norming norm for all other authorities (over tradition, reason and experience). They value its perspicuity: the Bible is clear enough for the simplest person to live by, deep enough for readers of the highest intellectual ability, and clear in all essential matters of faith and practice. Reformation Anglicans value both word and sacrament, and they see the communion table as an extension and explication of God’s written word; what is experienced by one human sense in preaching (hearing), is experienced by all senses in the two sacraments of the gospel, baptism and holy communion.   Reformation Anglicans are passionate about proclaiming Christ in all matters of church life, and they abhor moralistic sermons that end with advice for trying harder and doing more. They believe that salvation is a loving gift for undeserving sinners, and that we we are reconciled to God by grace alone through faith alone, and that this is the logic of Cranmer’s liturgy that is heard Sunday by Sunday. These folks believe in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, not in the bread and wine, but in the hearts and affections of those who receive the grace of the sacrament by faith with thanksgiving. Reformation Anglicans view ordained ministry in the light of 1 Corinthians 12 and the universal priesthood of all believers.   They largely value the principle of simplicity; Anglican worship is to be dignified and orderly as an offering to a completely worthy God, but paired down of all words, actions and ceremonial that distracts from the the goal of pointing people to Christ, rather than to fancy-dressed priests prancing around an altar and lifting up the sacrament. Queen Elizabeth’s favorite advisor, Sir Christopher Hatton, writing three decades after she became queen, spoke of the static and settled theology of the Church of England: “The queen had at the beginning of her reign placed her reformation as upon a stone to remain constant.” And the 1571 (and final) version of the Thirty-nine Articles succinctly states their lasting purpose: “For the avoiding of diversities of opinions and for the establishing of Consent touching true religion.” Every priest, bishop and layperson has one or both feet in one of these camps.  But in a day when we are tempted to close a blind eye to our Anglican theological distinctives for conciliar solutions to our indisposition, it couldn’t be more important to find again the ancient landmark of our fathers to anchor our faith and practice. A Reformation Anglican church that sees its authority in Holy Scripture as understood and explained in the traditional formularies is our only way forward. All other ways are place markers for individual pet peeves. At its heart, this is a church that is thoroughly biblical, theologically confessional and reformed, pastorally generous, and liturgically beautiful. Dean Chuck Collins is a Reformed Anglican theologian

Prof. Robert Gagnon debunks the claims Richard and Christopher Hays make in their latest book, The Widening of God’s Mercy   By Jules Gomes THE STREAM January 3, 2024   “Psst! Did God really say?” The very first words of the serpent, slyly whispered to Eve in the Garden of Eden, haunted me as I wrestled with the Bible’s prohibition of homoerotic sex.   I was teaching a module on Biblical Sexuality at the London School of Theology in 2009, and I was overwhelmed by the volume of new scholarly arguments challenging me to rethink my conservative position on same-sex relationships.   Of course I believed the Bible was inspired, inerrant, and infallible — but in the light of new exegetical evidence, was I correct in holding to a traditional interpretation of the texts prohibiting homogenital relations?   Moreover, several of my students who claimed to be “evangelical” had adopted rather worrisome postmodern and permissive perspectives on sexuality. It wouldn’t be easy to persuade them to accept an orthodox interpretation of the biblical texts.   Gagnon’s Bombshell   Robert Gagnon’s 2002 opus magnum The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics was the answer to my Sisyphean struggle. The meticulously researched and rigorously argued 500-page tome refutes every possible argument progressive scholars have raised in the last three decades. Its use of the Bible’s original languages and insight into the ancient world is unparalleled.   Gagnon is an evangelical Presbyterian scholar who has devoted his life to almost single-handedly dissecting and debunking every avant-garde argument that raises its serpent-like head against the biblical teaching on homosexuality. Unlike most scholars, he does this through his online lectures, website, debates, articles, and Facebook and X accounts. I got my students to read Gagnon’s book. It was like dropping a thermonuclear bomb. It won the battle for the Bible against the babble of the gay brigade. The serpent sulked and slithered back into his hole.   But the serpent has now returned with a state-of-the-art argument: “Psst! Maybe God did really say homosexuality is wrong. But can’t you see He’s now changed his mind?”   This is the reasoning of the evangelical father-son duo Richard B. Hays and Christopher B. Hays in their book The Widening of God’s Mercy: Sexuality within the Biblical Story, published in September 2024.   Richard teaches at Duke Divinity School; Christopher is chair of the Old Testament department at Fuller Theological Seminary. In 1996, Richard published The Moral Vision of the New Testament, arguing that “though only a few biblical texts speak of homoerotic activity, all that do mention it express unqualified disapproval.”   Deeper or Flawed Logic?   Richard has changed his mind because he (and Christopher) believe that “a deeper logic” shows the biblical God frequently changing His mind to “reveal an expansive mercy that embraces ever wider circles of people, including those previously deemed in some way alien or unworthy.” It is this “trajectory of mercy” in the Bible that “leads us to welcome sexual minorities.”   “The acceptance of sexual minorities in the church reenacts a narrative pattern that is pervasive in the Bible,” they argue. How dare we call “unclean” what God declares to be “clean”?   Further, there is a “metaphorical correspondence” between those formerly “unclean” foreigners, eunuchs, tax collectors, gentiles, non-kosher folk and LGBTQ people.   The book trumpets: We advocate full inclusion of believers with differing sexual orientations not because we reject the authority of the Bible. Far from it: We have come to advocate their inclusion precisely because we affirm the force and authority of the Bible’s ongoing story of God’s mercy.   In other words, God has really said, but God has also really changed His mind. He’s become more inclusive. He’s repented of His homophobia. Richard states that he wants “to repent of the narrowness of my earlier vision,” and he wants us to join him (and God) in his metanoia. And since the Holy Spirit promised to lead the church into all truth (John 16:12–13), that’s just what He’s doing, the Hayses claim.   Spirit of the Age   Gagnon, however, demolishes this woke reading of Scripture. “None of the other groups that get included in God’s ‘ever-expanding mercy’ … get a pass for immoral behavior,” he notes. God embraces Gentiles — but far from permitting their sexual licentiousness, Paul insists they must “abstain from sexual immorality” and “no longer live like Gentiles who do not know God” (1 Thessalonians 4:3, 5).   And while Jesus does change His mind on sexual ethics, “he does so in precisely the opposite direction of a ‘widening of God’s mercy,’ closing remaining loopholes on the basis of a rigorous application of the moral logic of God’s intentional creation of a sexual binary,” Gagnon writes.   As for the Holy Spirit, Gagnon observes:   If only the Hayses had read on from John 16:13, they would have discovered that the Spirit’s job is to “take from [Jesus] and report it to you” (16:14–15). … Yet this “spirit” the Hayses speak about is not elaborating or expanding on Jesus’s teaching about a male-female prerequisite for sex for a new context but rather diametrically opposing that teaching. Thus, it is far more likely that the Hayses are imbibing from the spirit of this age rather than from the Spirit of Jesus Christ.   As for the overall hermeneutical grid the Hayses impose on Scripture, he argues:   The “widening of God’s mercy” is not even a universal theme of the Bible … Even when present in the biblical story, the theme of God’s expansive mercy everywhere presupposes repentance from immoral conduct. And, finally, not only is this theme never applied in the Bible to an acceptance of homosexual practice, but it is categorically rejected whenever homosexual practice is mentioned.   What About Incest, Bestiality, Polyamory?   In a second essay pointing out “12 Disqualifying Errors in Richard Hays’ ‘Biblical’ Case for Gay Relationships,” Gagnon stresses how the authors “fail to recognize that the biblical theme of God ‘changing his mind’” nowhere entails a radical loosening of God’s moral standards but “entails God extending unfathomable kindness that is supposed to lead people to repentance from sins (Romans 2:4).”   So is God going to change His mind on adult-consensual incest, bestiality, and polyamory? As a biblical scholar, I must agree with Gagnon that the Hayses never deal with counterarguments and neither do they engage the relevant scholarship from the past 30 years.   In a 2016 essay, I wrote: I have explored every conceivable avenue for an exegetical get-out clause on the issue of homosexuality. For over 10 years I have considered every major publication on the issue. Quite honestly, I wish we could interpret the Bible with academic integrity in a manner that would permit rather than prohibit gay relationships.   Slaves, Women, and Homosexuals   I investigated a line of reasoning similar to the Hays’ using William J. Webb’s book Slaves, Women & Homosexuals: Exploring the Hermeneutics of Cultural Analysis. Like the Hayses, Webb explores what he calls a “redemptive hermeneutic” showing that the Bible demonstrates a progressive attitude to excluded groups like women and slaves.   However, Webb reaches a conclusion diametrically opposed to the Hays’, demonstrating that as it moves from Old to New Testament, the issue of homoerotic relationships is decided and closed from beginning to end.   Moreover, Webb observes, the same canons of cultural analysis, which show a liberalizing or less restrictive tendency in the slavery and women texts relative to the original culture, demonstrate a more restrictive tendency in homosexuality relative to the original culture. While continuing a negative assessment of homosexuality today, even of its least offensive form, the Christian community should reserve its greatest denouncement for the vilest forms of homosexual activity.   So does God even change His mind? Gagnon warns that the Hayses have capitulated to a form of “open theism” which may be “nothing more than a rhetorical smokescreen on their part, a means to shift the blame to God for the changing of their own minds about homosexuality.”   I was curious how the Hayses had dealt with the last chapter of the last book of the Bible. Does God change His mind again by the time we get to Revelation 22:15? Here God shuts the gates of the New Jerusalem to “the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.”   Several scholars conclude that “the dogs” in this verse refers to homosexuals. Gagnon suggests that the term “primarily has in view emasculated male cult prostitutes, without excluding a wider reference to any who engage in homosexual practice.”   Even if the scholars are wrong, the Bible is clear that the “trajectory of mercy” does ultimately exclude the “sexually immoral.”   I wasn’t surprised to find that the Hayses had failed to mention this text even in a footnote.   Dr. Jules Gomes, (BA, BD, MTh, PhD), has a doctorate in biblical studies from the University of Cambridge. Currently a Vatican-accredited journalist based in Rome, he is the author of five books and several academic articles. Gomes lectured at Catholic and Protestant seminaries and universities and was canon theologian and artistic director at Liverpool Cathedral.

Multimillion dollar mansions or humble shanties face the same fate of being reduced to ashes By Mary Ann Mueller VOL Special Correspondent www.virtueonline.org January 12, 2025 The pictures of A-list celebrity oceanfront mansions reduced to piles of smoldering ruins are grabbing the headlines.  It's like a Hollywood fire flick being played out in real time. The burning of Atlanta in the 1939 classic Gone With the Wind was Hollywood make-believe. What is currently unfolding in Los Angeles is horribly real.  It is a stark reminder that no one or nothing is immune from the powerful forces of nature — fire, wind, water and terra firma. Wildfires, hurricanes, floods and mudslides all wipe the slate clean leaving behind them trails of devastation — homes gone, lives upended, infrastructure destroyed, important community touchstones such as churches and schools disrupted. As the multiple wildfires rage in the Los Angeles area the city is entering into a deepening humanitarian crisis. Burned-out families have nowhere to go. No place to return to. No job. Many with no insurance. They immediately need the very basics of life  — food, clothing, water, shelter, employment, hope. Each day more families join the growing list of people who have lost virtually everything. White, Black, Asian, Hispanic … Anglican,  Catholic, Jewish, Islamic … Rich, poor, middle class, homeless ... Banker, baker, teacher, priest …  It doesn't matter.  The fire claims all in its path.  Since Tuesday (January 7) wildfires fuelled by hurricane strength gusts of the Santa Ana winds have been leveling various neighbors in and around the City of Los Angeles and the wider surrounding county.  Thousands of structures — twelve thousand and counting — have been leveled by the unrelenting flames. More than 2,000 structures a day are being destroyed. Saint and sinner face the same fate. Gone are their homes … their businesses … their hopes … their dreams. The question is how do they deal with their losses?  Do they curse God and government and neighbor for their fate or do they humbly bend the knee to the God of creation and acknowledge Him to be in charge regardless of the outcome even when that future seems to be covered with ashes and soot? How many people will follow Job's lead in giving glory to God in any and all circumstances? JOB HONORS GOD Job was a rich man of faith. He had 10 children and much livestock with many servants to help. “In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil.    He had seven sons and three daughters,    and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.” (Job 1:1-3)  Job, a loving father, would even offer sacrifice and penance on behalf of his children should they sin. “His sons used to hold feasts in their homes on their birthdays, and they would invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. When a period of feasting had run its course, Job would make arrangements for them to be purified. Early in the morning he would sacrifice a burnt offering for each of them, thinking, ‘Perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.’ This was Job’s regular custom.” (Job 1:4-5) But alas his fortunes turned. In one fell swoop he lost everything. His livestock was stolen. His servants were killed by  marauders and all his children died in a tornado. “ One day when Job’s sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house,    a messenger came to Job and said: ‘The oxen were plowing and the donkeys were grazing nearby, and the Sabeans attacked and made off with them. They put the servants to the sword, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!’ While he was still speaking, another messenger came and said: ‘The fire of God fell from the heavens and burned up the sheep and the servants, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!’    While he was still speaking, another messenger came and said: ‘The Chaldeans formed three raiding parties and swept down on your camels and made off with them. They put the servants to the sword, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!’ While he was still speaking, yet another messenger came and said: ‘Your sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house, when suddenly a mighty wind swept in from the desert and struck the four corners of the house. It collapsed on them and they are dead, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!’” (Job 1:13-19) In the face of devastating loss — his entire family, save his wife; and his livelihood along with his helpers — Job did not despair. He did not fault God.  He mourned, he grieved but he worshipped the Almighty, not laying any blame on God. His unwavering faith held.  “At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said: ‘Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the Name of the Lord be praised.’” In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.” (Job 1:20-22)  THE HALPIN FAMILY SINGS Now Peter and Jackie Halpin are facing devastating loss as their Altadena home was reduced to ash during last week as a part of the deadly Eaton Fire. As a result they, like Job,  worshipped. They gave God the glory through song honoring the Resurrection of the Son of God. The Halpins and six of their nine adult children  gathered on the ruins of their burned out  bungalow  and turned to singing a familiar prayer.  https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1HC3hXTyYq/ The children came to support their parents in a time of unimaginable loss. To grieve together the loss of their childhood home. And to join together in unified family prayer. The National Catholic Register reports that all that was left of the home the Halpins  have lived in since 1988 was  “the foundation, debris, and singed concrete statues of Our Lady of Guadalupe and St. Joseph.” But what was not lost were their lives, their memories and most importantly their rock-solid faith. Originally the Halpins’ Craftsman home was three bedrooms and one bath which over the years was stretched into four bedrooms and two bathrooms to accommodate their growing family. Being Roman Catholics, with a strong devotion to Mary,  it was natural for the Halpins to turn to her in prayer singing in Latin, and in perfect four-part acapella  harmony, the  Regina Caeli which honors the Resurrection of her Son — Jesus. It is alleged that St. Augustine of Hippo once quipped that “when you sing you pray twice.” With their eyes closed, bared heads bowed, and hands clasped in front of them they sing beneath an orange-tinged sky.  They sing from memory and from their hearts: “ Regina caeli, laetare, alleluia …”  (Queen of  Heaven, rejoice, alleluia.)  “Quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia …”  (For He, whom you did merit to bear, alleluia.)  “Resurrexit sicut dixit, alleluia …”  (Has risen as He said, alleluia.)  “Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia…”  (Pray for us to God, alleluia.)  Mary would understand their displacement. She was travelling when her Holy Child was born.  Then she and St. Joseph had to leave their cozy home and flee to Egypt, a foreign land, to protect her Son Jesus from the murderous King Herod the Great. Upon hearing the Halpins sing Lepanto Institute President Michael Hichborn commented: “Only those with real faith can sing so beautifully in praise of Our Blessed Lord on the ashes of what used to be their own home.”  Mary Ann Mueller is a journalist living in Texas.  She is a regular contributor to VirtueOnline

Archbishop Sentamu Academy in Hull will rebrand after an abuse victim criticised the peer’s ‘appalling’ safeguarding record Lord Sentamu, then the Archbishop of York, officially opened the Archbishop Sentamu Academy in Hull in 2008 Credit: Anna Gowthorpe/PA Archive By Janet Eastham Acting Religious and Social Affairs Editor THE TELEGRAPH 07 January, 2025 A Church of England school plans to drop the name of a former Archbishop of York over his failure to act on a report of child sexual abuse. Archbishop Sentamu Academy in Hull has announced that it will rebrand after an abuse victim criticised the peer’s “appalling” safeguarding record. In 2013, Lord Sentamu, then the Archbishop of York, failed to act after a retired vicar, the Rev Matthew Ineson, told him that he had been raped and sexually abused by a priest in Bradford called Trevor Devamanikkam as a 16-year-old boy in the 1980s. A Church national safeguarding team review later concluded that the failure of Lord Sentamu and other senior clergy to help the victim report these allegations to the police meant “safeguards could not have been put in place to protect others”. On Monday, Helen Wimm, the school’s chief executive, and Jane Lewis, the chairman of the Hope Sentamu Learning Trust, wrote to the Rev Ineson to let him know that the Archbishop Sentamu Academy would be changing its name. The decision came after the survivor appealed to academy executives to “distance” themselves from Lord Sentamu following the publication of the Church safeguarding report in 2023. He wrote: “I am sure that you will agree that John Sentamu’s behaviour is utterly appalling. Given that your place of learning is named after him I am sure that you will agree this puts you in a very difficult position. “Would you be willing to publicly distance yourself from his behaviour and do you think it appropriate that he is honoured by having a place where youngsters learn named after him?” Devamanikkam died by suicide in 2017 before facing court on six sexual offence charges, but Church safeguarding experts found that he had sexually abused the Rev Ineson in 1984. In correspondence seen by The Telegraph, school leaders told the survivor that they would be consulting on alternative names for the academy, with staff and pupils able to vote for their favourite. ‘On a journey of improvement’ A spokesman for the secondary school said: “Archbishop Sentamu Academy is on a journey of improvement, and we have been making good progress. This has led us to think carefully about who we are, what we stand for, where we are going, and how we communicate this to the outside world. “We believe a more relatable name for our school will help us to communicate the positive impacts we are making.” The academy’s decision to sever ties with the former Archbishop of York contrasts with the actions of the former Archbishop of Canterbury, the Right Rev Justin Welby, and the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell, the Archbishop of York, who has taken over as the institution’s temporary leader. Last November, the pair were revealed to be pushing for Lord Sentamu’s return to ministry. Because he had previously held permission to officiate in the Diocese of Newcastle, it fell to the Bishop of Newcastle, Helen-Ann Hartley, to suspend him following the publication of the national safeguarding team’s review. On Nov 11, shortly after Bishop Hartley called for the Right Rev Welby to resign, her diocese published a letter from him and the Archbishop of York on X, formerly Twitter, which said they “would very much like to see a resolution to this situation which enables Sentamu to return to ministry”. The bishop accused the two most senior leaders in the Anglican Church of using “coercive language” to pressure her into restoring Lord Sentamu’s permission to officiate. School leaders told the abuse survivor that they will be consulting on a shortlist of alternative names for the academy School leaders told the abuse survivor that they would be consulting on a shortlist of alternative names for the academy The Rev Ineson told The Telegraph the contrast between the school’s decision to drop Lord Sentamu’s name and the Archbishop of York’s attempt to restore his ability to minister demonstrated why the Archbishop was “wholly unfit” to act as the Church’s caretaker leader. “Lord Sentamu is beyond rehabilitation. If a school can see this, why can’t Stephen Cottrell? He has today taken over as the Anglican Church’s most senior leader when the institution is in crisis, and he is wholly unfit for the job,” he said. A report by the Church’s national safeguarding team published in May 2023 found that “the survivor’s allegation that he disclosed his abuse to the Archbishop of York [Lord Sentamu], and he did not act on this, is substantiated”. It also said: “Whilst the review has not been made aware of any further allegations against Trevor Devamanikkam, the failure to support the survivor in reporting his allegations to the police in 2012 and 2013 meant that safeguards could not have been put in place to protect others.” Lord Sentamu’s claim that he had “no authority” to act in the matter was disputed by a reviewer who said “no Church law excuses the responsibility of individuals not to act on matters of a safeguarding nature”. A spokesman for the Archbishop of York has previously told The Telegraph that his attempt to support his predecessor in returning to ministry was “not about minimising the impact of anything Lord Sentamu previously said”. The Telegraph has attempted to contact Lord Sentamu