ANGLICAN WAYS GROUP

Minutes of the Anglican Ways Committee meeting held in the lounge at St Michael and All Angels, Oxford Terrace on Thursday 17th April, 2007 at 4.30 pm.

Chair: The Reverend Bob Peck

Welcome and Opening Prayer: Bob

Present: The Rev'd Bob Peck, Jenny Daniels, The Rev'd Jill Fisher, Peter Oakley, Michael Ladd & The Rev'd John Fisher.

Apologies: Michael Ladd (lateness), Marla Hughes

Minutes of the Previous Meeting: The minutes of the previous meeting were passed with amendment, that amendment being that the words 'Dr Lynda Patterson' be changed to 'The Reverend Lynda Patterson' in section 2 under Matters Arising, Jill Fisher/Jenny Daniels. Carried

Matters Arising: Article for the Press: This was deferred and an alternative Easter message submitted which the Press did not print.

Correspondence: Nil

General Business:

1. Moved that Jenny Daniels be authorised to investigate procedures for operating the website more effectively and to take such action as is appropriate. John Fisher/Michael Ladd Carried.

2. A Constitution: Following an informal meeting held on Thursday 12th April at 10.30 am, those .

present being Bob Peck, Peter Oakley, Jill Fisher, Jenny Daniels & John Fisher an amended draft constitution presented by Peter Oakley was discussed.

Reasons given for the need for a constitution included that it was necessary to ensure incorporation, this being essential if donations were to attract tax rebates; other reasons included that without a constitution certain undertakings would be difficult , if not impossible to implement. The publication of an occasional magazine being cited as among these.

The discussion was lively and resulted in some amendments to the draft, principally the inclusion of a new clause 2(c) incorporating the original statement of the groups aims etc as printed on the card advertising Anglican Ways.

Moved that the draft constitution as amended be adopted, Peter Oakley/John Fisher

Moved that the motion be amanded by substituting the word 'received' for the word 'adopted', Jenny Daniels/Jill Fisher.

The amendment to the motion was put with the vote being tied. After further discussion it was decided to put the amendment again after which it was declared carried. The substantive motion, as amended, was then put and carried.

It was then moved that a further meeting be held urgently to give all members an opportunity to express their views on the draft constitution which was to be circulated by e-mail in advance. John Fisher/ Michael Ladd carried.

The date for that meeting was then set for Tuesday, 8th May at 11.00 am in the St John's hall at Bishopdale.

It was moved that an occasional magazine 'Anglicaqn Ways' be implemented with Peter Oakley and Jill Fisher as joint editors. Peter Oakley/ Michael Ladd carried.

Moved that Peter Oakley be thanked for the time, effort and expertise he had put into the formation of a constitution and the creation of a magazine Jill Fisher/Michael Ladd carried.

The meeting closed at 6.25 pm

Next Meeting Tuesday 8th May, 2007 at 11.00 am at St John's Parish Hall, Bishopdale.

Remember our website: anglicanways.org Your contribution is always welcome.

Minutes of a Meeting of the Anglican Ways Group

Anglican Ways Group

Minutes of a Meeting of the Anglican Ways Group held in the Sunday School Hall of St John the Evangelist Church Bishopdale, on Tuesday 5 February 2007, at 10:30 am.

CHAIR: Fr Bob Peck.

OPENING PRAYERS: Bob.

PRESENT: Bob Peck, Jenny Daniels, Michael Ladd, John Fisher, Jillian Fisher, Charlie Batterbury, (minutes).

MATTERS ARISING:

Advertising for the Marla Hughes Seminar was put in the Press by John Fisher.
There was discussion on the arrangements.
Parishes were advertised by email. Each time there is an emailing, some more emails come back as wrong email or undeliverable, ones which went ok last time. So this happened this time too.
Lynda Patterson and John Bruerton seminar dates..
For John Bruerton, suggest 5 June. Bob will check for availlabiliity and topic.
For Lynda Patterson, suggest 4 September*. Jill will check availablility and topic.
Motion: “That Fr Bob Peck asks Mr John Bruerton to be our speaker on Tuesday 5 June, the topic to be negotiated by Fr Peck and Mr Bruerton, and that Rev Jill Fisher to approach Dr Lynda Patterson to be our speaker on 4 September and again topic to be negotiated with her. Time to be 5:30 for 6 pm”. John/Michael. Carried. * [Note, Jill checked, and date is now to be 11 September, not 4^th.]

GENERAL BUSINESS:

We should remind members a few days before, of an ordinary meeting.
Michael Wallace is being ordained Deacon on behalf of the Bishop of Dunedin by the Old Catholics in Geneva. John Fisher suggests we write a letter of congratulation.
A Labour Weekend Seminar was suggested, on the nature of human sexuality, because of all the misunderstanding and confusion re homosexuality. It would need to be done exceptionally well. Perhaps we could have a major teaching slot once a year.
NEXT MEETING: Tuesday 17 April, 4:30 pm in St Michael’s Lounge following Evening Prayer at 3:30 pm.

ARE THEY THE NEW PHARISEES?

I’ve always had a sneaking sympathy for the Pharisees; after all, they were the leading religious and spiritual folk of their day. They were zealous for God promoting his standards and expectations. They attended to worship, to the major and minor facets of behaviour all with the highest and most sincere of motives. They defined what was acceptable conduct always in relation to scripture and its interpretation, always with God and His standards in mind. They demanded that everyone conduct themselves in ways that were worthy and that the Law be not broken or treated frivolously. They were, in themselves, paragons of virtue and they demanded the same standards from everyone else. The Law was paramount. It gave definite answers to all questions concerning religion, redemption and acceptable conduct, both in religious and secular living. The Law was not to be broken or taken lightly.

Then an upstart young preacher came on the scene. He was a tradesman, son of a tradesman, scarcely educated. He broke the Law. He worked on the Sabbath healing people, sometimes in a Synagogue. He lampooned the Pharisees, called them by nasty names, told people they’d got it wrong and that God wanted to be worshipped freely and that love and faith and trust in God meant more than the Law. He told pointed stories. He even went further and spent time with outcasts, bad people and those who didn’t go to Church. There was even a claim that he was God’s Son and had special qualities and that, in fact, he was a king - The King.

This was bad. The Pharisees were responsible people so they did something about it. They got rid of Him, but the damage was done. The things he had said and done stuck. Among the things that stuck were Jesus’s stories. He had followers.

One of those stories had to do with a feast in which the invited guests failed to turn up so their places were filled with people off the streets, the outcasts, ne’er-do-wells and so on. The feast went ahead without the best people in attendance, without the religiously good and so on. Very pointed. Now I wonder, who are to-day’s outcasts? What created them, and shouldn’t we be inviting them in? Is it possible that a new type of Pharisee is responsible and continues to exclude them?

I believe so, for among the outcasts we have a new group - the homosexuals. Their existence has become an issue to some. It ought not to be so. They’ve always been with us but never so intensely identified and labelled as today. And for that we thank some religious people. They appeal to the Bible, but there is nothing therein that supports their understanding of homosexuality, and Jesus, the teller of stories, friend of outcasts, said nothing of it. They claim it’s a chosen life-style. The only research that supports that conclusion, is driven by erroneous beliefs. All such studies are methodologically and logically flawed because they seek predetermined answers.

So these new outcasts are created by the belief of some and suffer persecution, condemnation and discrimination at the hands of today’s righteous faith-keepers.

Recently, some of them went from Christchurch to Dunedin in an attempt to disrupt an ordination of a gay man in the latter city. In so doing they broke an ancient Church discipline in which Bishop and Diocese are supreme. Uninvited, they invaded another Diocese in the name of a pharisaic law, thus showing ignorance and the desire to persecute someone for the way he was created.

The same people wrote to the Archbishops endeavouring to have them endorse a legalistic interpretation of a study document - the Windsor Report . Ironically, where a custom and, by practice a law, existed, they ignored it; where there was none they invented many laws to support their beliefs.

The Christ moved beyond legalism to love, inclusion and acceptance and taught a new humanity, both in his life and in his statements and stories. Those who ignore this and create outcasts and persecute them have departed from the Gospel. They do not diminish the Christ. They cannot. They do diminish themselves, religiously, spiritually and as people.

I believe that the groups I write of have redefined the Christian Faith to fit their own preconceptions and to enhance their comfort zone. They fail to realise that the Church ever seeks truth and that open discussion and debate is healthy and life-promoting. Among their sins is that of requiring everyone to believe and do as they do.

JOHN S. FISHER (The Reverend)

ECCLESIASTICAL TITBITS X

A look back at the past year - 2006 - it now seems a long time ago - discloses a number of events, some trivial, some momentous but all signifying our attitudes, beliefs and customs. Taken together, they tell what we believe collectively about other people, our nation, city and the world. They can also be seen as defining future pathways and directions.

The so-called war on terrorism continued unabated with loss of lives on all sides. That is something that must be displeasing to God, call him God or Allah if you must. Muslims continued to kill one another, often employing suicide bombers, which I would see more as a practical atheism than anything sanctioned by God, particularly given the number of innocents who are maimed and murdered. They also took Christians captive, brutally murdering many.
The Taliban showed a resurgence in Afghanistan. In fact dissension and war seemed to be the norm over much of the world and, as always, the innocent were the major victims.
Locally, the environment took much attention with debate about global warming - is it happening, is it not happening? The ability of humans to go into denial here became most apparent. Inertia is the rule. Leave things alone and they will all be all right. Politics also stayed in the public arena. Perhaps one of the most significant disclosures was the relationship between Don Brash and the Exclusive Brethren cult. The cynical pursuit of power and wealth demonstrated not only how easy it is to depart from the Gospel, but also how self-centred 'religious' people, politicians and, indeed anyone, can become.

I think, though, that some local happenings best illustrate the direction society is taking. The young woman whose house was crowded out by an aggressive developer so that her enjoyment of her home and ability to maintain it were seriously compromised shows the lack of care and respect for people that is enveloping our society. In this case, the City Council was also at fault in that they failed to exercise their duty of care to those they represent. This action has been repeated. Unfortunately, the developer's behaviour was legal. It was not ethical, it was not moral and it was not righteous. In essence this action contravenes the Deuteronomic law prohibiting the shifting of a neighbour's boundary marker. These days it is not possible to move a surveyor's peg but the encroachment on another's property fulfils the same end.

I wonder, has the world not heard, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself"? Or has it become negotiable? Civilisation, as we know it, was founded on co-operation, mutuality and the rule of law permeated by ethical understandings. Is that becoming a quaintness of the past and also negotiable?

PISCATOR

PROMOTING CHRISTIAN UNITY

ADDRESS AND DISCUSSION

Speaker: Dr Marla Hughes

Topic: Inclusiveness

Title: "What did the eye say to the hand?"

or

"Through a glass not so darkly".

Venue: Parish Lounge, St Michael and All Angels

Oxford Terrace.

When: Tuesday, 6th March starting at 5.30pm

Light refreshments - gold coin donation

Sponsored by Anglican Ways

See anglicanways.org

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

BBC Radio 4

Thought for the Day, 21 November 2006

The Rt Revd Tom Butler

Good morning. The Archbishop of Canterbury starts his visit to the Vatican today and the standard story is that progress towards unity between the Roman Catholic church and the Anglican Communion has been set back, sadly, by the ordination of women as priests and bishops and the fracas concerning gay priests and bishops in the Anglican Communion. There is another way of viewing the same happenings. The Church of England sees itself as being both Catholic and Reformed, taking on many of the reforms of the Reformation Churches whilst keeping a continuity with the catholic nature of the ordained ministry. More than this, it is possible to see the Church of England as a Prophetic, Catholic and Reformed Church, thoughtfully and prayerful making the developments that the wider catholic and orthodox churches might wish to take into their system later. For example, at the reformation the Book of Prayer offered the people of England and subsequently people in other lands, worship in their own vernacular language. It took four centuries before the Roman Catholic church replaced the Latin mass by local languages as the norm of their worship. Again, the Church of England since the reformation has allowed its clergy to marry. It's only in the last dozen years that the Roman Catholic church in England has allowed former Anglican priests to become Roman Catholic priests, despite them being married, surely indicating that there is nothing theologically inherent preventing a married man being a priest. Now we have the development of women being ordained as priests in the Anglican Communion. The decision was taken to ordain them believing that this was a legitimate development of church order. Over two thousand have already been ordained in the Church of England, I have 175 ministering in my own diocese. Women now form half the candidates at every ordination. It's nonsensical to believe that there'll be any going back and nor should there be. Women priests aren't a problem they're a blessing, not only to the Church of England, but to the wider community and I believe to the whole catholic church in years to come. And what of gay priests? Of course there are divisions and splits in the Anglican Communion over this issue at the present time, and because we are a transparent church, the arguments are conducted in public. But Archbishop and Pope both know that they have serving their respective churches innumerable dedicated and devoted gay priests, often ministering in the most difficult and dangerous places on earth. They're not a problem. They're a blessing. We may be in the winter of church unity negotiations, but calling blessings problems isn't the way to move towards the spring.

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Reflections on Ecclesiastical Titbits IX

The story of Sodom has for many years been understood as representing a condemnation of homosexuality. From other Biblical references it is seen that the sins of Sodom were many and varied. Sins such as pride (Ecc16:8) (Wis. 19:13-14) and lack of hospitality (Matt 10:14-15) (Luke 10: 10-12), outweighed sexual sin. (Ez. 16: 48-49)

Therefore when members of the church chose to judge homosexuals as an unworthy minority, then such judges are themselves guilty of the sins of pride and inhospitality.

We cloud the issue by saying that gay and lesbian people can come and sit in the church pews. Then we again become exclusive, by saying they are not worthy to answer a call to be church elders or to ordination. By sitting in such judgement we are guilty of the sin of pride. As “Piscator” points out, there is no medical evidence that homosexuality is a chosen state. We are born as male or female, heterosexual or homosexual. That is, this is the way we are created. Who created us? God. God looked on his creation and saw that it was very good (Gen 1:31). I for one do not chose to say to God that he made a mistake when he created homosexuals, I would rather rejoice in all of God’s creation.

When members of one fraction of the church condemn the ordination of homosexuals or the consecration of women whose ‘call” has been recognised by their Bishops are we in fact questioning God’s right to call these people?

Yes Lord we know you teach us to show love to our neighbour, to welcome all people and care for them but please Lord don’t call anyone to ministry who does not fit into our pattern of “normal”

From Kotuku

ECCLESIASTICAL TITBITS IX

Reflections on Ecclesiastical Titbits IX

The story of Sodom has for many years been understood as representing a condemnation of homosexuality. From other Biblical references it is seen that the sins of Sodom were many and varied. Sins such as pride (Ecc16:8) (Wis. 19:13-14) and lack of hospitality (Matt 10:14-15) (Luke 10: 10-12), outweighed sexual sin. (Ez. 16: 48-49)

Therefore when members of the church chose to judge homosexuals as an unworthy minority, then such judges are themselves guilty of the sins of pride and inhospitality.

We cloud the issue by saying that gay and lesbian people can come and sit in the church pews. Then we again become exclusive, by saying they are not worthy to answer a call to be church elders or to ordination. By sitting in such judgement we are guilty of the sin of pride. As “Piscator” points out, there is no medical evidence that homosexuality is a chosen state. We are born as male or female, heterosexual or homosexual. That is, this is the way we are created. Who created us? God. God looked on his creation and saw that it was very good (Gen 1:31). I for one do not chose to say to God that he made a mistake when he created homosexuals, I would rather rejoice in all of God’s creation.

When members of one fraction of the church condemn the ordination of homosexuals or the consecration of women whose ‘call” has been recognised by their Bishops are we in fact questioning God’s right to call these people?

Yes Lord we know you teach us to show love to our neighbour, to welcome all people and care for them but please Lord don’t call anyone to ministry who does not fit into our pattern of “normal”

From Kotuku

Anglican Ways Group

Minutes of a Meeting of the Anglican Ways Group held in the Sunday School Hall of St John the Evangelist Church Bishopdale, on Wednesday 13 September 2006, at 11.00 am.

CHAIR: Fr Bob Peck.

OPENING PRAYERS: Bob.

PRESENT: Bob Peck, Jenny Daniels, Michael Ladd, John Fisher, Jillian Fisher, Charlie Batterbury, (minutes), Bernard Richards.

BUSINESS:

1. Change “from ‘precious’ meeting, to ‘previous’ meeting”, on the Agenda.

2. General discussion as to why Anglican Ways has slowed down.
We should email minutes to Hugh Bowron, Lawrence Kimberley, and David Moore, any others?
What can we do to enliven interest, especially among younger people?
How to interest people in the seminars.
Us few can actually run it ok- do we need more people at these meetings?
It is not a numbers thing.
Our advertising has not been high powered. And we are more the leaven, and educational.
We need to do a few things and do them well.

3. These minutes could also go to Archdeacons, Mother Judith and the Community, and Latimer Fellowship, via Wally Behan.

4. Question we asked via the minutes, on thoughts on the Evening Services we have been holding, none.

5. Next Seminar, possibly Saturday 11 November 9.30 am to 3.30 pm.
General discussion on possible topics:
- Is the Church Militant or Moribund?
– Islam and Christianity.
– Sport and Religion.
– What is a Liberal?
– Future of Three Tikanga Church.
– What is Mainstream?
– Gay issue, ordination of gay people.
– Split to two parts of the same Church.

6. We should put the minutes on the Website.

The meeting closed at 12.36 pm.

NEXT MEETING: Wednesday 18 October, here.

ECCLESIASTICAL TITBITS VIII

Over the years in many places, and from many sources, I have had occasion, as many of you will have, to ponder the different expectations people have and express about being Christian. I am thinking here of illness and how it strikes us all, or nearly all of us, with its inevitable disabling effects either temporarily or permanently.

The views I have met include that of those who believe sickness results from sin and that repentance and penance, as well as true belief, will result in restoration to health. Others see it as an evil visitation signifying the presence of evil or the devil in the world. There are also those who think Christians should be exempt from illness because of their faith and special relationship with God and so on. Others are more pragmatic and accept that it is an inevitable fact of life and to be borne stoically or treated and overcome.

Truth is, sickness, with all its attendant inconveniences, troubles and even death visits the Christian and non-Christian impartially. It’s like the rain which falls on the just and the unjust without distinction or thought or sensitivity to the nature or status of the person.

For the Christian the difference comes from the way we understand God and how we use our faith to deal with illness and death. Our great advantage is that we have Christ, prayer, the sacrament of healing and a strong belief in the ultimate trustworthiness of God. We believe that whatever happens our spirit can be and will be healed. We believe that it is God’s faithfulness to us that means, in the end, we meet with Him as new beings who have been made whole through His love as expressed in the Christ. Then we will know that sickness and tribulation are part of life and borne through our faith and sharing in Christ’s suffering.

PISCATOR