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Hallo again and a blessed Whitsunday to all. We at Anglicans Online are admirers of Ship of Fools: The Magazine of Christian Unrest. We often refer you to material that we first learned about from this publication. We are delighted to learn, and honoured to be able to report, that two of the Ship of Fools editors are planning to travel abroad to the United States this coming July 1999, to speak at churches and Seminaries. Should your church wish to book them, or if you are simply interested in reading more about it, visit the Ship of Fools US Lecture Tour 99 web page. We highlight again the soon-to-occur celebrations in honour of the 450th anniversary of the 1549 Prayer Book. You'll find links to the two events of which we are aware--one in New York, at General Theological Seminary and one in Oxford, at Christ Church--in our General Resources section. The Diocese of Bermuda has hit the web with a very big splash. This extraordinary web site has all manner of technological razzle-dazzle, but manages to be dignified in spite of it. If you have the Shockwave Flash plug-in installed in your browser (or are willing to take the time needed to install it) then don't miss the "Resurrection" link. A few new parish listings scattered around the globe, including Australia, Canada, South Africa, England, and New York. The Church Times this week has made news by publishing a section listing Clerical Vacancies. While it is not yet possible to apply for these positions by email, you can now learn, online, about clerical job and job-related opportunities around the world. This week's listings, the first ever, include a rectory-swap offer in Ireland, an Australian priest seeking work, an opening for an assistant chaplain in Switzerland, and at least two dozen more. Some of the vocabulary in these adverts is rather specialised, but we assume that anyone who would apply for a job as an "incumbent" knows what that is, and knows that it is not a US elected office. The News Centre is quiet this week. People are still digesting The Gift of Authority and the reactions to it. Most church news is about Kosovo, which is covered so well in the secular press that we won't repeat it. Last week in this paragraph Brian issued a plea for someone to explain to him why the Church Times St Gargoyle cartoon for 14 May was funny. He is grateful to the people who took the time to reply. We were amused that the replies were categorised as follows: 53% pointed out that the problem was that the May 14 caption was run with the May 7 drawing, and offerered an explanation for why it was funny when the right drawing was run with the caption. 47% offered an explanation as to why it was funny as it ran. There was no significant difference between the explanations of why the cartoon was funny with the wrong caption and those about why it was funny with the right caption. Ah, England! We have always thought of Pentecost as the most Internet-related Sunday of the church year. It celebrates that Internet habit of Tongues of Flame, and it celebrates speaking in tongues, and the interpretation of tongues. In the early days of computers there were thousands of electronic tongues, and something produced on one kind of computer did not stand a chance of being understood by another. All of us have seen the Internet crowds coming together in bewilderment. And with our Babel of browsers, we hear many people declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues. Somehow, most people on the Internet can communicate with one another, and we know that the Holy Spirit is involved somehow. See you next week.
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updated: 16 May 1999 |
