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Daybook -- Today is Tuesday, November 7, 2006. The Church calendar remembers Willibrord, Archbishop of Utrecht and missionary to Frisia (658-739)
* Today in Scripture: Daily Office meditation: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm * Today in Prayer: Anglican Cycle of Prayer: http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm * Today in History: On this day in 1996, the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church met in a joint session with the Council of the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada in Toronto. http://www.episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/ENS/ENSpress_release.pl?pr_number=96-1572
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Diocesan Digest
MAINE: Convention dispatches business quickly in the face of wind storm http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_79378_ENG_HTM.htm
PITTSBURGH: Convention backs Duncan's desire to leave Province III, achieve alternative primatial oversight http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_79381_ENG_HTM.htm
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World Report
SOUTH AFRICA: Ndungane receives peacemaker award in Washington http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_79337_ENG_HTM.htm
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Teaching: Affirming Catholicism announces two conferences in 2007
Board focuses mission to provide inspiration and hope for next generation
[ENS] The recent retreat meeting of the Board of Affirming Catholicism, held at Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, New York, focused on the next generation of church leaders as part of its mission to provide inspiration and hope in the Episcopal Church and set the themes of their two North American conferences in 2007.
"At the General Convention, we became aware that a great number of the people visiting our booth were under 35. They were lay and clergy delegates, as well as members of youth delegations," said Mother Susan McCone, executive director of Affirming Catholicism. "Again and again we heard that they hadn't known that an organization like ours existed, and they were eager to know more about the catholic witness in the Episcopal Church. In particular, they wanted to know more about the 'holy life.'"
McCone said they understood the "connection between Christianity and social involvement" but had a much less developed sense of and little experience in the Church's tradition and practice of holiness -- the life of prayer, spiritual discipline, rule of life, sacramental worship -- as the underpinning of transformation.
The Board is responding to the interest of this "post-boomer" generation by exploring new ways to use electronic media and other direct means of contact.
The Board also announced the themes of Affirming Catholicism's two North American conferences in 2007.
The first conference, "The Gift of Communion: Is the Covenant a Gift of Grace?" will be held in Raleigh, North Carolina, April 30-May 4, 2007. Affirming Catholicism is sponsoring it jointly with the bishops of Atlanta, East Carolina, North Carolina, Southern Virginia, Southwestern Virginia, Upper South Carolina and Western North Carolina.
The second conference, "Orthodoxy: Living Communion in Worship and Belief," will be held in Seattle, Washington, October 21-25, 2007. Speakers for this conference will include Kenneth Leech, James Alison and Diana Butler Bass.
Both conferences will begin with a day of retreat to form a praying community and will continue in the context of a community of prayer and liturgical celebration.
Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_79405_ENG_HTM.htm _ _ _
Catalyst: "Seeking God: The Way of St. Benedict" from The Liturgical Press (April 2001), by Esther de Waal, 163 pages, paperback, $9.95
[Source: The Liturgical Press] -- For more than 1,500 years St. Benedict's Rule has been a source of guidance, support, inspiration, challenge, comfort and discomfort for men and women. It has helped both those living under monastic vows and those living outside the cloister in all the mess and muddle of ordinary, busy lives in the world. Esther de Waal's Seeking God serves as an introduction to this life-giving way and encourages people to discover for themselves the gift that St. Benedict can bring to individuals, to the Church, and to the world, now and in the years to come.
Through this definitive classic, de Waal has become known as an authority for the lay person on the Rule of St. Benedict. Her ability to communicate clearly the principal values of the Rule when applied to lay people is the ultimate strength of this book. She follows each chapter with a page or two of thoughts and prayers, contributing to its meditative quality.
To order: Episcopal Books and Resources online at http://www.episcopalbookstore.org or call 800-903-5544.
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