Episcopal Life Online Newslink December 18, 2007
Episcopal Life Online is available at http://www.episcopalchurch.org/elife.
Today's ELO Newslink includes:
* TOP STORY - Too many Episcopalians were silent on slavery, Massachusetts bishop tells Congressional committee * DIOCESAN DIGEST - ALASKA, NEW YORK: Alaskan bluegrass band to play benefit in New York * DIOCESAN DIGEST - MINNNESOTA: Guadalupe festival is congregation's outreach to Mexican community * WORLD REPORT - INDIAN OCEAN: First confirmation service held in new Antsiranana Cathedral * WORLD REPORT - KENYA: Accept results, Church leaders urge presidential candidates * FEATURE - Argyll and The Isles-Delaware: Walking together in companionship * OPINION - Give them what they really want (for Christmas)
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TOP STORIES
Too many Episcopalians were silent on slavery, Massachusetts bishop tells Congressional committee Shaw outlines Church's efforts toward healing, reconciliation
By Mary Frances Schjonberg
[Episcopal News Service] Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts Bishop Thomas Shaw SSJE told a Congressional hearing December 18 that "too many Episcopalians did not raise their voices" against slavery "when God would have wished them to do so."
"Episcopalians were owners of slaves and of the ships that brought them to this land," Shaw told the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties' oversight hearing on the legacy of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. "Episcopalians lived in the north and in the south and, as a privileged Church, we today recognize that our Church benefited materially from the slave trade." The Subcommittee is considering H.R. 40, a bill to establish a federal Commission to Study Reparations Proposals for African-Americans.
Shaw was representing Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori on behalf of the Episcopal Church.
Jayne Oasin, social justice officer of the Episcopal Church, said of the testimony: "The importance of the Episcopal Church being present to testify at this hearing on H.R. 40 cannot be overstated. Our church must call itself and our country to repentance. Since we have always held and still hold great power in this country, we are duly bound to follow St. Paul's admonition in Roman's 12 to not 'conform' but to 'transform' the country by the power of the Holy Spirit working through us. Studying the issue of reparations for slavery is a key way to begin to transform ourselves our church, and our country."
Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79901_92957_ENG_HTM.htm
More Top Stories: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/elife
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DIOCESAN DIGEST
ALASKA, NEW YORK: Alaskan bluegrass band to play benefit in New York http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81803_92955_ENG_HTM.htm
MINNNESOTA: Guadalupe festival is congregation's outreach to Mexican community http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81803_92948_ENG_HTM.htm
More Diocesan news: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81803_ENG_HTM.htm
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WORLD REPORT
INDIAN OCEAN: First confirmation service held in new Antsiranana Cathedral http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_92951_ENG_HTM.htm
KENYA: Accept results, Church leaders urge presidential candidates http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_92953_ENG_HTM.htm
More World news: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_ENG_HTM.htm
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FEATURES
Argyll and The Isles-Delaware: Walking together in companionship
By Jen Mason
[Episcopal Life] Starting in 1950s, the Episcopal Diocese of Delaware has had a series of active, rewarding companion relationships with three African and three Caribbean dioceses. These connections culminated with the experience of being twinned with the Diocese of Pretoria, South Africa, through the demise of apartheid and the historic elections and inspiring reconciliation process that followed in its wake.
Parishes were successfully joined, diocesan representatives eagerly exchanged, and mission trips readily organized, as sharing such an intense experience gave the dioceses something intimate and tangible with which to form their bond and build their connection. The people even chose to extend their relationship to correspond to the tenure of then Delaware Bishop Cabell Tennis, who helped to forge it.
When it came time to choose a new companion diocese, Delaware parishes expressed a particular interest in forming a relationship with a diocese that was relatively easily reached, so that parishioners could travel back and forth with a virtually unlimited opportunity for exchange. Scotland's Argyll and The Isles met that criteria and was enthusiastically pursued after Delaware Bishop Wayne Wright and Argyll and The Isles Bishop Douglas Cameron struck up a friendship at the 1998 Lambeth Conference.
Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81834_92954_ENG_HTM.htm
More Features: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/78936_ENG_HTM.htm
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OPINION
Give them what they really want (for Christmas)
By Tom Ehrich
[Religion News Service] Along about now, pulpits and church newsletters bristle with whining about the culture's theft of Christmas.
There's the so-called "commercialization of Christmas." The manic retail spending but hesitant church pledging. Bustling malls but empty pews. Spotlights on Santa Claus but not on Jesus. The "taking Christ out of Christmas." Need I go on?
We'll even gripe about the people who finally do show up en masse on Christmas Eve and then scorn them for not being there every Sunday.
Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/80050_92947_ENG_HTM.htm
More Opinion: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/80050_ENG_HTM.htm