Environmental Workshop

Theme: The Earth is in crisis: How can we contribute to sustaining the earth, our only home?

The Diocesan Environment Committee of the Diocese of Natal are holding a workshop for leaders and interested people from parishes and organisations who would be able to take the skills learnt at this workshop and share them with those in their church context. Young people are particularly encouraged to attend.

Resource person: Liz McDaid, experienced facilitator and environmental educator.

• Date: Saturday 17 March 2012
• Time: 8.00 – 15.00
• Venue: Koinonia Conference Centre, Botha’s Hill
• Cost: R100 per person, which includes tea and lunch.
• Closing date for applications: Monday 12 March 2012

RSVP: Either SMS your name and church to Guy Caws 083525 8265. Or fax confirmation to 0317021805

We will begin with a Eucharist at 8.30 at which Bishop Rubin will preside and preach. The workshop will explore aspects of the environment, including climate change, and discuss what actions God may be calling us to do in our parishes/organisations and as a Diocese.

Overnight accommodation will be provided for those who need to travel a long distance to get to the workshop.  To arrange overnight accommodation, and to arrange to pay the R100 workshop fee, please contact the Parish Secretary of St John the Baptist, Pinetown: 031 7020712 (8.00 to 13.00)

Limited bursaries will be made available on application to those in need.

Coming Before Jesus in Sackcloth and Ashes

From Bishop Rubin (Izindaba 9):

I met with Fr. Michael Lapsley, an Anglican priest known to many of us, at his hotel in Durban last week.  During breakfast, I had to help Michael by tearing off the end of the sachet of sugar and emptied it into his cup of rooibos tea.  I then had to push the cup closer to him.

You see, Michael has no hands.  In April 1990, in Harare, Zimbabwe, he was sent a letter bomb by the South African Government.  In the explosion he lost both his hands, an eye, and his eardrums were shattered, among other injuries.

However, Michael has taken the courageous decision to move on with his life.  His incredible work with victims of trauma has helped them to dare to hope and to recover their humanity.  He has demonstrated with words and , more powerfully, with his physical condition, that to forgive is to be liberated.  “Journeys of forgiveness”,  Michael said to the Canadian House of Bishops in 2011, “are costly, painful and difficult.  At the same time, they often involve grace.   Journeys of forgiveness require generosity of spirit, and this, to me, is what is meant by grace”.

Wonderfully, South Africa has given us a whole “cloud of witnesses” to the liberating power of forgiveness.  Take for example Desmond Tutu, Albie Sacks (also a victim of a parcel bomb), Steve Biko, Mampela Rampela.  Then there’s Nelson Mandela.  Just a few weeks ago, we remembered his release from prison, after 22 years, on the 11^th February 1990.  It is hard to imagine how someone who was kept in isolation on Robben island for 18 years could escape from being imprisioned by resentment, bitterness and hatred!  Instead, he took the high road.  He embraced his enemies and led his party in negotiations with the South African Government, an initiative which began the miracle of our transformation, without violence, to a new political dispensation.

So often we think of forgiveness in exclusively individualistic, personal and private terms, But Donald W. Shriver, President Emeritus of Union Theological Seminary in New York City (my alma mater) argues that even nations, races, ethnic groups – after long and bitter struggles – can learn to live side by side in peace (An Ethic for Enemies). The solution he posits, lies in our capacity to forgive.

As we begin this Lenten journey, let us come before Jesus in sackcloth and ashes, asking him to forgive us our sins, and, in turn, to help us to forgive the other.  Don’t remain imprisioned by resentment and unforgiveness.  Let go. Surrend to God.  For “Surrend to God is a highly freeing event.  It is like opening the lid of a jar and letting the butterfly wing away freely….  It is the freedom of a bound Lazarus coming forth from the tomb.”  (“Praying our Goodbyes” by J Rupp)

“Drink this, all of you, this is my blood of the new convenant, which is shed for you and for many, for the forgiveness of sins”.(Second Eucharistic Prayer)

Pray For The World

Bishop Ruben in his recent iZindaba writes:

I recently had the privilege of attending the Eucharist in an Anglican Church of another diocese. I didn’t wear a clerical collar on that occasion, and I must say that it was a wonderful experience sitting in the pew and, for a change, being at the receiving end of ministry.

The service was most meaningful. And it was evident that it was well planned. Thankfully, the celebrant did not make himself the focus of attention with silly jokes, drawn-out notices/announcements and ongoing commentary on the liturgy. The liturgy by its very nature, don’t forget, doesn’t need everything explained. We insult the intelligence of worshippers when we do so. What is wrong with simply saying: Let us pray? Anglicans understand that. Perhaps people in the sanctuary like the sound of their own voices. I don’t know! But there’s something else. When the celebrant or lay minister becomes too talkative in the service, then I think that they hinder the movement of the Spirit who wants to point us to Jesus, and not ourselves. Surely, like John the Baptist, we need to decrease in order that Christ might increase – yes, even in the liturgy!

My only disappointment with the Eucharist I had attended was that the Prayers of the Church/People (led by a lay minister) was anything but that. There wasn’t any intercession for the world or the wider church. In fact, it was scaringly inward looking. The prayers went something like this: Help us Lord, be with us in our needs, Lord, keep us safe from Satan, bless us, Lord, and so it went on.

Of course, we should be praying for ourselves and our parish. But surely we ought also to be interceding for the world (and the wider church). In the High Priestly Prayer (John 17), Jesus interceded for the disciples and in Acts 12, we witness the church praying for Peter, who was in prison.

Perhaps one of the Lenten “activities” in the parish could be to devote more time to intercession. However, we should certainly be doing that every time we gather as the worshipping community.

I commend the attached article, “Prayers of Intercession” to you. I also encourage you to look at these two websites: Anglican Church Intercession, and Topical Prayers – Church of England.