News & Views

The deadline for our newsletter, THE SALTSHAKER, is this weekend. Submit your articles about your committee, upcoming activities, report on past events, summer vacations, news and views. Our publisher, Terry Repol and editor, Andrea Rowan are anxious to hear from you. Please copy both of them on your submissions.

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The 2009 Annual Report is now available on line. Being conscious of our environment and making wise use of our resources there will not be a distribution of printed reports. There will be a limited number of printed versions available upon request from the office. So relax, read all the interesting reports highlighting the activities of the past year. Bring any comments or questions to the Congregational Meeting on Tuesday, June 22.

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Daniel Gullotta is a theological student and candidate in the process toward ordination in the Episcopal Church in Australia.  He attended the Common Dreams conference in Melbourne and introduced himself by saying "Hey! We're friends on Facebook!" Which, of course, earned him an instant hug and instant camaraderie!  Daniel's review of my book, With or Without God, was posted on website of The Center for Progressive Christianity in the States.  Here, Daniel reflects on the closing service at the Common Dreams conference.

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 The word "transcendent" has often been used to convey something beyond us which we cannot attain, maybe because we belong to the natural order and, since it was considered spiritual, we could never grasp it wholly.  If we believe the things we don't understand now, were we to come to understand them, would be found to be natural, too, what does "transcendent" mean? Can we attain it individually? As a community?

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There was some good initial discussion yesterday around unpacking the statement "Everything happens for a reason" and its implications.  Anything to add?  What does that statement mean to you?  Is it positive? Does it give you hope? Or does it infuriate you?

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"It is with a deep sense of awe and joy that we acknowledge the wonder of life in all its dimensions."

Religion is sometimes described as the institutionalization of what were profound and inspirational moments in the lives of individuals or groups.  In their efforts to share what they had come to know, they passed along their experiences with the implication that if you did what they described, you'd get the same experience.  It sometimes left people feeling inadequate if they didn't get that experience or the inspiration they'd been expecting.

Have you ever experienced wonder and been so blown away you just had to share it, but the person with whom you did so didn't have the same response? What was sacred for you was humdrum or insignificant for them? If so, how did that make you feel and did it make you feel differently about the person?

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While in Brisbane, I was honoured to give the homily and preside at the Eucharist at St. Mary's in Exile with rebel priest, Peter Kennedy.  Here, Peter Kirkwood of Eureka Street, posts his interview with Kennedy and a reflection on his first year outside the embrace of the Catholic church.

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Peter Kirkwood interviewed me while at the Common Dreams II conference and has posted his article and video here on Eureka Street, a Catholic On-line news forum.  Enjoy!

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World attention has been focused for some time on the Bilin community in the West Bank whose farmland was being walled off from them by the building of what they have called the "racial segregation wall" but that Israel calls a "security fence".  Ordered to redraw the line by the courts, the Israeli government has yet to do so.  Now, attention is increasing and fast as those opposed to the wall, Palestinians, Israelis, and others, have been painting themselves blue and drawing references to their plight from the blockbuster hit Avatar.

Read more Na'vi and Goliath

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After claiming that the absence, in the publication of the new study guide for immigrants, of reference to Canadian equality rights as they pertain to gays and lesbians was the result of an oversight , homophobic Immigration minister, Jason Kenney, is found to have personally wielded the red marker that struck sections on gay equality and marriage from early drafts.

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