Luther movie reviews from Christianity Today

Headline: Luther, Luther, Luther!

Best quote - the last line: "Each generation, it seems, gets the Luther that it needs."

Why the Classics may still be the Classics

Before I read this article, I decided - thirty minutes a day with the Classics and I may be somewhere in twenty years.

I am currently on Book XII of The Iliad.

This article inspires me - and makes me pray for good teachers for our kids in school - and good pastors as well...

Growing Up 80s and Christian

Interesting article from someone who remembers how it was back in the day.

God's Awful Music, Pure and Clean

Clearer News, at least

OK - what it REALLY means is that Council recommended to Assembly that ANY Task Force report recommending a change in standards require a 2/3 majority vote to pass. This is a non-binding recommendation and I believe can be ignored by the Assembly. But the recommendation is a positive.

Here is the salient passage of a new, revised news release:

In the rules of procedure recommended by the council for the
assembly are requirements that a two-thirds majority vote is
needed to adopt recommendations from a task force that require
amendment of a constitutional or bylaw provision, or establish a
practice or policy that is contrary to an existing practice or
policy of the ELCA, such as a policy or practice contained in a
social statement.

Following is a very interesting little part of the article:

In a report to the council, the Rev. Kenneth M. Ruppar,
Richmond, Va., chair of the council's legal and constitutional
review committee, proposed on the committee's behalf that the
assembly rules be recommended except for the section regarding
task force recommendations, most of which which require a two-
thirds majority vote to be adopted. Instead, the committee
suggested the section regarding the rules on task force
recommendations be considered at the council's April 2005
meeting.
But many council members said they wanted to adopt the
assembly rules, including task force report rules now -- as the
council indicated at its April 2004 meeting -- before the Studies
on Sexuality task force report and recommendations were completed
and made public.

Quotes following prove the wisdom of this. Any decision AFTER the Task Force made its report on whether to make Task Force recommendations either simple majority or 2/3 would have constituted an implicit referendum on the Task Force. By doing this, in the words of a council member, the Church Council has "protected their integrity."

It seems that most, if not all, task force recommendations of any sort require a two-thirds majority. Some were eager to suspend in this case.

Read the whole article here - although it is all messed up with question marks on the webpage (how ironic!)

Good News...I think

The council commended Rules of Organization and Procedure for the 2005 Churchwide Assembly, and it defeated an attempt to defer action on possible additions to a section of the rules on voting to adopt "certain recommendations" from ELCA task force reports. The addition states that a two-thirds majority vote is required to adopt recommendations from a task force that requires amendment of a constitution or bylaw provision.
The council's discussion on churchwide assembly voting rules took place in light of a report and recommendations coming from the ELCA task force for the Studies on Sexuality in January. The task force plans to share its report and recommendations confidentially with ELCA lay and ordained ministers through e-mail on Jan. 12. It plans to release the report and recommendations publicly on Jan. 13, with a news conference here at the Lutheran Center.
Speaking against the motion to defer action Linda J. Brown, council member, Fargo, N.D., said, "It is critical that we act on the rules of procedure independent from upcoming recommendations to protect our integrity." Initiating a two-thirds rule "is consistent," she said.
"This is not a neutral recommendation," said Ellen T. Maxon, council member, Washington, D.C., who spoke against implementing the two-thirds rule. The rule "sets a high bar and sends a clear message that, if you want change, it's going to be harder" to achieve, she said. The "cleanest way" to avoid sending that message is by letting a simple majority vote prevail. "Let the assembly do what it wants and not have the church council decide for it," Maxon said.

If I read this correctly, it means that the Church Council must approve by 2/3 the Task Force's recommendation.

This is good...I think.

Of course, a passage by 2/3 could send a strong message to CW Assembly to adopt.

Full story here

The kids are wide awake...

And "practicing a play."

The good news - they're morning people.

The bad news - they're morning people.

What is up with that?

What Does It Mean, Reverend Bishop?

Jason and Brett, and whoever else might pick this up:
What does this mean? asks our Bishop. Is he reciting the Small Catechism as a child, as Luther recommends pastors and bishops do, following his example? Is he asking himself what the decline in membership in the ELCA, the decline in giving to the churchwide expression, the anxiety in the church as we continue our march to Orlando 2005 means? Or is he asking himself why every single news release regarding himself in recent months has had to do with politics and war?

No, rather this:

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The death of Yasser Arafat, the recent
U.S. presidential campaign and election, and multicultural
challenges facing the church prompted the presiding bishop of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) to ask, "what does
all this mean?" in his report Nov. 11 to the ELCA Church Council.

What it means, first of all, is that it was a grievous error for Bishop Hanson to accept and for the Church Council to allow him to accept the Presidency of the Lutheran World Federation. This only exacerbates his peculiar temptation to believe that his primary focus is to speak as a "world leader" and advise other "world leaders" rather than to feed the bishops and clergy of the ELCA who are his charge as Presiding Bishop.

The Rev. Mark S. Hanson, speaking on the day of Arafat's
funeral in Cairo, Egypt, and burial in Ramallah, West Bank, said
he spoke earlier in the week to the Rev. Munib A. Younan, bishop
of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan (and Palestine).
Younan was to be at Arafat's funeral in Cairo and hoped to get
into Ramallah for the burial, Hanson said.
Hanson said Younan asked him to remind the ELCA that the
Palestinian people are more mature than is reported in the media
and some people believe. Younan also asked Hanson to challenge
President George W. Bush "to be a peace broker and to work for a
two-state solution" in the Middle East, Hanson said.

With all due respect to both bishops, I rather think that President Bush has listened to Prime Minister Blair and come out strongly on the day of Arafat's funeral for a two-state solution in the Middle East. Whether he will take Bp. Hanson's advice seriously is another matter. There are just under 5 million ELCA Lutherans who would love for the bishop to be encouraging them and listening to them, for a change.

On the U.S. presidential election, Hanson questioned
observations of election analysts that Bush was elected on the
basis of "personal moral values and fear of terrorism."
"Fear hardens lives, and fears close borders," Hanson said.
"Faith opens our eyes. Fear causes us to flee the world; faith
gives us the courage to go out into the world. Faith causes us
to see the world through the eyes of the cross."

What indeed, does this mean, in concrete terms? Is the Presiding Bishop suggesting that American Christians should not keep in mind, when choosing a leader, who best can protect them from clear and present danger to their lives? Whatever happened to Luther's insight that government, as an expression of God's LOVE for the innocent, has a mandate to protect them from those who would cause harm to them?

Hanson returned to themes he pressed during the campaign.
He asked what it meant that a president was elected who
supposedly speaks to moral values, yet neither Bush nor Sen. John
F. Kerry could address "moral issues" such as poverty, HIV/AIDS,
lack of clean water in the world, genocide in Sudan and "horrific
acts" in Fallujah.
"What does it mean for those of us who care about those
things and are dismissed as not caring about moral values?"
Hanson asked.

What it means, to my mind, is that the Bishop of the ELCA needs to be setting about articulating his views in such a way that it inspires people to follow rather than simply heaping more guilt upon them. Moreover, the Bishop, for as interested as he seems to be in politics, should be a little bit more savvy of the media "spin" that has used the phrase "moral values" to paint every Bush supporter with the fundy brush.
Or perhaps all that it means is that Bishop Hanson was not approached by an exit poller.

Religious groups that focus on what he termed
"fundamentalism" and "Pentecostalism," are getting more
attention, Hanson said, adding he was "not willing to say that in
that religious landscape we have nothing to say as Lutheran
Christians." The ELCA can "become an evangelizing church in a
Lutheran 'key,'" he said.

That is because Pentecostals and fundamentalists, for all we whine and complain about them, take each individual seriously. For Bishop Hanson, it seems as if we privileged need only be awakened to our privileged status, and all will be well. He is not interested in our healing, only in the healing of those who interest him.

Comments? Chime in. As always, I could be wrong, and as always, I pray for my bishops and for my fellow pastors.

Links added

I figured out how to add links to the sidebar. (Applause)

Check them out, if you don't already know about them. Oremus Bible Browser is the only site I know of that offers online searching of the NRSV.

Back in the pulpit for the first time since Oct 10. Consecration Sunday Dinner bet. services so no Sunday School. No YG tonight either. Almost like a vacation day for me.

The kids are asleep and I am listening to the Music Box on witf.org. Tonight I hope to say Vespers, do a little reading and go to bed.

How it all began

A slightly different take on the Creation of the internet...

And yes, I blogged this post with Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Now to work.

President Hanson weighs in on Arafat

Film at 11.


http://www.lutheranworld.org/News/LWI/EN/1556.EN.html

anyone interested?

give me a holler. Let me know.

Pax Christi
Chip