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September 20, 2006
Why seek oversight outside:There is hope within the USA
"Silver and gold I have none: but what we have, we give you." These words of the Apostle Peter, are ours now. What we have is a deep faith in Jesus and commitment towards His Kingdom in the traditional Anglican way.
The coffers of our church may not be full, but our hearts are full of love for the Lord and His faithful. This is what you will experience in any of our UECNA churches: traditional God-focused liturgy, sound doctrine reminiscent of the old church, sacramental worship, faithful who travel sometimes great distances to attend the service, exuberant love within the ambience of smallness of the congregation and dedication to one another. You will also find priests who are convinced of their calling, at the service of the people, wanting to foster the families in the Anglican faith tradition.
These days there seems to be a trend toward turning to the global south for oversight. There is still hope within United States among the continuing churches!
Here is one of my earlier blogs in the April of 2005:
The “Faith once given to the saints” has been subjected to so much compromise to fit the convenience of some individuals that the faithful people are constantly challenged by the proponents of such compromise. Those who abide by Scriptures and Traditions are not merely conservatives but the FAITHFUL. Those who abdicate Scripture and tradition are the apostates.
Such faithful ministers of God and the faithful people need not have to look to Africa for an apostolic oversight. There is hope within United States. There is the UNITED EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF NORTH AMERICA, that has rejected ECUSA’s slippery slope right from the start, since 30 years ago: UECNA continues to be faithful to the FAITH AND MORALS codified in the Scriptures and Apostolic Tradition. The 1928 Book of Common Prayer is what we use in the worship, adhering to the theology and liturgy and all the great time honored values that they entail. UECNA is Biblically Sound, Sacramentally Orthodox and Apostolically Valid. We will continue serving the Lord until His Second Coming.
May His blessings be with you as you stand up for the truth. And the TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE!
Posted by frleo at 10:08 PM | Comments (0)
September 19, 2006
Whither gone the visionary gleam?
We read stories of clergy men who have been faithful priests in the Anglican Tradition and leave to join Rome and stories of Laity in search of a lasting place leaving their tradition for Rome. Perhaps the doctrinal security and the conservatism provides a safe haven in Rome! The question remains: Why leave a small Anglican church in order to be lost in the anonymity of numbers when we can foster the faith once given to the saints through our Anglican tradition?
My life has been the other way around. Having been in Rome since my childhood, nay almost until a decade after my priesthood, I have seen the way authority and autocracy have left several priests and seminarians in a make or break situation. I've seen favoritism, powermongering, abuse of authority, etc. destroy a genuine calling to the priesthood. Some of these misguided leaders of the church are under the impression that they have total contol over the other just because the other has given his will over to God under the vow of obedience. This tends to make many naiive ministers, literally slaves, not to Christ and His kingdom, but to the few autocrats. In the case of laity, people who because of their lives' situation have met with divorce, have hope of neither salvation nor any sacramental means to the same. Or the righteous feeling, "nulla salus ex ecclesia" no salvation outside the church - often seems to be exclusively claimed, so that Christians from other denomination are made to squirm. On the part of the self-righteous, somewhere in the subconscious, there is often a feeling that I am one up or better than you. These are not just thoughts but have been true attitudes of some devout Roman Catholics who still think that I am doomed because I am no longer with the Roman church. One of them is still praying for my soul.
Against this backdrop, I think of my mother. If there was one who should have been utterly bitter and angry, it should have been her. A very devout catholic who did not miss the daily mass even up to today, at age 83. She is very proud of my, continuation in the priesthood. She tells me that soon after I met with an accident and I was dismissed from my duties as a priest, she went on her knees on a Maundy Thursday and prayed for my persistence in my vocation as a priest. This was four years ago. Even till today, she remembers her supplication to the Lord and is thankful that He answered her prayers. She saw me off when I was 14 as I left for the minor seminary. Next to God, she knew how much I cherished my calling.
I believe in holy catholic and apostolic church: This is the creed that I professed when I was a Roman and now as an Anglican. The bottom line is that I am a catholic – that I hold on to the universal truth of the historic faith in Jesus as handed down through the apostles and early fathers of the church. This is the bedrock of my belief, the belief that has been fostered by many a martyr with their blood and many a saint with the daily grind of life lived faithfully for His Kingdom and His cause.
No matter what denomination we belong to, the best thing is to leave the judgement part to the Almighty and each of us strive to do our utmost for the Highest. It is sad, that some are called to belong to this elitistic society, where heaven is guaranteed only for self and no other, either by way of attitudinal arrogance or by suicidal accomplishments of terrorists.
Anglicanism, is certainly a mid stream between the Roman church and the protestant church, heading towards the destination, without getting stuck on either side of the banks, having the faith nurtured through Scripture, Sacraments and Reasoning, enabling us to decipher the will of God, we can safely sail across. In the meantime if there are friends whom we have missed, let us remember to pray for them, hoping that we all will meet someday at Jesus' feet. I am still content that we are noticed in the smallness of our churches and are not lost in the obscurity of anonimity. We all can be the mustard seed that Jesus speaks of, tiny yet potent, capable of growing into little trees or shrubs giving nests for the birds of the air. Do not be ashamed if you belong to a small church, keep doing the good job, continue investing into the kingdom to come, by loving God and your neighbor.
Strange, born in India in a populace of 1.2 billion of which only 2.6% is Christian against 82% of Hindus, the land of spirituality, the land of Gandhi and sages that I grew up as a Roman Catholic. Went to an RC school, taught by great nuns and Montfort brothers and faithful teachers--Great teachers, wonderful influences, something that I will never forget. So much so, I remember visiting with this nun who was in her late seventies, whose shoes I used to get in as a kid, of which my sister will still make fun of me. There she was a granny. This nun wanted me to stay after school and she offered me a snack so that I could stay there for the evening eucharist and then go home. My mom certainly knew I was in safe hands. God bless this nun who shared with me His care and kindness.
Wanting to be a priest: That was my calling as a kid and therefore no nonsense! I remember leaving home in March of 1976 for the vocation camp.
I went naively with high hopes. Its strange how authority was an abuse in the middle ages and even now. The saints who recommended a spiritual way of life, saw in one’s will, the willingness to submit to authority and obey. Some of the veterans would know the system of watering the dry stick – just out of sheer obedience and not to ask the reason why. It was that kind of obedience that was inculcated in me or any novice. Could you imagine authority transferring into wrong hands, a person who could care less for God’s will and instead purely reflecting one’s own instinct. That certainly happened in my situation.
So, I am content as an Anglican where authority is reflected in servitude and I am glad to be a servant. If you are an Anglican/Episcopal priest, please do not give up your call. You have so much to offer within this Anglican catholic faith. So many souls to be cared for. And certainly the Good Lord's blessings will be yours.
Posted by frleo at 11:22 PM | Comments (0)
September 17, 2006
History's Lessons
History has been the record of events of humanity in terms of spatial-temporal categories and cause and events. This contains things that we can be proud of as well as things to be ashamed of. The role of every religion is to encourage its followers in holding on to what is truth, beauty and goodness that is so much the characteristic of God. Whatever atrocities have been done to humanity in the name of belief, philosophy or someone's idiosyncrasy is to be despised. Certainly winning followers for one's religion is not by the annihilation of another human persona.
If there is any religious belief that subscribes to fanaticism, fundamentalism and violence, its belief system calls for reconsideration. If the goal of religion is ultimate salvation of the human person, then it cannot negate itself in the destruction of fellow human beings. Otherwise we are reinventing the barbaric Stone Age, the survival of the fittest and the ideology that might is right.
Moderates in any religion need to speak up and reflect what the tenets of a religion hold out for the benefit of humanity. Burning at stakes, Jihad or killing of missionaries in any part of the world is inhuman. At the end of it all, if we are doing this in the name of Almighty God, wonder if the Almighty will approve of championing His cause by the misguided loyalists.
God has endowed us with reasoning and therefore we need to engage in a civil manner even if we choose to disagree. What kind of a world are we passing on to our posterity, is something worth asking. Devaluing one's life through suicides and that of others by homicide or genocide is not the right seeds of morality that we are sowing in the minds of the young.
If pointing this out warrants an apology, then we all owe an endless apology down the human history for the atrocities committed against ourselves down the centuries as far as we could see. Whether it is sanctioned by one's religion or not, taking out the lives of the others for any reason, is certainly against the mind of the Creator. We need to remember that today's story is a tommorrow's history.
Posted by frleo at 7:16 PM | Comments (0)
September 12, 2006
UECNA - Who are we?
Some have been wondering about who the UECNA is! In a letter to his flock, our Presiding Bishop, The Most Reverend Stephen C. Reber Sr. ponders on the identity of UECNA. Read on.
The United Episcopal Church embraces the divine truth that Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior, the Supreme Head of His Body— the Church. That church is both Catholic and Apostolic. That means we are a Sacramental church in the traditional time honored way. We believe that the sacraments are “of the church” in the double sense that they are “by her” and “for her”. They are “by the Church”, for she is the sacrament of Christ’s action at work in her through the mission of the Holy Spirit. They are “for the church” in the sense that the sacraments make the church, since they manifest and communicate to men, above all in the Eucharist, the mystery of communion with God, who is love, one in three persons. Forming, as it were, one mystical person with Christ the head, the church acts in the sacraments as an organically structured priestly community.We profess that the sacraments of the new law were instituted by Jesus Christ, our Lord. The sacraments are “powers that come forth” from the Body of Christ, which is ever-living and life-giving. They are actions of the Holy Spirit at work in his body, the Church. They are “the masterworks of God” in the new and everlasting covenant.
The Apostolically ordained ministry (priesthood) guarantees that it is Christ who acts in the sacrament through the Holy Spirit for the Church.
The saving mission entrusted by the Father to his incarnate son was committed to the apostles and through them to their successors: they receive the Spirit of Jesus to act in his name and in his person. The ordained minister is the sacramental bond that ties the liturgical action to what the apostles said and did and, through them, to the words and actions of Christ, the source and foundation of the sacraments.
The real purpose of the sacraments is to sanctify men, to build up the Body of Christ and to give worship to God alone. Because they are signs, they also instruct. They not only presuppose faith, but by words and objects they also nourish, strengthen and express it. That is why the are called “sacraments of faith”.
As Anglicans, we then accept the components of the faith revealed; the Scriptures, Creeds, Councils, Sacraments, Worship, Ministry, and Tradition. We believe that all of the components are like strands of a rope; a unity which holds the church together. In this belief we share a Catholic ideal way of faith.
The Reformation of the 16th century was the most comprehensive and far reaching effect to return the Christian faith to its legitimate roots of faith and practice. We accept the English Reformation as that which diligently sought the true sources of faith and discredited the many corruptions and distortions of the Middle Ages. Actually, the Articles of Religion found in the Prayer Book were written not as a statement of faith, but to deal with the above mentioned distortions and corruptions of the medieval church.
We do not, however, accept the theology of the Continental Reformation or its uncatholic effort which tried to discard the fundamental principles of the historic faith along with the abuses.
We do not accept private innovations intruding into the Church’s teachings. We honor Luther, Calvin, Knox and others for their efforts to explain the faith, but do not accept them as having prophetic abilities to speak for God.
We celebrate the historic faith-fundamental form of Christianity; its faith, worship, teaching, devotions and life with joy and love and with real thankfulness and real confidence. We believe this catholic approach to be the most comprehensive and satisfying expression of gratitude for God’s unlimited love and mercy.
We believe God has given us a special position as a “bridge church”—a bridge between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. We proclaim a living way of faith and worship that believes in every persons right to life, honor traditional marriage between a man a woman and practice financial policies that allow local ownership of local property (Church, parish house, etc).
The United Episcopal Church of North America, while coming from the American arm of the Anglican Communion and having our apostolic succession from these bodies, does not belong to either of these organizations nor shares their extreme liberal views on morals and their abandonment of orthodoxy.
We are a church truly catholic and evangelical in scope and embrace a broad base of ceremonial practice inherent in the Historic Anglican Tradition. Look us up on the web: www.united-episcopal.org or call today 1 704 871 0272 or 479 756 5074. We are just what you are looking for in a faith community.
Blessings
++ Stephen C. Reber, Sr.
The Presiding Bishop
The United Episcopal Church of North America
Posted by frleo at 6:32 PM | Comments (0)
September 11, 2006
Remembering 9/11 let us take a moment to pray for...
OUR COUNTRY
ALMIGHTY God, who hast given us this good land for our heritage; We humbly beseech thee that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of thy favour and glad to do thy will. Bless our land with honourable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogancy, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindreds and tongues. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in thy Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to thy law, we may show forth thy praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in thee to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
For all the dear departed
REMEMBER thy servants, O Lord, according to the favour which thou bearest unto thy people, and grant that, increasing in knowledge and love of thee, they may go from strength to strength, in the life of perfect service, in thy heavenly kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, ever, one God, world without end. Amen.
GOD BLESS AMERICA!
Posted by frleo at 8:15 AM | Comments (0)
September 10, 2006
9/11: God bless America
Landing in New York JFK airport in August of 2000, was something unbelievable for me, coming from a third world country. I was standing on the ground of the "Land of Freedom" looking at the Statue of Liberty.
In the few days that followed, I boarded with my priest friend who was assisting at the Our Lady of Victory's church on Wall Street. In the evening hours one of the places that we visited was the WTC. Upon the pavement we stretched ourselves and embraced the feeling what literally and figuratively WTC stood for.
A year later, when the planes were used as missiles against WTC towers, I was sitting at the Northwest Arkansas Community College attending my Spanish class. Unbelievable. I got out asap and went to my house on the hospital premises and like all other fellow citizens began to watch and watch and watch the incredible catastrophe that was forced on us by the terrorists.
Checking back with my priest friend on Wall Street, I heard about the heaps of ashes that were strewn from the bellowing towers that lost their anchors. I heard about my priest friend's ongoing involvement in the counseling triages that were set up. The magnitude of the tragedy only began to unfold.
Perhaps at that time we did not know who the culprits were, but five years later, we certainly are aware of the operatives of terrorism that is supported by the religious fundamentalism. Will God ever reward the so-called suicide bombers for their heroism...a world or fundamentalism gone bezurk! If there is heaven to be attained then let us make it happen here.
Sadly enough, all of the families who have lost their dear ones are never going to recover. Our thoughts and prayers are with them as they have to come to terms with their loss at each anniversary. But one good thing happened out of tragedy. At the same time, "One nation under God", "God bless America" resonated the length and breath of the country. We felt united as a nation. There was no political correctness whatsoever. Everyone got down on their knees and prayed for the victims and prayed for the safety of our nation.
Should we only turn to God in times of calamity? How about hoping in Him, anchoring our lives on Him. Good to pray for this great nation that has afforded us everything. Good to think of men and women who have given their lives in defence of freedom. Let us strive to foster this deep seated faith in God, in the hearts and minds of people. That we will turn to Him always, no matter what life brings. God bless America!
Posted by frleo at 5:33 PM | Comments (0)