Not Just Rotary With a Pointy Roof: Archbishop Justin Welby on His Faith and the Church He Serves

An encouraging read this morning. Charles Moore, a school mate of Justin Welby, writing in The Telegraph. Apart from the title of this post, the following statements caught my eye particularly:

Does he know Jesus? “Yes. I do. He’s both someone one knows and someone one scarcely knows at all, an utterly intimate friend and yet with indescribable majesty.”

Because he came to faith dramatically, he has few prejudices about which tradition to inhabit. “I am a spiritual magpie,” he says. As well as speaking in tongues (a Protestant practice), he adores the sacrament of the eucharist (a Catholic one). He also says the morning and evening office, Book of Common Prayer version, in the chapel of the palace, every day. “Today it was Psalm 51, which is penitential. If you come in thinking how brilliant you are, it’s good to say that psalm.”

All here. H/T Anglican Down Under.

 

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Lulu of a Letter from Lambeth

On behalf of God, Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, writes to Lulu, a six year old Scottish girl who wrote a letter asking God how He got invented:

Dear Lulu,
Your dad has sent on your letter and asked if I have any answers. It’s a difficult one! But I think God might reply a bit like this –
‘Dear Lulu – Nobody invented me – but lots of people discovered me and were quite surprised. They discovered me when they looked round at the world and thought it was really beautiful or really mysterious and wondered where it came from. They discovered me when they were very very quiet on their own and felt a sort of peace and love they hadn’t expected. Then they invented ideas about me – some of them sensible and some of them not very sensible. From time to time I sent them some hints – specially in the life of Jesus – to help them get closer to what I’m really like. But there was nothing and nobody around before me to invent me. Rather like somebody who writes a story in a book, I started making up the story of the world and eventually invented human beings like you who could ask me awkward questions!’
And then he’d send you lots of love and sign off. I know he doesn’t usually write letters, so I have to do the best I can on his behalf. Lots of love from me too.
+Archbishop Rowan

Brilliant.

H/T Faith and Theology.

Lent and Premature Alleluias

I enjoyed this....

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams - Easter Message to his Diocese

I was always taught, of course, that you should never under any circumstances say ‘Alleluia’ during Lent. It was like giving up chocolate or alcohol. Save it till Easter, and then you’ll really enjoy it as it was meant to be enjoyed.

There’s plenty of good sense about this, if we understand what Lent is properly about – a preparation for Easter, a reminder that we still live in a world in which Easter hasn’t yet quite sunk in and changed as it should.
...

Well, this year I started Lent in Sudan.
...

one thing you quickly discover at worship in the Sudan is that there is no occasion free from alleluias. That Ash Wednesday service echoed with the joyful shouting of ‘Alleluia’ – from the children and the women especially as we came in, from every speaker who got near the microphone during the service, in hymns and songs throughout. My liturgical conscience had to resign and slink away. Lent it might be, but this was not an Easter-free zone.

UPDATE: sorry, can't find the link any more.

He Reigns!

The sun is shining, our son, Anthony, and Kristy, his wife, are visiting for the weekend. Life is good.

Something for a spring day from William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury from 1942-1944, from the opening sermon to the Lambeth Conference:

While we deliberate, He reigns; when we decide wisely, He reigns; when we decide foolishly, He reigns; whe we serve Him in humble loyalty, He reigns; when we serve Him self assertively, He reigns; when we rebel and seek to withhold our service, He reigns - the Alpha and the Omega which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty. Amen.

The heaven of it is, the same applies whatever is happening in our lives at the moment: when we mourn the loss of a loved one, enjoy some back-yard solitude, suffer through a difficult time and enjoy our friends and families on a spring day.

Deep Theology: Jesus Loves Me This I Know

Just read Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams,' sermon to mark the 450th anniversary of the martyrdom of Thomas Cranmer, the one who, essentially, wrote The Book of Common Prayer. Williams quotes Karl Barth, a great theologian who summed up his Church Dogmatics to an interviewer with the words:

'Jesus loves me, this I know, For the Bible tells me so'.

...and that about says it all for this Wednesday.