Drell’s Descants

Well, I can’t begin to describe what a wonderful time I had at this last Kairos weekend. It had been a year and a half since I had served a complete weekend, as during 2007 I was focused on my duties as state chair. Frankly, after 2006 serving on two Kairos weekends and attending General Convention 2006 while attending to state Kairos business and attending closings all over the state, I was tired and needed to recharge the spiritual batteries.

Kairos Prison Ministry is so definitely what God has called me to do. I so feel his pleasure when I am in the prison and exercising a ministry of listening and loving with these men. Men who have so often not known God, love, basic kindness, anyone who listened to them and cared for them without an agenda, who don’t receive visits from family, or mail, or decent food. It is amazing what just a little bit of normality coupled with Jesus Christ can do for someone’s soul and outlook.

The man sitting to the left of me at my table accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior this weekend. Lots of other miracles abounded in changes of attitude and countenance, some of the other men came to Jesus as well, and many whose faith has been broken or destroyed were restored.

I also really benefited from my own intense prayers to the Lord this weekend. Even though I pray daily, it lacks the intensity of prayers said when I am away from the world for a while.

It is also so very refreshing to see unity in the Body of Christ among Christians of so many denominations in this ministry whereas we experience such intense disunity in the Episcopal Church, precisely because we all agree on what the members of the Episcopal Church can’t.

Here is Kairos’ statement of faith:

The people of Kairos are called by God to share the love of Christ with those impacted by incarceration. Kairos encourages believers from a variety of Christian traditions to be volunteers in this Christ-filled ministry.
Kairos programs offer to prison residents, their families, and those who work with them, the opportunity to receive God’s forgiveness through faith in Jesus Christ, and to grow in their faith and servanthood in Christian community.
We stand on the common ground of the following elements of faith:
We in Kairos believe:
The Bible is God’s authoritative and inspired word for our faith and our lives.
In the Trinity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit;
In the deity, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ;
Friendship with God is a free gift, for God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.
The love of Jesus Christ motivates His followers to provide food for the hungry, drink to the thirsty, welcome to the stranger, clothes for the naked, and visits to the sick and those in prison.
In sharing the love and forgiveness of Jesus Christ with all incarcerated individuals, their families and to those who work with them inside and outside the correctional institution.

If you start with the part “We in Kairos believe” and substitute the Episcopal Church for Kairos and put this in the form a resolution at General Convention, it would fail. Miserably. They’d get hung up on this Jesus being God stuff, John 3:16 as it requires belief in Jesus, and heck, they might even object to working with all incarcerated individuals, saying some should be excluded. I don’t know, but I think if a church can’t buy this simple statement of faith that gives a wide berth to all kinds of Christians to believe in different things but really focuses on the cores issues, then, well, that church is in deep trouble, and may not even be Christian anymore.

But, if the Episcopal Church could pass a statement like this, then I would have a lot fewer problems with it. I don’t know if I’ll try to do something like this in 2009.

Kairos Winn #28 is coming up this weekend. This will be a powerful weekend, particularly because we have the largest team on record for this weekend and we will host 42 residents rather than the usual 30.

One of the things we do is have a prayer chain that covers the entire weekend in prayer. Every minute is prayed for by someone who volunteers for a ten minute block of prayer. This is represented to the residents in the form of paper links representing each minute, with the name and town of the person praying.

I have drawn the 3:00 a.m. to 4:20 a.m. shift on Sunday morning. I am hoping some brave souls and or folks who read this blog from other parts of the world might volunteer, as the times I have are CDT.

Please leave a comment on this blog if you can pray during the above cited time. Thanks in advance for your support!

Note: There will be an interview of Kairos Executive Director John Thompson on Sirius 159, the Catholic Channel, tonight.

Kairos Prison Ministry
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: (407) 629-4948

Sharing the love and forgiveness of Jesus Christ in Prison

“There is always discussion about our ministry plans and our future ministries. Certainly we care about inmates and their reentry into society. We want prisoners to have education, good medical care, job training, etc. However, we must never lose sight of the original vision of our ministry. The vision of our founders and the reason God has blessed us so generously. We bring the love of Jesus Christ to inmates and through Kairos Outside to their families. We are currently just touching the surface of that core ministry.” – John A. Thompson, Jr., Executive Director, Kairos

“I have never seen the Gospel impact a group of people with such power and so quickly. I do not think I have ever laughed as much or cried as much or prayed as much as I did during those four days.” — The Rt. Rev. Furman C. Stough, former Episcopal Bishop of Alabama.

“I have known for years, as have most of the leading criminologists in the country, that the greatest hope for an inmate to avoid the revolving doors of our prisons is to undergo a religious conversion experience during his or her incarceration.” – Dr. Peter P. Legins, Prof. Emeritus, University of Maryland, Institute of Criminal Justice and Criminology.

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart for giving my son a time he will never forget. I hope you know that when you gave my son that gift you also gave it to me.” — A mother of a Kairos participant in Oklahoma.

“After 12 years involvement with this ministry at all levels, I believe the strength of Kairos is in how we build an ecumenical community and then, through the power of the Holy Spirit, transform the lives of those we minister to as we help them build their own Christian communities.” – Ross Anderson, Former President of the Kairos Board of Directors

“I am amazed by the way God re-educated me in prison and opened up this waiting door for me so quickly and wonderfully. I thank him every day for the way my life has been changed by the Lord Jesus.” - A former inmate from West Glamorgan, U.K.

The following are comments made by Kairos graduates immediately following the three-day short course (names withheld to protect inmates’ privacy):

“I’ve been locked up since I was 16 and I’m not getting out for a long time. When you’re faced with that, reality is dark. At times, you find things that light your way. This agape love will forever be a light in my darkness.”

“I came to Kairos with a heavy heart, full of anger, hate and revenge. While in Kairos, I heard a speech on forgiveness. I needed that because of what happened to my son. Because I was locked up I wasn’t there to protect him and stop terrible things from happening to him. With the plans I had for this young man, God helped me give the gift of life back.”

“What spiritual condition was I in when I came? I was in critical condition. I hope to be out of the hospital soon with the love of Jesus. I discovered agape love I never experienced before except from my grandma.”

“When I came, I had no faith in myself, no faith in mankind and no faith in God. God loved me when I could not love myself. I’ve dedicated anew, my life to Christ.”

For more information on the Kairos Prison Ministry, call John Thompson, executive director @ (407) 629-4948 or visit the Kairos website at www.kairosprisonministry.org.

Jazz Violin. Unreal.

Bishop Jefferts Clueless. Read it all.

Read it all; here is part:

Bishops attending the Lambeth Conference will be asked to affirm their willingness to abide by the recommendations of the Windsor Report and work towards the creation of an Anglican Communion Covenant.

A spokesman for the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams told The Church of England Newspaper that letters affirming support for Windsor and the Covenant process had not yet been mailed, but would go out presently.

Bishops attending Lambeth must have a “willingness to work with those aspects of the [Lambeth] Conference’s agenda that relate to implementing the recommendations of [the Windsor Report], including the development of a Covenant,” Dr. Williams wrote in his Dec. 14 Advent pastoral letter.

The Windsor Report calls for a ban on gay bishops and blessings and discouraged violating the diocesan boundaries of bishops in opposing theological camps. Affirming the recommendations of the Windsor Report may cause difficulty for US Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and other progressive American, Canadian, Brazilian and British bishops who have given either their formal or informal support to moves to normalize homosexuality within the life of the church. It also closes the door on full participation in the conference of the Bishop of New Hampshire, the Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson.

From here:

The recent deposition of bishops John-David Schofield and William J. Cox lends credence to those who say two sets of rules govern The Episcopal Church, according to Bishop D. Bruce MacPherson of Western Louisiana.

At a diocesan standing committee meeting on April 14, all six members approved a statement that noted that the deposition votes of the House of Bishops on March 12 failed to achieve the canonically required number of votes for enactment. A pastoral emergency prevented Bishop MacPherson from attending the standing committee meeting, but he endorsed the statement and urged its approval the following day at a meeting of diocesan council. All 19 members of council present also approved the resolution.

“The purpose is to express displeasure and concern, to encourage everyone to obey the canons” Bishop MacPherson told The LivingChurch. “Right now there is a disparity. It appears there are two different sets of rules for one church.”

When the statement was introduced during the council meeting by the Rev. William R. Bryant, president of the standing committee, one council member questioned whether everyone was familiar enough with the details to cast an informed vote. In response, Bishop MacPherson provided a brief narrative history and commended the statement for council approval.

“I didn’t twist anyone’s arms,” he said. “I told them it was important that we clearly state where we are as a diocese. We have got to have consistency and order. That is the purpose of the canons.”

The Very Rev. Peter J.A. Cook, a member of the standing committee, said Western Louisiana was hoping that other “right-thinking dioceses” would also express their concern. Western Louisiana, he said, had been inspired by a similar resolution approved by the South Carolina standing committee and bishop.

“The failure of the House of Bishops to follow proper procedure in deposing bishops Cox and Schofield resulted from no accidental reading of the canons,” Dean Cook said. “It, and the manner of the Presiding Bishop’s intrusion into San Joaquin’s affairs, were deliberate and ride roughshod over proper canonical procedure.”

Pay close attention to the quotes from Bishop MacPherson and from Fr. Cook, at whose behest I wrote the statement for consideration by the Standing Committee.

STATEMENT OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE
DIOCESE OF WESTERN LOUISIANA
This 14th day of April, 2008.
We, the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Western Louisiana, make this statement that we do not recognize the depositions of Bishops Schofield and Cox as having had the requisite canonical votes necessary for the deposition of a bishop. We would refer the Church to the March 27, 2008 letter from the Standing Committee and Bishop of South Carolina to the Presiding Bishop, which we believe to be correct in its recitation of the applicable canons and their history.

The Constitution and Canons of the Episcopal Church have been held up by some church leaders as part of the way forward for our broken church, in that these governing documents provide a procedural basis for our common life together. One of the main justifications for the actions taken at General Convention 2003 regarding the consents to the Bishop of New Hampshire was that the Diocese of New Hampshire had followed the canonical process in electing a bishop. We also note that the Diocese of South Carolina was held to an exacting standard in obtaining consents for the consecration of Bishop Mark Lawrence, while such exacting standards as to form of consents have not been applied to any other Episcopal election to our knowledge.

However, such documents cannot provide the basis for our common life when they are ignored for expediency’s sake. Selective enforcement of canonical requirements breeds mistrust in the church which can preclude reconciliation. Moreover, we find that the uncanonical actions taken in the matter of the depositions of Bishops Cox and Schofield erode confidence in the church and its canonical processes and delegitimize subsequent actions taken by the Presiding Bishop and others in attempting to reorganize the Diocese of San Joaquin.

We call upon all in authority in the church, including ourselves, to follow the Constitution and Canons of the Episcopal Church in decision making.

Adopted unanimously April 14, 2008, with a motion that the same be sent to:
The Presiding Bishop
Episcopal Life Online
The Living Church
Alive (Robert Harwell, Ed.)
Standing Committee of the Diocese of South Carolina

Endorsed by Bishop MacPherson On April 15, 2008

UPDATE: The Diocesan Council expressed its support by unanimous resolution for this statement by the Standing Committee on April 15, 2008.

Hmmmm.

After a summer and autumn of various tangled and unsatisfactory events, the Archbishop then wrote an Advent pastoral letter in which he reiterated the terms of his initial invitation and declared that he would be writing to those bishops who might be thought particularly unsympathetic to Windsor and the Covenant to ask them whether they were really prepared to build on this dual foundation. Those letters, I understand, are in the post as we speak, written with apostolic pain and heart-searching but also with apostolic necessity. I am well aware that many will say this is far too little, far too late - just as many others will be livid to think that the Archbishop, having already not invited Gene Robinson to Lambeth, should be suggesting that some others might absent themselves as well. But this is what he promised he would do, and he is doing it. If I know anything about anything, I know that he deserves our prayers at this most difficult and fraught moment in the run-up to Lambeth itself.

We are heading down to Lafayette later this morning for a visit.