Feature

Articulating Faith

Arthur Van Seters

Back in the early 1970s William Stringfellow, a tenacious lawyer and lay theologian, contended that what the church most needed was the spiritual gift of discernment. That is, one should exercise the gift of spiritual insight that truly engages the particular times in which you are living. Now, in the listing of spiritual gifts by the apostle Paul, discernment is not explicitly mentioned. But Stringfellow, speaking at a Presbyterian College convocation in Montreal, made a compelling case. The social upheaval of the 60s, the long drawn out Cold War and profound questions raised by the Vietnam War were among the growing challenges to face those who would soon enter ordained ministry. For him the witness of Scripture to the Gospel of Christ compelled discernment of the times as a spiritual discipline.

Sharing The Love

Calvin Brown

February is a time when we think about love and part of that is the Lenten emphasis on repentence for not loving enough. As I thought about that I reflected on my experiences with our Muslim neighbours.

Transforming the land

Alex MacDonald

Augusta Gómez remembers when her mother began to work with Soynica — a partner of Presbyterian World Service & Development committed to helping communities in Nicaragua improve nutrition — more than seven years ago. She watched over the next five years as her mother transformed her one-and-a-half acres of land into a kaleidoscope of fruit and vegetables destined for the local market and family dinner table. Not bad, Augusta thought, but she was sure she could do even better with the plot of land right next to her mother's. And so began a bit of friendly competition that benefited both families.

South to South

Mary Lou Johnston

This is a success story that must be told. It involves the determination of one man and his wife, some seed money, and the abundance of God's creation. It is the transfer of ideas from one southern country (Nicaragua) to another (El Salvador) with the help of our church in Canada. And the most thrilling thing is that this idea can continue to grow and develop in other directions because it involves plants and animals, which naturally reproduce. The economists call it sustainable development. But to those of us who have been involved, it is the result of the spirit of God working in the hearts of people in all three countries.

Living in a Gardasil World

Roland J. De Vries

Although it seemed a relatively innocuous line item in last year's federal budget, the Conservative government's HPV (human papillomavirus) vaccination program has generated more controversy than might have been expected. The latest instalment in the debate unfolded as various Catholic school boards in Ontario considered whether to allow the vaccine to be administered within their elementary schools. The Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops weighed in with an open letter, suggesting that introduction of the vaccine is inconsistent with a Roman Catholic understanding of human life and sexuality.

Sharing The Love

Calvin Brown

February is a time when we think about love and part of that is the Lenten emphasis on repentence for not loving enough. As I thought about that I reflected on my experiences with our Muslim neighbours.

A Heart for the Poor

Alex MacLeod

The new face of evangelicalism is down to earth — it comes barrelling in from southern California in the form of a big bear-hug of a man in faded blue jeans. All in orange and green and brown in his trademark Hawaiian shirt, Rick Warren is the pastor of one of the biggest congregations in North America, Saddleback Church in Orange County, just south of Los Angeles. He's also the author of The Purpose Driven Life, the world's bestselling book from 2003-2005.

Presby-assyrians

Jennifer Higgs

The story of a small town and congregation in rural Saskatchewan begins halfway around the world and more than 100 years ago, when settlers from Persia came to North Battleford to build their future on Canadian soil. They fled from religious persecution and formed a Presbyterian community that continues to influence worshippers today.

The Protestant Liturgy

Stephen Hayes

Kathleen Norris, the American poet and author well known for her meditations on the Christian faith (The Cloister Walk, Amazing Grace), refers to hymns as “the Protestant liturgy” in one of her books.

A Winter Birthday

Barry Baldwin

Matthew (2:1-16) and Luke (2:1-20), the Biblical nativity narrators, do not specify the date of Jesus' birth. Still, as Northrop Frye remarks in The Great Code: The Bible and Literature, “The Gospels are not biography.” John (21:25) had already concluded, “And there are many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.”

A Closed Mind

W. Owen Thornton

Philosopher Karl Popper talks about having an attitude of reasonableness in a debate. The attitude of reasonableness suggests that two combatants come to the table on either side of a debate knowing that they are right, willing to convince the other person they are right, but accepting that the other person has a viable view and that they may have to adopt the opponent's viewpoint. My position is that believers have an attitude of reasonableness. Atheists do not. In fact atheists cannot be reasonable for reasons I intend to explain.

Prayer and Violence

Doug Lackie

Record readers first met Doug Lackie in the April issue as he was anticipating his work as an Ecumenical Accompanier serving on the World Council of Churches' Ecumenical Program in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). The following are excerpts from his reports during his time in Israel this Spring. The opinions expressed are Mr. Lackie's.

Afghanistan's dusty hope

afaiz

I can't keep up with Sayed Ahmad. His compact wiry body is constantly on the move, driven to do something good in his beloved land. He has lived his 50-something years here in the province of Bamiyan, Afghanistan. He watched the Soviets enter in the early 80's, then the Mujahadin and then the Taliban. He watched two massive 1,500-year-old Buddhas bombed into oblivion by the Taliban; he watched friends, neighbours, relatives arrested and murdered; he has watched his own community, his people, slowly disintegrate through 30 years of war and then drought.