Diversity or University

Diversity or University

In the past it was a pleasant word

If not innocuous.

It pointed first to variety then spurred

Toward the vacuous.

With the spoken word progressively distorted

And correct speech politically enforced,

Violators of tongue now escorted

To prisons of languages divorced.

Diversity in truth no longer abides.

Its original undergirding destroyed,

Diversity now divides

A univers-ity once employed.

Remembering Doug Davidson

Remembering Doug Davidson

My friend Doug passed away last evening (May 16, 2016). He was in his late 70s, he might have been eighty. But what does that matter? Perhaps we have seen each other only three or four times in the past 55 years. But I remember him, our mutual friends, and our time as youth.

We were not the so-called “Baby Boomers.” Our births preceded the arbitrary designation for boomers, but in some way we were part of that generation. Our home town was Norfolk, Virginia – a U.S. Navy town – and our parents were the ones who endured, and for some participated in, World War II.

A goodly dozen of us were close friends in the 1950s. I was on the younger side. My older sister Cynthia, and Nancy, Lois, Kathy, Mary Faye, Frances, Bob, Paul, Fred, and Doug were the “seniors.” What was our glue? Doug may not have been the oldest ,but he was the tallest of the group and he was our upbeat, natural leader. He possessed the simple charm of happiness. He also sported a “butch” haircut. The rest of us guys had “crew cuts” and once Elvis came on the scene our hair amazingly grew longer.

Doug was employed. If I remember correctly he worked for a supply company named Empire. He always had a car – usually a fairly large vehicle. He probably upgraded his wheels every 12 months. I remember quite vividly when he bought a dazzling, new, red and white Mercury Phaeton. That would have been in 1956. WOW, what a car! The announcement for that amazing people carrier was made on the Ed Sullivan Show. Ah, I remember it well. But, back to the glue.

Doug was a natural leader even though at times he seemed shy. But we all shared in another glue, Norview Methodist Church. Sometime during those years we became Norview United Methodist Church. It was MYF or the Methodist Youth Fellowship that brought us together for the years of our youth. Almost every Sunday evening or late Sunday afternoon we would return to the church building for our MYF meetings. Afterwards we would drive down Sewells Point Road toward Little Creek Road, the point where those two roads intersected, and continued our fellowship by sharing a meal at Shoney’s.

Most everyone, well perhaps I was the prime person who, wanted to ride to Shoney’s in Doug’s Phaeton. He always obliged.

In our time the many Methodist Churches in Norfolk would gather their young people for weekend meetings and songfests. One gathering I continue to recall occurred at Park Place Methodist Church. I could not believe the number of young people gathered to fellowship with one another and to pray and to sing. I remember singing the “Alleluia Chorus.” (I worked hard on memorizing the words to the Alleluia Chorus). What a grand sound of voices it was. Ah, I remember it well.

So, I sit here writing this short essay with several senses attacking me. One reaction to Doug’s death is the immediacy of his passing to Nancy and her family, and to the rest of us. His days from health to illness to death were rapid. 

Another reaction to Doug's death is the speed of which the years of our time have passed. Time has too quickly been moving from its beginning to its end. When I think of Douglas Davidson in my mind I capture his smiling face and his friendly disposition. His is a great loss, but I must also think about Doug and friends through they eyes of God, if I may be so daring.

God made us free to love Him. We are also free not to love Him. So in life we choose.

God gave us the Church. (We celebrated the birth of the Church just this past Sunday – Pentecost). Our particular church gave us MYF and in that fellowship we learned to love God by loving our friends in a Godly relationship. The Trinitarian God - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit - is the perfect relationship. We knew that and we learned to live in that relationship throughout our lives.

My memory of Doug's life, the life he actually lived, is that his was a witness to the life in Christ that he and his forever-youthful friends shared and continue to share. Rest in Peace, Doug!

Douglas E. Davidson Obituary

Potential Presidential Cabinet Picks

Potential Presidential Cabinet Picks 2016-2017
DEMOCRATIC	O F F I C E	REPUBLICAN
Hillary Clinton (Cheryl Mills – Chief of Staff)	President	Donald Trump (Jeff Sessions – Chief of Staff)
Stephanie Rawlings-Blake	Vice President	Marco Rubio
Huma Abedin	Secretary of State	Jeb Bush
Mandy Grunwald	Secretary of Defense	General Jack Keane
Sidney Blumenthal	Justice	Chris Christie
John Podesta	Treasury	Carl Icahn
Gina Raimondo	Interior	Sam Brownback
Maya Harris	Agriculture	Jack Dalrympl
Bernie Sanders	Commerce	Michael Bloomberg
Elizabeth Warren	Labor	Carly Fiorino
Van Jones	Homeland Security	Rudy Giuliani
Regina Benjamin	Health & Human Services	Dr. Ben Carson
Muriel Elizabeth Bowser	Housing & Urban Development	Mia Love
Rodney Slater	Transportation	Susana Martinez
Maggie Hassan	Energy	John Thune
Kate Brown	Education	to be eliminated
Rachel Maddow	Veterans Affairs	Scott Walker

Only For the Last Line

Only For the Last Line

This will be easy

And you won’t think it strange

That in my youth how sleazy

My affairs did I arrange.

You will believe me,

But you will not observe

How I achieved not three

But two loves undeserved.

I should not have let it happen,

But I felt I could not change.

My driven desire wanted to tap in

To immediacy, not thinking long-range.

First it was Marge,

Statuesque and tall,

Some say large.

For her did I swiftly fall.

In my mindless youth

They were bountiful in the arena,

My eyes blinked as a sleuth

When I viewed the beautiful Tina.

Could this be true love?

How can one love two?

But away they both did not shove

Me like worn shoe.

Then I left them to serve in the militia,

Not really, it was the Marine Corps

When I met Patricia

And I knew to the other two I must close the door.

I chose a new freedom

With one love now, no more fooling around.

To the former two I asked that they see from

My point of view, not to weep tears and drown.

So, don’t cry for me, Marge and Tina.

Holy Saturday As We Wait

Holy Saturday As We Wait

Yesterday one man died

And so the hope of many with Him.

Weeping and wailing women cried.

No longer the day bright, but dim.

On the next darkened morning, the week's first day,

The Magdalene, bereft, in grief at her loss,

Visited His tomb. Empty. "They took Him away,"

She told her apostle brother who stood at the cross.

Her teacher nowhere to be found,

At His empty tomb she gives answer to a nearby gardener:

"They have taken Him from where He was bound."

Not knowing, Magdalene speaks to her pardoner.

Imagine the Magdalene's heart

Once full in presence of Absolute Love,

Empty, she thinks, being apart

And distant from Truth above.

The gardener inquires, "Woman, why do you weep?"

She asked, "Have you taken Him away?

Where does He now keep?"

"Mary", then gently did the Gardener say.

A lump in her throat, her ears heard clearly.

From her weeping she turned to sing.

"Rabboni, Rabboni, with all my heart I love dearly,"

She reaching with arms, He cautioned "Do not cling."

"I must ascend to my father" for man's sin just bore.

It was Mary, the first to greet the Risen Lord.

With death conquered and no more,

Christ and His purpose completed, one accord.

Glenn Beck, Ted Cruz, Donald Trump, and GOD

Glenn Beck, American Politics, and God

A few days ago in this Holy Week, I was driving to an appointment in the morning. Hardly do I listen to the radio while driving, but on this particular morning I turned on my car radio and began listening to Glenn Beck. So, I just listened. It took a few days later for me to realize what Beck had said.

Before writing this short piece I checked the blogosphere and Internet-based magazines to see if those sites had commented on what Beck said. They did. They have. But, I have decided not to read them because I want no outside influence on my thinking and what I am about to write.

I write about my impression of what Beck talked about. I have not found a recording of his particular show to make sure I heard what he said. I simply have an impression of what he said.

Glenn Beck so much dislikes Republican candidate for president Donald Trump that he verbally positions his favorite candidate for president, Ted Cruz, as the only person “pure enough” to become the President of the United States. How did he do that?

By way of comparing the lives of the two candidates and their “preparation” for the presidency. In a nutshell Ted Cruz has been preparing himself for this moment and thus becomes, in a way, anointed for the job.

Beck preceded his comparison by talking about God. He discounted any criticism of him and his religion as not being Christian, because, he said, he is like any other Christian. Perhaps! Who can say? But Beck seemed to be setting himself up as the appropriate representative of the Sovereign Creator in order to make life comparisons between Cruz and Trump. In other words, Beck presented his argument as pure logic suggesting that if you are a Christian you will follow his line of reasoning.

To Beck Cruz and only Cruz has led an exemplary life worthy enough to be elected President. Trump, on the other hand, has led a sleazy, manipulative, and low-morals life. The result of Beck’s comparison is that no American Christian should vote for Trump because – and this is my impression of Beck’s intent – God, too, would not like for Trump to become President of the United States.

God, for His purposes, chose Isaac and not Ishmael; Jacob and not Esau. God chose Moses, a murderer. David, a despicable person, was made King of Israel by God. Beck used the heretical tactic of Pelagianism to promote Ted Cruz over Trump – meaning Cruz has “earned” the American presidential honor. Perhaps God favors good Christians over lapsed Christians.

Candidates for political office certainly need to “earn” the trust of the voters. But voters have varied beliefs, differing sets of logic, personal assumptions, and dissimilar preferences. This is the political realm. Does the spiritual realm have anything to do with the political? Certainly the Sovereign Creator knows what is happening. Beck's comparison, however, suggests an "anointing" of Cruz based on right Christian living. That's his opinion, an opinion intended to influence voters.

Logic is conditional and finite. Logos is infinite. God will do what God will do.

For this instance in Beck's argument of "good-living" logic favoring Ted Cruz, I must say “You can never trump God!”

Anglican Church in North America Leadership and Russian, Greek, and Protestant Churches

The formerly nascent Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) is expressing itself as an ecumenical juggernaut. Formed out of the failures inherent in Anglicanism’s loose structure and biblically-errant teachings, specifically in the Anglican Communion’s western provinces throughout the past 50 years, the ACNA is forging its way by building ecumenical relations around the world.

The ACNA and its episcopal leadership hold no interest in changing traditional and historical norms and doctrine as practiced in Christianity over the centuries. This biblically-focused Anglican province is interested only in preaching the Gospel and spreading the good news about Jesus Christ.

Many biblical scholars and preachers have noted over the centuries that the Book of Acts should be re-titled the Books of Acts of the Holy Spirit. The ACNA’s leadership is open to the Spirit and is submitting itself to the work and power of the Spirit: it is a House-in-Action. This is a time in history when the church must act and act in a wholly biblical and evangelical manner.

ACNA Archbishop and House of Bishops

ACNA Archbishop Foley Beach is seizing the moment. There is no time waste. He and the well-coordinated House of Bishops are in the midst not only of planting new churches, specifically in the United States and Canada, but they are opening ecumenical doors with other denominations and communions at – in an ecclesiastical timeframe – a rapid pace.

The Protestants

Since 2010 when Archbishop Emeritus Bob Duncan was the ACNA’s primate or leading bishop, talks began with the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS). This dialogue project is remarkable in that the LCMS had never before engaged in ecumenical dialogue with non-Lutheran denominations. The young North American Lutheran Church (NALC) and the ACNA are close to completing formal recognition and reciprocal liturgical agreements.

Certain Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist conversations are active as well. Within the “Anglican-oriented” world there are several jurisdictions, which for multiple reasons, left structural Anglicanism and formed their own churches and jurisdictions. ACNA is talking with several of those churches. Additionally, there are non-Anglican churches migrating toward “traditional Anglicanism” and seeking alignment or recognition.

The Russians Are Coming … The Russians Are Coming

What about the Orthodox Church? ACNA Archbishop Beach was invited by Metropolitan Tikhon of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) to attend the Orthodox All-American Council in 2015. Bishop Tikhon also introduced Beach to Metropolitan Hilarion, head of the Department of External Relations of the Russian Orthodox Church. Bishop Hilarion is also Metropolitan of Moscow.

The meeting with Metropolitan Hilarion eventually led to a trip to Moscow by Archbishop Beach, ACNA Ecumenical Officer Bishop Ray Sutton, and other ACNA bishops, where they met with the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Kyrill. Those meetings were covered in various church media including the Connecticut- and internet-based Anglican TV. If this initial engagement with the Russian Orthodox Church and its potential results were not enough excitement, consider the Ecumenical Patriarch of all Eastern Orthodoxy.

Greek Orthodoxy Openings

Archbishop Beach inherited a House of Bishop well-versed in international affairs. One example is ACNA Bishop Paul Hewitt and his delegation of laypersons and clergy who traveled in 2014 to Athens and Constantinople-Istanbul. There, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew assigned one his bishops, a theologian and seminary professor, as protocol officer and dialogue partner.

A Juggernaut?

There are at least two definitions of juggernaut. One is negative and destructive, and the other defines a huge, powerful, and overwhelming force or institution. ACNA is not hegemonic but it is already a strong, traditional Christian institution. It is small in comparison to other Anglican provinces, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Eastern Orthodox churches. But they have become an influential institution and are creating new and lasting ecumenical relationships. They make things happen.

Perspective

From the point of view of the leaders of the Anglican Church in North America, it appears that they have asked themselves, “Why wait?” They are actively planting churches and they have embarked on a forward, Christ-centered, ecumenical journey. Since they are working in the Spirit, who can stop them?

Yet

Lest we think that Archbishop Beach and his House of Bishops are “going it alone,” think again. The Anglican Church in North America was given life through the senior archbishops or primates in the Anglican Communion’s Global South and formed through the Global Anglican Fellowship Conference (GAFCON). And if ACNA is demonstrating gospel hegemonic leadership, it is acting not on its own. It is part and partial of  the larger fellowship.

A New Day Coming?

Many have witnessed the Anglican fabric tear apart rapidly in recent decades. Some have deemed this decline as opening opportunities for renewal: time also for an Anglican “realignment.” The Anglican Communion might disintegrate as we have known it historically. And it could very well be replaced by the new and wholly different Anglican Fellowship with faithful, biblical, orthodox ecumenical partners.

Worth Earlwood Norman, Jr. is a biographer and historian. He is also publisher of Archdeacon Books. Retired from EDS Corporation, he is a deacon in the Anglican Diocese of the South (ACNA) and lives in Birmingham, Alabama.