Those movies where you see a prisoner walk out the gate and look around and see no one to greet them are sometimes true. Stories are even told of full-timers being deposited at the front gate of the prison and being given directions to walk to the nearest train station, as no transport is provided.
People who understand themselves to be transexual, asexual, non-binary, bisexual, gay or lesbian are not making an ideological statement but seeking simply to express who they understand themselves to be. They have not made a choice driven by an ideological principle. They are simply honoring the fact that they are part of the beautiful crying forth of the ideas of God…
I have received and planted two trees: one has been planted in the garden at St Anne’s, Highfields, and one in the clergy house garden at Highfields. My plan is to treat them like Pokémon and “collect them all!”
However, that’s not really the intent. To use a local example, Highfields an area of high growth, and that means trees coming down for development at rate that seems unsustainable and damaging to our local wildlife, particularly koalas and native birds.
So, this motion calls us to be givers as well as receivers. In supporting this motion, we hope that all parishes, schools and agencies will find ways that we can use our collective strength to make a real difference towards conservation, re-foresting and re-wilding.
“We are witnessing a disturbing attempt to scapegoat, stigmatise and socially exclude young people through negative reporting. This messaging in the media is damaging. It does not reflect the truth of young people in our society and in many cases seems to deliberately present a false message not supported by the data. This is particularly the case regarding youth offending.”
.. a meaningful, genuine and effective apology starts with saying sorry. Period. It is very tempting to want to explain why, or to indicate that one didn’t mean it to cause harm, or to refer to social mores at the time and so on. This undermines the effectiveness of the apology. Anything that sounds like self-justification doesn’t help those to whom the apology is directed. This is one of the costs of being prepared to make an apology. And reminds us to remember that the apology is for those who have been hurt, not those who are doing the apologising. The words of the apology therefore need to be clear and unequivocal; free of any desire to save face, to qualify or justify.
We are not called to conform and to sit still, the people of God have always been a people on the move. As Dom Hélder Câmara said, “Pilgrim, when your ship long moored in harbor gives you the illusion of being a house; when your ship begins to put down roots in the stagnant water by the quay: put out to sea! Save your boat’s journeying soul and your own pilgrim soul, cost what it may.”
I hope the Church that will benefit from the work of our new bishop will be more like the Australian River Red Gums. Sometimes their life-giving water cannot even be seen – only a track of rough, gnarled shady sentinels indicating secret channels winding across our outback landscapes. Their roots delve to the depths for the huge created sea below. Their foliage has supplied shelter, material, food, and medicine for many thousands of years for our first inhabitants. Those ‘red gum churches’ shared God’s love, long before the ‘God boxes’ arrived!
“The truth is that, as I said at my welcome, I do not want this diocese to be labelled either a High Church diocese or a Low Church diocese. It is neither. It is a Church diocese. And if there be some, as I know there are, who reflect sadly that services are in several churches different from what they were thirty or forty years ago, I would ask them to remember that certain changes such as have occurred rather generally in England were bound to come here….Room must be found in our Church and in this diocese of our Church for those who are Anglo-Catholics and for those who would not like to call themselves so. There must be in essentials unity, in non-essentials diversity, in all things charity.”
Archbishop Sharp, Brisbane Synod 1924
The committee charged with developing the apology would like to hear from LGBTIQA+ people who are current or past members of The Anglican Church Southern Queensland, and members of their families, regarding their experience of The Anglican Church Southern Queensland (Diocese of Brisbane) through its parishes, schools, and institutions.
“For those of same sex attraction in Uganda there is no sanctuary left to be found, there is no place to have an honest conversation, there is no capacity for them to be themselves before God, not even in the church of God.”
