Irish bishop plants trees to mark silver jubilee
THE Bishop of Cork, Cloyne & Ross, the Rt Revd Paul Colton, has celebrated his 25 years in the episcopate by planting trees for the Anglican Communion Forest. During his anniversary year, the Bishop has made 128 visits to all the parishes and schools in the united dioceses that he oversees, planting 29 trees in the process. Bishop Colton said that his fascination with trees went back to childhood camping on Fota Island, in Cork Harbour, with the Scouts. “It was a particular joy, therefore, to be invited by the Scouts to return to Fota to plant a tree at the Scout Centre there,” he said. The Communion Forest is a programme inaugurated at the Lambeth Conference 2022 by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Wealthy countries urged to end to debt crisis
A GROUP of 125 faith leaders have written to the finance ministers of the G20 group of countries, urging them to reform the framework within which low-income countries repay sovereign debt. The letter, published on Wednesday as G20 finance ministers met in Johannesburg, calls for a new debt-cancellation framework to bring payments down to “a genuinely affordable level”, and legislation to limit the actions of private lenders. The signatories refer to the Vatican Jubilee Year, saying that the “Jubilee tradition calls for debts to be forgiven, land restored, and slaves freed. This Biblical practice embodied justice, mercy, and reconciliation, offering a renewed covenant with God and harmony within the community.” The signatories include representatives of other denominations and faiths, as well as many RC clerics and lay leaders.
New Zealand churches in suspected arson attack
POLICE in New Zealand have issued a warrant for the arrest of a man who claimed online to have started fires at seven churches in the town of Masterton, north of Wellington, on Saturday morning. Four churches were reported to have sustained “moderate to significant” damage. A further three showed signs of being targeted. The churches, of various denominations, included the Anglican Church of the Epiphany, Masterton South, which was damaged. The day after the fire, the congregation held an open-air service in the church car park. The next day, a post on the church’s Facebook page thanked people for “all the aroha [love, sympathy], prayers and offers of support. It has been quite an overwhelming and humbling experience and we are so grateful to be part of the Masterton community.”
Former ACNA congregation joins Episcopalians
A CONGREGATION of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) in Texas, Resurrection, South Austin, has become affiliated with the Episcopal Church’s diocese of Texas, Episcopal News Service reports. The church was planted in 2015 by its Rector, the Revd Dr Shawn McCain Tirres, who had been ordained in ACNA three years earlier. The congregation of the Resurrection disaffiliated from ACNA in 2023 after a parish vote (News, 4 August 2023). On 8 February, the Resurrection was officially welcomed by the diocese of Texas’s diocesan council, ENS reports. In an article in The Living Church magazine in 2023, Dr McCain Tirres wrote that the congregation’s “misalignment” with ACNA included concerns that “range far wider” than “matters of sexuality”; among them were “ACNA’s treatment of racial and sexual minorities [and] women” and its handling of a sexual-abuse case elsewhere in the country.
