Suicide Bomber in Stockholm

Today muslim fanatics detonated bombs in a downtown shopping district in Stockholm, Sweden.

Lest there be any mistake about motives, watch this video.

Prayers to the gods: the paganism of Global Warmists

The Washington Post reports that the Global Warming Summit in Cancun was opened with an invocation to the moon goddess, one of the gods of the heavens of the ancient American indigenous peoples.

Imagine the uproar if it opened with an invocation to the true God of Heaven.  The hyper warmists show their real colours. What next human sacrifice? Oops! That's already on their agenda: depopulation of the world by way of abortion as a moral way of restraining growth in 3rd world countries.

Random Acts of Culture

I wish I had been there



A random act of culture!

Mother Church

Here is an article I wrote for a Column in Clarion which I co write with my Brother George

Ecumena

Commentary on News and Trends in the International Church

Mother Church

In Sept. 2010, The Bishop of Rome, Benedict XVI came to London, to visit the Queen, the head of the Church of England. Some 500 years earlier, the King of England, Henry VIII, had broken with Rome and declared himself head of the new Church of England. Since then, the British Monarchs have been titular head of the Anglican Church. In the years that followed Henry’s break, the Anglican Church joined the Reformation. Under the direction of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer and with the ascendancy of Elizabeth I to the throne, Calvinism came to London and Westminster. Since then, the Anglican Church has been part of the Protestant world.

Benedict addressed the combined houses of Westminster, the “Mother of all Parliaments”. It used to be a beheading crime to vow allegiance to Rome in Westminster Hall, but relations, it seems, are better now. (Although Tony Blair left the Anglican Church for the Roman Church only after he left No. 10 Downing Street: no British Prime Minister could be allied with Rome, after all!) Later that same day Benedict joined Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, in Westminster Abbey. There no Pope had ever set foot in its 1000-year history.  The Anglican Church had invited many, and in the congregation were official representatives of the many branches of British Protestantism: Methodists, Baptists, Reformed, Presbyterian. And so, in Westminster Abbey, the “Coronation Church” of the British throne, Archbishop Williams the Protestant, and Pope Benedict of Rome, greeted each other with the hand of fellowship and with a kiss at “the passing of the peace” and the congregation broke out in spontaneous applause. Benedict’s wry smile betrayed his pleasure at the moment! During his discourses that day, at both Westminster Hall—to the Parliament—and at Westminster Abbey—to the Church—he did not shy away from reminding the audience that he was the successor to the bishopric of Peter. In other words, “I am head of the church, not Rowan Williams; not Elizabeth II.  Rome is the ‘Mother Church’.”

His visit to London is a remarkable moment in the history of England, Britain, the Commonwealth and the world, but more so in the history of the church. One of the great Protestant churches of the world makes peace with Rome, but does not speak of their differences.

Closer to home, however, something different happened this year. The GKNv, our sister churches in the Netherlands (in a certain way, our ‘mother church’) has for the past decades sought to extend the hand of fellowship to many Reformed churches around the world. They were instrumental in the founding of the ICRC (International Conference of Reformed Churches). They have investigated various churches, and recognized and declared them true churches, and desired to have ecclesiastical fellowship with them. Recently they invited the OPC (Orthodox Presbyterian Church) to enter into a closer relationship; full ecclesiastical fellowship. (In our older vocabulary, they asked the OPC to formalize a “sister church relationship.”)  The OPC would find their history not in the Netherlands, but in Westminster. 100 years after Cranmer, the English churches met at Westminster Abbey, and drafted the Westminster Confessions (WCF). Via Scotland, these confessions became the standard of English Presbyterianism, also in North America.

Students of our own church history will know that it took nearly 40 years for us to move to that full relationship with the OPC. One of the obstacles we had was the “sister church” relationship the OPC had with the CRCNA (Christian Reformed Church). We had doubts about the faithfulness of the CRC and its trends concerning the truths of scripture.

Remarkably, the OPC has declined the invitation of the GKNv. At their General Assembly, in June 2010, they made (in part) the following decision.

However, the Assembly believes that, given the serious nature of the obligations undertaken in the sister church relationship, such relationships should not be entered into in situations where the Assembly finds itself unable to affirm, without reservation, that the other church is indeed Reformed in its confessional standards, church order, or life. It is our prayer that the Lord would be merciful to our GKNv brothers and grant them grace to work through the weighty issues facing them—particularly those touching upon the sufficiency (WCF 1.6), interpretation (WCF 1.9), and authority (WCF 1.10) of Scripture, that seem to be currently troubling the GKNv—in a manner that is in full obedience to and accord with Scripture (Article VII of the Belgic Confession).

Two strands of the English Church: both look to continental Europe. One looks to Rome approvingly; the other looks to the Dutch Reformed, and finds it lacking.  Perhaps we too need to look to our “mother church” and warn them seriously of encroaching error. Our Presbyterian “Westminster” brothers and sisters are hailing the first serious warning: “We are unable to affirm, without reservation, that the [GKNv] is indeed Reformed.” 

We must yet extend the right hand of fellowship to our “mother”, and be willing to give a kiss in peace—but not at the expense of the truth!

jvp

The Heidelberg Rap

I played this for my catechism students tonight: The First Ever Rap Song About the Heidelberg Catechism.


They were impressed that their confession had a song written about it. As we listened there were smiles and nodding heads all around!





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CRTS Conference

The Canadian Reformed Theological Seminary is hosting a conference in January 2011

Dr. Cornelis Van Dam has taught a whole generation of ministers and missionaries in the Canadian Reformed Churches. It seemed appropriate to gather a number of his friends and colleagues together to celebrate what our faithful God has given us in this faithful teacher and preacher. 

Link to CRTS

Register Online at www.canadianreformedseminary.ca

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Polygamy and the Greens

When the same sex marriage debate filled the press and the airwaves, Christians argued that if the state attempted to change the definition of marriage to from a union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others, it would not be long till some one would advance an argument for polygamy. Of course that was scoffed at as scaremongering! "That will never happen!"

Well a mainstream political party will debate the question in a plenary session of their convention. In Canada! I'm not making this up!

TORONTO - The Green Party of Canada will consider a motion Sunday on whether or not they will push to decriminalize polygamy.

Party members in a workshop on Saturday evening voted to send the motion to the full-Party plenary, where they'll debate and vote on it.

Excuses

I found this deep in an old archive file on my hard drive! I thought it might be time to revisit this!

_____


Have you grown tired of hearing all the time-worn excuses people give for not going to church? Two pastors
put together this list of reasons for not attending the movies:

WHY I DO NOT ATTEND MOVIES

1. The manager of the theater never called on me.

2. I did go a few times, but no one spoke to me.

3. Every time I go they ask me for money -- they mention it even before I get in.

4. Many of the folks who attend do not live up to the moral standards of the films.

5. I went so much as a child I've had all the entertainment I need.

6. The performance lasts too long -- I can't sit still for a couple of hours or longer.

7. I don't always agree with what I see and hear.

8. I don't think that they have very good music.

9. The thermostat is always too high or too low, and the lighting is terrible.

10. The shows are usually in the evenings, and that's the only time I am able to be at home with my family.

Dominion Day

Here is an interesting article explaining why we should continue to call July 1 "Dominion Day". Changing the name to "Canada Day" was actually illegitimate, if not illegal!

Earthquake 2

It was a 5.5 magnitude quake along the Ontario Quebec border. Maybe Quebec is separating!

Earthquake

At 1:45 PM today we had an earthquake roll through southern and eastern Ontario. I was sitting at my desk and the whole house started shaking and groaning. My computer screen was rocking back and forth intensely. I immediately sent chat note to my son who lives outside of Ottawa and they felt it too. That's nearly 400 Km away! I'm going to watch the news!

Dinosaurs killed in (the) flood

I find this quite interesting. Evidence that the dinosaurs of Alberta were wiped out by a catastrophic flood -- a flood that occured "on a geographic scale that [was] so vast" that it created unprecedented carnage...


I wonder which flood that was: Could Noah have something to say about this.


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Burlington's Number One!

But this is a dubious distinction. Remarkably, the city I come from is number 3!

This only underlines the need for maintaining computer security!

Bonita's story

Bonita (my lovely companion) is posting a short illustrated story here. Enjoy... It's very cute.

Here is an interesting perspective!

Here is a man who would put "hot iron to flesh" for information!

Kind words from an American

It's not often that an American broadcaster notices Canada or says something nice....
Here is an exception.



This reminds me of a former Canadian broadcaster speaking well of our southern neighbours in 1973.



We may thank God for the peaceful coexistence that we have on this continent. No other continent has had peace for as long!

Abortion and Cancer

Here is an interesting and necessary read concerning the abortion industry, health and politics. It seems as if more and more evidence is coming to light that abortion is bad for the health of the mother as well as for the child! Go figure!

Google Staring Down the Tanks

I just read that Google's US executives have given an ultimatum to Beijing!

The Globe and Mail reports: 

Risking both billions of dollars in potential revenue and the prospect of triggering an Internet fault line, the world's biggest search engine is threatening to cease operations in China.
Citing a “highly sophisticated” cyberattack on its corporate infrastructure that appeared aimed at stealing intellectual property and spying on human-rights activists, Google said on Tuesday it will no longer censor search results on the Chinese version of its site, and may shut down its operations altogether in China, one of the fastest-growing markets in the world.
 
Read the rest of the story

This will be a watershed moment in history. It is either the beginning of the fall of a communist bloc, or the balkanization of the internet!

As Obama bows to the East

the ultimate free-enterprise no-borders internet-cloud company calls Beijing's bluff. "We're not playing your game anymore!" The audacity of it all!