I have been reading articles by Ruth Gledhill, religion correspondent of the Times Online (and the paper too, presumably), for several years now and she seems to me to be quite knowledgeable.

A March 9 piece offers some good words from Rowan Williams. He is much criticised from both ends of the spectrum for his lack of leadership skills, but he certainly is intelligently thoughtful and deeply faithful. Here is an excerpt:

The Archbishop of Canterbury has condemned evangelist "bulies" who attempt to convert people of other faiths to Christianity. Dr Rowan Williams said it was right to be suspicious of proselytism that involves "bullying, insensitive approaches" to other faiths.

In a speech at Guildford cathedral, Dr Williams criticised those who believed they had all the answers amd treated non-Christians as if their traditions of reflection and imagination were of no interest to anyone. "God save us from that kind of approach," he said.

But he added: "God save us also from the nervousness about our own conviction that doesn’t allow us to say we speak about Jesus because we believe he matters. We believe he matters, because we believe that in him human beings find their peace, their destinies converge, and their dignities are fully honoured."

[We believe more than this about Jesus, of course, and Dr. Williams would be the first to agree. But this is in the context of trying to find an approach that is really universal without yielding our foundational Christology.]

Link to the complete article: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article7055377.ece

I just posted an article in Tips by Nicholas Kristof, extolling World Vision and other evangelical and Roman Catholic organizations for their work in the troubled zones around the world.

Yesterday I heard a talk by the head of Episcopal Relief and Development who said that it is better to support longstanding, experienced organizations than it was to rush to the area personally with no well-defined mission or special expertise.

And a few days ago I read an article about the Haitian situation which quoted Dale Winslette, 51, a volunteer with Give Me Shelter Ministries in Shalimar, Florida, which has been providing food and medical and dental care in Haiti for the past four years. Mr. Winslette said there were many missionaries who were mostly interested in returning to their churches with grand stories of good works. “These people are so zealous to get out there and say, ‘Look what I did; look at these kids I saved,’ ” he said.

Even doctors who have flown into Haiti on private or chartered planes have sometimes been less than helpful, according to Dr. Scott Nelson, a veteran Adventist missionary.“The community trusts us [the Adventist doctors and nurses], but when other groups make shortsighted decisions it undermines everyone’s credibility,” he added. Dr. Nelson and other veteran missionaries faulted the new arrivals for frequently acting on their own instead of collaborating with more established missionary groups that plan on staying in Haiti for years to come.

All of this adds up to the great need for us to give significant support to the established organizations with longtime experience and proven effectiveness. The Episcopal Church has had a strong presence in Haiti for 150 years, and so it is in a position to be really helpful. (Most of the publicity has focused on the Roman Catholic Church in Haiti, so this fact is an important corrective). The Episcopal Bishop chose not to flee to the countryside, or to the US where his severely injured wife is receiving treatment, but has remained with his destroyed cathedral where the people continue to gather for worship and mutual comfort despite the loss of their building. Therefore, Episcopal Relief and Development is one of the most effective funds to support right now for those interested in Haiti. (If you are interested in Chile, then there are other funds that have better connections there.)

The article concludes:

“The outpouring of compassion is heartwarming,” said Sarah Wilson, spokeswoman for Christian Aid, a British organization that receives much of its financing from church members and has a longstanding operation in Haiti. But she added: “People shouldn’t come down here for an experience. They should stay home and write a check.”

Here is the link to the article
haiti

The front pages have been filled, the last few days, with fresh news of the horrors of childen sexually abused by Roman Catholic priests and--far worse--the systematic cover-up that invariably seems to follow.

It is therefore a cause for thanksgiving that The New York Times has seen fit to print two very favorable and encouraging articles about Roman Catholics. The first is called "Giving Up, but Also Taking On, for Lent." It's about a business executive who is doing volunteer work this Lent at a nonprofit employment agency. The article is full of Christian testimony:

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In volunteering four hours a week at a nonprofit employment service called Jubilee Jobs, Mr. Hisle aspired to more than doing good; he aspired, in the spirit of the season, to approach an understanding of Jesus’ mission and sacrifice.
“I’m hoping that somehow or other by helping with a résumé, treating him with respect, showing him we care, that even though he’s had a hard life, maybe things can get better,” Mr. Hisle said after the appointment. “In doing this work, I try to see what we call in our church, ‘Christ in our midst.’ Meaning I believe that God is with us. And that no matter what we do, God loves us.”
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The article about Mr. Hisle is well worth reading from beginning to end. Click here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/20/us/20religion.html?ref=todayspaper

The news in the other article is probably available in many other sources besides the Times, because it is about some nuns who are supporting Obama's health care plan in spite of their opposition to abortion. However, the Times article includes some good quotes. You gotta love these nuns. Here are some tidbits:

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“It is an utter mystery to me” how religious groups that oppose abortion could read the same bill so differently, said Sister Simone Campbell, the executive director of Network, a Catholic social justice lobbying organization that supports the bill. Sister Simone, who described herself as anti-abortion, said she did not believe that the Senate version of the bill would make abortion more widely available. She did not directly criticize the [Roman Catholic] bishops, but said “some people could be motivated by a political loyalty that’s outside of caring for the people who live at the margins of health care in society.”

....Mr. Stupak [Congressman from Michigan] hit back at the nuns on Thursday, saying they did not have much influence. “With all due respect to the nuns, when I deal or am working on right-to-life issues, we don’t call the nuns,” he said on the MSNBC program “Hardball.”

The divide between the nuns and the bishops reflects a larger one nationwide among those who both oppose abortion and believe that the nation’s health care system must be overhauled.
“When I read the Gospel, where is Jesus? He’s healing the lepers,” Sister Simone said. “It’s because of his Gospel mandate to do likewise that we stand up for health care reform.”

As for Mr. Stupak, he is in a fair bit of trouble with nuns for his remarks.

“We have a number of nuns in his district, and they’ve been calling him,” said Sister Regina McKillip, a Dominican nun who lives in Washington. “Who’s been on the ground, in the field? Who knows the struggles people have to deal with? It’s the sisters.”

Here is the link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/20/health/policy/20abortion.html?ref=todayspaper

In case you haven't heard, a truly shocking and terrible attack on the World Vision headquarters in Pakistan has killed five local Pakistani aid workers and wounded many others. This is just so heartbreaking because Pakistan is not a place where it is easy to recruit local people for ministry. It would be heartening for World Vision if donations came in in memory of these workers, who can almost be considered martyrs in the true sense of that term.

click here

Don't miss this column by Nicholas Kristof in praise of World Vision. "Evangelicals have become the new internationalists." He quotes Richard Stearns, head of World Vision in the US and author of the new book The Hole in the Gospel:

"In one striking passage, Mr. Stearns quotes the prophet Ezekiel as saying that the great sin of the people of Sodom wasn’t so much that they were promiscuous or gay as that they were 'arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.'” (Ezekiel 16:49.)

Mr. Kristof has been defending the relief work of evangelical organizations (as distinguished from well-meaning but ignorant and inexperienced "rescuers") for years in his column in The New York Times, where disdain for Christianity is more typical.

He writes further:

"Some liberals are pushing to end the longtime practice (it’s a myth that this started with President George W. Bush) of channeling American aid through faith-based organizations. That change would be a catastrophe. In Haiti, more than half of food distributions go through religious groups like World Vision that have indispensable networks on the ground. We mustn’t make Haitians the casualties in our cultural wars.
"A root problem is a liberal snobbishness toward faith-based organizations. Those doing the sneering typically give away far less money than evangelicals. They’re also less likely to spend vacations volunteering at, say, a school or a clinic in Rwanda.
If secular liberals can give up some of their snootiness, and if evangelicals can retire some of their sanctimony, then we all might succeed together in making greater progress against common enemies of humanity, like illiteracy, human trafficking and maternal mortality."

Do read this, and let's support World Vision even more! Here is the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/opinion/28kristof.html