Work starts on seminary’s memorial to labourers
A CEREMONY of breaking the ground marked the start of work on a memorial at Virginia Theological Seminary, in the United States, last week, to enslaved and free African Americans who were labourers there between 1823 and 1951. The initiative, due to be completed by 2027, is part of the Episcopalian seminary’s reparations programme, which has identified more than 200 descendants of labourers to receive annual payments from the seminary’s $2.8-million reparations endowment.
No need for National Guard, says Memphis bishop
PRESIDENT TRUMP’s deployment of the Tennessee National Guard in Memphis has been denounced by the Bishop of West Tennessee, the Rt Revd Rhoebe Roaf. “If federal troops can help further reduce crime in Memphis through non-violent, constructive efforts, that would be a positive step for our community. However, military force by itself is not a long-term solution,” she said. President Trump has sent troops into several US cities, including Washington, DC, recently.
Ecotheology as a discipline discussed
THE first European Christian Ecotheology Research Network conference concluded in Stavanger, Norway, last week. “The time was ripe to gather all the good forces that are concerned with ecotheology in higher education,” the conference chair, the Revd Professor Tom Sverre Bredal-Tomren, said. “Many churches have long been concerned with climate and the environment; but, if we are to translate concern for the planet into good theology and good practice, we need both new and innovative thinking and deeper knowledge of ecological resources in our Christian traditions.” The initiative is part of the European Christian Environmental Network.
Pope: Make religion and politics work
POPE LEO has told members of the European Parliament’s Working Group on Intercultural and Interreligious Dialogue that: “European institutions need people who know how to live a healthy secularism, that is, a style of thinking and acting that affirms the value of religion while preserving the distinction — not separation or confusion — from the political sphere.” He was speaking to the group in the Vatican on Monday.
No African rapture brings dismay
THE rapture prophesied for last week by the South African pastor Joshua Mhlakela but unrealised has left many people who believed his prediction in shock, it is reported. Many had parted with their jobs, homes, and belongings. The live stream of the prophecy by Pastor Mhlakela — who is originally from Cape Town and says that he now lives in Cape Town — has since been removed from the internet. He has been condemned as heretical and misleading by other religious leaders in Africa. The Shepherd Superintendent of the Household of God Church, in Lagos, Nigeria, Pastor Chris Okotie, criticised the “prideful ejaculations of a spiritual charlatan . . . the spurious agitations of religious mountebankism”.