Tag: Christianity

‘IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER’

On By Everald ComptonIn Community and Values, religion

Christianity has not had a good year. Nor have some of its Churches.

Quite clearly, its time for all genuine believers to do something positive to reverse the negative trend that is diminishing an important cornerstone of our society.

Let me outline a few of the high profile religious negatives that have occurred and note that every one of them was avoidable.

*Just a few days ago, 3 demented people who convinced themselves that they were carrying out God’s will, murdered two police officers and a neighbour at a rural property in Queensland in a cold blooded manner that chilled us to the depth of our souls and shook Australia to the core.

*A few months earlier, several irresponsible members of an ultra religious family in Toowoomba were charged with murder for failing to give medication to a very ill child who ultimately died. They declared that their reading of the Bible assured them that the use of such medication was against the will of God.

*Recently, a leading Churchman was reported by Murdoch media as saying that it was very difficult for a priest to give the last rites to anyone who chose Voluntary Assisted Dying. Hard to understand why it was worth a comment as the fact is that believers who pray regularly know that God hears our prayers with or without a priest being present.

*The Russian Orthodox Church has formally approved the invasion of Ukraine and blessed Putin. Their aim is to regain control the Ukraine Orthodox Church which broke away from them when the Soviet Union broke up. The fact that many people will die while they make their takeover bid is apparently God’s will.

*More paedophile priests have been discovered throughout 2022 & more will be discovered in 2023. The recent Royal Commission on Child Abuse has had little effect.

*The so called Christian Right has been highly active in demeaning the faith within the Parliaments of Australia, making appalling decisions at prayer meetings where they said they acted on God’s will. They have crippled the once great Party founded by Robert Menzies, a committed Presbyterian who did not ever use his faith to gain political advantage.

*A powerful Christian Lobby will have a leadership role in a campaign to defeat the Voice Referendum for reasons that appear to be racist. They are entitled to vote in whatever way they want to, but it is difficult to understand why they need to publicise it as a Christian act when many traditional Christians may quietly vote Yes,

*Some Churches have gained government grants with the stated aim of helping the poor, but have used the grants solely to promote their brand of Christianity. Law breaking is not a Christian vocation.

I could list more but those are enough to highlight the fact that the stature and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth is being demeaned for no valid reasons.

May I just say this?

From the day when my mother first took me to Church 90 years ago, I have been a committed working partner of Jesus of Nazareth, a great person who is worth following.

At no point in my life have I ever experienced a conversion event. I simply grew in the faith year by year and have never regretted it.

My faith journey reminds me there is not much that you and I can do to fix any of the religious outrages I have listed above. Hopefully, we can safely leave most of it to be handled by the lawmakers of our nation.

However, I know I have one clear calling and that is to walk daily with my role model, Jesus of Nazareth, to help Him create a better and more compassionate world.

In doing so, a clear challenge of my calling is to invite others to join me on my walk and share in the privilege of serving humanity as an article of faith.

In this way, it may well be that distortions of the faith made in the Name of the Father will steadily fade away.

Grace and Peace

Everald

Pictured below is the Aspley Uniting Church at which I have been a long time Member and Elder. Like Churches everywhere we face the challenge of reaching out to the community in new ways to share the many difficult issues we all face daily.

IN THE STEPS OF FRANCIS OF ASSISI

On By Everald ComptonIn Community and Values, History, religion

Tomorrow, Sunday, my local church, the Aspley Uniting Church, at which I have been an Elder for 63 active years, celebrates ACTS SUNDAY, as we do every year at this time.

ACTS is the community service arm of our small Church which has about 100 regulars attenders.

Obviously named after the New Testament book, ACTS is an abbreviation of ASPLEY CARING THROUGH SERVICE.

It’s purpose is make direct cash grants to people in strife, especially those who are not members of our Church and live far beyond Aspley. We achieve this through a network of friends, usually Members of Parliament or Ministers of Religion, who let us know of people facing tough times and have little hope of receiving government aid.

For the last two years, we have made grants totaling 75000 dollars each year. The funds are donated to ACTS by our church members over and above our usual Sunday offerings, plus friends of members who want to identify with what we do. Gifts are tax deductible as we have legally established ACTS as a public charity.

We take pride in the fact that all of our ACTS team are unpaid volunteers. Our only expenses are the annual fees to our auditors.

On Sunday, when I report to the congregation on our work (especially mentioning 29 grants of 1000 dollars direct to bank accounts of flood victims this year and 35 grants of 1000 dollars to people hit by bush fires last year), I will talk about the man who is our role model.

SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI

Francis was born into a wealthy family in Assisi one thousand years ago and lead a very happy social life in the days of his youth. This changed when on separate occasions he was significantly confronted by a beggar and a leper seeking alms.

To cut a long story short, he renounced all claims to his family wealth and went to live for the remainder of his short life with the poor and the sick, begging for alms in the same manner as they did, wearing the most shabby clothing, and sleeping with them in the streets.

Eventually, he founded an Order of Franciscan monks who spent their lives caring for beggars and lepers. The Order exists to this day in many nations.

Frances, on many occasions, told people that, while making regular gifts to the poor and the sick is an essential element in the life of a Christian, we cannot possibly know what their existence actually is in reality until we choose to live the same life.

Few of us, and particularly me, will deliberately choose to live in poverty, but we can come to a realisation that no matter how generously we give to people in need, we are only ‘dancing around the edge of the fire’. Even though our actions help, we can always do better.

Francis died a young man. Only in his mid forties. The toll of his spartan life caught up with his huge huge personal commitment to humanity.

So it is. At the Aspley Uniting Church, we intend to do better every year by extending the size and outreach of our work and identifying more closely with the pain of those we try to help.

Huge challenges lie ahead of us in facing crises in the areas of domestic violence, elder abuse, homelessness, poverty, mental illness etc.

We intend to give it our best shot.

Listen in to our Church Services on ACTS Sunday tomorrow, 19 June, on https://aspleyuc.org.au at 8.30am or 10.15am or any time later on live streaming.

If you would like to get involved with ACTS, we will welcome your contact on https://aspleyacts.org.au

If you buy any of my signed and personalised books, ACTS gets 5 dollars from the royalties of each book sold, Go to https://everaldcompton.com & click on Books.

Choose from (or buy all three)

THE MAN ON THE TWENTY DOLLAR NOTES

DINNER WITH THE FOUNDING FATHERS

A BEAUTIFUL SUNSET

Our world is a great place when we work together to make it progressively better for everyone.

Let me close with a few words from a famous hymn written in honour of Francis of Assisi.

‘Make me a channel of your peace. Where there is despair in life, let me bring hope.’

Everald

Voluntary Assisted Dying. Crunch time at Queensland Parliament.

On By Everald ComptonIn Community and Values, Elections, Government, Join the Debate, religion

Last year, the Queensland Parliament voted to authorise its Health Committee to hold public hearings throughout Queensland to assess public attitudes to Voluntary Assisted Dying and Palliative Care. They did an extraordinary job of holding hearings far and wide across the State and encouraging all opinions to be expressed.

I spoke at one of the hearings and it was evident that there was huge support for Queenslanders to have the right to choose to end their lives peacefully and in comfort when faced with an incurable illness. It was also clear that people felt that palliative care services were not adequate and were not an alternate to Voluntary Assisted Dying as many people will choose both. People who attended other hearings gained the same impression as I did. Continue reading “Voluntary Assisted Dying. Crunch time at Queensland Parliament.” →

Future of Marriage

On By Everald ComptonIn Community and Values, Government, History, religion9 Comments

I voted YES because I do not believe that heterosexuals like me are finer human beings than homosexuals, nor are we entitled to any special privileges.

So, I cheered mightily when YES won decisively and have now set out to play my part in healing the deep rifts in society caused by having a totally unnecessary Survey when Parliament had the power, but not the guts, to pass legislation without it. As a result, we have experienced an awfully vindictive and divisive time in the life of Australia as a nation that has destroyed goodwill.

Sadly, I note in the social media that some ‘Christians’ have stated that the institution of marriage has now been trashed to the extent that it has absolutely no value for humanity. They intend to get divorced, but still live together, so they are not ‘shamed’ by being married in the same manner as gays.

My only observation on the plight of these sad people is that in October next year, Helen and I will celebrate the 60th Anniversary of our wedding and we can confidently say that, while the piece of paper we signed on our wedding day has had nothing whatsoever to do with us living happily together for 60 years, it is a treasured document that we are not going to tear up. Continue reading “Future of Marriage” →