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Bishops on the Wing

Bishops on the Wing

We wanted to give you a bit of an update about our travels over the next few months. It feels strange to be re-entering a global space after so much time with a locked-down world, but we are excited about the opportunities it presents to connect with brother and sister Bishops across our global communion.

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Bishops’ Pastoral Letter for Lent

Dear family, this week as our church begins our Lenten journey with Jesus to the cross, we write to you with deep awareness of our hurting world and its impact on each of our lives. This year, more than most, our world, for which Jesus’ life was given, calls us into our Lenten disciplines: prayer, charity and the self-discipline of fasting. We want to encourage us all into these disciplines this Lent, not just because our world yearns for the kingdom of God to come in greater fullness, but also because these disciplines strengthen and support us to hold close to Jesus in distressing times.

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Bishops’ News: January 2022

But those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint. (Isaiah 40: 31) (NIV)

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Bishops’ Christmas Message 2021

The Light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.

As we prepare to celebrate Christmas this year, I don’t think any of us could have envisaged the sort of regulatory environment and continuing pandemic response that we are all necessarily navigating. It is a long-haul journey for our globe.

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Bishops’ News: October 2021

I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. (Philippians 4:12-13, NSRV)

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Bishops’ News - Our ‘Outside the Box’ God

Over this past week or so both of us have been reflecting on the story of David and Goliath (1 Samuel 17) and what it could mean in our present season. I (+Justin) have been revisiting social anthropologist Malcolm Gladwell’s book David and Goliath (he does a great TEDtalk summary here).

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Bishops’ News: August 2021

‘…he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus’ (Phil 1:6)

Over the recent weekends at our Diocesan Training Days in Wellington and Palmerston North, we have all been humble learners together, exploring what it means to be part of the Missio Dei in each of our contexts. As we gathered together to worship, pray, and learn, we were struck once again by the variety of expressions and needs, longings and anxieties that are represented across our Movement.

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Bishops News: July 2021

Dear whānau in Christ,

Many of you will have seen the article in this weekend’s news in which a person spoke of their experience of abuse from a member of our church who was subsequently ordained.

We want to affirm how grateful we are to the complainant in sharing their story, and indeed to all who share their experience, and are committed to learning as much as we can from it. Nobody should have such a story to tell.

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Bishops’ News: June 2021

But God has put the body together, giving greater honour to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honoured, every part rejoices with it. (1 Corinthians 12:24-26)

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Bishops’ News: Unswerving Hope

We feel like we always say this, but it is true: our hearts are full of gratitude. This weekend over 500 mission and ministry teams from almost all of our local parishes, chaplaincies and other arms of God’s church in this Diocese gathered at El Rancho for Ministry Leaders Family Camp. Our theme was Renewing, Rebuilding, and we gathered to be refreshed after the 12 months that it has been. Huge thanks to the many people who made this all happen. It was so good to be together and we are so mindful of our privilege in doing so.

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Bishops’ News: Easter 2021

“As you come to him, the living Stone — rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him — you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 2:4-5, NIV). This is a wonderful piece of scripture for us all as we lead into Easter week, following our Lenten studies focussing on Rebuilding the Ruins.

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Building the house: Bishops’ News

As a Diocese, we can be (humbly!) proud of the way that we continue to work together to try to bring transformation in our local communities, and in our national and international spaces. There is a lot to celebrate and we want to take this opportunity to thank each one of you who has written, spoken and taken action in our coordinated work of transformation together.

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Royal Commission Update from the Bishops

We encourage all of our Diocesan whānau to continue to pray for the work of the Royal Commission into Abuse in State Care.  This week, representatives of the Salvation Army, Anglican Church and Catholic Church will be present at the Commission for Redress Hearings relating to cases within faith-based institutions. We again offer the following prayers for you to use this week as you spend time before God.

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Bishops’ News: “A Time to Build Up”

Dear Whānau

We greet you in the name of Jesus; the one who makes all things new and the first-born of God’s new creation. As our season of Lent begins this week, we are reminded of the need to allow ourselves to be deeply moulded by the renewing work of the Holy Spirit so that Christ, who builds the church, may use us as he wills for his good purposes.

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Bishop Eleanor’s Psalm 23 tour blesses many

Over the last few weeks, Bishop Ellie has been travelling the length and breadth of the Diocese sharing the stories God has placed on her heart during her long period of illness and slow recovery during 2020.

Hundreds of people have now heard of God’s heart for each one of us to grow in deeper intimacy with Jesus.

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Bishop’s News: Royal Commission Update

We encourage all of our Diocesan whanau to continue to pray for the work of the Royal Commission into Abuse in State Care, as outlined in last week’s Bishops’ News. This week, there will be Redress Hearings relating to cases within the Anglican Church. Archbishop Philip Richardson and Archbishop Don Tamihere have released the attached statement on behalf of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa New Zealand, and we encourage you to read this. We also offer the following prayers…

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Bishops’ News

No one lights a lamp and then covers it with a bowl or hides it under a bed. A lamp is placed on a stand, where its light can be seen by all who enter the house. For all that is secret will eventually be brought into the open, and everything that is concealed will be brought to light and made known to all. (Luke 8:16-17)

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