On Sunday 15th December, the Revd Canon Dr Arun John was licensed as the new chaplain of St Andrew's Anglican Church in Moscow, in a service led by the Archdeacon of the Eastern Archdeaconry, the Venerable Dr Leslie Nathaniel, acting as Bishop's CommissaryCanon John, who is originally from India, where he was ordained a priest in the Church of North India in 1977, was most recently chaplain of St Nicolas Anglican Church at the British Embassy in Ankara (Diocese in Europe) and previously served in England (Dioceses of Bradford, Blackburn & Leeds), South Africa and IndiaHe was also licensed as Area Dean for Russia, meaning that he will also support the St Petersburg congregation, and the St Petersburg churchwarden, Maria Karyakina, attended the service, as did a representative from the Moscow Patriarchate's Department for External Church RelationsThe service, streamed live on St Andrew's channel on YouTube, can be viewed here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=uf_hnXmOudA
AskCathy.ai (Cathy = "Churchy answers that help you") is a new AI chatbot for use in The Episcopal Church (and on Episcopal church websites) that searches its own library of resources including the Book of Common Prayer and Forward Movement publications before sending the question/context to ChatGPT to craft its answerFor more on Ask Cathy, a project of TryTank Research Institute at Virginia Theological Seminary and the Innovative Ministry Centre, based at the Toronto United Church Council, see this Episcopal News Service article: bit.ly/3X0T1tl or listen to the latest TryTank podcast: trytank.org/podcast.html
The Spring 2024 edition of European Anglicans, the quarterly magazine of the Church of England's Diocese in Europe, is now available to read online: online.fliphtml5.com/cfrvk/uxlh/.It focuses on mission and growth, with stories of new worshipping communities from Marseille, which in recent years has seen new congregations added in the Luberon & in Manosque; from Vienna, where the German-speaking CityKirche was planted in 2021; and from the Het Gooi region, east of Amsterdam, where the Church of the Ascension, a new congregation in the Anglican High Church tradition, began in September 2022.There are also stories of continuing growth in the church community on Ibiza, which has a very active outreach programme; and of online work, begun during COVID at Holy Trinity, Maisons Laffitte in France to prepare young people for confirmation, which has since been replicated at La Côte Church in Switzerland and which has also helped to build friendships and community.For the Diocese in Europe news item about this edition of European Anglicans, see: www.europe.anglican.org/news/latest-news/european-anglicans-spring-2024
An Easter message from 'the other Anglican Bishop in Europe', the Rt Rev Mark Edington, Paris-based Bishop in Charge of the Convocation of Episcopal Churches in EuropeYes, Easter comes to assure us of life after death. But even more, Easter comes to rouse us out of prisons of darkness and to live the life we have been given before death. “The glory of God is a human being fully alive,” Irenaeus preached. So let us all go search for what God has set out for us to find. And when we do, let us rejoice that we share in the glory God has intended for us.To view and subscribe to the Bishop's Letters from Europe and other messaging from the Convocation, see this link
