God, AIDS, Africa & HOPE

Reflections / Gedanken

10/21/2009 • 6:00 am Comments Off on 21.10.2009 Anglican Catholics…

21.10.2009 Anglican Catholics…

And in between this news:

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) – Pope Benedict on Tuesday took a major step to make it easier for disaffected Anglicans who feel their Church has become too liberal to convert to Roman Catholicism.

The move comes after years of discontent in some sectors of the 77-million-strong worldwide Anglican community over the ordination of women priests and homosexual bishops.

While both sides stressed the step would not affect dialogue between the two Churches, it was clear it was taken because of the growing number of Anglicans who want to leave their Church.

The Vatican said the Pope had approved a document known as an “Apostolic Constitution” to accept Anglicans who want to join Catholicism, either individually or in groups, while maintaining some of their own traditions.

It marks perhaps the clearest and boldest institutional step by the Vatican to welcome disaffected Anglicans into the fold since King Henry VIII broke with Rome and set himself up at the head of the new Church of England in 1534.

The new structure allows for the appointment of leaders, usually bishops who will come from the ranks of unmarried former Anglican priests, to oversee communities of former Anglicans who become Catholics and recognise the pope as their leader.

“In this way, the Apostolic Constitution seeks to balance on the one hand the concern to preserve the worthy Anglican liturgical and spiritual patrimony and, on the other hand, the concern that these groups and their clergy will be integrated into the Catholic Church,” the Vatican said. ”
Euronews (Secular; Independent; French), article by Reuters (Secular; Independent; French)

20 / 10 | October / 2009
[read on at article]
http://www.euronews.net/newswires/40473-pope-approves-document-on-anglicans-joining-church/

Filed under: Uncategorized, , , , , ,

10/20/2009 • 9:02 am Comments Off on 20.10.2009 Hans Kueng – and “Das Lied der Deutschen”

20.10.2009 Hans Kueng – and “Das Lied der Deutschen”

Residing in Fallersleben in the house, where August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben wrote his “Das Lied der Deutschen” which is today the text of the National Anthem of Germany. So a real historic place to be and I like it more and more reading his life story: He studied theology while having interest in the old history, I did study theology also and was actually interested to study archaeology and Egyptology. Prussia kicked him out being suspected to have to democratic thoughts – Nachtigall ick hoer Dir trapsen..:-)) – he had great friends supporting him and backing him up. The nice thing is that his story has a happy end and he is rehabilitated before he is died in 1874.

Thinking of rehabilitation my mind directly recalls Hans Kueng, who wrote me an email after hearing of me terminating the duties as a chaplain of the German speaking Catholic Community. I have learned to know Hans Kueng in 1999 as a visitor to our community and we both participated in the Parliament of the World Religions. At that time we also concelebrated and I must say that I have very very seldom experienced a more pius priest in the best sense of the word as him. And my wish is the same like that of Mr. Erwin Teufel, previous premier of Baden-Wuerttemberg: That Hans Kueng will be rehabilitated within the official Catholic Church. He more than deserves that, the Catholic Church actually owes it to him.  Much more than any of those Pius brothers who think they are owning the truth. Sure, Hans Kueng is critical to many aspects of the church and I am too, but that does not make us less faithful or less part of the Catholic Church. In contrary: I strongly believe that only with honest critics we can find our way through the times. And my experience is that honest criticism brought me personally always a step further in life. There are anyhow too many people only saying what one wants to hear.

What for thoughts while having breakfast in this historic house…

Filed under: Reflection, , , , , , , , ,

10/19/2009 • 12:14 am Comments Off on 19.10.2009 will they listen?

19.10.2009 will they listen?

At 9 am today we will have the meeting with the papal council for the health care workers, which also deals with the topic of HIV and AIDS.  Coming closer to the meeting I am really excited, thrilled and a bit anxious how they will receive our POZ proposal working with HIV positive clergy. Open support?? silent support?? No support?? More talks needed? Are they the right partners for such an endeavor?  We will see…

I am glad that Joachim is with me,  it also gives us the opportunity to discuss the topic “sports and church” in the field of HIV and AIDS.

Joachim Franz and Stefan Hippler

Filed under: HIV and AIDS, Networking, , , , , , , , , , ,

10/18/2009 • 10:03 am Comments Off on 18.10.2009 Rome ….

18.10.2009 Rome ….

Flying to Rome always sounds like a great trip, and indeed the city is amazing. History, past and present times are melting together in a way which triggers interest in the past history of human mankind. I surely could live in Rome for a while.

But only 16 hours will bring me to Rome, one meeting with the papal council of the health care workers – a council dealing also with HIV and AIDS. We, Joachim Franz and I will meet with the secretary, Bishop Jose and continue our discussion from last November. It is for me vital to introduce during the talk also our project dealing with HIV positive clergy – and it will be very interesting for me to see how they see the subject. Ideal would be to join forces on this tricky issue, but I am not sure they are really wanting to put such a topic on any official agenda. So I will see… but I hope for support and understanding,especially in the African context, but also internationally. There is no reason to put the head into the sand and to ignore an obvious problem within the church.

Bishop Jose, secretary of the papal council and Fr Stefan

Filed under: HIV and AIDS, , , , , , , , , , ,

10/11/2009 • 10:46 pm 2

11.10.2009 Diversity and in between

This weekend is the first weekend as a priest without a fix community and I supplied mass in Milnerton and Brooklyn. As I know Milnerton a longer time, it was a good experience, also seeing people again who I had not seen for a longer time. It has been as a chaplain always good to keep in touch with the “South African way” of saying Mass. What stroke me most today was the diversity of the Brooklyn parish – and how many kids attended the service. The church was full, the singing more “African” with clapping. Generally the diversity and the way of being relaxed is in both communities remarkable.

One has still the feeling of belonging to a big family when attending such a service, it is a feeling I still know from the good old days in Germany. As it is in often in South Africa, the mix of modern and old fashioned is fascinating, beamers bring the hymns to the screen, but the mobilar is still from “annodazumal” as the Germans would say. Writing this it reminds me of the meetings with the sangomas, where during rituals suddenly cellphone are ringing: pearls, feathers and bones are no obstacles to embrace new cellphone technology.

I think that this mix of diversity combined with old traditions and new technology carries the fascination of this country and its people – and it adds to the confusion of the visitor and guest: South Africa is still a developing country but also a modern country, it is a country in between. And the same goes for the church of South Africa – it is between the old and known and the new and unknown. Especially the Catholic Church, which was during apartheid times rather a suspicious group, had to jump quite fast to catch up after the end of apartheid.

A fascinating field to work in as a priest between the old and the new world.. in transition..

Filed under: Reflection, , , , , , , ,

Blog Categories

Follow God, AIDS, Africa & HOPE on WordPress.com

You can share this blog in many ways..

Bookmark and Share

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 2,711 other subscribers

Translation – Deutsch? Française? Espanol? …

The translation button is located on each single blog page, Copy the text, click the button and paste it for instant translation:
Website Translation Widget

or for the translation of the front page:

* Click for Translation

Copyright

© Rev Fr Stefan Hippler and HIV, AIDS and HOPE.
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Rev Fr Stefan Hippler and HIV, AIDS and HOPE with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

This not withstanding the following applies:
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.