If you haven’t read part 1 yet, or the ‘Is Anglicanism strategic’ post, go catch up there first. I am now deeply satisfied. After reading part 2, Churl is now wanting me to perform some sort of ‘theological magic’ to enact a ‘Houdini-like escape,’ as ‘digging one’s grave very deep makes rising from it that much more spectacular.’ Moreover, after the previous Wong Fu diversion, he is now commending my Anglican theological acumen: “It’s kind of complicated. Let’s talk about... Read more
In a move that will likely annoy Churl to no end, I would like to take a short break from the Chinglican posts on Anglicanism (Part 3 is almost done, actually) and write something a bit more fun. When I first began blogging on A Christian Thing, I saw myself as a sort of Asian American voice on the blog, and it was my original intention to highlight how portions of contemporary Asian American and Asian Canadian arts and culture... Read more
I’ve gotten exactly what I wanted. Over the night after I posted my first post, Churl read it. The suspense is now killing him, and he is now describing my talents as made for television miniseries, such as ‘The Real Anglicans of Canterbury, Jordan Shore, The Amazing (G)race, and Survivor: The Evangelical Church, to be followed by Survivor: the Neo-Reformed Church (in which we don’t bother to vote anyone off the island because the matter is predestined anyway).’ For my... Read more
Yesterday, the Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) covered a panel at Metro Vancouver’s Simon Fraser University on 7 June (Monday) where Asian Canadian scholars completely busted open the idea that rich Asians were inflating Vancouver’s property prices. ‘For years, many have blamed Vancouver’s sky-high real estate market on the Asian buyer,’ CBC Vancouver Late Night anchor Renee Filippone began, ‘but tonight, a group of experts say that’s simply not true.’ CBC journalist Richard Zussman then took us to the panel at... Read more
It seems like an apropos time to re-introduce a conversation on race back onto the blog. Yesterday’s post struck a few raw nerves for some people on the race question, and to keep the conversation going, I thought I might re-introduce the old problem of the ‘ethnic vote’ scandal in British Columbia, on which you can catch up here on this blog, if you’ve forgotten about it. Of course, it has been some two months since the scandal, and since that... Read more
A comment thread that has been an extremely civil conversation on Churl’s post on evangelicalism via Flannery O’Connor (thank you to all the participants involved) now has got me reflecting on: what’s so good about being Anglican? I suppose that following my last post on Anglicanism (is Anglicanism strategic?), this is a bit of a natural follow-up. (Churl and Lelbc43, did you see what I did there? I used the word ‘natural,’ like ‘natural theology’ natural). What is so good... Read more
Recently, there have been several stories circulating about religion and ethnicity that have an implicit view of race. That view is: in North America, people are colour-blind. We do not see colour any more. Unlike our racist ancestors, the fact that we don’t see colour any more means that we’re no longer racist. In fact, to bring up colour in our contemporary society is to risk being called racist. ‘Race’ and ‘colour’ are backward, regressive, conservative terms. We progressive people,... Read more
In the Revised Common Lectionary, today is the third Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 5. The church catholic meditates on the Jesus story in Luke 7:11-19 where Jesus raises the widow’s son from the dead at the town of Nain and is pronounced a prophet. (This theme is certainly brought out by tonight’s Vespers canticle antiphon: A great prophet has arisen among us and God has visited his people.) I preached today in a young second-generation Chinese evangelical congregational context and... Read more
June 4 is a day for remembering. This year is no different, for it is now the twenty-fourth anniversary of the Tiananmen Incident, the event in which students who had occupied Tiananmen Square in Beijing for over a month were brutally suppressed–the official term of protest from its observers is massacred–as they demonstrated for a new democratic regime in China. It is thus a day to remember. We remember that the fight for redress is not yet over. When a... Read more
Today is Corpus Christi Sunday. The evangelical Anglican church that I attend probably doesn’t care very much, but I do. In fact, I care quite a lot, even though, unlike Churl and Audrey Assad down below, I actually don’t feel much need for myself to actually become Roman Catholic, much as I hunger and thirst for greater catholicity and for the Anglican and Roman Catholic communions to keep getting blown together by the Spirit. But still, I do believe in... Read more
Eastern Catholic Person
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