True Anglican Blog

The Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region is the sick man of emerging markets. While the global crisis means few, if any, bright spots worldwide, the situation in the CEE area is particularly bleak. After almost a decade of outpacing worldwide growth, the region looks set to contract in 2009, with almost every country either in or on the verge of recession. The once high-flying Baltics (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) look headed for double-digit contractions, while countries relatively less affected by the crisis (i.e. Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia) will have a hard time posting even positive growth. Meanwhile, Hungary and Latvia’s economies already deteriorated to the point where IMF help was needed late last year.

The CEE’s ill health is primarily driven by two factors – collapsing exports and the drying-up of capital inflows. Exports were key to the region’s economic success, accounting for a significant 80-90% of GDP in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia. By far the biggest market for CEE goods is the Eurozone, which is now in recession. Meanwhile, the global credit crunch has dried up capital inflows to the region. An easy flow of credit fueled Eastern Europe’s boom in recent years, but the good times are gone. According to the Institute of International Finance, net private capital flows to Emerging Europe are projected to fall from an estimated $254 billion in 2008 to $30 billion in 2009. Whether or not this is formally considered a ‘sudden stop’ of capital, it will necessitate a very painful adjustment process.

What is especially worrisome is that the days of easy credit flows were accompanied by rising external imbalances that rival or even exceed the build-up of imbalances in pre-crisis Asia – e.g. current account deficits in Southeast Asia from 1995-97 fell within the 3.0-8.5% of GDP range, while those in CEE were in the double-digits in Romania, Bulgaria and the Baltics in 2008. As examined in a recent RGE analysis piece, the vulnerabilities in many CEE countries – high foreign currency borrowing, hefty levels of external debt and massive current-account deficits – suggest the classic makings of a capital account crisis a la Asia in the late 1990s.

Read it all.

A wonderfully uplifting story about a parish making a difference through generosity–watch it all.

Kendall has the goods:

Here in this tiny town of horse farms and rambling historic houses, town supervisor Paul Greenwood shared his wealth and was turning around the town, by some accounts.

But on Wednesday, the 61-year-old horse aficionado was arrested for an alleged investment scam, giving this small, elite town north of New York City a first-hand taste of the financial scandals rocking the country.

Mr. Greenwood and a partner at Westridge Capital Management, Stephen Walsh, were charged with conspiracy and wire fraud for an alleged scheme that may have cost investors at least $553 million. They are free on $7 million bond.

Read it carefully and read it all and here is more on the wonderful Marjory Wentworth.

From The Institute on Religion and Democracy:

As the conference opened, the assembled were led through a breathing exercise and a responsive chant: “Holy is the silence and Holy is the sound. Holy is each one of us and Holy is the ground.” Aside from displaying a vague spirituality worthy of Oprah, the silly chant was minor compared to the next activity: a Native American ceremony offering a gift of smoking tobacco to welcome the spirits from the four cardinal directions. Originally scheduled to be led by the Rt. Rev. Carol Gallagher, the retired assistant bishop of Newark (and a Cherokee Indian), illness had instead required a Lakota medicine woman to lead the offering.

“To the sacred guardians of the West,” the medicine woman cried. She identified the west as the place of great mystery, the vision quest, and death, “The place of finding your own divinity.” The congregation faced each direction as brightly colored streamers on tall poles swept through the air, symbolizing the invited spirits. . . .

. . . The Episcopal Office of Women’s Ministries underwrote all of the scholarships to attend “Sacred Circles,” and a paid staffer of the cathedral served as the convener of the event. To read full coverage of the conference by IRD’s Rebekah Sharpe and discover what Episcopal tithes are supporting, click here.

Hmmm.

From Reuters.

(Paul Greenwood served as treasurer at St. James Episcopal Church in North Salem, New York and his wife was at one time a Sunday school teacher there also)–KSH.

Here in this tiny town of horse farms and rambling historic houses, town supervisor Paul Greenwood shared his wealth and was turning around the town, by some accounts.

But on Wednesday, the 61-year-old horse aficionado was arrested for an alleged investment scam, giving this small, elite town north of New York City a first-hand taste of the financial scandals rocking the country.

Mr. Greenwood and a partner at Westridge Capital Management, Stephen Walsh, were charged with conspiracy and wire fraud for an alleged scheme that may have cost investors at least $553 million. They are free on $7 million bond.

They also were sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Prosecutors allege that client money was used for horses, homes, collectible teddy bears and other luxuries.

Read it all and there is more there also.

Amid this bad news, however, never forget that our country has faced far worse travails in the past. In the 20th century alone, we dealt with two great wars (one of which we initially appeared to be losing); a dozen or so panics and recessions; virulent inflation that led to a 21.5 prime rate in 1980; and the Great Depression of the 1930s, when unemployment ranged between 15 percent and 25 percent for many years. America has had no shortage of challenges.

Without fail, however, we’ve overcome them. In the face of those obstacles – and many others – the real standard of living for Americans improved nearly seven-fold during the 1900s, while the Dow Jones Industrials rose from 66 to 11,497. Compare the record of this period with the dozens of centuries during which humans secured only tiny gains, if any, in how they lived. Though the path has not been smooth, our economic system has worked extraordinarily well over time. It has unleashed human potential as no other system has, and it will continue to do so. America’s best days lie ahead.

It really is worth the time–read it all (22 page pdf).

Most members of Congress and lobbyists are delighted that the White House has surrendered so much authority to Capitol Hill. Everybody is working on a way to push their own particular vision of reform through the muddle.

There are good plans on offer, but it won’t take long for this to get ugly. We’ll either get an irresponsible bill produced by the Old Order or no bill at all. It could be that even with a thousand “conversations,” no consensus will automatically emerge from the hundreds of players who have produced the gridlock of the past 30 years.

Even though the budget is not all one would have hoped, I’d trust the folks in the Obama administration to craft a decent health care plan before I’d trust the Congressional Old Bulls.

Obama blew a mighty trumpet Tuesday night, but after you blow the trumpet, you actually have to charge.

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An excellent article from Catholic Culture, from which the below is excerpted:

These apparent similarities led to heightened Catholic interest in Buddhism with the rise of the New Age movement in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Some imagined that Buddhism had many new insights to offer to Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular due to their supposed compatibilities.

But Pope John Paul II threw water on that fire in 1994’s Crossing the Threshold of Hope with comments regarding Buddhism that received a good amount of press at the time (and also a lot of debate). In his comments, our late pontiff really didn’t pull any punches, calling Buddhism “in large measure an ‘atheistic’ system’.” He pulled the carpet out from under comparisons to Catholicism by pointing out that the ultimate end of man for Christians is union with God, while for Buddhists it is Nirvana (complete detachment, or a state of nothingness).

Two separate warnings concluded the Pope’s remarks on this subject. The first deals with the notion of extracting certain characteristics of Buddhism and incorporating them into Catholic practice:

For this reason it is not inappropriate to caution those Christians who enthusiastically welcome certain ideas originating in the religious traditions of the Far East—for example, techniques and methods of meditation and ascetical practice. In some quarters these have become fashionable, and are accepted rather uncritically. First one should know one’s own spiritual heritage well and consider whether it is right to set it aside lightly. Here we need to recall, if only in passing, the brief but important document of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith “on certain aspects of Christian meditation” (10/15/1989). Here we find a clear answer to the question “whether and how [Christian prayer] can be enriched by methods of meditation originating in different religions and cultures”.

Second, relating Buddhism to the New Age movement and its Gnostic aspects, the Pope wrote:

A separate issue is the return of ancient gnostic ideas under the guise of the so-called New Age. We cannot delude ourselves that this will lead toward a renewal of religion. It is only a new way of practicing gnosticism—that attitude of the spirit that, in the name of a profound knowledge of God, results in distorting His Word and replacing it with purely human words. Gnosticism never completely abandoned the realm of Christianity. Instead, it has always existed side by side with Christianity, sometimes taking the shape of a philosophical movement, but more often assuming the characteristics of a religion or para-religion in distinct, if not declared, conflict with all that is essentially Christian.

By means of these and other articulate remarks, the Holy Father clearly drew a sharp line between Buddhism and Christianity, rejecting any notion that the two are of like purpose and insisting that Buddhist principles are to be gravely cautioned against.

Interestingly, some critics of the Pope’s remarks stated with vigor that Buddhism is not “atheistic”. Counter attacks varied. One Buddhist commented in rebuttal that followers of Buddha believe that he was the “teacher of gods and men”, and that some Buddhists believe in multiple deities or spirits that look after the affairs of both men and nature. Others pointed out that certain teachings of Buddha specifically point to an uncreated being without which nothing would be in existence.

Please note that though these arguments object to the Pope’s characterization of Buddhism, they in fact do nothing to bring it closer to Catholicism.