Father Matthew Moretz of YouTube fame with Camera holding icon of Christ.


Curate of of Christ’s Church, Rye, New York, USA, he makes YouTube videos aimed at Episcopalians and finds his viewers in the United States and United Kingdom—mainly. He does this work “on his own time,” for in reality he is a working Priest in a Parish with responsibilities of the usual pastoral kind. That work alone keeps him busy.


He has a wife, they have a dog named Beauregard and a puppet that is a monkey whose name you’ll discover when viewing his YouTube creations.

In the following interview Father Matthew agreed to answer questions and did so from his office in his Church by telephone. This writer was glad to get to talk with Father Matthew, who at this time continues his YouTube work which is found here.

Before the interview starts, this quotatation from a newspaper in Yonkers, New York.

Priest’s video blog inspires laughs, faith
By Hannan Adely
The Journal News
(Original Publication: February 6, 2007)





INTERVIEW

This is a good story, and I hope it will interest readers as your YouTube work is charming and so educationally helpful.

That’s its goal. That’s concise and it’s true. It allows people in a casual informal atmosphere to learn about the basics of their faith, if their Christian. It’s not manipulative. Its goal is to share and to explain.


I was thinking this morning about talking to you, and wondering if you know where your main audience is located. Have you many people in the west? How about Europe, though that is not so likely, I suppose.

It’s mainly people in the United States and the UK. YouTube provides me with data and they’ll show me a map. It’s different for every video. It’s not a trend. There are a lot of viewers who are baby boomers, greatest generationers, and not all young. A smattering of other places. Maybe that’s just the travelers.


Also, if you were to choose 4 or 5 YouTube’s to show, which would you go with? Are you submitting one to the Guggenheim competition at YouTube?

The ones I recommend for first time users are the ones I use for the sign of the cross using my puppet friend Regina. And one where I summarize The Book of Common Prayer in four minutes, the book that is used by the Episcopal Church. I used post it notes. I’ve one that is a funny dream sequence with my friend Jehosephat. St. Francis Sabotage. Recently I took a trip to Jerusalem with my wife where I filmed a two parter, where I went through the Stations of the Cross. Those would be the four.


How long does it take to make one of your videos? Who runs the camera? Do you write a script, or wing it?

From script to distribution, probably about eight hours for five minutes. I do. I’m a priest in an active parish. I do it take by take as I can. I fill it in in the cracks of my daily responsibilities. My wife did it when we were in Jerusalem. I write a script. It depends on if there is research involved. It is more like writing a poem, it is varying. A five minutes script is only 300 to 500 words. I have to have drama and movement in it. There are stage directions in it.

Does someone screen them prior to uploading?

My wife does. Sometimes we change things. Mostly it’s edits. Rather than scrapping something. I rely on her opinion. If I can make her laugh, I feel like I’ve done a good job.

How do you get your topics?

I work in a Church and a very healthy and thriving church in Rye, New York. I get to see what their questions are. I try to answer their questions in Christianity. One question at a time. I try to keep them at a basic level, so that they might be foundational.

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Sign of the Cross: Regina is often misunderstood. She helps me around the church with various tasks and is quite diligent. But, like all of us, she gets frustrated when things don’t turn out the way she wants them too. She is a good soul with a scary set of teeth!






Did you ever imagine you would be putting YouTube on the internet prior to going to your new Church? Whose idea was it to make them, and how did you come to the idea?

I’ve been doing the YouTube videos since my ordained Church and I’ll be doing my YouTubes at my next Church. That will make two Churches.

Do you get many letters? Is there one in particular you remember?

Many. From both Christians and atheists. Or lapsed Christians. Maybe ten a month. I get little notes, maybe three a day. When I post a video there are a lot of emails I get. Rarely letters. But sometimes. A letter from an official in Peru, and he sent me a little Jehosephat puppet. It is a monkey knitted with a banana. It would fit Jehosaphat’s hand. I featured that little puppet in my Book of Common Prayer video.


What kind of duties do you have at your Church besides YouTube? What is a Curate? What does he do?

I officiate at funerals, baptism, I preach, I teach both adults and young people. They are the regular priestly duties. I have regular pastoral care; I perform weddings. I love this job. A Curate is an Episcopal term for an Assistant Priest in the United States.


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Stations of the Cross: This video is the product of my pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I wanted to give people in their homes a taste of this holy megaplex from the standpoint of one who was a pilgrim, not a tourist. I hope that showing the Stations of the Cross in the Old City of Jerusalem encourages more Christians to make the journey.






Have you children? Do you live within walking distance of the Church? Have you given a sermon on YouTube making or a particular one?

No children, but a puppy named Beauregard. He’ll be in a video coming up. Yes, I live in Rye close to the Church. Usually my sermons are about the reading for the day. I respond to the Biblical readings that are appointed for that day.



I noticed that you recently do more puppet work in YouTubes you offer. Why is that?

Well, I like …the danger in making a video in YouTube is it is a talking head. What is more interesting is a dialogue, a drama, my puppet friends I am able to interact with someone. I tried editing it talking to myself, but that seemed narcissistic. It is a way to not make it staid. Really, Church is fun. Church is about community and joy. I hope that translates with the videos. That’s just not the Church’s public face.

Are you a professional movie maker, and where did you learn to do this YouTube creation, script writing, presentation work so well?

I’m not a professional movie maker; I learned it from books and watching others work. And trial and error. I’m still honing the craft. It’s a wonderful art form, a rhetorical style like a sermon and the fifteen minutes speech vs. the five minute video.


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Book of Common Prayer video: This book is daunting for the newcomer. We don’t make it easy in the Episcopal Church, with a high learning curve. I thought that this video might help that sense of frustration by giving a quick survey of the BCP to encourage familiarity with it.







Is there anything I haven’t asked you’d like to add, or a statement you’d like to make?

I have a homepage called http://www.fathermatthewpresents.com/, and I have a Facebook page called FatherMatthewPresents. (Anyone may sign up.) I actively spend a lot of time at conferences around the US talking about my YouTube. There are DVD’s available on Amazon.com. Those are collections of YouTube videos. Some people like to have one for educational purposes. Other Churches are using them in their Christian Education to start a class or close a class, on an informal basis.



Addendum

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Stained Glass: Father Matthew Presents





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The Cathedral of St. John the Divine: Father Matthew Presents





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Holy Eucharist: Father Matthew Presents the Sacraments




The Rev. Matthew J. Moretz is the creator of the “Father Matthew Presents” series of video blogs. The light-hearted pieces focus on issues of faith and ministry from the perspective of an Episcopal priest. The series is a close-up view of the Episcopal Church in the 21st century. Father Matthew seeks to present the treasures of Christianity one video at a time.

His faith began at the Church of the Good Shepherd while being raised in Augusta, Georgia. He had some excellent mentors as an adolescent, participating in youth programs throughout the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia. He discerned a call to the priesthood during and after his undergraduate at Davidson College. Father Matthew worked at Christs Church, Frederica in St. Simon’s Island, Georgia as a Christian Education Director and Youth Minister, before attending the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church in New York City.

The Rev. Matthew Moretz is the Curate of Christ’s Church, Rye, NY, one of the oldest Episcopal parishes in the United States.




Monkey friend Jehosephat: puppet.

 

Father Matthew lives in Rye, NY with his wife, Dr. Melanie Moretz, and their two cats Daisy and Belle.

(From Father Matthew’s website.)


This article originally appeared in The Church of England Newspaper, London.

Self identified Lesbian minister tried for homosexual marriage ceremonies, Presbyterian Church USA

by Peter Menkin

The Rev. Jane Adams Spahr testifies at her trial for violating her ordination vows
 by conducting same-gender marriage
ceremonies

A blatantly gay player for changing the Presbyterian Church USA to accept Gay Marriage is again up for appeal on charges of committing her fourth offense of marrying homosexual people in another Church ceremony. Openly Lesbian herself, as she self-describes her position as an ordained Presbyterian Church USA minister, now retired, her lifelong mission has been to get the Church to let gays and Lesbians be married in the sight of God, though this is against Church doctrine.

The Redwood Empire trial was reported as: Spahr officiated at 16 same-sex weddings during a window when the unions were legal in California. She is a former San Francisco lesbian minister who has challenged the church on its stance on homosexuality. The Napa Register also reports she “persisted in a pattern or practice of disobedience” against the constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) between June 17 and November 2008 by performing the ceremonies as marriages.

The Church trial was described by reporter Alisha Wyman, Covenant Presbyterian Church in Napa, drew a crowd of ministers, media and other interested people. Six commissioners from the Permanent Judicial Commission of the Presbytery of the Redwoods, which represents 54 congregations in Northern California, presided over the proceedings, sitting at a covered table at the end of the sanctuary.

Testimony from the Lesbian couple in the trial gave the usual heart rendering story of their sadness concerning the nature of denial of marriage rights in the Church, and the usual claim of their being second class citizens as a result of the Presbyterian Church USA refusing to accept marriages that are not between a man and a woman.

As argument of the defense, Scott Clark, who is representing Spahr along with defense counselor Reverend Beverly Brewster, offered Spahr didn’t do anything in violation of the constitution or the Bible. It is the defense’s opinion that both call for the church to be open to its members and love of all God’s people, Scott Clark said.

The Gay activist, retired minister, Reverend Spahr, who is 68 years old and as a Lesbian minister who is sexually active, was charged in the Presbytery of the Redwoods with violating governing documents of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A) by calling those ceremonies “marriages.” Prosecutors are asking for the lowest level of censure: public rebuke. Many opposed to Gay Marriage in the Presbyterian Church USA may be asking why so slight a punishment for so chronic and blatant an act done in a near chronic series of actions for which she is neither repentant, nor sorry, but very proud of committing.

In another Napa Register newspaper report. The discipline decision was explained this way: In its acquittal of Spahr, the commission reasoned that the definition of marriage is a definition only and is not subject to discipline. Spahr also didn’t define the ceremonies as “marriages” in her reports.

Scott Clark, representing Spahr, said she was adhering to of inclusion and openness in her acts.

The ten couples stand with Janie Spahr and Defense Counsel Scott Clark and Beverly Brewster for the reading of the decision. Jim Spahr, Sphar's former husband and long-time supporter, sits with Prosecuting counsel JoAn Blackstone who is a friend of the Spahr family.

These Progressive religious theological arguments that are so popular and widespread in California and especially Northern California and San Francisco, are held by Reverend Spahr, who has been a minister as an evangelist for the progressive organization That All May Freely Serve since before retiring in 2007. She has been an ordained minister for 36 years and served at the First Presbyterian Church in San Rafael, California (Marin County and north of San Francisco), the Metropolitan Community Church in San Francisco and the Downtown United Presbyterian Church in New York. So notes reporter Alisha Wyman in a second Napa Register story. This writer assumes reporter Wyman was eyewitness at the trial just held.

In its guilty verdict, the commissioners censured her with rebuke; they stayed her sentence until an appeals process is complete.

Spahr, a lesbian activist, at the Covenant Presbyterian Church in Napa, California USA was told, the commissioners urged the church to re-examine its policies, which are contradictory and against the Gospel of Jesus Christ, moderator Jim Jones read from the opinion. So the eyewitness report said.

By the Napa Register newspaper story, a reader would believe the members of the Church that held the most recent attempt at forming a religious marriage between homosexuals favors such actions:

“Please understand, there is nothing but love for Jane and the work she is doing for us,” said Covenant Presbyterian Church elder Elizabeth Groelle.

In an August 30, 2010 press statement by the Presbyterian Church USA with the titled, “Spahr found guilty on same-gender marriage charges”: ‘Journey of reconciliation’ needed as state, church law diverge, court says”—

Civil law was not the issue in this trial. “This is an ecclesiastical trial,” Blackstone said, “and we are not here to debate civil law.” The prosecution called no witnesses.

Spahr, 68, an honorably retired member of the Presbytery of the Redwoods, was charged with presiding over the June 20, 2008, marriage ceremony of a same gender couple while such marriages were recognized and recorded as legal by the State of California.


In addition Spahr was charged with presiding over an additional 15 same-gender marriages during that period of time.


The third charge was that in presiding over the secular marriage ceremonies, Spahr was violating her ordination vows by failing to obey an Authoritative Interpretation of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s Book of Order.

“I am deeply proud of the PJC and all involved with the process,” Redwoods Executive Presbyter and Stated Clerk Robert Conover said, “and I am profoundly moved by the sadness of those who feel hurt by this decisions.” “I am deeply proud of the PJC and all involved with the process,” Redwoods Executive Presbyter and Stated Clerk Robert Conover said, “and I am profoundly moved by the sadness of those who feel hurt by this decisions.”

[A defense witness named] Krause testified … on the scriptural understanding of marriage and how Spahr did or did not act in violation of her vows of ordination. She argued that the Book of Order definition of marriage is based on a contemporary understanding of partnership, while the scriptural understanding is based on the idea of a wife as property and subordinate to the husband.


Krause noted that one of the PC(USA) predecessor denominations, the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., changed the definition of marriage in its constitution in the 1950s in response to cultural changes that opened up the opportunity for remarriage in a church after divorce.

Thus, Krause noted, marriage is a unique blending of state and church authority.




"Calvin taught that the civil authority creates the contract and the church solemnizes it,” Krause said. When the definition of marriage was in harmony between the two institutions, Krause continued, the 2008 authoritative interpretation had logic…

The statement for Presbyterian Church USA as released to the Press is credited to: Anitra Kitt…a free-lance writer in northern California and a candidate for the ministry under the care of the Presbytery of the Cascades.

Susan Childress, Special to The Layman Online, Posted Monday, March 6, 2006 said in her web report, A seven-member California Redwoods Presbytery Permanent Judicial Commission found that the Rev. Dr. Jane Adams Spahr, an ordained Presbyterian minister, evangelist and lesbian activist, committed “no offense” and acted “within her right of conscience” when she pronounced each lesbian couple “bride and bride and partners in life” in 2004 and 2005. (Note this is Jane Spahr’s prior trial, not her recent one of 2010 reported on in The Layman.)

It remains clear by the Presbyterian Church USA Layman website that Reverend Spahr remains both unrepentant and “swears” to continue her revolutionary purposes to change marriage in the Presbyterian Church USA so it is also between avowed and practicing homosexuals:

“Today is just a beautiful day for us,” said Spahr immediately after the Commission’s 6-1 ruling at Church of the Roses in Santa Rosa, chosen because of its location within the Redwood Presbytery and for the lack of its association with either the defense or prosecution.

“Today there was an honoring of who we are, and we can’t tell you what this means to us,” Spahr said. Proclaiming that she will continue to marry both lesbian and gay couples, Spahr added, “I know we’ll continue to do our work with love, with integrity and with justice.”

Ten couples stand with Janie Spahr and Defense Counsel Scott Clark
and Beverly Brewster for the reading of the decision. Jim Spahr, Sphar's former husband and long-time supporter, sits with
Prosecuting counsel JoAn Blackstone who is a friend of the Spahr family.

Part of the practice and belief held by homosexuals regarding homosexual marriage is they are the future, as is gay and lesbian marriage the future. One Lesbian who is married said to writer Susan Childress, and she quoted her:… Douglass, 41, a Rochester resident raised in San Rafael, California, said she met Spahr 27 years ago when she attended a Presbyterian youth group where Spahr served. “Being a lesbian in a Presbyterian church has been really hateful because you’re not seen as being okay,” she said. Douglass resolved the issue by staying in the denomination and believing that “the church would just have to catch up.”


The San Francisco gay newspaper The Advocate reported briefly on the findings:

“This is such a sad moment for the Church” Spahr, who has been a minister for 36 years, said in a statement. “Today, the Church rejected God’s” amazing hospitality and welcome. It deeply troubles and saddens me.�

Interestingly, in its verdict, the church praised Spahr:

In the reality in which we live today, marriage can be between same gender as well as opposite gender persons, and we, as a church, need to be able to respond to this reality as Dr. Jane Spahr has done with faithfulness and compassion.�

Spahr and her legal team are looking into options for appeal.


Addendum


Janie began her “out” liberation work with and for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people

as the Minister of Pastoral Care in the Castro area of Metropolitan Community Church in San

Francisco from 1980-1982 when her own Presbyterian denomination did not know what to do

with this “lesbyterian”.


In November of 1982 Janie, along with many friends, founded the Ministry of Light which became the Spectrum Center for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Concerns. She served

as their Executive Director for over 10 years. From youth groups, parent groups, PFLAG, support groups, family camps, AIDS Ministry, speakers bureau, this ministry has become the L/G/B/T center in Marin County, California, where it continues to flourish. Janie completed her work there on February 28, 1993.


In November of 1991 Janie was called to serve as one of four Co-Pastors at the Downtown

United Presbyterian Church in Rochester, New York. She was denied that call by the

denomination’s highest court in November 1992. In March of 1993 The Downtown United

Presbyterian Church invited Janie to become their evangelist to spread the good news by

“personing the issue” and challenging exclusive church policies.

Janie has traveled throughout the country, educating and informing Presbyterians and others working on behalf of greater

inclusiveness for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.CLGS is honored to include her papers in the CLGS Archives, together with materials from That All May Freely Serve, a pioneering LGBT-oriented justice ministry within the Presbyterian Church (USA). Both collections are currently being catalogued and archived. CLGS will make an announcement when these are accessible and available for research.

(Biographical data comes from the LGBT Religious Archives Network Profile Gallery.)


This article appeared originally in The Church of England Newspaper, London where it may still be found.

Mustard Oak, Santa Rosa, CA USA--by Terry Peck

Writer's essay on Seventh Day Adventist editorial on: Mercy, Surrender, and Reliance

by Peter Menkin

Believers often have ideas and even doctrine in common. Here the subject is the Christian faith, and the topic explained by Seventh Day Adventist columnist Gerald A. Klingbeil. His subject is the Can Do American attitude, the secular belief, “We Can Fix It.” In his article published in the 150 year old Adventist Review, he says, “The effect of this pollution on the environment of a large strip of eastern states in the U.S.A. is still not fathomable, but every day I read about new schemes, suggesting that we can fix it—somehow—if we just throw at it sufficient resources and money.”



He is referring to the Gulf Oil Spill in specific, but more, he is offering a statement of Biblical proportion on man’s self reliance.



Gerald’s thesis displays God’s place in the life of man on this earth. To rely on God as strength and wisdom for man and woman:



The “we can fix it” mentality is prevalent in all areas of life. A major financial crisis—we can fix it. A devastating earthquake or typhoon—we can fix it. Dysfunctional families and broken relationships—we can fix them. Slow or even negative church growth—we can fix it.



He offers a giving into life in the sensibility offered in his article. He offers a surrender sensibility in the short piece appearing in the June, 2010 issue. He offers a way to become closer to God and live in relationship to God.



Yes, Christians will probably agree these are ways to find God, these are ways to gain authority in one’s life with meaning. These are ways to make the Bible part of one’s life. He offers this quote from the Bible:



[Living within one’s Church, living with God’s message]… It calls for more humility and less swaggering…[A]t the end of the day, it is God’s Spirit and His guidance that we need, not do-it-yourself attitudes and another seminar on strategic thinking. In a time of utmost national crisis following the exile in Babylon, the best antidote against the we-can-fix-it mind-set can be found in the words of the prophet Zechariah: “‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord of hosts” (Zech. 4:6, NASB). 



Argument, sermon, essay and article presented to listeners and readers by Christians like Gerald A. Klingbeil ask that the reader turn in a direction that may be new to them. The turning, turning, turning that is part of a Christian life is by its hope a means of providing a way of thinking, and a way of tapping into Common Sense when what may be perceived has in the past been a stone wall. Does this sound like a sermon Gerald A. Klingbeil offers. This writer of this essay thinks it is more one of those popular essays that gives people a New Perspective, like the books so popular in many libraries today that tell us New Age messages of self help, or modern messages of Positive Thinking, and other capitalized words of description that are best sellers in bookstores. Call this essay of this Religion Writer an introduction to a Seventh Day Adventist’s view on Relying On God. Three easy words to say, and as Gerald offers, not so easy a thing to do in life as it is something to read about.



In his essay that lays out so much in so short a number of words, he explains how we in the Western World came to this We Can Fix It! state of mind: With the arrival of modernism in the late nineteenth century, people developed a sense of control. As a matter of fact, most people living at the beginning of the twentieth century were excited about the future and the possibilities of technology that would make life easier, more comfortable, and ring in an age of tranquility, peace, and progress.



The Seventh Day Adventist Church magazine (Adventist Review) calls Gerald’s article an “editorial.” We discover the Christian sensibility of The Seventh Day Adventist Church on its pages, and learn something of ourselves and Christianity when reading the “editorial.” Is this not what inter-denominational dialogue is about, the tension between Christians in their statements and beliefs that illuminate our own faith and brings a light to bear on the commonalities of faith that Christians hold?



It is in the effort to find insightful words and meaning that man and woman are led deeper into faith. This is a rational faith, not blind in the sense of brainwashed faith, or faith that has the taste of intimidation. After all, as a Roman Catholic writer wrote recently in an article in San Francisco Catholic, we need to not abide in the legalistic or angry, but find mercy in a subject and in offering and in living mercy in our thought and lives find the right way. For the Christian, that is Christ’s way, for Christ is love, God is love: Mercy speaks of God’s love.



Shall we offer that reflection about mercy stated in “Spirituality for Today” by Father John Catoir on this timely essay by Grald K. Klingbeil titled, “We Can Fix It!” For it is a mercy we offer ourselves when we give over to God, when any of us follows the dictum presented in a paragraph that rings of sermon: We need outside help. We need, even (and especially) in our Christian walk, One who can carry our iniquities and transform our inabilities into capability. Paul wrote about this in his letter to the Philippians. “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me” (Phil. 4:13, NASB).* The emphasis here is on “through Him” and not on “I can.” As a child of God, I realize that I cannot fix everything. I depend on the Master to transform me, to reshape me, to renew me, and to heal my brokenness. I need the Great Healer to restore my relationships.



In the sense of the Anglican it is in reason as well as Biblical revelation and in tradition that we find a truth being Christian. Yes, “We Can Fix It!” as “editorial” offers a reader the wisdom of The Seventh Day Adventist, and demonstrates in this instance the way a lense of Church belief becomes fruit. So as a Religion Writer, this writer offers the statement that it is also in the practice of inter-faith and in this instance inter-denominational dialogue one may learn about being Christian and become stronger in one’s faith.