St. Laika’s

The Rev. Jonathan Hagger of Newcastle Upon Tyne, aka Mad Priest and author of the blog Of Course, I Could Be Wrong… (OCIMBW), initiated a new blog today, St. Laika’s. Describing the new site, Hagger writes, in part:

We are an ecclesial community without any formal membership. You are part of it if you want to be part of it.

We are pan-denominational and nobody is excluded because of their personal beliefs or lack of belief. Our worship is from the Christian tradition and our liturgy is borrowed from any source that takes our fancy.

Tobias Haller, BSG, describes St. Laika’s as a “virtual parish.” From what little there is on the blog so far, that seems like a fair description. The blog carries the tag line “You don’t have to be like me and I don’t have to be like you,” a commentary, I take it, on the uglier trends within the Anglican Communion.

A companion site to St. Laika’s is THE ANCHORHOLD @ St. Laika’s, administered by Ellie Finlay.

Hagger seems to have a thing about “St. Laika,” who has long appeared in the OCIMBW sidebar labeled “OUR PATRON.” Laika, it turns out, is the Moscow stray sent into orbit on Sputnik 2 in 1957. Laika actually was something of a martyr, as she could neither be sustained in space nor brought back to earth. (See the Wikipedia article on Laika here.)

Check out St. Laika’s.