Posted on 02/25/2005 10:23:31 PM PST by neverdem
The Episcopal Church U.S.A. began to grapple yesterday with a request from the leaders of the worldwide Anglican Communion to withdraw its official representatives from a major Anglican governing body to avoid a rupture over homosexuality.
"That request is going to create agony in this building," the Rev. William L. Sachs, director of the Episcopal Church Foundation, said, referring to the headquarters of the church in New York. The foundation, an independent organization, follows grass-roots trends in the church.
"I hope," Father Sachs said, "they would see the long-term wisdom in the request rather than the short-term pain. I see the request as a compromise gesture from trying to exclude the churches on the one hand and excusing what they've done on the other. It's the classic Anglican middle ground."
Late Thursday, the primates of 35 provinces, or regions, of the communion meeting at Dromantine, a 200-year-old estate 30 miles south of Belfast, Northern Ireland, issued a communiqué addressing the rifts in the denomination that emerged after the Episcopal Church ordained an openly gay man as a bishop of New Hampshire in late 2003 and a diocese in Canada developed a liturgy for and blessed same-sex unions.
As part of a compromise, the primates asked the two North American churches to refrain from sending official representatives to a meeting in June of the Anglican Consultative Council in Nottingham, England. But they left open the door for unofficial delegations from both churches who could explain their decisions on homosexuality.
The requests have no precedent, members of the clergy and other church experts said. Neither church acted on the request. But American clerics from conservatives to moderates to advocates of gay rights said they saw positive steps and concessions in the communiqué.
"It pains me that to facilitate the process of reconciliation, the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada have been invited to withdraw from the next meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council," Bishop John Bryson Chane of Washington wrote in response to the communiqué. Bishop Chane, who voted to consecrate the Rev. V. Gene Robinson, who is gay, as bishop of New Hampshire, added, "Yet this does not seem too onerous a price to pay for the preservation of the communion."
Bishop Chane was heartened by the invitation to delegates who would explain to the communion the actions involving gays.
Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh, moderator of the Anglican Communion Network, a group of 10 dioceses that reject the Episcopal Church's governance, said he was impressed by an apparently opposite sentiment, the primates' willingness to distance themselves from the North American churches for their decisions.
"I think it was hugely positive," Bishop Duncan said. "There is a clarity in it that we haven't seen before. The only way you can read it is two provinces of the communion have been asked to explain themselves and stand aside until they can do it."
Such conflicting interpretations point to the primates' desire to answer needs on both sides, members of the clergy and other experts said. Conservatives, especially from developing nations, wanted to punish the North American churches. Liberals sought an affirmation of national and regional churches' autonomy.
That each side picked out what it deemed positive also pointed to a deep desire among Anglicans to hold their church together, those members of the clergy and other experts said.
"In order to maintain our integrity and hold our heads high, we all needed to take something home," Archbishop Andrew Hutchison of the Anglican Church of Canada said.
The Most Rev. Frank T. Griswold, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, would probably consult with a variety of clergy and laity before responding to the request for the June meeting, a spokeswoman, the Rev. Jan Nunley, said. The archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, indicated yesterday at a news conference in Dromantine that the unity of the 77 million-member denomination rested with the North Americans' decisions.
"The North American churches have been told very clearly and very directly about the potential cost of the decisions they have taken," Archbishop Williams said. "The question now is, Given that cost, where will you put yourselves? How close to you want to be to the other churches?"
Neela Banerjee reported from Washington for this article, and Brian Lavery from Newry, Northern Ireland.
You notice how they want to infect others with their illness?? Whether it be the Boy Scouts or your local private school they are trying to infiltrate with their leftist and crazy ideologies.
Ping.
"That request is going to create agony in this building," the Rev. William L. Sachs, director of the Episcopal Church Foundation, said, referring to the headquarters of the church in New York.
It should be painful. I have no sympathy for a religious body that doesn't just come out and say that homosexuality is a sin and remove those from its clergy who desire to live in this lifestyle.
Suck that!!
It is not going to happen.
The Episcopal Church in America is not going to back away from its stance on homosexuality.
And the majority of Episcopalians remaining will not leave the Church because of that, because they AGREE with the stance.
Those who disagree will leave.
The remainder will stay.
Nobody is going to give in.
Protestant sect #2341 has now split into Protestant sect #4317.
Protestant sect #4317 might form the foundation for group soon joined by splinters from the rest of the liberal denominations.
The Presbyterians (USA), the United Methodists, ELCA Lutherans, etc etc etc are all facing simular splits. The UCC long ago embraced gay ordination, so they'd be in there too.
Of course, the only problem with all of these groups is that they shrink in numbers every day, and their average age increases as well. They consistantly are at the bottom of the financial giving scale as well as the attendance scale. In other words, they will band together to die together.
Ping
Well put.
Love your tagline.
Hey pal, it "pains" me that you call yourself a Bishop and a Christian, yet you spit in the face of the Almighty and His Word.
People aren't going to leave a church because of most disagreements, but homosexuality will drive them away, especially when you ordain a practicing one as bishop.
Have you ever noticed this push for gay ordination is only going on in the churches in which the denomination as a whole owns the property. Churches like the Southern Baptisits, in which congregations own property individually, don't have nearly as much trouble with these activists.
"Are we seeing the stories of Sodom and Gemorrah being replayed before our very eyes here???"
And in so many other places. In the age of abortion uber alles are you even surprised? I'm surprised at how many are sticking to their guns on this issue. Pleased, but surprised.
Good point, though I wonder if the age of the whole church has something to do with that as well. The Anglicans have been together much longer than the Baptists have.
Good point, though I wonder if the age of the whole church has something to do with that as well. The Anglicans have been together much longer than the Baptists have.
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