Move to Halt Delegations Is Challenging Episcopalians

NY Times ^ | February 26, 2005 | NEELA BANERJEE and BRIAN LAVERY

[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.

[NHResident]

"I'm Catholic and the Catholic Church has taken a lot of heat of late because of the pedophilia but it is still very strongly condemned, especially in my little part of the world."
It would be nice if there was some strong statement against pedophilia and active homosexuality/lesbianism by the Catholic Church as a whole. All we get are 'prayers for the 'victims of these unfortunate events' and snotty comments about . Of course, our Bishop and his chief aid were active enablers and protectors of the Pervert Priests.

[stm]

Our Bishop is very outspoken on this topic. There is no gray areas whatsoever. Although we have not had any child molestation incidents in our diocese we did have a priest who was a drunk. He was gone in a skinny minute once this Bishop took over. No idea where he sent him, he just vanished off the face of the earth.

[stm]

"This isn't a personal criticism--but the problem is, too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it. "

If this were something I thought I could fight I would stay and stand my ground. But it lools as if the Episcopalian Church has steadfastly made up it's mind over this one. And permanently soilded their own nest. Were I Epicsopalian (which I am not) I would just bail and leave this insanity.

[NYer]

It would be nice if there was some strong statement against pedophilia and active homosexuality/lesbianism by the Catholic Church as a whole.

Is this strong enough for you?

Vatican Document On Homosexual Unions

“Homosexual unions are totally lacking in the biological and anthropological elements of marriage and family which would be the basis, on the level of reason, for granting them legal recognition. Such unions are not able to contribute in a proper way to the procreation and survival of the human race. The possibility of using recently discovered methods of artificial reproduction, beyond involving a grave lack of respect for human dignity,(15) does nothing to alter this inadequacy.”
CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALS TO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITION TO UNIONS BETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS

Catholic Ping - Come home for Easter and experience God’s merciful love. Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list

[AnAmericanMother]

It would be nice if there was some strong statement against pedophilia and active homosexuality/lesbianism by the Catholic Church as a whole.

The Vatican has consistently condemned pedophilia, and any homosexual (or heterosexual for that matter) activity by priests or religious. In the 60s and 70s they allowed the American church way too much rope - partly because of Vatican II, partly because of fear of being seen as meddling in American affairs (a common refrain of nativist anti-Catholics).

That has changed drastically. Coincidentally, yesterday I received our archdiocesan newsletter, which contained a comprehensive report from an independent investigative agency appointed to review all sexual misconduct allegations against ALL the dioceses in the U.S. (whether homosexual or not - but something like 80 percent are homosexual).

Two interesting points from this report - 1. our archdiocese was commended by the agency for implementing every point and aspect of the Vatican's plan for rooting out those guilty of sexual misconduct and preventing any future offenses. 2. there was a laundry list of allegations -- virtually all allege misconduct that occurred more than 25 years ago. About half are new allegations against priests already laicized, imprisoned, or dead.

That tells me that strong action HAS been taken, and what we are seeing now is mostly winding up the remainder of the sexual offenses from the 60s and 70s.

You can't ever completely eliminate the possiblity of misconduct -- you don't hear about what goes on, for example, in the public schools -- but the Church after a bad period of indifference has made significant efforts to combat this problem.

[AnAmericanMother]

"This isn't a personal criticism--but the problem is, too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it. "

Friend, we stayed and fought for thirty years.

In hindsight, we saw this coming when the Prayer Book revision was undertaken, back in the late 60s/early 70s. (Gee - do we see a pattern developing here? That's when the Catholics ran into trouble too. Those $)*)%^( hippies have a lot to answer for.) Then the ordination of women, then abortion "rights", then homosexual "rights" . . . it's an accelerating train.

The orthodox in ECUSA were able to ignore the trend of the national church for a long time. So long as ones own parish was relatively orthodox and the bishop was willing to leave the orthodox alone, you could worship, keep your head down, and ignore what was going on at the national level. (It was impossible for the isolated orthodox parishes to have ANY effect on the doings of the national church - no leverage.)

The final straw for most of us was when (due to radicalization of the seminaries and the continuing efforts of the national leadership) the loony-left influence got down to the diocesan and then the parish level. This happened in our old parish - a relatively laissez-faire bishop was replaced by a radical leftist, who started agitating for his causes (including the radical homosexual agenda). Naturally, the parish priests who were lukewarm on doctrine wanted to "get in good" with the new bishop. So now the wolf is in the fold down at the level of individual churches.

Because of something called the "Denis Canon" that was rammed through at the national level, the national church now owns most of the parish property. So again, lukewarm parishes will not rock the boat for fear of losing their building, the cemetery where their grandparents are buried, the priest's retirement fund, etc. Fighting the national church for the property would be so expensive (even if a particular state like California gives the parish some legal ground to stand on) that most vestries hesitate to pour out the hundreds of thousands of dollars they would need to fight the national church. . . good money after bad.

If a diocese has a liberal bishop that has bought into the party line, the individual parishes are to put it bluntly, screwed. The only choice is to leave individually or to leave as a parish and leave all the property behind.

If the Anglican Communion decides to throw out the ECUSA, that's another whole story. A good legal argument can be made that that will de-legitimate the national church, and individual dioceses and parishes will then be able to take their stuff and go. But we have young teenage children, we cannot wait around for this dispute to play out. It will take YEARS, we may not live to see the end of it.

So we fled, like so many others. Quite a number have gone to conservative Lutheran and Presbyterian churches - we were "high Anglican", so we went to the Catholics. Thank the Lord the Catholics are still willing to hold the line.

[sionnsar]

Thank to bd476 for spotting this.

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[McGavin999]

I agree with you, it's time to fight back. Just who owns the churches? If you are split off from the main church, does the church in the USA own the buildings or does the "Chruch" where it is headquartered own it. If the US us split off from the main church, can the conservative members of the US request the church acknowledge them as true members and evict those who are in rebellion?

[sitetest]

Dear sionnsar,

This article reinforces my belief that the pagans won this round, and likely the whole fight.

It seems that the pagans have been asked not participate in a particular communion entity, albeit an important one, but maintain communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the entire Anglican Communion. Approved, I assume, by a significant majority of Primates, it appears that this will be the status quo until the next Lambeth Conference, three years from now.

Thus, the pagans get to keep their homosexual bishop, haven't really promised not to do it again (the report urges others to urge them not to do it again), and get to stay in the communion at least three more years.

During that time, they are to answer the questions of the Windsor Report, but as far as I can tell, I'm not sure that there are any agreed-to standards as to what are acceptable answers.

Finally, through all the next three years, time passes, and what was done will become an artifact of history.

In three years' time, the pagans will say, "Look, you've accepted communion with us and our homosexual bishop for four or five years, now. It would be precipitous and uncharitable to break communion with us now. Your vote to permit us to stay in the communion while we discussed these matters was, essentially, a vote of accepting us in that state, in communion with you. There is no reason to now exclude us when previously you included us."

It seems to me that whatever support there was for taking decisive action will be at least somewhat dissipated by 2008.

Am I missing something, here?


sitetest

[TomSmedley]

This isn't a personal criticism--but the problem is, too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it. The evildoers are rewarded with control of a half million--or multimillion--dollar properties! They can sell it off, then direct the monies from the sale into homosexual-friendly nonprofits, etc....Nice feedback loop for them if we let them get away with it....WICKED.

The doctrine of "sunk costs" applies here. The wagon trails over the Rockies were littered with family heirloom furniture, libraries, etc. -- weighty objects that made it impossible for the yoke beasts to make progress. The pioneers kept their tools, their seed, their resolve. The failures turned back.

"Tom, you are like a man who sees a freight train heading for a cliff," a friend told me eons ago, when I wanted to be a methodist preacher. "You don't know the first thing about trains, but you do know that it's going in the wrong direction, and you are determined to jump on board and turn it around!"

The big problem is -- every year you stay with the hell-bound train, wrestling with the demented crew for control over the machinery, is another year when your tithe money funds enemy causes -- and your children sit under a compromised pulpit. You might have enough theological health to resist said pulpit -- but it's unlikely that your children do. Yes, you may in the end end up with the echoing properties -- but your children may not be with you.

Remember Lot's wife. (and daughters!)

[Huber]

This isn't a personal criticism--but the problem is, too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it. The evildoers are rewarded with control of a half million--or multimillion--dollar properties! They can sell it off, then direct the monies from the sale into homosexual-friendly nonprofits, etc....Nice feedback loop for them if we let them get away with it....WICKED.

By your token, the early Christians should have been fighting to gain control of the Temple in Jerusalem. Now what would the Bible say about that?

You get to a point where you make a rational judgement that the time to protect your material losses of real estate, etc. would deprive you of building a new church to rise from the ashes of the old. Besides, despite the conventional wisdom, there is no better way to force reform than to create a viable alternative to the corrupted status quo. We are doing that in the Anglican Mission in America. www.amia.org

[Huber]

This isn't a personal criticism--but the problem is, too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it. The evildoers are rewarded with control of a half million--or multimillion--dollar properties! They can sell it off, then direct the monies from the sale into homosexual-friendly nonprofits, etc....Nice feedback loop for them if we let them get away with it....WICKED.

By your token, the early Christians should have been fighting to gain control of the Temple in Jerusalem. Now what would the Bible say about that?

You get to a point where you make a rational judgement that the time to protect your material losses of real estate, etc. would deprive you of building a new church to rise from the ashes of the old. Besides, despite the conventional wisdom, there is no better way to force reform than to create a viable alternative to the corrupted status quo. We are doing that in the Anglican Mission in America. www.amia.org

[sionnsar]

It seems to me that whatever support there was for taking decisive action will be at least somewhat dissipated by 2008.
Am I missing something, here?

sitetest, yes, there is something not stated here. First off, there is this posting: Church remains at risk of schism on homosexuality, warns Williams.

But in response to your question I will post another article illustrating how ECUSA & New Westminster are not going to amend their ways one bit. The final showdown has been postponed for now, but it be all the stronger for it.

[Raycpa]

Am I missing something, here?

15. In order to protect the integrity and legitimate needs of groups in serious theological dispute with their diocesan bishop, or dioceses in dispute with their Provinces, we recommend that the Archbishop of Canterbury appoint, as a matter of urgency, a panel of reference to supervise the adequacy of pastoral provisions made by any churches for such members in line with the recommendation in the Primates’ Statement of October 2003 (xii). Equally, during this period we commit ourselves neither to encourage nor to initiate cross-boundary interventions.

[Raycpa]

too many good people are fleeing the evil instead of staying and fighting it.

Sandals, dust, shake.

[sitetest]

Dear sionnsar,

Yes, I saw that other thread. Thanks for the ping, as always.

I agree with you that the pagans aren't going to change. Grizzie has stated as much.

I just think that on the issue of acceptance and normalization of homosexual relations within ECUSA (and really, the Anglican Communion as a whole), this is a setback.

The final showdown, now having been postponed for three years, gives the pagans three years to establish more "facts on the ground." In addition, they can now use the actions of the orthodox Primates against them: "You didn't throw us out in 2005. In fact, you said we could stay three more years! You lived with our 'outrage' for years! You already have a history of accepting what we do! You even agreed not to meddle in our affairs while we do it!!"

Perhaps righteous anger may increase over three years' time, but I suspect that Archbishop Akinola just didn't have the votes for immediate action, and I suspect waverers today will be cool to the idea of cutting off ECUSA and the Canadians in three years.

In the meanwhile, orthodox Episcopalians must suffer for at least three more years under the yoke of the apostasy of their ecclesial masters, whose undisputed authority within the provinces of North America is recognized by the entire Anglican Communion.


sitetest

[bboop]

We fled the Episcopal Church, too, a number of years ago. 'Fingers in the dike' we did, but they just ignored the conservative parishes, biding their time, pushing their agenda. We are joining the Catholic Church, too. And THIS says it all, to me: "Rev. V. Gene Robinson" -- The V stands for VICKI. gag.

[sitetest]

Dear Raycpa,

It appears that Bishop Griswold has interpreted the "pastoral provision" in a way that he believes that he and his fellow pagans have met the demands of it, already. In the last sentence the rest of the communion has essentially said, it seems to me, that they may not interefere with the American interpretation.


sitetest

[newheart]

Sitetest,
PMJI, but I don't think the prospect is quite so bleak. First, because there are still many very faithful Anglicans within the Episcopal church, if the Communion as a whole were to exclude the entire group from communion it would affect many who completely disagree with the ECUSA's revisionist leadership. Part of the genius of this, I believe, is that it is very strong in its exclusion of the leadership (Griswold and his minions) but considering paragraph 15 it will take very seriously the concerns of pastoral oversight of dissenting parishes (mostly conservative). Again, had they cut off the entire ECUSA, the AbC and the communion as a whole would have no claim to pastoral oversight, leaving many faithful 'uncovered' so to speak.

As for the 'get your act together before Lambeth' issue, some of that has to do with realities of Episcopal polity. None of the organizations referred to as 'instruments of unity' has any genuine legislative power. However, as the largest and most representative of the Instruments, the Lambeth Conference has the most weight. In 1998 they overwhelmingly reaffirmed traditional views of human sexuality and I seriously doubt that would change b/n now and 2008.

So, the ECUSA has to get its act together. Individual parishes now have an opportunity to define their position. There will probably be a split, with some parishes siding with the Primates (and thus the whole Anglican Communion) and others will stand with the revisionists. At least, over the next three years, itwill become clearer where everyone stands.

On the downside, there will be significant battles over property inn the next few years. Ugly disputes which will damage the witness, but at the end of the day, I think there will be a more unified (clarified) Anglican presence in the United States. Whether it goes under the name of ECUSA or not, isn't really a problem for me.

Yes, the 'pagans' will try to make the claim you describe. It is their typical ploy. but Lambeth will have none of it. The orthodox values of the Global South and the faithful in the rest of the Anglican world are on the ascendancy.

At least that's my two cents.

[sionnsar]

In the meanwhile, orthodox Episcopalians must suffer for at least three more years under the yoke of the apostasy of their ecclesial masters, whose undisputed authority within the provinces of North America is recognized by the entire Anglican Communion.

This is definitely a bad outcome of this.

I wrote Akinola a month or so ago. Maybe I will write him again.