Posted on 04/11/2005 8:27:07 AM PDT by sionnsar
WATERTOWN -- At around 10 a.m. Sunday, the Rev. Allyn Benedict's voice boomed from the pulpit.
The rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Watertown was giving his sermon with a thunderous enthusiasm that elicited many an amen from the 50 or so gathered for a two-hour service.
Sunday's service may be his last with the congregation because he may be defrocked as soon as Friday over his opposition to ordaining homesexual deacons and clergy.
In celebration of what Catholics and Protestants deem the third Sunday of Easter, Benedict's sermon centered on the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. He asked the worshippers to picture themselves alone on a desert island. There's no food. No water. Just a gun with one bullet.
"You pray and pray that someone comes for you," he said. "Then there's one morning when you've given up. ... But off in the distance we see a shape. It's a ship and it pulls up to this tiny island ... and the captain puts down his gangway. And you take your gun and that one bullet and shoot him."
The story is a metaphor for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, who, according to the New Testament, came to save the world from sin only to be put to death by the very people he came to save.
This week, though, it could easily be a metaphor for Benedict himself.
Asked after the service if he would be the man on the island or the captain who was shot, Benedict said, "I know I can't separate myself from the ones who crucified Jesus Christ."
So for now, Benedict sits on the island and waits -- but not alone.
He and five other Episcopalian priests throughout this state could be defrocked because they oppose a decision by Bishop Andrew Smith, head of the Episcopalian Diocese of Connecticut, to ordain homosexual deacons and clergy.
Disappointed with Smith's decision, they have asked for alternative oversight of their parishes, but an agreement could not be reached.
Smith wrote the priests at the end of last month, saying they had abandoned the communion of the church and would be defrocked if a reconciliation is not made by the end of this week.
The Episcopal Church has been in turmoil ever since its national meeting in 2003 approved consecration of an active homosexual, the Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, as New Hampshire's bishop.
The six Connecticut rectors facing expulsion are members of the American Anglican Council's national network of conservative parishes. The group has retained legal counsel, but Benedict said there no plans to make the issue a legal one.
"That would be up to the diocese," he said.
Smith could not be reached for comment Sunday, but released this statement last week: "The six parishes asked for Delegated Episcopal Pastoral Oversight last May. When it was offered, the expectations they had were different from what the church can allow. In the time since then, we've made no progress... My clear desire is for the clergy and parishes to remain in communion and for us to continue to serve Christ together."
Benedict was asked, after his service, if he would be interviewed with some of his church leaders and parishioners on the challenges he is facing. Instead, he wanted to meet alone in his spacious, but sparsely decorated office to discuss the matter.
He said he is proud of the events that have led up to his possible removal from the church.
"I feel honored and blessed and I believe that, as it says in the Book of Esther, I have been placed here for such a day," said Benedict, who is soft-spoken and reflective when not on the pulpit.
After his Sunday service, as his congregation gathered in the basement of the church for coffee and reflection, Benedict and his daughter Sarah, 24, and son Tom, 26, "let the pain wash over them" and wept alone in Benedict's office for about 20 minutes.
"I can't get through the day without calling on the mercy and grace of God," Benedict said. "I could say I'm getting stronger, but what that means is the Lord is getting stronger in me. It's his life I seek to live."
More than 16 years ago, Benedict, a native of Danbury, abandoned a successful career as a concert pianist, composer and music teacher to follow God. At the time, he thought that would be his biggest challenge.
"My wife, Jude, rejoiced for about one-half of one second and then she wept," Benedict said of the day he told her of his calling. "She understood what it would cost. But she knows it was of God and we're together in this ministry now."
Benedict, now 58, was ordained at age of 42. His calling didn't come over time. It came like a "thunderbolt" or a "lightning strike," he said.
"I'm a cradle Episcopalian," he said. "I came to faith as a young man and teenager. Then I went out of the church and set aside my active faith for a quite number of years. I did some bad things.
"God is sometimes known as the hound of heaven," Benedict continued. "I was faithless, but he was faithful. He kept after me."
Benedict is well aware that in the coming weeks he may be sitting in one his church's pews rather than speaking from the pulpit, and he is prepared. "I'm blessed with the kind of support I have from this congregation," he said. "We have unity, not because we agree on things. Because we don't agree on everything. But God has given us the gift of spirit, which is unity in him and unity of the body of Christ."
His children are arranging a vigil for him that will begin at 6:30 a.m. Friday and continue until 9 a.m. Sunday. The goal is to have at least one person pray for Benedict and his parish continuously throughout that 50.5 hours.
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams. Yesterday was the SECOND Sunday after Easter, Marecca.
I think there may be a mass exodus someday, perhaps back to the mother church.
Ya know, it occurred to me that the next Pope, said by St. Malachy's dubius prophecies to be the "Glory of the Olives," might not be a peace-maker among nations (one way to decipher what olives could symbolize is peace), but among schisms. That hit me when I saw on TV the Orthodox patriarchs pray for the Pope in his funeral mass.
But if you include Easter itself, it's the third OF.
That's very generous of you, sionn.
Depending on how this goes, it could become rather more widespread -- at least in the more "militantly liberal" dioceses.
Next I suppose it will trickle down to the parishioners.
Actually, it could. A month ago I posted an article about a proposal to extend the disciplinary canons to cover the laity as well.
I have been a member of the Episcopal Church most of my adult life, and am in a state of shock because of Griswold's, Andrew Smith's, and others' conduct.
God save the church from diabolical messengers such as these. I have friends who think they "don't understand," but I don't believe so. This is deliberate heresy if not outright blasphemy.
You've probably been well-insulated from it all then. About a quarter-century ago my eyes were opened upon attending our liberal diocese's convention. When we moved to an even worse diocese, I really had no choice but to leave. Although, or because, I paid little attention to the Episcopal church after that (at first out of necessity, then because I was focused on our Continuing church), this came as a shock to me too.
Sad, sad, sad days for the Episcopal Church. Honestly, when I read the article in my beloved Waterbury Republican this morning, I thought my youthful dabblings with LSD were coming back on me, but no such luck. What manner of devilry festers in American Episcopalianism? A Bishop of the church enforcing degeneracy? OY!! Your house is on fire, people. Place yourselves under the authority of an African bishop, investigate Orthodoxy, do whatever you have to, but for God's sake(literally) get out of that desecrated temple. You will be in my prayers.
The Eastern Orthodox leaders stood on the sidelines with the other religious leaders in attendance... like the muslims, Buddists, Hindus and others.
They paid their respects but did participate in the service.
There were a couple of threads with pictures about this subject after the funeral.
Right; I'm in the West Texas Diocese, and most people out here are staunchly conservative. We continue to watch events in the Northeat with total amazement, shock, and disbelief.
Don't get me wrong: None of us is crazy-wild anti-gay or anything like that, and we would pray for and even accept gays in our parish. But if communion were to be administered by a gay priest or bishop, I would sit it out.
>> I think those priests you saw were the eastern version of the Roman Catholic Church. <<
Unless Fox and CNN screwed up gravely.
CNN: (from memory) "Coming up: Something that has not been witnessed in almost fourteen hundred years. [Later:] This is truly a monumental event in the history of Christianity. What is about to be read is the prayer of the patriarchs. Every patriarch of the ancient church -- not just the Roman church -- is gathered here for the first time in 1400 years. Copt, Russian, Greek."
What followed was the Patriarchs forming a half-circle around the casket and praying in Greek. They had very varied clothing, including headwear that varied from what looked like a classical fantasy-realm crown, to elaborate, ornate and exotic tiaras.
Well, the Orthodox were wearing all black except the one from Russia and he was wearing a white hat. All those others were the EASTERN ROMAN CATHOLICS. And YES, the news made a BIG error. As was also noted in last weeks threads.
Tell the Priest that the Anglican Diocese of Christ the King is growing so fast(no queers)we need Priest for new Parishes.
Indeed it needs new priests. All the Continuing churches do. The establishment of new parishes is held up by this need. Although (I could be wrong) I don't think the APCK excludes homosexuals from its ministry -- it only excludes practicing homosexuals. There are others denied the ministry also, but again it is practice, not "orientation" that is the basis of denial.
You may be correct in your statement about "queers". I visualize a church that follows Biblical guidelines that "condems" the claim and the practice. This is the "new" Church, replacing, in the opinion of some, the "old" Chruch.
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