Posted on 03/10/2006 5:10:06 PM PST by sionnsar
Oh look. Another ECUSA special Windsor Report committee:
Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold and the Very Rev. George Werner, president of the House of Deputies, have appointed a 18-member special committee to handle General Convention resolutions concerning the Episcopal Church’s relationship with the Anglican Communion.
The group is one of 22 committees that will consider proposed resolutions and prepare them for debate during the 75th General Convention, which meets June 13-21 in Columbus, Ohio. The other appointments will be announced soon.
Twenty-two committees? Just call ECUSA the United Nations at prayer. What's this committee going to do anyway?
Werner and Griswold said the special committee will handle all resolutions that propose the church’s official response to the process set in motion by the Lambeth Commission on Communion, which issued the Windsor Report in October 2004.
The committee will also consider resolutions that deal with "reconciliation and communion in the service of mission occasioned by differing views regarding expressions of human sexuality within the Episcopal Church and other provinces of the Anglican Communion," according to the committee’s charge.
Didn't you just appoint some kind of Windsor Report special commission a while back, Frank?
The special legislative committee will overlap the work of the Special Commission on the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion, which Griswold and Werner appointed in the fall to help prepare the way for General Convention to receive and respond to the Communion’s request that the church respond to the Windsor Report and subsequent official statements.
The commission also served as a council of advice to Griswold and Werner to help them consider the "complex questions" involved in crafting a response "so that we might be able to present it to the houses [of Convention] and the church in the clearest possible terms," Werner said.
I see. What else is this committee going to do?
Griswold added that he hopes the committee can model for General Convention a way to deal with differences and continue to be "part of the mystery of growing into Christ." He said the commission members had very different views and worked hard to come to an "authentic common ground" from which to work.
Not that any of these committees are going to help ECUSA actually decide anything in June, mind you.
[Griswold] added that he sees the coming Convention’s work "as a vast field of exploration rather than a moment of decision" that might be construed by some as a make-or-break moment in the history of the Communion.
But ECUSA wouldn't have to go to all this trouble if the rest of the Anglican world weren't such prudes.
"We are aware that our actions, which came as part of an at least 40 year listening process of our own, had a drastic impact on a number of provinces where, if issues of human sexuality were discussed at all, they were discussed behind closed doors," he said.
The Episcopal Church recognizes that the actions of the 2003 General Convention forced some provinces into a conversation about human sexuality that they may not have been prepared to have, Griswold said. Thus, criticism of the Convention’s decisions came not from "ill will" but from the awkwardness of varying degrees that often surrounds conversations about sexuality.
Yeah, that's it. The Current Unpleasantness came about because orthodox Anglicans here and around the world didn't want to talk about...you know...that thing that people do. You know what I mean. That thing. You know.
WARNING: Before proceeding, immediately swallow whatever you may be drinking and remove any liquids from the immediate vicinity of your computers.
Griswold said the church must follow Paul’s teaching that when one part of the body hurts, then all the body suffers. He said the Communion has a "profound interconnectedness that possibly we didn’t give enough attention to" during the last Convention.
"Possibly," Frank? "POSSIBLY?!!"
According to some commenters at Kendall Harmon's, there are a few orthodox voices on this committee. Not that it matters.
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams. 
Good grief, I don't know how the last Convention could have paid MORE attention to "interconnectedness". It's always about the importance of proclaiming the rights of gays to interconnect any way they want. The minority of homosexual Episcopalians are nothing but a major pain in the butt to the vast majority. Forget the message of Jesus, it's time to talk about deviant sex.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.