Posted on 03/30/2006 6:54:23 PM PST by sionnsar
Why whatever ECUSA's bishops decide about the Windsor Report is a complete waste of time:
Representatives from the advocacy groups Integrity and Claiming the Blessing intend to make their presence known during the 75th General Convention. The steering committee for Claiming the Blessing announced March 25 a series of General Convention objectives at the conclusion of a joint meeting with the board of Integrity at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland.
The 13-point platform includes calls for the Episcopal Church to:
Clarify its theology of marriage, family and human sexuality, and study the role of clergy as civil magistrates in marriage;
Reaffirm the sacredness of long-term, committed relationships as defined in Resolution D039 of the 73rd General Convention;
Authorize the development of liturgical rites of blessings where civil marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships are a reality, and elsewhere;
Engage the international community in a listening process which includes the active voices and full presence of lesbian, gay, transgendered and bisexual (LGBT) persons;
Reaffirm that all orders of ministry are open to all the baptized who are otherwise qualified; and
Establish as church policy the commitment not to meet in those places where justice and liberation for all Gods children, including LGBT people, are absent in state law or local ordinance.
For its part, Integrity stated it wants to keep the momentum it has gained through 30 years of respected, successful advocacy and witness. The organization said it will send more than 30 committed and well-trained volunteers to help coordinate and prepare the testimony of witnesses at important public hearings, track legislation, monitor the work of committees, maintain a visible presence in the exhibit hall, and work cooperatively and strategically with others to advance a gospel agenda of justice and inclusion.
On the other hand, if they put the House of Deputies GenCon meetings on pay-per-view, ECUSA could probably raise some serious scratch.
Successful witness?
Is there anyone under 30 left in the ECUSA? I mean, seriously... any time you see a population straight-line down, that means the old-timers are simply going to die and that will be the end of that.
No, come to think of it, I do know under-30s at the largest congregation in the ECUSA... but that church simply ignores the existence of its bishop in Virginia, while it does the groundwork for establishing that it pre-exists the diocese and therefore cannot revert to the diocese.
Message to ECUSA: Gays don't breed.
The same goes for the largest congregation in Colorado.
It's amazing, really, that the revisionists appear to have forgotten the words of Gamaliel, in Acts:
Therefore, in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God."
Well, they have been left alone in the ECUSA, and the church is withering under their ministrations. It is clearly of human origin. And really, who could argue otherwise?
Not even the revisionists argue that -- their first task is always to attempt to convince us that the words of Scripture don't actually mean what they clearly state.
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