Posted on 04/13/2006 9:19:44 PM PDT by sionnsar
BALTIMORE, MD (4/12/2006)--When Patrick Cunningham left St. John's Episcopal Church in Glyndon to follow a new spiritual path, he didn't expect to walk straight into a clash with the north Baltimore-based Episcopal Diocese of Maryland.
Cunningham, who is now lay leader of a breakaway American Anglican congregation called Church of the Resurrection, is one of several church members who accuse Episcopal bishops of meddling in their affairs.
They say the church, which has no home of its own, held services in a Presbyterian church on North Charles Street but that an Episcopal bishop persuaded Presbyterian officials to rescind the agreement.
They also say the head bishop of the Episcopal diocese, the Rt. Rev. Robert Ihloff, publicly questioned the validity of the new church and the credentials of its pastor, the Rev. Eliot Winks.
"It was intriguing to me that they went to these lengths to shut us down," Winks said. "I have seen some nasty things done in the past, but never anything like this. I never expected it."
Now, as the Church of the Resurrection prepares to celebrate its first Easter, its attorneys are demanding that Episcopal bishops "cease and desist" any interference with the breakaway church's activities.
Going their own way
Last summer, Cunningham and a handful of other worshippers at St. John's began to feel uncomfortable with "revisionist" interpretations of the Bible, as advanced by St. John's parent organization, the Episcopal Church of the United States of America.
After a series of independent prayer meetings, about 40 St. John's worshippers broke away to form a more orthodox American Anglican church, the Church of the Resurrection.
"Our attitude was, let them (St. John's) go their way and God bless them, and we are going to go our way," Cunningham said, adding that officials at St. John's accepted the split graciously.
Leaders of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland, however, apparently didn't feel the same way, he said.
After months of holding services in church members' homes, officials shook hands on a two-month trial arrangement to rent space at Brown Memorial Woodbrook Presbyterian Church on North Charles Street.
Members excitedly prepared to hold their first service in their church's new home on Christmas Eve, Cunningham said.
The plan, however, began to unravel in mid-December.
At a Christmas party, Cunningham said he learned from a Woodbrook member that the Episcopal bishops were pressing Presbyterian officials to cancel the arrangement with the Church of the Resurrection.
On Dec. 22, Cunningham said, Woodbrook officials informed him and Winks, then a recent seminary graduate, that Resurrection would have to find another site for services after just three weeks.
United against division
Peter Nord, executive presbyter of Presbyterian churches in the Baltimore area, said he and the Rt. Rev. John Rabb, bishop suffragan of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland and the diocese's second-in-command under Ihloff, had discussed Resurrection's arrangement with Woodbrook.The two men, Nord said, also discussed their mutual dislike of churches dividing.
"We have in this world an effort to divide denominations and churches and this effort troubles me because I think the unity of the church is important," Nord said. "I think the church is best served when we have a wide variety of theologies and people within it to represent a fuller picture of who God is. So when one group decides to leave the church, I believe that is both unscriptural and harmful to the body."
Describing Resurrection members as "a group of people who rejected the appropriate leadership of their church," Nord said he personally approached Woodbrook's clerk of session, or chief administrator, and passed along a request from himself and Rabb to reconsider the decision to lease space to Resurrection.
"And they listened to the bishop's request, to my request," Nord said.
An assistant to Rabb said the bishop declined to comment on anything regarding Church of the Resurrection, because it is not a member of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland.
Praying in a hotel
Resurrection's newsletter at the end of December explained the pending move from Woodbrook and stated: "We ask that all of you pray for the misguided men in power who for some reason see us as a threat."
Resurrection's sudden ouster from Woodbrook left the membership scrambling for a new meeting place. They temporarily held services in a conference room of the Towson Sheraton hotel.
The setback, he said, had an upside.
"I trust that God knows all things and knew we would learn something from this experience," Winks said.
Noting that many members previously worshipped in ornate churches, he said, "I think it was important to the community to see that they could worship in a hotel."
The loss of worship space, however, wasn't the only effort by the Episcopal diocese to undermine the Church of the Resurrection, Cunningham said.
In November, Ihloff, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese, issued a letter to clergy.
"Since this may be in newspapers, you should be aware that Church of the Resurrection is not an Episcopal congregation, nor even a proper Anglican one," Ihloff wrote.
Describing the church as a "small group of former Episcopalians," Ihloff said that he and Rabb had previously refused to license Winks.
"We were not impressed with his credentials; obviously our judgment has proven sound," Ihloff wrote.
Winks, who holds a bachelor's degree in psychology from Yale University and a master's degree from Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in Ambridge, Pa., said the refusal had little to do with his credentials and much to do with Ihloff's theological differences with more orthodox church officials in Pennsylvania.
Legal letter
In a March edition of the church's newsletter, Resurrection officials announced their formal response to the diocese's actions. They said Resurrection's Servant Council "has taken the step of authorizing a letter to Bishop Ihloff from our attorneys, firmly demanding that the bishop and those acting under his authority cease and desist from interfering (with) and hindering the lawful exercise of religious activities of the Church of the Resurrection."
To date, Resurrection has received no response, Cunningham said.
In the meantime, the Resurrection membership, which now tops 100 people, has secured a new site for worship at the Rainbow Hill Mansion in Stevenson. Committed to community outreach and eager to attract young families to the church, Resurrection has organized an Easter egg hunt on the mansion grounds for the community.
"We're all about looking to the future and growing. We're not about moaning over the past," Cunningham said. "Our two main roots are the Anglican/Episcopalian tradition and also the little house churches that St. Paul created in Acts as he moved throughout the Roman Empire.
"We just want to do our own thing, and we don't want anybody from our past to interfere with us."
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams. "We have in this world an effort to divide denominations and churches and this effort troubles me because I think the unity of the church is important," Nord said. "I think the church is best served when we have a wide variety of theologies and people within it to represent a fuller picture of who God is. So when one group decides to leave the church, I believe that is both unscriptural and harmful to the body."
Mrs VS
A good example of how the orthodox/revisionist divide cuts across Protestant denominational boundaries.
Agreed. It seems inevitable, the establishments will draw together in mutually defensive arrangements. The ELCA went through a torturous process to reach full fellowship with the ECUSA a few years ago. This last year they reached the same position with the apostate UCC, seemingly with no more than a few emails among lawyers and a wink of the eye. It was a done deal before anyone knew about it. Life on the slippery slope, I guess.
More negative news for the ECUSA and the PCUSA. The leadership of both denominations seem to believe that negative news will attract new members.
The people in the pews in both organizations need to arise and oust the leadership in both organizations. Until the leaders are terminated, the PCUSA and ECUSA will continue on their course of self-extinction.
PC(USA) Translation: Blasphemous churches must support each other.
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