ELECTION OF WOMAN PRESIDING BISHOP IS SLAP IN THE FACE AT GLOBAL SOUTH

VirtueOnline ^ | 6/18/2006 | David W. Virtue

[monkapotamus]

ELECTION OF WOMAN PRESIDING BISHOP IS SLAP IN THE FACE AT GLOBAL SOUTH

News Analysis

By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org

COLUMBUS, OH (6/18/2006)--The election of the Rt. Rev. Katherine Jefferts Schori, 52, the ninth Bishop of Nevada to be the 26th Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, is a major league slap in the face at the Global South primates and bishops, most of whom do not even endorse women to the priesthood let alone to the episcopacy, and now they will have to contend with a woman ECUSA Presiding Bishop/Primate. Her election also goes against the spirit and intent of the Windsor Report.

To say this is a shock to the system doesn't touch it. A youth delegate to the House of Deputies, on hearing the news said, "If they are not ready, we are."

The voting was: Schori 95 (the minimum number needed), Henry Parsley, 82; Charles Jenkins 3, Stacy Sauls "the stripper" wannabe bishop got 0 as did Ted Gulick. Schori has never been the rector of a church, though she has been assistant rector at the Episcopal Church of the Good Samaritan in Corvallis, Oregon. She holds a Ph.D. in oceanography.

If the Anglican Communion wanted clarity, a word much bandied about here at this convention, they got it, in spades. Said an Anglican priest in the UK who phoned VOL on hearing the news; "The Episcopal Church just committed suicide."

Canon theologian Kendall Harmon from the Diocese of South Carolina said, "This is a shrinking (Episcopal) church and she (Schori) is in a booming state, and her diocese is not growing."

The Roman Catholic Church will not accept her, the great Orthodox churches of the East and West will not acknowledge her episcopacy and there are rumblings that the three Anglo-Catholic dioceses in the ECUSA - Quincy, Ft. Worth and San Joaquin - might pull out of The Episcopal Church. We shall see.

A spokesman for the American Anglican Council issued a statement saying, "We are grateful for the clarity that this vote demonstrates, sadly because Bishop Schori is against everything that Windsor is for."

Schori voted for the election of V. Gene Robinson, the openly homoerotic Bishop of New Hampshire (though she did not attend his consecration) and she supports same sex blessings.

Said the AAC spokesman; "She will bring into sharp relief the difference between being an Episcopalian and being an Anglican. It is not clear how she can do anything other than lead The Episcopal Church in walking apart from the rest of the Communion."

In her acceptance speech she said she was "awed and honored and privileged" at being elected and she hoped that her brother bishops will be blessed for their gifts and be strengthened. Schori said she gave "abiding thanks" for Frank Griswold and hoped he would "stay healthy." And that his gifts would be shared with the world. "May this great and greatly blessed church of ours be the vehicle and leader in building the reign of God in our day," she said.

Ready, ECUSA might be, but the consequences of her election will be history making and catastrophic.

As one orthodox bishop noted, "this is the best thing to have happened. We now have complete clarity. We now know what the church stands and where it is going. W should be grateful that clarity is complete. We will send the end of the church."

James Rosenthal, ACNS News Director, said the Archbishop of Canterbury will issue a statement tomorrow. VOL will post it immediately.

END

[N. Theknow]

Does this article insinuate that a woman Bishop is worse than a gay Bishop? Further, if the election of a gay Bishop didn't kill off the denomination, how is the election of a woman Bishop going to do so?

No. It is most definitely not worse.

However, it was hoped that the EC USA would repent of its ways and take a steadier course back to a the safe harbor of one holy, catholic and apostolic church.

Instead, the ECUSA has defiantly said by her election, "Not only are we not repentant of electing and ordaining a homosexual, but here is a further slap in the face of electing a woman to head the entire ECUSA.

It's like reprimanding your child for reckless behavior behind the wheel of the family car and the next time the child drives, he not only thumbs his nose at you as he pulls out of the drive, but he also puts on a blindfold.

[Claud]

Does this article insinuate that a woman Bishop is worse than a gay Bishop? Further, if the election of a gay Bishop didn't kill off the denomination, how is the election of a woman Bishop going to do so?

I can't speak for Episcopalians, being Catholic, but on the Ecumenical side of the question (which I know is weighing heavily on the minds of those Anglicans who truly believe themselves to be a part of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church) there is a huge difference.

A man can be ordained bishop no matter how heinously he sins, and the ordination--while it may have been idiotic, stupid, imprudent, whatever--still holds as a valid sacrament.

A woman cannot be ordained a bishop no matter what, because she is not, "valid matter" for the sacrament. Even if she goes through the ceremony of being ordained, it is null and void from the get-go.

[BelegStrongbow]

I cannot speak for all Anglicans, but all Anglo-Catholics of my acquaintance take precisely the position you state.

[Rosie405]

We ain't seen nuttin' yet. "Poly-amory" and the reduction in age of consent will be next. As soon as they think they've got the gay issue settled once and for all, it will not be long before the new agendas will be trotted out. After all, if you think God made you homosexual, and that same-sex behavior is "holy" and "filled with the Holy Spirit," it's a mere hop-skip-jump from there to also saying that God made you to have multiple wives/husbands or to love the young, and that those activities are "filled with the Holy Spirit" also.

[Carolina]

Dallas-Fort Worth has asked for alternate oversight.

[hinckley buzzard]

Without doubt, this woman was chosen & elected not for her gifts & experience..., she was elected because she & she alone would bring the greatest possible shock & offense to the rest of the Anglican World.

I believe this is true. Not only a slap in the Face, but an extended middle finger.

This woman was not initially considered a serious candidate but now is revealed to have been the stalking horse of the homosexual lobby. The manipulation which led to her election illustrates the aggression and hostility which drives homosexuality in general.

[hinckley buzzard]

I believe there are about two million+ actual members of the ECUSA, with something less than 800,000 in church on any given Sunday. And about 25% of the membership are over 65 years of age.