Posted on 12/08/2006 6:26:02 PM PST by sionnsar
Northern California's Episcopalian leader, the newly appointed Rev. Marc Handley Andrus, was arrested this afternoon for blocking the front door of the San Francisco federal building to protest the Iraq war.
Andrus, carrying a shepherd's staff and singing "Down by the Riverside," was among 200 protesters who had marched from Grace Cathedral on Nob Hill to join the weekly "die-in" at on Golden Gate Avenue near City Hall.
The bishop celebrated communion at the entrance plaza before Federal Protective Service officers began arresting protesters for lying down and blocking the two main doors. The officers passed Andrus in their first round of arrests as he was not positioned in front of the doors.
After Andrus, in his purple robe, got up, moved a few steps and lay down again directly in front of the entrance, the officers returned and placed him in handcuffs -- as one said, "How are you?" and shook the priest's hand.
Protesters applauded, cheered and sang as Andrus was photographed by another officer and led inside the building.
"God is with all who have suffered in Iraq," the bishop said. "This war needs to be opposed. Even though there is widespread sentiment against the war, we need to continue to push for peace."
Andrus became the eighth bishop of the 80-congregation Episcopal Diocese of California in July.
It's been that for a long time now; I first saw that clearly a quarter-century ago. (Which is in part why I am no longer Episcopalian.)
God help TEC indeed! I am not surprised by any of this at all. Liberation theology and many other heresies have been the stock and trade of leading "Episcopal" seminaries here in the US. They threw out the baby with the bathwater decades ago by allowing the ordination of women to the priesthood and their subsequent "consecration" as bishops, the gutting of solid biblical doctrine by revisionists in the 1979 prayer book, the "New" (and politically correct) 1982 Hymnal and the "New" translations of Scripture during that period. It is written that judgement will begin with the house of God - I say, bring it on! When Christ returns for His Bride, she will be without spot or wrinkle. That may take a while, but it will happen, as promised. And, what a blessed day that will be. MARANATHA!
Musically, it's of much higher quality, with some really excellent additions from sources such as Greek and Russian chant, Latin polyphony, and the best German chorales (both Catholic and protestant). It did put in some abysmally stupid modern happy-clappy stuff ("Earth and All Stars" is my candidate for the absolutely dumbest and most vacuous words, set to a silly jingle of a tune that for a free bonus is also difficult to sing) but on the other hand it took out most of the worst of the treacly, sentimental Victorian claptrap. So that, for me, is a wash.
From a theological point of view it does leave something to be desired - especially the mutilation of the words of old gospel/New England hymns such as "Amazing Grace" and "Come Thou Fount" - but judicious application of White-out and a good fine point pen can remedy most of that . . . . and the Catholics have nothing to brag about wrt theologically faulty hymns, given the prevalence of OCP and the St. Loooey Jebbys . . .
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