Posted on 02/11/2007 5:28:24 PM PST by sionnsar
The Episcopal liberal meltdown continues as Jim Naughton gets all warm and cuddly:
While the covenant is being drafted by a committee stacked with conservatives, and while its principle aim seems to be to shackle the Holy Spirit, it must nonetheless appeal to a substantial majority of the Communion, so it may be moderate enough for us to sign.
To this point, I have assumed that if the Episcopal Church is forced out of the Anglican Communion, we’d go our way and it would go its way, and that the Network diocese would fade into obscurity because so few of them are large enough to command any real attention once the conflict is over. Yes, there would be other bishops claiming our properties, and other Anglicanisms in our mission field, but I think we’d do just fine institutionally—assuming we can do something about our growth issues, which will be with us whether we are in the Communion or not. .
In other words, I have been relatively optimistic about our ability to flourish outside the Communion..
But reading the recent offerings form the odious trio of N. T. Wright, Graham Kings and Michael Scott-Joynt, I’ve hatched a new set of concerns. These folks don’t just want to disassociate from us; they want to destroy us. They want to impose some sort of extra-constitutional temporary government over a significant number of provinces, and while this is clearly unconstitutional in our system, provoking a constitutional crisis seems more or less what they have in mind.
So, while we’ve been thinking that it would be sad to lose the 10-12 percent of the Church that might place themselves under another primate, jolly old Tom Wright (Yes, let’s invite him over to sell a few of his books) and his allies have been scheming ways to put 20 to 30 percent of the Church under interim leadership with an eye towards appending it to some other ecclesial body.
Now, as it happens, I think this scheme is fanciful. I don’t detect anything like the dissatisfaction in the House of Bishops, or in middle of the road dioceses that would be necessary for Wright’s “College of Windsor Bishops” to make a credible challenge to General Convention. Indeed, the scheme may indicate certain desperation on Wright’s part. He may realize that the covenant isn’t going to be the instrument for the advancement of homophobic bigotry that he hoped it would be, and this is his latch ditch effort to push matters rightward. But I am speculating there. My point is that our Church has numerous opponents, and some of them don’t regard us as friends from whom they must regrettably estrange themselves, but as enemies who, in the words of one pugnacious right winger must be “taken down.”
In this context, to behave as though all will be well if we just keep our mouths shut and embrace the dream of a moderate covenant is simply poor stewardship. We need to be discussing our response to the various scenarios that might unfold in and after Tanzania. We need to be talking with the people in our pews about the choices that may lie before us. We need to be cultivating allies whom we can work with whether we are in the Communion or outside it.
Dear Lord, where to begin? Yes, that is exactly what a Christian group is trying to do. "Shackle the Holy Spirit." Actually, from out here in darkest Missouri, it looks like the Communion wants to establish a standard for judging whether or not some innovation is a "movement of the Spirit" with a good deal more spiritual and intellectual rigor than "Because we voted that way, that's why, you homophobic bigots."
And would somebody explain why the "odious" N. T. Wright should give a stale Communion wafer about TEC's polity or its constitution? TEC hasn't cared what the rest of the Communion said or did for decades now. Remember the TEC left's childish petulant reaction to the 1998 Lambeth Conference? Resolution 1.10 was dead-on-arrival in America before the ink was dry.
Remember this? The time when the Primates told Frank exactly what would happen if Gene Robinson got a pointy hat? Frank even signed his name to it, basically lying to the faces of every Anglican primate in the world and imposing a practicing homosexual bishop on the entire Anglican world.
No one got to opt out. The moment Robbie got his pointy hat and his hooked stick he became, under the Anglican rules of the game, an Anglican bishop regardless of what any Anglican province or any Anglican polity thought about it. So for Naughton to prattle on about "extra-constitutional" this and "unconstitutional" that and "a constitutional crisis" is really, really funny.
So the "odious" Bishop of Durham, one of the most respected theologians in the world, even among non-Anglicans, "may realize that the covenant isn’t going to be the instrument for the advancement of homophobic bigotry that he hoped it would be?" Aside from the fact that I never realized that libel was an Episcopal virtue, that statement may be as concise a reason as I've ever read why an Anglican split must happen.
For Jim Naughton and his side are right. End of story. They don't have to prove anything or make a serious case for their position. Their correctness is self-evident, every reasonable person knows it, and therefore anyone who disagrees with them is obviously a bigot. And those who criticize them are obviously out to "destroy" them.
Had the Episcopal Church displayed the slightest hint of humility over the last three years, this controversy would have been stopped in its tracks. TEC could have strangled this controversy in its crib if, immediately after the approval of Robinson, it passed a resolution stating that it realized the seriousness of what it had just done and that therefore, no more practicing homosexual bishops were to be elected or would be approved by the church, that Gene Robinson would be a bishop in New Hampshire and no place else and that any New Hampshire parish that disapproved would be allowed to choose another bishop.
But it didn't and it never occurred to TEC to even consider the idea. For my part, the Episcopal Church is not my "enemy." It was the church I grew up in and loved. But it is also a church gone horribly wrong and a church about which I have had trepidations for a very long time. I managed to rationalize most of them away until Gene Robinson's election, the spurious "movement of the spirit" claims that attempted to justify the unjustifiable and the up-yours-Anglican-world arrogance that surrounded it kicked the last stepladder out from under me. Fact is, Jim lad, that for most of us, Gene Robinson was only the icing on a very large cake.
Go ahead with the bigotry blasts, big man. Whatever gets you and your boss through the day.
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams. but I think we’d do just fine institutionally—assuming we can do something about our growth issues, which will be with us whether we are in the Communion or not.
Is this an admission that the church is losing members and not growing?
Naughton is a silly cry baby f*g.
Thanks for the ping. This is a pretty disturbing article on many levels; traditionalists.
Let me try that again. LOL
Thanks for the ping. This is a pretty disturbing article on many levels; traditionalists are under threat in nearly every segment of society.
Not all Episcopalians are bad. If I lived in Bishop John-David Schofield's diocese I might have still been Episcopalian.
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