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'Large, viable remnant' wants to continue as Episcopal congregation
Episcopal News Service ^ | Tuesday, December 19, 2006 | Mary Frances Schjonberg

Posted on 12/19/2006 4:22:38 PM PST by Condor 63

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1 posted on 12/19/2006 4:22:40 PM PST by Condor 63
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To: Condor 63

Good luck to them....they'll have to tithe to pay the utility bills..


2 posted on 12/19/2006 4:28:10 PM PST by ken5050
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To: Condor 63

Thirty or so, eh? Ummm hmmm!


3 posted on 12/19/2006 4:42:46 PM PST by davisfh
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To: Condor 63
Good luck with that. (sarc)
4 posted on 12/19/2006 4:50:10 PM PST by GOP Poet
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To: Condor 63
Sandra Kirkpatrick referred to that slowly organizing group as a "large, viable remnant."

Large? I wonder if she would consider $30 a week a "large" salary.

5 posted on 12/19/2006 5:04:05 PM PST by taxesareforever (Never forget Matt Maupin)
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To: Condor 63

They could always turn the church into a bath house to help raise revenue.


6 posted on 12/19/2006 5:04:35 PM PST by Maynerd (Virtual Fence - only the tax dollars are real)
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To: Condor 63

Translation --

A large, viable remnant doesn't have the money to buy back the church buildings when they vote to leave because they've dwindled to the point where they can barely afford to keep their rector in fancy robes.

The reason why those congregations are no longer viable is that the only people left are the few who don't care that scripture, tradition and reason (norms of authority in that denomination) take a back seat to feeling good reciting liberal platitudes.


7 posted on 12/19/2006 5:07:20 PM PST by TWohlford
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To: Maynerd
They could always turn the church into a bath house to help raise revenue.

Isn't that what started this whole thing?

8 posted on 12/19/2006 5:07:35 PM PST by NonValueAdded (Prayers for our patriot brother, 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub, now more than ever my FRiends.)
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To: Condor 63
30 members is barely enough to support a home church.

They wouldn't even be able to pay to have the lawn mowed at the old church building, let alone the utilities.

And it's just a little tiny 19th c. wooden Carpenter's Gothic structure . . . but those buildings tend to have serious (and expensive) maintenance issues. My parents' little church, St. Andrew's Darien, is almost a carbon copy, and you wouldn't BELIEVE the expense they've had to go to to keep the building up, small as it is.

9 posted on 12/19/2006 6:09:34 PM PST by AnAmericanMother ((Ministrix of Ye Chase, TTGC Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment)))
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To: NonValueAdded; Peanut Gallery
They could always turn the church into a bath house to help raise revenue.

Isn't that what started this whole thing?

snicker

10 posted on 12/19/2006 6:16:30 PM PST by Professional Engineer (As far as we know, all numbers are imaginary. some just hurt your brain more than others. ~ lepton)
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To: Condor 63

Reminds me of the PCUSA here in my town. They have a hugh large beautiful old church and only 70 members most old folks. They use a small ancillary building for their services because they can not affored to pay the bill for utilities in the big church. The Baptist Church has built a large new church with a gym as such for kids. They have to have three services on Sunday can they can not fit everyone including lot of kids and teenagers and young families in. They plan to to build a larger building. Amazing. They do alot of things for the kids.When the Passion came out they bought out the theater and gave free tickets to anyone and a free paperback bible. The had a potluck dinner for anyone who showed up at Thanksgiving time. The old liberals have no or not many kids and if they do their children do not attend church or would not step foot in the church of their parents. They have not activities for the young. They are a dying Church even with a private liberal PCUSA Univ. in town.


11 posted on 12/19/2006 8:24:31 PM PST by therut
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To: AnAmericanMother

"They wouldn't even be able to pay to have the lawn mowed..."

Why would a church of 30 pay to have the lawn mowed? In my church, volunteers keep the place clean, mow the lawn, and pitch in to handle any maintenance that needs done (including roofing, plumbing, etc.). Thirty is more than enough to handle the job.


12 posted on 12/20/2006 9:45:36 AM PST by Kahonek
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To: Kahonek
You must not be an Episcopalian . . . < g >

They MIGHT be able to handle mowing the lawn (actually, their kids would have to do it. If they have any kids, vide Bishopess Schori's riff on Episcopalians not having kids for the good of the planet.)

But it's the rare Episcopalian who can actually DO anything with his hands. And most of us who could, are not Episcopalians any more. It's the liberal whiners who are remaining behind. Think men with turtleneck sweaters and soft hands, women with short hair that looks like it was cut with the nail scissors, lots of clunky folk jewelry and (badly) hand knitted sweaters. All they can do is whine, so far as we have been able to determine none of them do any useful work.

(I'm only exaggerating a little bit. The most liberal crowd in almost any ECUSA church are the wine-and-croissant artsy bunch.)

13 posted on 12/20/2006 12:02:43 PM PST by AnAmericanMother ((Ministrix of Ye Chase, TTGC Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment)))
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To: AnAmericanMother; sionnsar

You know what they say about an SUV belonging to an Episcopalian....


...the only mud it ever sees, is from an occasionally tipped over "potted lily".

:D


14 posted on 12/21/2006 10:41:28 AM PST by TaxRelief (Wal-Mart: Keeping my family on-budget since 1993.)
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To: AnAmericanMother
"You must not be an Episcopalian..."

Hey, that quip just gave me an idea. Someone needs to write a "You might be an Episcopalian..." book along the lines of Jeff Foxworthy's "You might be a redneck". Like, "If you consider yourself devout but spend more on car washes every week than you put in the offering plate......you might be an episcopalian." Heck, that book would write itself.

15 posted on 12/21/2006 10:46:50 AM PST by joebuck
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To: TaxRelief
Heh.

Another Reason I'm No Longer an Episcopalian.

The last hunt test we went to was 8 miles down an unpaved Georgia red clay road . . . and it POURED on Friday . . . 200 dogs entered, you figure maybe 120 cars went down that road (lots of folks entered several dogs) . . . it was just wall to wall Mud Soup.

I WISH I had a picture of my (formerly) white Explorer before I washed it! It was a two-tone job, red to the windows!

Hunting Retriever Club Baptism:


16 posted on 12/21/2006 11:39:55 AM PST by AnAmericanMother ((Ministrix of Ye Chase, TTGC Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment)))
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To: All
DESPERATION
Christopher Johnson, Midwest Conservative Journal

Apparently stung by the massive media coverage of people who no longer want any part of it, 815 launches a counteroffensive:

The 30 or so members of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Heathsville, Virginia, who opposed a recent vote by the majority of the congregation and the rector to join the Anglican Church of Nigeria say they want to continue as the Episcopal presence in their community.

"We are prepared to continue to operate St. Stephen’s as an Episcopal Church, and I think we have people who will agree to accept leadership positions and to continue to carry on the work of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church," said Dawn Mahaffey, one of the people who voted against what some members are calling "the secession."

Sandra Kirkpatrick referred to that slowly organizing group as a "large, viable remnant."

Thirty people is a "large, viable remnant."  Membership-wise, that's probably a little bit under par for the Episcopal course these days.  But why did St. Stephen's vote this way in the first place?  Easy.  The leadership.

"This is not personal. These people have been my family, and I, and I don’t think any of the others that have come to me, would harbor any evil feelings toward our fellow parishioners," she said. "This has been an issue around leadership and it’s just been the way in which it has been handled. I don’t think it’s been done in a kind and equitable and fair way."

She called the actions of the vestry and the rector, the Rev. Jeffrey Cerar, "divisive, irresponsible and manipulative."

Translation: Cerar wouldn't stop talking about the real world.

Both Mahaffey and Kirkpatrick said that the decision at the 2003 General Convention to consent to the election of Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire prompted a change in the attitude of St. Stephen’s leadership, which only got more determined with time.

Mahaffey said that Cerar initially said at a congregational meeting late in 2003 that he would try to work within the framework of the Episcopal Church to make changes but that he would leave if he felt he could not continue in the church. He said at that meeting that if he left and if others joined him, they would not attempt to take over St. Stephen’s property, she said.

However, Mahaffey recalled, the perceived failings of the Episcopal Church "became the topic of his sermons from that point forward. It did not matter what the liturgy was for any given Sunday or what the Gospel was, there was always a way to bring the topic around to that issue. We very often got the message that the Episcopal Church had sinned and needed to be repentant."

"It got to the point that our needs for pastoral oversight and ministry were not being met because of the single-minded focus on this issue. We were not hearing the Word and how that was applicable in our daily lives. I don’t think we were being ministered to in all of our needs."

Which prompted the "real" St. Stephen's folks to leave the parish and a bunch of fundie carpetbaggers to come in.

There was a "steady outgo of people who found this message intolerable," Kirkpatrick said, and a "steady influx" of people who approved of the leadership’s position.

"Everyone down here knew that St. Stephen’s was taking this stance," she said.

Everyone knows this has been planned for a long time.

Mahaffey said the growing disaffection with the Episcopal Church "has been very well staged."

"I think it has been sold to the congregation," she said. "Three years of hearing it week after week after week."

The Episcopalians at St. Stephen's just wanted to remain Episcopalians and didn't want to have to, you know...actually believe stuff.

The issue of homosexuality was the "precipitating event but it has gone so far beyond that that I haven’t even heard that mentioned in probably the last year," Kirkpatrick said. "The first year it was an issue, but not since. It has been: ’We know the truth and we are telling it to you. If you don’t accept this truth then you really don’t belong here."

"It is biblical inerrancy – taking the Bible seriously as a primary source, taking the Bible literally in a lot of cases. There’s very much been from the pulpit and from everyone connected with the leaving-the-Episcopal-Church-side that there is one way, there is one truth and that they know what that one way and that one truth is… that anyone [who] believes, says, [or] accepts the idea that anyone could find truth in a religious life any way except through Jesus Christ in this particular narrow revelation of him is not a Christian."

Awfully telling passage, that.

17 posted on 12/21/2006 11:55:39 AM PST by sionnsar (?trad-anglican.faithweb.com?|Iran Azadi| 5yst3m 0wn3d - it's N0t Y0ur5 (SONY) | UN: Useless Nations)
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To: ahadams2; piperpilot; ex-Texan; ableLight; rogue yam; neodad; Tribemike; rabscuttle385; ...
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18 posted on 12/21/2006 11:57:14 AM PST by sionnsar (?trad-anglican.faithweb.com?|Iran Azadi| 5yst3m 0wn3d - it's N0t Y0ur5 (SONY) | UN: Useless Nations)
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To: Condor 63

For some reason, "large, viable remnant" sounds like something from a "Left Behind" novel.


19 posted on 12/21/2006 1:39:05 PM PST by neodad (USS Vincennes (CG-49) Freedom's Fortress)
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To: Maynerd

you took my idea! had that for our episco-baalians here


20 posted on 12/21/2006 1:59:03 PM PST by stan_sipple
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