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Absolutely. If you think this church is not dead, read the pathetic mealy-mouthed vomit from the Archbishop of Canterbury concerning this matter. A time for righteous anger and this wimp produces blathergab. This church needs burial. It's an abomination.

Doesn't matter. In 30 years their daughters will be wearing the burka, and their sons will spend their time memorizing the Koran. This is the only reality.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is a pathetic blithering mealy-mouthed wimp. The good news is that this ridiculous quasi-Christian social club will slowly continue its descent into well-deserved oblivian, and will be only a religous footnote in 50 years.

With respect, targeting Gibson's movie because of concerns that anti-Semitism is spreading in the world is beyond ridiculous. At a time when half of the world seems to lust for the blood of Jews, we have certain Jewish leaders in the United States wringing their hands over an interpetation by a Christian of the Christian gospels. This is so completeley irrational that it can only be explained as symtomatic of a latent anti-Christian bigotry on the part of certain of these leaders. The irony is that the hysterical and bigoted reaction to Gibson's movie is without any doubt creating more anti-Semtism than the movie itself ever would.

Yeah, the Eurotrash "don't do God" right now. However in about 30 years their grandchildren will be "doing God" 5 times a day in the local mosque. As for abstinence, they'll damned well have abstinence. Sleep around and if your a female you'll be getting a bullet in the back of the head in the local soccer stadium. Funny thing is the thought of Europe disintegrating into an Islamofascist theocracy doesn't bother me in the least. 10 years ago, even 5 years ago, the thought would have really bothered me. Now it doesn't. Not sure why that is.

Forget it. I wasn't trying to be rude or obnoxious. And the comment about "Da Joos" was uncalled for. Don't know who you are, but I'll remember you. I'm out of here.

Persons who have a solid grounding in their own faith and tradition are not susceptible to conversion. I don't accept for a minute that the reason why JFJ is having some apparent success is that they are preying on the less well-educated in the Jewish community. This is a cop-out, pure and simple. Why are Christians having much less success in proselytizing the less well-educated in the Islamic community? I suspect it is because their faith is extremely important to them on a daily basis. Your anger and your energy should be directed towards the weakness in your own community. Much easier (and probably less internally bothersome) to simply rant about JFJ. And I'm still waiting for an explanation as to why an atheist can be a Jew but a Christian cannot (assuming that "Jew" denotes religion and not race).

B'nai Brith Canada. Used to attend their fund-raising events. Don't anymore. Ultra-liberal on every major social issue. Not too subtle dislike of evangelical Christianity. Incredibly sanctimonious. I take no position on this absurd debate. Jews for Jesus are entitled to preach their message, B'nai Brith is entitled to oppose them. Why is there an issue here? However everyone should understand exactly what B'nai Brith is. I can guarantee you that they would nothing but disdain for Free Republic and the great majority of the people who post here.

The Board of Deputies of British Jews and the ADL should immediately SHUT THE F___ UP. Doing way more harm than good. I know I'm getting more and more aggravated by this implicit anti-Christian bigotry.

Hey, tpaine, I use the word "prick" once or twice, and all of a sudden the word "eat" starts appearing in your posts. Never knew till now you were inclined that way. How come we haven't seen you over on the Episcopalian gay Bishop threads?

The man asked for the law and you instead gave him the court decision. Decisions of the courts must be based on law. Now quit being a sanctimonious sarcastic prick and answer the man's question.

Come on now. The national media (and the ADL for that matter) have much more important things to worry about. In particular Mel Gibson's movie of the Christian gospels. You know, the real hard-core anti-semitic stuff.

Very disappointing letter. This situation calls for righteous anger, not platitudes and hand-wringing. Where is the outrage? This letter indicates to me that there is absolutely no hope for the Episcopalian church. In 20 years it will be a small Unitarian-type church having less tham 1,000,00 members. Headed to well-deserved obscurity.

"If you met him, it would be like meeting Bob Dylan or somebody like that. He had that kind of stature." That statement pretty well sums up the thrust of the entire article. "That kind of stature"?! Bob f----g Dylan? Billy Bob Thornton is a dork.

The incredible irony here is that the absurd criticisms of Gibsons movie coming from the usual left-wing sniveling wing of the Jewish population (which are in fact implicity bigoted and anti-Christian) are going to engender more anti-Semitism than Gibson's movie ever will. Obviously these elements of the Jewish community have very little regard for, and in fact are disdainful of, the deeply held beliefs of traditional Catholics and evangelical Protestants as reflected accurately in Gibson's movie. This approach will, in the end result, be extremely counter-productive insofar as the Jewish community in North America is concerned. As the refrain from a certain drinking song goes: "I don't give a damn for any man who doesn't give a damn for me". The ADL and the Weisenthal Center should just shut the f.... up. Right now. Before they do any more harm.

How good was that USSSR team? In 1972 Canadian NHL all-stars played the USSR for the first time. It was an 8 game series, 4 games in Canada, 4 games in the USSR. The Canadians won the last 3 games in Moscow to take the series 4-3-1, with Paul Henderson scoring the winning goal in the last minute of the 8th game. That Canadian team had all the NHL greats of that era on it - Esposito, Savard, Dryden, etc (although Bobby Orr was injured and missed the series). During the 70's Canadian NHL all-star teams played the USSR on numerous occasions. I would say that overall the results were about even - maybe a slight edge to the NHL.

The 1980 USSR team that the US college team beat was at least the equivalent of the 1972 USSR team. In effect a bunch of US college players beat a team equal in talent to the best in the NHL (NHL players couldn't play in 1980 because they were pro's). Difficult to think of a comparable sporting result. Amazing.

Thank you for the very interesting information. For the first time in my life I know what a "rector" and a "deacon" are - have heard the terms a thousand times of course, but never knew exactly what they were. You state that the Bishop has "ecclesiastical authority" over parishes. I assume that a Bishop could remove a Priest for doctrinal or moral abuse, and that this would not require the approval of the church congregation? Why then, was this immoral Priest not removed? If a Bishop refuses to act to remove such a Priest can the Presiding Bishop remove the Bishop as being complicit in the immorality of the Priest? Can the Presiding Bishop remove the Priest, and if he does not do so, is he complicit? Does the Presiding Bishop answer to anyone such as a Church Council? Just trying to find out where the buck stops on this one.

It would be useful to know the hierarchy for those of us not familar with this type of structure. Actually it would seem to me that it should be easier to impose doctrinal consistency in a hierarchical structure. Does the priest answer to a Bishop, and a Bishop to an Archbishop? Does the Archbishop answer to a Church council of some sort? Where were the Bishops and Archbisops and Church Councils up the chain from Robinson when he was living as a priest in an openly adulterous homosexual relationship? Silent apparently, to their everlasting disgrace. Could not an Archbishop from Texas or Colorado or South Carolina raise this issue? Those who did nothing (including the laity) are, it seems to me, complicit in this debacle.

Thanks for the response. I can understand how this got started. However I think the church leadership was remiss in not vigourously stamping this rot out at the local congregation level. Either this activity is sinful or it isn't. A church is not a democracy and a local congregation is not a town council. In my opinion the Episcopalian Church leadership has a serious problem in terms of doctrine. I place the blame on the conservatives who seemed willing to look the other way while this corruption was taking place. Where was the fierce condemnation, the righteous wrath in terms of Robinson acting as a PRIEST? Something missing in this church.

Surely different each diocese cannot have a different interpetation as to what constitutes sinful behavior. At what point does the national body step in? Presumably if a diocese was practising, for example, witchcraft, the national body would institute some sort of disipline. My point is that I find the actions of the dissenting Bishops more than a little disingenuous. Where have they been for the last 10 years on the issue of active gay priests? Why the sudden shock and dismay at this point? It strikes me that they never did really want to face this issue. Leads to believe that the "progressives" are right - the conservative leadership will wimp out. Much sound and fury, signifying nothing.