Posted on 07/15/2005 8:04:10 AM PDT by Dane
The Episcopal Church Self-Destructs over Homosexuality
Episcopalians Defend the Consecration of a "Gay" Bishop
By Allan Dobras
The Episcopal Church has been flirting with a disastrous schism for the last thirty-five years, and now a formal breakup seems inevitable following an unapologetic June 17–22, 2005, appearance before the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) in Nottingham, England. The purpose of the meeting was to hear the church's defense of its consecration of "gay" Bishop V. Gene Robinson.
Over the years, the denomination continued to hang together as it blundered through several divisive issues while causing its rolls to plummet by about 1.3 million congregants, or nearly 40 percent of its membership. Remarkably, the church had managed to survive clergymen like Bishop John S. Spong, who institutionalized heretical teachings in the denomination, the failed heresy trial of Rt. Reverend Walter Righter, who opened the church to the ordination of homosexual deacons, and the church's persistent embroilment in leftist politics.
Now, ramifications from the consecration of Bishop V. Gene Robinson are sending shockwaves through the Anglican community, and the denomination is on the brink of imploding. The June 2003 election of Rt. Reverend Robinson to the office of bishop was the final straw for the traditionalist-minded American Anglican Council (AAC) and a number of conservative prelates-primarily from Africa-who put pressure on the Worldwide Anglican Communion to respond to what they thought to be contrary to church doctrine.
As a result, in October of 2003, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, established a commission to look at life in the Anglican Communion in the light of recent events-at the time, the imminent consecration of the Reverend Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire and the decision to authorize a service for use in connection with same-sex unions in the Diocese of New Westminster, Canada.
The commission was tasked by the archbishop to "offer advice on finding a way through the situation which currently threatens to divide the Communion." After studying the matter for several months, the commission issued its final report (The Windsor Report) on October 28, 2004, which called upon the Episcopal Church (USA) to:
* Express its regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of affection were breached in the events surrounding the election and consecration of a bishop for the See of New Hampshire. * Pending such expression of regret, those who took part as consecrators of Gene Robinson should be invited to consider in all conscience whether they should withdraw from representative functions in the Anglican Communion. * Effect a moratorium on the election and consent to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate who is living in a same-gender union until some new consensus in the Anglican Communion emerges.
The commission also called for a moratorium of Rites of Blessing of same-sex unions and recommended that bishops who have authorized such rites in the United States and Canada be invited to express regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of affection were breached by such authorization.
Conservative primates of the Anglican Communion gathered in February 2005 at Newry, in Northern Ireland, at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury to consider the recommendations of the Windsor Report. The primates endorsed the report and encouraged the Anglican Consultative Council to "organize a hearing at its meeting in Nottingham, England, in June 2005 at which representatives of the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada, invited for that specific purpose, may have an opportunity to set out the thinking behind the recent actions of their Provinces."
The Episcopal Church (USA) Responds
During the week of June 20, 2005, representatives of the Episcopal Church (USA) met with the Anglican Consultative Council in Nottingham, England, and presented their response to the Windsor Report in a 135-page document titled "To Set Our Hope On Christ," which was long on superlatives, but devoid of either regret or repentance. In substance, the response was little more than a repeat of the unsubstantiated junk science claims that homosexuality is inborn and unchangeable and the discredited revisionist theology that denies the validity of the biblical record concerning homosexuality.
In a hopelessly convoluted reply to the specific recommendations of the Windsor Report, the American church dismissed the call to express "regret" for their actions or to respect a "moratorium" on the consecration of any additional clergy involved in a same-sex relationship:
* At the present time part of the Church believes that it recognizes members of same-sex affection who are living Christ-like lives of generous self-donation, costly witness, and courageous acts of discipleship in conformity with the pattern Christ establishes for us. And this part of the Church is calling the rest to "come and see" if this isn't in fact the work of the Holy Spirit. . . . "We believe that God takes our differences, which the world would wickedly harden into divisions, and embraces them by the power of Christ and the Spirit within those blessed differences-in-relation of the Divine Persons . . . " * "The experience of the Church as it is lived in different places has something to contribute to the discernment of the mind of Christ for the Church. No one culture, no one period of history has a monopoly of insight into the truth of the Gospel. . . . We wish most deeply to express our loving concern for the good of the whole Church, especially for those Anglicans worldwide who are living in faithful, committed same-sex partnerships, and also for those Anglicans worldwide who do not see how such relationships can be open to God's blessing."
The Canadian Primate, Archbishop Hutchison, expressed regret over strained relationships that its actions have caused and agreed to a moratorium on dioceses authorizing same-sex blessings rites until the General Synod considers the matter.
On June 22, 2005, the Anglican Consultative Council, citing the standard of Christian teaching on matters of human sexuality expressed in the 1998 Lambeth Resolution 1.10, endorsed the Primates' request that "in order to recognize the integrity of all parties, the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada voluntarily withdraw their members from the Anglican Consultative Council for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference."
Thus, the Episcopal Church (USA), like a person addicted to hard drugs, cannot give up its romance with homosexuality and instead acquiesced to the relatively mild and inconsequential censure implicit in the ACC request for "voluntary withdrawal" from the council.
The American Anglican Council Calls the EC (USA) Response "Blasphemous."
The reaction from the American Anglican Council (AAC) to the EC (USA) presentation was swift and blunt, calling their defense "shameless" and declaring it was "blasphemous to suggest that the Holy Spirit would lead any Christian to accept or embrace doctrine or behavior contradicted throughout the body of Scripture."
The AAC dismissed out of hand a claim by the church's emissaries that "God designed and created a percentage of the population to be gay." In a sharply worded rebuttal, the ACC said, "It is not established that same-sex attraction is innate [and] God cannot be understood as having created what His revealed Word defines as sinful."
In its concluding statement, the AAC ridiculed their call for "unity in disagreement," and saw only a church in deep distress: "The logical conclusion of [their] argument is that unity is more important than truth. . . . The Episcopal Church is fractured and bleeding; punitive actions against the orthodox abound; and trust has been broken over and over. Additionally, data provided by the Episcopal Church itself demonstrates a church in disarray with a significant number of churches and individuals leaving ECUSA and dioceses experiencing serious budgetary shortfalls. It is most unfortunate that many other bishops representing a radically different view were not included in this ECUSA team."
The EC (USA), having weathered many storms in the past that left it intact but drove its membership into mass exodus, appears to have finally reached the end of the road, and a major breakup of the denomination seems inevitable.
--Al Dobras is a freelance writer on religious and cultural issues and an electronics engineer. He lives in Springfield, Virginia
YOU were the one who dragged me into this.
I was nowhere near this damn thread until you began defaming me.
Can the neo-maddie albright, xena princess, rhetoric.
You and jmc bantered about innuendo all the time on FR, so don't act like some vestal virgin now.
Then show me where I appeared on the thread before you defamed me.
Your reputation with bantering innuendo with jmc preceded you.
Jer 50:6 My people hath been lost sheep: their shepherds have caused them to go astray, they have turned them away on the mountains: they have gone from mountain to hill, they have forgotten their resting place.
One place I would never want to be on the great and awful day of judgment is in these "preachers" shoes.
Zec 11:17 Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.
Why won't you admit that you started this by defaming me on a thread I wasn't on?
Xena you "defamed" yourself with your vapant innuendo on endless FR threads with jmc, IMO.
Your anger should not be directed at me, but at jmc, IMO.
Why won't you admit that you started this particular fight by defaming me on a thread I wasn't on?
What do you have at stake that makes you so intent on being "right"?
Uh I didn't start it, you started it with jmc.
What do you have at stake that makes you so intent on being "right"
Nothing, what makes you intent on denying the obvious(i.e you and jmc had an innuendo bantering going on for a while)
I will type slowly and use short words, in hopes that you get it.
I was not on this thread until you defamed me.
Why did you bring me onto this thread, if not to defame me?
These are very simple questions, and for some reason you refuse to answer them. What dog do you have in this fight?
I think I get it. You just don't like me, and are looking for any chance to try to make me look bad.
Admit that's the case, and I'll go about my business, satisfied that you are a little man of little character.
Dog and Flyer, you two are eminently sensible (although I promised not to let that out).
If you have a spare few minutes, might you scan the parts of this thread that bear on me being accused of cheating on my fiance, and tell me if my anger at being so accused is unjustifiable or unreasonable?
Because I am angry. Damn angry. Angry enough to beau up and take it to the Messrs. Robinson.
I get it, no matter how slowly you type.
I was not on this thread until you defamed me.
Uh my point is that you "defamed" yourself with your vapant innuendo with jmc.
IMO, you two are locked at the hip together.
Why did you bring me onto this thread, if not to defame me?
See the above reply.
These are very simple questions, and for some reason you refuse to answer them. What dog do you have in this fight?
I've answered them, looks like you are the dog(no pun intended) looking for the fight.
No, I don't think you get it, which is why I think you dislike me.
Take that up with your woman, and quit taking it out on someone you have never met.
Take that up with your woman, and quit taking it out on someone you have never met.
I don't dislike you, what I dislike is the vapant banter between you and jmc.
Tar and feather me for making such a statement.
You don't dislike me, and you defame me?
How do you handle the people you really don't like?
FINALLY! She gets it.
And he's danely, to boot.
Actually HG, the above is a good sign, per my defintion of "vapant" in reply #92 of this thread.
vapant: adj. trivial, unimportant, self-centered, self-absorbed
JMO, but "No Vapancy" implies good thinking, unlike the modern liberals, who, IMO, are very vapant.
He's saying you deserve the raping cuz you wore such a short skirt.
How do you handle the people you really don't like?
Easy, the way the people kneejerkingly who dislike me for my opinions.
I tell them, I don't dislike(hate) them. Drives the liberal leftist nuts.
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