Anglican schism?

[dsdrane]

:reading: I just read a fabulous editorial in the Edmonton Journal:

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/opinion/story.html?id=a8ce7899-cb37-481d-8d67-32bc0fe91260

I found it via the always informative:

http://episcopalchurch.typepad.com/episcope/

...which is a great source for all news Episcopal.

[u-dog]

You're right David, that was as articulate a summation of the situation as I have ever read. He hit it directly and resolutely on the head.

[BenL]

Thanks for posting that link. That's how I have been feeling for a while now but have been afraid to say out loud, preferring mumbled platitudes about reconciliation. I feel like the conservative wing at home and abroad is leaving us, not the other way around. I loved his description of the Levitical and Pauline verses that are used to condemn us.

Thanks again.

[NathanATX]

Here's an excerpt of an article I've written. I'll post the link to the full article when it's published.

Bishop Jack Iker, of the very conservative Fort Worth Diocese, has become one of the most vocal leaders in the movement to break the ECUSA apart. He has requested that a primate, or presiding bishop, from another country be allowed to take over their governance since he rejects Presiding Bishop Schori’s authority as he believes women shouldn’t be ordained and he rejects her support of Bishop Robinson’s ordination.

His choice for alternative primatial oversight appears to be Bishop Peter Akinola of the Anglican Church of Nigeria. Bishop Akinola is extremely anti-gay. He has spearheaded Nigerian legislation that mandates the prohibition of same-sex marriages, celebration of same-sex marriages in houses of worship, the registration of gay clubs and societies, the publicity of same sex relationships. Here is some of the actual text: “Any person who is involved in the registration of gay clubs, societies and organizations, sustenance, procession or meetings, publicity and public show of same sex amorous relationship directly or indirectly in public and in private is guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a term of 5 years imprisonment.”

The penalties for violating this law are: “Any person goes through the ceremony of marriage with a person of the same sex is guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a term of 5 years imprisonment. Any person performs, witnesses, aids or abets the ceremony of same sex marriage is guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a term of 5 years imprisonment.”

Imprisonment for marrying someone you love? Is this what the Diocese of Fort Worth is stooping to? They don’t believe gay men & women should be ordained so they advocate their imprisonment?

[BruceChris]

I especially like the part where it says that US Episcopalians, who comprise 3% of world Anglicanism, pay 30% of the bills. It sounds a bit un-Christian to suggest that all we need to do for Bishop Akinola is to give him enough rope, but then he seems to be doing just that all by himself.

Peace and Love, Bruce Chris

[Rick336]

Nathan, That's a very disturbing and thought provoking article. I'm looking forward to the entire text when it's published.

Rick

[Diane Vera]

I especially like the part where it says that US Episcopalians, who comprise 3% of world Anglicanism, pay 30% of the bills. It sounds a bit un-Christian to suggest that all we need to do for Bishop Akinola is to give him enough rope, but then he seems to be doing just that all by himself.

Has the IRD promised sufficient replacement funding, I wonder??? If not, it would seem that he is definitely hanging himself.

[BruceChris]

Canon Kendall Harmon of the Diocese of South Carolina, a leading conservative thinker, called the bishops' statement "as strong a repudiation as you can get" of Anglican demands.

"The reality is that they've rejected what's been asked," Harmon said. "They went out of their way to both push back on Rowan Williams and the primates."

The Rev. Susan Russell of the Episcopal gay advocacy group Integrity compared the bishops' statement to a "coming-out process."

"This was a huge step that the American church was not willing to go back into the closet about its inclusion of gay and lesbian people in order to capitulate to those who would exclude us," Russell said. (Rachel Zoll, AP)

For the whole article, see below:

http://www.planetout.com/news/article.html?2007/03/21/6

The American Episcopalian Church has made a stand, and one they will not/can not easily back down from. I'm likin' this lady bishop more and more all the time.

Peace and Love, Bruce Chris

[WillySF]

Indeed it is our only option.

[Daniel]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/23/ngay123.xml

http://www.towleroad.com/2007/09/anglican-arch-1.html

[Steven E. Webster]

Friends,

I think this schism is unfortunate on the one hand, and hopeful on the other.

Hopeful, because a mainline Protestant church in the U.S. has refused to be intimidated by the homophobes both here and abroad.

Unfortunate because of the broken unity. However, LGBT people could not justly be required to pay the price of the unity which the likes of Peter Akinola and the IRD were insisting on.

The only unity that really matters is the unity which is the gift of Christ. In time these new wounds will heal, and it may be sooner than anyone expects.

Steven Webster

[BenL]

... till the fat lady sings! Check out Walking With Integrity (http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/), the blog of Integrity, the Episcopal Church's lgbt organization.

I believe this is a game of chicken on the conservatives' part. I don't believe that the American bishops will be the ones to blink. I am reassured from the accounts that I have read that the House of Bishops is acting with a deliberate process that recognizes that lives, spiritual and physcial, are at stake. I see the House's debate as Spirit-filled. I believe that their response will challenge all people of good will in the Anglican Communion to come to the table to deliberate with them. I also believe that if there is an immediate fracture of the Communion, it will be because the conservative side had intended to force such a split no matter what. I pray for God's grace to touch the hearts of all Anglicans and all Christians, no matter what their views.

[BenL]

Latest from the Episcopal Life Online about the talks in New Orleans:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79901_90431_ENG_HTM.htm

The Reuters story reported on Walking With Integrity (http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/):
Episcopal bishops see "clear" statement on gays
http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/2007/09/episcopal-bishops-see-clear-statement.html

Keep prayin'!!

[Pablo Rafael]

I have to express my appreciation with the Episcopal church.

Whereas my church (Roman Catholic) and the church of my upbringing (Lutheran) have bowed to popular pressure and taken the non-Biblical stand saying that, "Homosexuality is wrong, but we love homosexuals (as long as they don't do anything that is gay and realize that they are worse sinners than we are)", the Episcopal church has had the courage to take a strong stand for what is right.

The Episcopal church is fighting the battle against prejudice and hatred that all Christian denominations should be fighting. The Episcopal church has my great respect and admiration.

Tu Amigo, Pablo

[andrewlittle]

Leaders of the Episcopal Church in the United States have agreed to halt the ordination of gay clergy to prevent a split in the Anglican Church.
The Church will also no longer approve prayers to bless same-sex couples.
From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7013552.stm

[Steven E. Webster]

From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7013552.stm

This story makes it appear that the conservatives got everything they wanted. No gay clergy. No same-gender blessings.

I think it's a little more complex than that.

What's really going on here?

Steven Webster

[Daniel]

But if the BBC article is accurate, the Bishop's previous statement about supporting gay members of the church rings hollow, to say the least.

Looks like the American Bishops blinked first.

We need more information. That said, it doesn't look good.

[Daniel]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/26/us/26episcopal.html?hp


Episcopal Bishops Reject Anglican Church’s Orders

By NEELA BANERJEE
Published: September 26, 2007
NEW ORLEANS, Sept. 25 — Bishops of the Episcopal Church on Tuesday rejected demands by leaders of the worldwide Anglican Communion to roll back the church’s liberal stance on homosexuality, increasing the possibility of fracture within the communion and the Episcopal Church itself.

After nearly a week of talks at their semiannual meeting in New Orleans, the House of Bishops adopted a resolution that defied a directive by the Anglican Communion’s regional leaders, or primates, to change several church policies regarding the place of gay men and lesbians in their church. But the bishops also expressed a desire to remain part of the communion, and they appeared to be trying to stake out a middle ground that would allow them to do so.

Still, up to five American dioceses led by theologically conservative bishops may try to break with the Episcopal Church and place themselves under the oversight of a foreign primate in the coming months, said the Rev. Canon Kendall Harmon, a conservative Episcopal strategist.

“We’ll have the chaos here increase as more individuals, parishes and dioceses begin moving,” Mr. Harmon said. “What will happen is that we will see more of the disunity here spread to the rest of the communion.”

In a voice vote, all but one bishop supported a resolution, called “A Response to Questions and Concerns Raised by Our Anglican Communion Partners.” Several conservative bishops who are considering leaving the Episcopal Church were not in attendance.

The resolution affirmed the status quo of the Episcopal Church, both theological conservatives and liberals said.

It states, for example, that it “reconfirms” a call to bishops “to exercise restraint” by not consenting to the consecration of a partnered gay bishop. It also says the bishops promise not to authorize “any public rites of blessing of same-sex unions.” Still, some bishops allow such blessings to occur in their dioceses. Both positions have been stated in past meetings of the governing body of the church, the General Convention.

The resolution also calls for an “immediate end” to the practice of foreign bishops’ consecrating conservative Americans to minister to breakaway congregations in the United States, a trend that church leaders believe undermines their authority.

The Bishop Martyn Minns of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America, a prominent conservative group supported by the Archbishop of Nigeria, responded to the bishops’ resolution: “They’re offering business as usual. The communion asked them to make a change, to embrace the teaching of the communion about homosexuality, and there’s no change at all.”

The Anglican Communion in 1998 denounced homosexuality as incompatible with Scripture. Bishop Minns spoke from a meeting in Pittsburgh where he and leaders of as many as 50 breakaway groups were discussing how to cooperate and avoid further splintering.

Contrary to recent news reports that the conservatives were close to forming a unified new structure, Bishop Minns said there were no plans to announce the formation of a new Anglican body that would consolidate all the conservative groups that have broken with the Episcopal Church under one umbrella.

The dispute over homosexuality has simmered for at least 30 years, as part of a larger clash about biblical interpretations and primacy. Tensions worsened when the Episcopal Church consecrated an openly gay man, V. Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.

At a February meeting in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, 36 primates of the Anglican Communion issued the directive on gay bishops and same-sex unions. They also demanded that the Episcopal Church create a parallel leadership structure to serve the conservative minority of Episcopalians who oppose the stance on homosexuality.

The communiqué held out the possibility of a diminished status for the Episcopal Church in the communion if it did not satisfy the primates’ demands.

In March, Episcopal bishops rejected the parallel structure, saying it would compromise church autonomy. At the time, the Episcopal bishops sent an urgent invitation to Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the communion’s spiritual leader, to meet with them in New Orleans, which he did last week, along with other Anglican leaders.

At a news conference in New Orleans on Friday, Archbishop Williams said that other Anglican leaders at this week’s meetings would be “reading and digesting what the bishops have to say” and would share their opinions with him. He said he would also talk to primates and others and then give his own opinion about what to do in the coming weeks.

Bishops in New Orleans said the Dar es Salaam communiqué galvanized them, despite their differing views on homosexuality, largely because of what they considered efforts by foreign primates to interfere in the life of the Episcopal Church.

The communiqué’s idea of outside oversight for dissident Episcopal dioceses and the recent consecrations of bishops to serve breakaway congregations violated most bishops’ notions of local authority and appropriate interactions among provinces of the communion, bishops said.

Some bishops said they have reconciled themselves to the fact that some kind of break in the Episcopal Church or the greater communion is inevitable. If several months ago, a sizable number of bishops would have argued for the unity of the communion at almost any cost, far fewer would do so now, several bishops said.

But others argued that the bishops had sought to prevent a split by agreeing not to ordain more gay bishops or to formalize rites for same-sex unions.

“I think they had a sense of what the communion needed to hear from them, and I think that they said it,” Jim Naughton, canon for communications and advancement of the Diocese of Washington, said of the bishops.

“We wanted to give the people working to hold the Anglican Communion together a useful tool to help them do that,” he added. “At the same time, we did not want to backtrack on our commitment to gay and lesbian Christians. It’s our sense that this resolution has accomplished that.”

Laurie Goodstein contributed reporting from New York.

Based on this reporting, the BBC has drawn an inaccurate conclusion as regards the meaning of the resolution.

You're right Steven- it's more comples than that.

[Daniel]

Here is the address made to the House of Bishops this past week.

http://www.standfirminfaith.com/index.php/site/article/6132/

An excerpt

My friends, you may believe you have discovered a very different truth from that of the majority in the Anglican Communion. It is not just about sexuality, but about your views of Christ, the Gospel, and the authority of the Bible. Please forgive me when I relay that some say you are a different church, others even think that you are a different religion.

And I rather like this response posted on the Blog In a Godward Direction.

http://jintoku.blogspot.com/

[BenL]

Those of a theological/pastoral bent can read the complete text of the bishops' statement here:

http://episcopalchurch.typepad.com/episcope/2007/09/the-statement.html#more

It will take me a while to digest what the bishops said and what impact it might have on the Episcopal Church and on the worldwide Anglican Communion.

I do think that the headstrong on both sides of the debate are itching for a breakup. Unfortunately, I don't think that most people in the pews care one way or another about worldwide church politics. They do care about their own parishes and how the local churches act on these issues.

[andrewlittle]

From the Statement

Resolution B033 of the 2006 General Convention

The House of Bishops concurs with Resolution EC011 of the Executive Council. This Resolution commends the Report of the Communion Sub-Group of the Joint Standing Committee of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Primates of the Anglican Communion as an accurate evaluation of Resolution B033 of the 2006 General Convention, calling upon bishops with jurisdiction and Standing Committees "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion." (1) The House acknowledges that non-celibate gay and lesbian persons are included among those to whom B033 pertains.

Blessing of Same-Sex Unions

We, the members of the House of Bishops, pledge not to authorize for use in our dioceses any public rites of blessing of same-sex unions until a broader consensus emerges in the Communion, or until General Convention takes further action. In the near future we hope to be able to draw upon the benefits of the Communion-wide listening process. In the meantime, it is important to note that no rite of blessing for persons living in same-sex unions has been adopted or approved by our General Convention. In addition to not having authorized liturgies the majority of bishops do not make allowance for the blessing of same-sex unions. We do note that in May 2003 the Primates said we have a pastoral duty "to respond with love and understanding to people of all sexual orientations." They further stated, "...[I]t is necessary to maintain a breadth of private response to situations of individual pastoral care."

[Daniel]

It's an interesting document, the relevant sections being this..


* We reconfirm that resolution B033 of General Convention 2006 (The Election of Bishops) calls upon bishops with jurisdiction and Standing Committees "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion."
* We pledge as a body not to authorize public rites for the blessing of same-sex unions.

and this...


Resolution B033 of the 2006 General Convention

The House of Bishops concurs with Resolution EC011 of the Executive Council. This Resolution commends the Report of the Communion Sub-Group of the Joint Standing Committee of the Anglican Consultative Council and the Primates of the Anglican Communion as an accurate evaluation of Resolution B033 of the 2006 General Convention, calling upon bishops with jurisdiction and Standing Committees "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion." (1) The House acknowledges that non-celibate gay and lesbian persons are included among those to whom B033 pertains.

Blessing of Same-Sex Unions

We, the members of the House of Bishops, pledge not to authorize for use in our dioceses any public rites of blessing of same-sex unions until a broader consensus emerges in the Communion, or until General Convention takes further action. In the near future we hope to be able to draw upon the benefits of the Communion-wide listening process. In the meantime, it is important to note that no rite of blessing for persons living in same-sex unions has been adopted or approved by our General Convention. In addition to not having authorized liturgies the majority of bishops do not make allowance for the blessing of same-sex unions. We do note that in May 2003 the Primates said we have a pastoral duty "to respond with love and understanding to people of all sexual orientations." They further stated, "...[I]t is necessary to maintain a breadth of private response to situations of individual pastoral care."

Two things stand out, the first being the matter of exercising 'restraint'. This could mean that no openly gay candidate will have much likelyhood of being consecrated bishop any time soon, though the statement doesn't exactly prohibit it either. And in the second case of 'rites', none exist at present, and leaves the matter up to a future convention.

All in all, the matter read like a 'pause', rather than a retreat. In that sense, the address is heartening. Gay members of the church haven't exactly been thrown under the bus.