Your Press Release states that Nigerians and Ugandans have taken over our churches, both as occupiers and congregants. Both of these are totally false statements. Neither country launched a campaign to take over churches in the USA. One image I had from reading your words was these “occupiers” allied with General Grant and the Yankees marching on Richmond again. As you mentioned the forbears, this was even stronger.Which forbears do you mean? Are they those who would not have welcomed me into the Episcopal Church, as orthodox Anglicans from the Global South are not welcomed today by TEC? Or rather would it be those who were missionary minded and supported, the abolition of slavery, reaching out to all parts of the world etc? How can you claim to speak for an entire group of individuals who can no longer speak for themselves? Do you not think it possible that many forbears would be appalled at how the TEC by moving away from orthodox biblical faith has little resemblance to the church they loved? This is far more likely than your claim to the contrary. Neither can be applied to the group as a whole and serves no purpose other than to cloud the real issues.
Malcolm Phillips
Vestry, Church of th Apostles
Fairfax, VA
In a Letter to Bishop Lee of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia regarding his Statement of Dec. 17.
Read the whole letter and Bishop Lee's response at StandFirm.
5 comments:
Perhaps Bishop Lee would do much for his blood pressure if he thought of these defections as reparations.
I'm sorry BB, I think you had it right the first time. I'm sure Mr. Malcolm Phillips is sincere, but I think your orginial reading of vailed thread is more appropriate than racial slur.
Turo & TFC are pretty non-Africian linage, the occupation is probably a rallying cry to kick the invaders out of "their buildings"). The timing was probably a crossed fingers behind the back while signing the "standstill agreement."
Not that Father Jake and others have not really be racist in their views, but I think your intial read was probably more apt.
Objectively, I do not Peter James Lee is a racist. Nevertheless, we live in an age where the media constantly tells us "macaca" is a racial code word and the Harold Ford, Jr. advertisement (the one that had a white woman mention meeting Ford at the Playboy mansion) was racist. Accordingly, measured against contemporary standards, I think Mr. Phillips is quite correct -- this is a not very subtle racist attack from a leader named Lee who lives in the capital of the confederacy.
Sorry, PJL -- you need to change your tactics.
You mention with some distaste, forbears. Well both my father and brother are buried in the grounds of The Falls Church. Believe me our family intended that they be buried in Episcoplian ground, not Church of Nigeria ground. There has been a terrible breach of trust by the CANA movement, towards stewardship of those who lie in the church grounds.
Well, last time I checked The Falls Church was still in Virginia and still in the United States, and thus, still American, unless there was some invasion no one bothered to tell me about.
One does wonder if it had been an Australian Archbishop, like New South Wales for example, who had come to our rescue. Would BIshop Lee have called us the "Australian congregations?"
Doubt it.
bb
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