How do you evaluate the meetings you had at the Ecumenical Patriarchate during your present stay at the Phanar?
"It has been a wonderful couple of days; we have had an opportunity to talk with several people at the Phanar about our ecumenical relations, about our hopes, our anxieties because both of churches are facing considerable problems at the moment. We talked very honestly and very helpful about that and it has been an immense privilege and joy to be with the Patriarch, to spend personal time with him and to share in worship with him, it is always a gift to which I am very grateful to be here."
How do you characterize the course of dialogue between the Anglican and Orthodox Churches?
"We are planning the next round of the dialogue, the document that has come out so far, from the dialogue over the last maybe twenty years has already had a very positive impact in many ways. We now begin on a new course of work which starts later this year thinking about the Christian doctrine of human nature. We have our membership lined up; we have our subject matter defined, so I think the prospects are very good."
Last year (2008), the Time Magazine chose the Ecumenical Patriarch as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. At that time you wrote about the personality of the Patriarch that he is "an Eastern Orthodox leader that defines environmentalism as a spiritual responsibility" among Leaders and Revolutionaries.
"I have heard the Ecumenical Patriarch's name was one of those being talked about, and because I so greatly admire him as a theologian and as a pastor and as a person, I felt that it was a privilege to be able to say something in praise of him and the way in which he has I think created a role for the Ecumenical Patriarchate worldwide by teaching his teaching/ advocacy on environmental matters and the Christian approach to environmental questions, that has been a great example to many of us."
UPDATE: It's been learned that the official bylaws of the Order of the Daughters of the King stipulate that any proposed amendments (or, as in the case of the "Episcopal Community," amendments to the amendments) to the bylaws must be presented to the chapters three months before the start of the Triennial. As I think all DOK members may attest, these massive changes to the bylaws have only been circulated in the last week by the "Episcopal Community." Triennial starts this week. What's up with that?Do they honestly think the bylaws do not apply to them? That can't be right. I honestly do not understand why these sisters want to expell their fellow sisters from the Order.This is not a club. We don't blackball members who have taken their vows before God and their rector. As a friend tonight at dinner said, "this is not Junior High."
Proposed bylaws being submitted by a faction called the "Episcopal Community" is seeking to expel the non-TEC members from the Order of the Daughters of the King.
The draft bylaws now being circulated in anticipation to next month's Triennial include entire sections of the current by-laws rewritten so that those non-TEC members who are in the Order now will be expelled from membership.
The draft reads, "All members must be women communicants of The Episcopal Church (hereinafter referred to as TEC, formerly known as the Episcopal Church of the United States of America) . At no time shall any non-TEC person have seat or voice or vote or hold office or serve as chaplain in TEC Daughters of the King."
In addition, the wearing of the Daughters of the King cross will only be granted to so-called "parallel structures" (separate but equal?) by explicit permission of the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church following a rigorous consent process of the Episcopal-only membership. "Non-TEC parallel Orders may ... apply to the full National Council of TEC Daughters of the King for a license to use the name, cross, and such other items as may belong to this Order," reads the Episcopal Community draft Article IV:I. "The decision of the National Council to grant such license must be ratified by the membership and consented to by the Presiding Bishop of TEC."
The rest of the bylaws are rewritten so to reflect the expulsion of the non-TEC Daughters, clarifying that no one who is not in TEC can be in the Order of the Daughters of the King. The entire Section IV on membership has been deleted and rewritten in this draft being circulated by the "Episcopal Community." If this attempt is successful, it would mean that the Anglican chapters, as well as Lutherans and Roman Catholics will all be expelled from membership in the Order.
This viewpoint is a far cry from what was experienced at the recent Province III Daughters of the King annual retreat which you may read more about here. More information on this attempt at expulsion may be found here. It does make the heart sad.
The Order of the Daughters of the King will hold their Triennial next month in Anaheim. Please, please, please pray for that gathering and for the witness of Province III and others who seek to hold the Order together and not break apart.
I remember the day that Elvis died. I was living in Hawaii, a place that Elvis Presley loved and when he died the islands went into mourning. I bought my first Elvis record then. I knew he was big deal, like Jack Benny or Bob Hope, only younger. Elvis was too young for my parent's generation, and too old for mine. But I still remember when he died. They called him simply The King.
Another king, the heir apparent, died yesterday. I remember Michael Jackson too from childhood. I was ten, maybe eleven years old. I used to watch Saturday morning cartoons and both the Osmonds and the Jackson 5 had Saturday morning cartoon shows. There was a press rivalry between Michael Jackson and Donny Osmond - in fact, I remember when the two of them presented an award, it might have been the American Music Awards. My friends and I taped it with our bulky and awkward cassette tape recorders pressed against the single mono-speaker of our color TV. And then we played it over and over again.
A clip of that show is on YouTube:
My friends and I had that clip memorized. We thought it was the coolest thing. It's still pretty cute. This was how I remembered Michael Jackson when I was growing up.
And then of course, came Off the Wall, and then craziness with Thriller and those younger days were like they never happened. Now he really was cool.
And then the crash and burn, like Elvis. Over in an instant - and it wasn't as if we didn't see it coming. Bob Dylan, of course, crashed too. But he didn't burn. Gotta wonder about that.
Michael Jackson was immensely talented, who broke down racial barriers almost when no one was looking, before things got really strange, before the roots were pulled out and he was set adrift, lost.
Lots will be written about the life and death of Michael Jackson. For those of us here at the Cafe, though - through the Thriller, and the Billie Jean, and the Rock with You, and the Don't Stop Until You Get Enough, and the Off the Wall, and the Beat It days - we still go back in time, to the less-than-cool days, but perhaps realer days, to the first Michael Jackson song I ever bought and say good-bye.
“The assembly meeting was a wonderful coming together of the various jurisdictions represented in the Anglican Church in North America. Everyone was determined to make it work and we kept our eyes on Jesus and the Gospel.
“Since day one, CANA has been and will continue to be a full participant in the life of the new province, and will continue to maintain our own identity. We will encourage groups of congregations, when they are ready, to establish themselves as free-standing dioceses. Our goal is to support the work, mission, and ministry of the Gospel on this continent and bring our own particular distinctive to that task.
“CANA congregations now have a ‘dual citizenship.’ They are members of the Church in Nigeria and as a result of that relationship, full members of the global Anglican Communion. CANA congregations are also members of the Anglican Church in North America and will participate fully in the life of the new province.
“CANA is unique in its connection to the largest province in the Anglican Communion, the Church of Nigeria, which represents about 25 percent of the entire population of the Communion. CANA also has a distinct connection with the GAFCON and Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans movement, and with the Global South. We have a radical commitment to ministry of the poor which crosses all ethnic lines, to planting new churches, equipping the next generation for leadership in the church, and educating the church about how to engage with a resurgent Islam in North America.
“The future involves radical inclusion, profound transformation, and inspired service. The vision has not changed. Jesus Christ is the same and the Gospel remains unchanged. The new province has given us a way to do this work more effectively and more collaboratively.”
UPDATE: Here is a Q&A with Bishop Minns and members of the CANA delegation to the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) Assembly:
What were your impressions of the inaugural Assembly and what do you hope ACNA will achieve? It was a wonderful coming together of the various jurisdictions represented in the Anglican Church in North America, everyone was determined to make it work and we kept our eyes upon Jesus and the gospel.
CANA is a founding member of ACNA. Please describe how CANA will operate as a member of ACNA. Since Day 1, CANA has been and will continue to be a full participant in the life of the new province, and will continue to maintain our own identity. We will encourage groups of congregations when they are ready, to establish themselves as free-standing dioceses. Our goal is to support the work, mission, and ministry of the gospel on this continent and bring our own particular distinctive to that task.
Will any CANA districts such as the Anglican District of Virginia (ADV) or the Anglican District of the Great Lakes (ADGL) apply to become a new diocese in ACNA? In time, it is expected that several clusters will be formed and will apply for recognition. In the coming months I will be working with groups across CANA who are wanting to explore this process.
The Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) amended its constitution to include CANA. Will CANA continue to have an official relationship with the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion)? Yes we will. Part of the work this summer is to meet with the canonical lawyers in the Church of Nigeria to work on this process. CANA has a significant number of Nigerian clergy and congregations. For many in CANA - both Nigerian and non-Nigerian - our link with the Anglican Church of Nigeria is important. We are also reminded through this link that the body of Christ is larger than North America and that we are members of the global family of believers. Will CANA congregations have two Archbishops: Archbishop Bob Duncan of ACNA and Archbishop Peter Akinola of Nigeria? CANA congregations will continue to be under my leadership as Missionary Bishop. I will continue to be a missionary bishop in the Church of Nigeria, however I will be working closely with Archbishop Duncan in the work that takes place in North America. For a period of time, CANA congregations will have a 'dual citizenship'. They will be members of the Church in Nigeria and as a result of that relationship, full members of the global Anglican Communion. CANA congregations are also members of the Anglican Church in North America. CANA is a founding member and full participant in ACNA and will participate fully in the life of the new province.
Will CANA congregations have to join a new diocese in ACNA or will they be able to stay as CANA congregations? No one will be required to change anything. I am encouraging CANA churches to move forward and develop missionary structures that help us do the work of the gospel.
What distinctives can CANA offer member churches and ACNA? First, our connections with the largest Province of the Anglican Communion, the Church of Nigeria which represents about 25% of the entire population of the Communion. CANA also has a distinct connection with the GAFCON and Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans movement, and with the Global South. We have a radical commitment to ministry of the poor which crosses all ethnic lines, to planting new churches, equipping the 'next generation' for leadership in the church, and educating the church about how to engage with a resurgent Islam in North America.
Are new congregations and clergy joining CANA? Absolutely. The numbers continue to grow. We are welcoming new clergy and new congregations on a regular basis. We also have a growing number of individuals who are seeking ordination.
As you consider the inauguration of ACNA and the continued ministry of CANA, what are some of the challenges and opportunities that are ahead? We need to keep our eyes fixed on the gospel and mission, rather than becoming side-tracked with lots of debates and discussion about the things we disagree over. Sometimes questions about structure can consume us; however, I believe we need to keep focused on the local congregation fulfilling the mission of the gospel.
On a personal level, you have worked hard to see ACNA established. What now is the future for Martyn Minns? This is only the very first step. A lot of work remains to be done. By God's grace, I anticipate being involved in this ongoing work to find ways where we can have a common mission and strategy across the nation; ways where our worship can have a common life, common governance so that structures serve the ministry of the church! There is a huge amount of work still to be done. I will also continue to encourage clergy to faithfully fulfill the ministry that has been entrusted to them and offer leadership in the growth of the local church and the planting of new congregations.
This week we found out that churches and clergy in the USA formerly under the jurisdiction of Uganda now are part of their own diocese within the new province. Does that mean they are no longer members of ADV? Those who are in Virginia remain part of ADV in mission and ministry. Their new jurisdictional home was established so that the clergy and congregations associated with Uganda could be transferred and become part of only the Anglican Church in North America and no longer be canonically resident or under the jurisdiction of Uganda. How will the roles of various bishops who have helped orthodox congregations through this transition change within the new province? We are going to invite some of the bishops who have assisted in the past to serve as episcopal consultants; they will therefore be part of the college of bishops in the new province. Some of the bishops will have a change in their assignments and this will help to further strengthen our shared life together. Will the constitution and canons for ACNA continue to change and is there a formal group tasked with overseeing that process? I believe that we have a strong foundation from which we can move forward. There will be a group that will be tasked to deal with any changes or amendments. Archbishop Duncan chose as the first chancellor for the ACNA the best person for the job: Hugo Blankingship. Hugo is a supremely distinguished canonical lawyer who loves Jesus and the church. He was the son of a bishop, a former member of Truro Church, and more recently of The Falls Church (Falls Church, Virginia). Also, CANA's own Chancellor Scott Ward will be the assistant ACNA chancellor assisting Hugo for affairs in the USA, while Mrs. Cheryl Chang will help in Canada.
How does the ACNA constitution address church property issues? As is the case in CANA, the emphasis in ACNA is on each congregation owing its own property. We have made it very clear that there will be no claims made against local church property by the Province - in contrast to what The Episcopal Church is doing.
What is the vision for the future? The challenge is to keep our eyes firmly fixed upon the Lord himself and to keep the main thing as the main thing. The future involves radical inclusion, profound transformation, and inspired service. The vision has not changed. Jesus Christ is the same and the gospel remains unchanged! The new province has given us a way to do this work more effectively and more collaboratively.
Here it is, possibly my favorite moment this week:
It just says so much more than words. The extraordinary prelude, I understand, was commissioned for this service by the rector of Christ Church Plano. The prelude captures so well what it has felt like these past months, yes, even years. To God be the glory.
Scenes as people find their seats before the service begins:
An overview of the crowds that packed Christ Church Plano for the installation of the Archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America, only find an old friend from Truro in the crowd.
Just recorded the most amazing procession of clergy and bishops into Christ Church Plano. It was just really moving to me - I recognized so many of those who processed in and know some of their stories and it just really moved me to see them come in to a new beginning.
Here it is:
The introduction to Praise My Soul, The King of Heaven was incredible - what an arrangement which in the service program says is by John Watson. It just evoked so much feeling, of a journey into the desert. We may not be entirely out of the desert, but the music with the drums was filled to the brim with mystery and drama.
It was clear to me that the master of organization of the service (I am sure there is an Episcopal/Anglican word for it!) was Bishop Martyn Minns, who stood in the back and shepherded in all the participants who walked in orderly and on time. Ah, some things just do not change. How many times have I seen him in the exact same position, standing at the door in the Narthex of Truro Church, only now to find him standing at this door, shepherding in a new province.
There are all kinds of clergy here, from all walks and streams of life, as I am sure is true for the laity in the pews. The diversity is rather wonderful, for what draws them together is a common faith in Jesus Christ and a word of blessing to one another, as those who have walked together through fire and storm, man and woman alike.
The scriptures are from Psalm 85:7-13, from Isaiah 40:1-11, from Acts 13:14-26, and now from Luke 1:57-80 which is being read at this moment. Archbishop-elect Bob Duncan is next and will be preaching.
It interesting - they take the song of praise, pause to do the Gospel, and then do a reprise of the song. Very good!
Bob Duncan is now at the pulpit/lectern. He is dressed in a white and gold cope. He begins by recognizing that today is the feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist and gives thanks that today is not the Feast of the beheading of John the Baptist, such a day exists, but not today.
Today is also the day of Scottish Independence with Robert the Bruce and William Wallace. Today is also the day that Henry VIII was crowned King of England 500 years ago. He talks about how a leader of the church gone astray, confiscating the property of the church along the way - but instead, to remind ourselves about Romans 8:28 how God works all things according to His purpose.
It's not about the past, Bishop Duncan says, or what we've come out of. We are not to be reactive in our course forward in our ministry, as Rick Warren reminded us, or the vision of a terrible war and conflict and yet to be called to another place, to come up the stairs of treasure and a voice saying, that war is not your war anymore, as Edwina Thomas of SOMA said. It's not your war anymore, that's all done.
It was hard for us to hear, Bishop Duncan said, the words - that some of the things that separate us from the Orthodox are also those things that separate us from one another.
No, it's time for us. There are Calvin Anglicans - right? And there are women in Holy Orders, right? The miracle of this moment is that the Lord has brought us together to do mission, not papering over the differences or just putting it down. Rather, to stand as we stand and be prepared to talk with Christian brothers and sisters about the truth and unity that comes in Jesus Christ.
It's not about the past. We have been brought together for a noble work and God has blessed this journey and he's ready to bless in great measure as we move forward in our respect for one another.
It's not about me, Bishop Duncan says. "I get to wear all the stuff," he says, "but it's only about me about the servant of the servants of God." It's when we go, the further we go down the more the Lord lifts us up.
The timing and the message is about us and about God. It's about messengers and the message and about the method. Bishop Duncan will speak to each.
We will not miss God's message to us - what is it He wants us to be? He wants us to be messengers, for-runners, witnesses, where we're headed and what we are to do. It's about being messenger of Him. We go before Him to prepare His way.
He wants us to be messengers, He wants us to be forerunners - it's a wilderness out there.
(BB NOTE: You can also follow people twittering the service here.)
He's telling the story of his flight on the plane and of the big guy who came and sat down next to him in the middle seat. The fellow was wearing a shirt with expletives. He opened up a book and started reading about the 12 steps. So now, Bishop Duncan - am I supposed to talk to this guy? Bishop Duncan asked him his name and noticed that he was reading the 12 steps. He asked how long he'd been sober? The young man said he'd gotten out of rehab two days ago.
Bishop Duncan, knowing that he'd never done this on a plane before, he asked the young man, "Do you have a faith?" The young man said no, he was not raised in any faith. He had been suffering with alcohol since he was fifteen and now he was twenty-five. He's trying to get well and he has a family. He's trying to start over. He needs to know he has been forgiven. He needs to know that God loves him. And he needs to know that there is a power of God who can help him get out of the mess he's in. Who's going to tell him but us?
Bishop Duncan talked with him, that he would be praying for him, and got others to pray for him as well. We are to be forerunners, have to prepare the way. God is coming in the flesh - and it's His flesh and our flesh. He's the main thing - He wants to come into every town and village and He's sending us ahead of Him, we are His messengers.
Are you ready? Are you willing?
The message: Taking a second look at Luke 1 - the message to give salvation to His people in the forgiveness in their sins. It's about forgiveness. The way that people know the knowledge of salvation they know that they are forgiven.
Light in darkness, the light is the life of man. The message is that not only is there forgiveness, there is life, no shadow of death. That is the message. Then He says, and to guide our feet into the way of peace. The young man on the plane needed to know that he was forgiven, that he has life, and that he had power accessible to do what would be impossible if he didn't have it. We need to guide our feet in the way peace.
What is really important - this passage is one of the most recited passages of scripture, along with the Magnificant. God wants us to prepare His way, by telling them about forgiveness, about the light, about the peace.
Those who are the thrones get thrown off - to go off and prepare the way. Liturgy is great stuff, Bishop Duncan says.
Final thing: the method. What does God want us to do - ten suggestions.
1. Embracing our identity as messengers, as forerunners. 2 Doing what pleases the Lord, growing in unity and charity so that people will see how we love one another. 3. Welcome back the wounded. 4. Calling and equipping and modeling to a new generation of leaders - never too young. 5. In the next five years Bishop Duncan wants us to plant 1,000 churches. The congregation breaks out in applause. "We can do that, there's 700 churches now." 6. We've got to be about the business of engaging Islam and secularism, and materialism - but especially Islam. There is only one way to the Father - it is the only way, it's a matter of life and death. The congregation breaks out in more applause. 7. We need to be about the great corporate acts of mercy - loving the hungry, the thirty, the strangers, the sick, those in prison, and being with them. 8. Blessing of creative ministry responses - we don't have to do everything as it's been done, but believe everything as it has been believed. 9. We need to get much better to get scripture by heart. 10. We need to be praying, giving thanks, rejoicing in all circumstances.
If you are trying to recall what it's all about. Remember the birth of John the Baptist - remember his father's words, as is our Father's word over us, His vision for us. "You my child shall be called the prophet most high, you shall go before the Lord to prepare the way." Brothers and sisters, let us do this together.
Amen.
The Presentation
The Presentation now begins. The presenters have gathered at the front. "Rt. Rev'd Father in God, we present to you this godly and learned man to be recognized and invested as Archbishop and Primate of this Church."
They are now reading what is called the Mandate.
He has now taken his oaths:
We, as the people, now promise that we will pray for Archbishop Duncan.
The congregation now goes to prayer.
Preparation is now underway for the anointing.
Archbishop Duncan is now anointed by the Anglican Primate of Kenya, an Archbishop of the Anglican Communion in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury.
"You are to know the people and be known by them."
Now comes the giving of the primatial cross and presentation.
Now Nara Dewar Duncan, Archbishop Duncan's wife, comes to his side.
The Press Conference at Christ Church Plano is now underway in preparation for the installation of the Archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America, the Rt. Rev'd Bob Duncan.
So far we've heard from Bishop Duncan, Michael Howell, Bishop Martyn Minns, Bishop Jack Iker and Ms Chang, Chancellor.
Q & A is now starting.
Here is Part One of the Press Conference:
Here is Part Two of the Press Conference:
Part Three of the Press Conference:
"We are uniting 700 congregations, and more importantly committed Anglican believers, in the north and in the south, on the west coast, and the east coast. We are oriented toward a hopeful future again. And the main thing is the mission of Jesus Christ. That mission is carried forward by us, His people, who are loved Bod God and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God loves everyone. God calls us to share that Good News with everyone." -Archbishop Bob Duncan
Join us in the press van as we head from St. Vincent's Cathedral, Ft. Worth to Christ Church Plano, Texas for the installation of the archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America:
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. – June 24, 2009 – St. James Anglican Church, which is at the center of a nationally publicized church property dispute with The Episcopal Church, today will file a petition for writ of certiorari with the Supreme Court of the United States. St. James is asking the Court to overturn a prior decision of the California Supreme Court, which conferred a special power on certain religious denominations to take property they do not own simply by passing an internal “rule.” The petition asks the Supreme Court to decide whether, under the U.S. Constitution, certain religious denominations can disregard the normal rules of property ownership that apply to everyone else.
Dr. John Eastman, a nationally recognized constitutional law scholar, has joined the legal team to pursue the appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. A response from the Court regarding the St. James petition can be expected as early as October 2009. A decision could be reached as early as mid-2010.
“We will be arguing to the U.S. Supreme Court that the California Supreme Court’s interpretation of state law has violated the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. The First Amendment says Congress shall pass no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Even though it says Congress, that Amendment has been interpreted as applicable to the states as well.” Eastman said. “The California Supreme Court has given a preference to certain kinds of churches that claim to be hierarchical, that other churches and non-religious associations are not entitled to, and that violates the establishment clause. We will also be arguing that denying the local church community their ability to organize and hold title to their own building and conduct their religious services in a manner they see fit, this California decision violates their right to the free exercise of religion,” Eastman added.
Under longstanding law, no one can unilaterally impose a trust over someone else’s property without their permission. Yet, in the decision titled Episcopal Church Cases, the California Supreme Court ruled that certain denominations – those that claim to be a “superior religious body or general church” – can unilaterally impose a trust on the property of spiritually affiliated but separately incorporated local churches, resulting in the local church forfeiting its property if it ever chooses to leave the denomination. St. James will argue before the U.S. Supreme Court that this preferential treatment for certain denominations violates the U.S. Constitution.
The constitutional issues St. James is raising before the U.S. Supreme Court go far beyond the Episcopal Church. Every local church, temple, synagogue, parish, spiritual center, congregation or religious group which owns its own property through a religious corporation, and has some affiliation with a larger religious group, is at risk of losing its own property under the California Supreme Court’s ruling. As a result, religious freedom is suppressed, as those who have sacrificed to build their local religious communities are now at risk of having their properties taken based on some past, current or future spiritual affiliation. A United States Supreme Court decision in favor of St. James would benefit local church property owners throughout the country because it would allow them the ability to freely exercise their religion without risk of losing their property.
While petitions for review with the U.S. Supreme Court are never assured, there are compelling arguments for the Justices to grant this petition, including these facts:
· Dozens of church property cases are percolating in the court system, lacking clear constitutional direction.
· States are in conflict regarding the handling of church property cases.
· These issues have garnered widespread national attention and involve important questions of federal constitutional law.
The people of St. James Church have owned, and sacrificed to build and acquire their church properties for many decades without any financial support from the Episcopal Church. St. James Church never agreed to relinquish its property to the Episcopal Church upon a change of religious affiliation, and has consistently maintained that it has the right to use and possess its own property.
Even as St. James seeks a place on the Supreme Court calendar, the church’s legal battle has returned to the Orange County Superior Court. “While we are surprised that the California Supreme Court would prefer certain religions over others when it comes to property ownership, the battle in this case is far from over,” said Eric C. Sohlgren, lead attorney and spokesperson for St. James. “The case has already returned to the Orange County Superior Court. Because St. James had an early victory in 2005 by legally attacking the Episcopal allegations, we now look forward to presenting evidence and additional legal arguments on behalf of St. James. For example, St. James has brought a complaint against the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles based on a 1991 written promise that it would not claim a trust over the property of St. James on 32nd Street in Newport Beach. We had hoped Episcopal leaders would abide by this promise, but they sued St. James and its volunteer directors anyway.”
Click here for a copy of the writ of certiorari which will be filed today with the U.S. Supreme Court: http://steadfastinfaith.org/content/st-james-ussc-petition
For more information, please visit the website: www.steadfastinfaith.org
The Episcopal Church announced today that Rowan Williams will only make "a presentation addressing the world's economic crisis during a panel discussion webcast" during the 2009 General Convention of The Episcopal Church, rather than follow in his predecessors' footsteps when he attends the General Convention next month in Anaheim.
Over at least the past thirty years. the Archbishop of Canterbury has been a participant and preacher at the official General Convention Eucharist. But this year, the current Archbishop of Canterbury's involvement will be reduced to making a speech at a panel discussion webcast and perhaps lead a morning Bible Study.
Former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, preached at a General Convention Eucharist in 1997. Robert Runcie also preached at a General Convention Eucharist in 1985. And Donald Coggan also preached at a General Convention Eucharist in 1976.
Earlier reports had Rowan Williams attending one of the morning Bible Studies to offer a meditation, but the Bible Studies have since been replaced with "listening process" exercises instead.
Note, however, how an earlier report noted that both Katharine Jefferts Schori and Bonnie Anderson would be preachers at a "worship service," while Rowan Williams will only conduct a "Bible Study." The Eucharist and United Thank Offering, which has usually been the venue for the Archbishop of Canterbury to preach, will have the Presiding Bishop be both celebrant and preacher. A no-show then for the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Rowan Williams will be one of many speakers at the non-ecclesiastical event, "Christian Faithfulness in the Global Economic Crisis" in Anaheim.
"While I don't want to make too much of this point," Jim Naughton of Episcopal Cafe wrote earlier this year, "the fact is that Rowan Williams has kept his liturgical distance from the Episcopal Church since the consecration of Gene Robinson. He has never worshipped at a church in the Diocese of Washington, despite frequent week-long visits to Georgetown University (where he sometimes invites guests to a Eucharist in a private chapel followed by breakfast.) He lived a stone's throw from three of our church a couple of summers ago while he was on Sabbatical, yet never visited one of them. He turned down an invitation to participate in the year-long 100th anniversary celebration of the National Cathedral. It doesn't seem to me too much of a leap to conclude that for one reason or another he'd prefer not to be seen associating too closely with Episcopalians in any sort of voluntary, un-official, what-choice-did-I-have kind of way."
"No doubt he has his reasons," Jim Naughton wrote.
The point is, at least this time, that Rowan Williams was not invited to celebrate the Eucharist at General Convention by Katharine Jefferts Schori and Bonnie Anderson. And at the end of the day, that remains the point.
From The Living Church: Metropolitan Jonah will announce this morning that the Orthodox Church in America has ended ecumenical relations with the Episcopal Church and is establishing formal ecumenical relations with the Anglican Church in North America.
Here we are starting the third day of the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) Provincial Assembly in Ft. Worth, Texas. The legislative part of the assembly was finished yesterday with the ratification of the canons. Today we hear from Metropolitan Jonah of the Orthodox Church in America this morning. The other major highlight today is the installation of the Rt. Rev'd Bob Duncan as the new archbishop which will take place tonight at Christ Church, Plano.
In a recent interview with the BBC, Bishop Duncan was asked about his relationship with the Archbishop of Canterbury and whether he would welcome Bishop Duncan in the Anglican Communion. "What we have is an openness," said Bishop Duncan. "The Archbishop of Canterbury and I are in regular contact. He is determined, and has asked my permission to send one of the Pastoral Visitors ... he will be here to listen and to observe." Indeed, Bishop Santosh Marray, sent by Rowan Williams, has been here sitting in the front row of the sessions.
We're to be shuttled out there this afternoon - I've never been to Plano, so this will be another adventure!
The Anglican Church of Uganda has now officially recognized the Anglican Church in North America and has transferred all their bishops and clergy to the ACNA, Bishop John Guernsey just announced to the ACNA Assembly in Ft. Worth.
This came just as the ACNA Canons were ratified on the floor. The ACNA Constitution was ratified yesterday.
The legislative session begins and there has been a motion to table a motion to adopt the canons by acclamation.
There are amendments that are being entertained. They are going through the amendments. And now have turned to Title One.
Diocese of Pittsburgh - on Title One on Canon 10, section 2.8 - concerning the duties of the laity. He's focusing on his concern on the language of the "duties" - would like it sent back for reconsideration. It's about the duties of the laity:
Section 2 - Concerning Duties of the Laity It shall be the duty of every member of the Church: 1. To worship God, the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit, every Lord’s Day in a Church unless reasonably prevented; 2. To engage regularly in the reading and study of Holy Scripture and the Doctrine of the Church as found in Article I of the Constitution of this Church; 3. To observe their baptismal vows, to lead an upright and sober life, and not give scandal to the Church; 4. To present their children and those they have led to the Lord for baptism and confirmation; 5. To give regular financial support to the Church, with the biblical tithe as the minimum standard of giving; 6. To practice forgiveness daily according to our Lord’s teaching; 7. To receive worthily the Sacrament of Holy Communion as often as reasonable; 8. To observe the feasts and fasts of the Church set forth in the Anglican formularies; 9. To continue his or her instruction in the Faith so as to remain an effective minister for the Lord Jesus Christ; 10. To devote themselves to the ministry of Christ among those who do not know Him, utilizing the gifts that the Holy Spirit gives them, for the effective extension of Christ’s Kingdom.
So the people are coming up to the mic to discuss the roles and duties of the laity. Now a member of the Governance Task Force is defending why the spelled out the duties of the laity to call them out in mission.
Ohio- a call is made to take it canon by canon as was done with the Constitution instead of jumping all around. A very good point, I am having a deje vu all over again after ACC in Jamaica. We're not going canon by canon but are suddenly talking about the laity in Canon 10. Bishop Duncan is not chairing this session either.
Bishop Ackerman is now at the podium opposing sending this section back to the committee.
Neil Lebhar speaks in favor of sending it back to the committee and the other alternative is to amend it, but it would be better to send it back to committee for clarifying the formularity. It is unclear.
Bishop Bill is at the podium and is asking for a friendly amendment that will send the Canon back to the committee to clarify the feasts and fasts.
Someone - a clergy - has just stood up where he was and now he's running up to the to the mic - there is a lack of clarity, and said this is a different order, a different category - a different nature than they others.
Another clergy is at the podium saying that it's the clergy who should be encouraging the laity and help clarify this title. He is from AMiA.
Another clergyman has taken the mic and is saying he opposes sending it back. Anglican formularities are vague because there are so many jurisdictions coming together with different formularities and so the language is vague. The point is to observe Feasts and Fasts and claim that laity are obligated to observe as clergy are.
Where are the laity -
Another bishop has taken the podium, one from Canada, is saying that they need to get back to the process or this will just go on, either take it as is or send it back.
The person at the mic is talking about what should be left to the diocese should be left there as a princple of subsidarity. The chair just says it's time to go to a vote. A minority voted to send it back and the vast majority voted to retain it.
The chair is now saying he will go canon by canon.
Point of order. Bill Thompson, asked whether they need to take the whole section out and improve it. The chair is saying that they will go canon by canon.
A motion and ready to vote on Title One. It has passed.
Title Two - a bishop takes the podium to introduces Title Two. Seconded. He's now asking if there are any questions on each canons. Neil Lebhar stands up to Canon 2 about authorizing 1979 Book of Common Prayer. Then another lay person asked about the Book of Common Prayer as well.
Canon 2 Of the Standard Book of Common Prayer
Section 1 - The Book of Common Prayer as set forth by the Church of England in 1662, together with the Ordinal attached to the same, are received as a standard for Anglican doctrine and discipline, and, with the Books which preceded it, as the standard for the Anglican tradition of worship. Until such time as a Book of Common Prayer for use in this Province has been adopted, all authorized Books of Common Prayer of the originating jurisdictions shall be permitted for use in this Church. Section 2 - It is understood that there is a diversity of uses in the Province. In order to use these rich liturgies most advantageously, it is the responsibility of the Bishop with jurisdiction to ensure that the forms used in Public Worship and the Administration of the Sacraments be in accordance with Anglican Faith and Order and that nothing be established that is contrary to the Word of God as revealed in the Holy Scriptures.
They are discussing a common Book of Common Prayer, but in the meantime they recognize there are several. They continue to go Canon by Canon - and now up to Canon 4 on the Adminstration of the Sacraments and a request to send it back regarding the standards of receiving the sacraments, i.e. like the Diocese of Ft. Worth (which has a lot more restrictions than just to be baptized and welcomed in your own church, as we have at Truro). The Diocese of Ft. Worth has many more stipulations that communicants must observe before they take communion and is concerned about lessoning the requirements and would like it sent back to include repentant of sins as in the early prayer books. It has been moved and seconded.
Canon 4.3:5 - Discussion is now requested. But there seeems to be no one (Bob Duncan has now entered the room). A person has gone to the Mic and is reading that this is in fact is observed. Another minority voted in favor and the great majority voted no.
No questions on 5, 6, 7 - and a question on Canon 8:
Recommend to send Sections 2 and 3 back to committee. There is a motion but no second. Title Two is received with no opposition. Bob Duncan is now on the platform and is being briefed and asked if he would like to take over, to much laughter. The current chair is now briefing Bob Duncan again on what has all ready transpired. He is recalling that the motion was table to just acclaim the canons and that it would be reconsidered at 30 minutes into the process.
Bob Duncan is now asking if the Assembly would like to accept all the canons by acclamation. Wick Stevens said there are technical problems because there are amendments that have not yet come before the body. A bishop says that they should tackle the 30 minutes postponement - Reformed Episcopal Church rules are being followed, rather than Roberts Rules.
Bob Duncan now asks that a motion is before the assembly to take each canon at a time.
The person at the mic says that part of the Reformed Episcopal Church rules says that the motions include prayer - and Bob Duncan asks the clergyman at the mic to lead the assembly in prayer.
The prayer comes at a very good time, it's been a bit confusing. But now there is an opportunity for clarity. "Reform us first before you reform the church," the clergyman prays.
Bishop Duncan asks that they consider each of the remain titles in order. Bob Duncan says there are eccumenical guests and missioners who want to speak to the Assembly. He's encouraging the Assembly to move on rather than to spend the entire time on the canons.
Mr. Murphy rises and removes his motion from the floor.
We are now moving to Title III.
Of Ministers, Their Recruitment, Preparation, Ordination, Office, Practice, and Transfer. But before that happens we are hearing about a missionary in Cambodia.
A great presentation from a woman heading to Cambodia as a missionary. Now we're hearing from a bishop, a representative of the Church in Uganda.
Now Bob Duncan turns to Title III with an amendment. Section 8:4 regarding the Election of Bishops. Adding the words "present and voting" - more specifically was needed for a quorum and the change comes out of a recent meeting of the college of bishops and the election of news bishops.
"A quorum shall be a majority of the active members of the College" is added to define a quorum.
Bishop Duncan asks if anyone wishes to speak and a layman from the Reformed Episcopal Church. Canon 6:1 Asks about the intention about allowing local jurisdiction is able to refuse an ordained woman who is transferred there. The answer is yes. The bishop can refuse the letters of anyone as he deems appropriate.
Another question - 8.6:4 on the change - the canon allows the consent process rather than being present in a meeting. Present doesn't mean that they must be physically present. They can also do it by correspondence.
Bob Duncan calls for the ratification of Title III. It passes.
Another mission minute.
Bob Duncan recognizes today as the 46th anniversary of Bishop Schofield's ordination which is followed by a standing ovation.
Bishop Duncan now calls on from the official guest from Alexandria, Egypt representing Mouneer Anis, who says that he is indeed "going back to Egypt." He is also studying at Trinity School for Ministry. He now reads a letter from Mouneer Anis extending his greetings. Bishop Anis congratulates the new province and how much he wishes he could be here.
Bob Duncan now calls to proceed to Title IV: Ecclesiastical Discipline. No amendments have been added. Wick Stephens introduces the the Title from the podium. Asks if there are any questions.
One layman goes forward, again from the Reformed Episcopal Church. Canon5:7 on "Concerning Procedures" which covers the provincial tribunal. They are now talking about the disputes between dioceses. "In all courts of original jurisdiction, the standard of proof shall be by clear and convincing evidence." The delegates asks that this language be stricken and sent back. A bishop stands and opposes the strike, saying that there will be no standard of proof.
Bishop Duncan asks if there are any more questions. And now calls for a vote. All vote aye.
Bishop Iker takes the podium on the platform. He is introducing the Roman Catholic Bishop of Ft. Worth who is present.
Chris Sugden has taken the podium to bring greetings from bishops and leaders in the Church of England.
Now Bishop Duncan says he knows that when he turns to Title V it will be hard to hold the room after it has passed. He calls on William Beasley on "Christ's Awakening."
Scott Ward now takes the podium for the final title, Title V: Enactment, Amendment and Repeal of Canons. Bob Duncan asks if there are any questions. No questions are asked. Bishop Duncan asks for vote and it's unanimous. The canons are passed.
John Guernsey announces: The Anglican Church of Uganda has just voted to recognize the Anglican Church in North America.
Part One of the Q&A with ACNA Governance Task Force Hugo Blankingship (chair and now official chancellor of the Anglican Church in North America Assembly), Wick Stevens (chancellor of the Anglican Communion Network), and Cheryl Chang (chancellor of the Anglican Network in Canada):
Here we are in Ft. Worth on Day Two of the ACNA Provincial Assembly. Rick Warren is fixing to make his address starting at 10:30 a.m. which will be broadcast live from the "Marquee." The Marquee is a Big White Tent (as opposed to the Big Top of the Lambeth Conference) set up in the parking lot of the Diocese of Ft. Worth's St. Vincent's Cathedral for the overflowing crowds.
Spent the morning driving around the freeways of Ft. Worth with Faith of Scary IRD looking for a CVS Store and trying to follow her GPS "Tom-Tom" that sounded more like old friend David Aikman after a long stint in Russia. It took a while for us to figure out what it was saying to us (we've dubbed the Tom-Tom "David" - sorry, David) and ended up doing one loop-d-loop after another until we found yet another part of our team to pick up and head back to St. Vincent's in time for the morning sessions. Did manage drive-thru at McDonald's for coffee and biscuits.
This afternoon the Assembly will tackle the proposed ACNA Canons. It will be interesting to see if the delegates will be as compliant as yesterday. There is much, very much to commend that amount of work that has gone into the drafting of the Constitution and Canons. But one still gets the sense that these delegates are war veterans and just want to get on with it.
That being said, there is still a lot of fascinating offline conversations going on, where delegates, press, and guests are having theological conversations regarding the more detailed aspects of the Anglican tradition of the Christian faith. It's nearly what I might call "religious wonk talk" as we talk about a variety of topics from the finer points of the administration of the episcopate to whether it better to order albs from Whipple rather than Almy.
11:03 a.m. - "You may lose the steeple, but you will not lose the people," says Rick Warren during his address at the ACNA Assembly, reminding the delegates and guests that the work of the church must center on the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and making disciples.
I'm here on the floor of the inaugural session of the ACNA Provincial Assembly. Right now the delegates are milling about, we're running a bit behind - probably because everyone is so busy reconnecting with old friends, like a family reunion. The buzz in the room is fairly loud, as people reach across aisles and embrace one another, like a reunion of veterans.
Many of the faces here are indeed veterans from many General Conventions of the Episcopal Church. Now the shoe is on the other foot, as it were, with the leadership here charged with governing. I am reminded of the famous quote from Ben Franklin at the founding of the American republic. He was outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia as the first Constitutional Convention in 1787 came to end. A woman came up to him and said, "Well, Doctor, what have we got - a republic or a monarchy?" to which Dr. Franklin responded, "A republic, if you can keep it."
What we may have here is a church, if we can keep it. To God be the glory.
2:52 p.m. - We are getting announcements about parking and shuttles to hotels. Bob Duncan is up at the head table and welcoming the delegates and guests. He is acknowledging bishops and guests from other nations and dioceses, including from Southeast Asia, Nigeria, Uganda, North Africa (Egypt), England, and the Archbishop of Canterbury's Pastoral Visitor, Santosh Marray. There is also a representative from the Diocese of South Carolina as well as greetings from several bishops in the Church of England. Archbishop Venables left this morning for a clergy conference back in Buenos Aires.
The "corrections and changes" to the ACNA Constitution and Canons are being handed out right now. Bishop Duncan is announcing the election of new bishops for Canada, as well as AMiA.
Bishop Duncan is now outlining the transition of the Common Cause council of leadership to the new ACNA Council.
I am reading through the "amended sections of the ACNA Canons" and it looks as though the changes are minor.
Hugo Blankingship has been appointed the chancellor of the Assembly. On the dias is the recording secretary, the secretary of assembly, the chancellor, and Bishop Duncan.
3:15 p.m. The are now taking out the Rules of Order for the meeting.
It seems that Bishop Duncan is recommending that if there are parts of the Constitution and Canons would like to change, that it may be best to send it back to the Council rather than try to "perfect" it on the floor of the Assembly.
Bishop Duncan is calling the delegates to look at the proposed ACNA Constitution. You can read the Constitution here. The are beginning with the preamble.
In the Name of God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
We are Anglicans in North America united by our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and the trustworthiness of the Holy Scriptures and presently members of the Common Cause Partnership.
We know ourselves to be members of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
We are grieved by the current state of brokenness within the Anglican Communion prompted by those who have embraced erroneous teaching and who have rejected a repeated call to repentance.
We repent ourselves of things done and left undone that have contributed to or tolerated the rise of false teaching, and we humbly embrace the forgiveness that comes through Christ's atoning sacrifice.
We are grateful for the encouragement of Primates of the worldwide Anglican Communion who gathered at Jerusalem in June 2008 and called on us to establish a new Province in North America.
We affirm the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) Statement and Jerusalem Declaration issued 29 June 2008.
We believe that this Constitution is faithful to that call and consistent with the Historic Faith and Order of the Church and we invite the prayers of all faithful Anglicans as we seek to be obedient disciples of Jesus Christ our One Lord and Savior.
The first delegate comes to the mike, Chris Cantrell from the Diocese of Ft. Worth suggests that the expression of grief be stricken. The Diocese of Pittsburgh raises the same concern, saying that this is a constitution and leave out "shots to the other side" and strike the language. This is the section that is being requested by the Diocese of Ft. Worth and Diocese of Pittsburgh to strike:
We are grieved by the current state of brokenness within the Anglican Communion prompted by those who have embraced erroneous teaching and who have rejected a repeated call to repentance.
Bishop Duncan asked if there was anyone who wants to speak in favor of it and Phil Ashey takes the mic that it should remain, thinking of the section that follows it since they are connected.
Neil Lebhar from what might be the Diocese of North Florida (in formation) - reminds the assembly that nothing will be rejected, just sent back to the council. Adopt it first without the disputed clause and then ask whether the Assembly should accept the clause. Neil Lebhar speaks to sending both paragraphs back to Council, including the following one.
Bishop Duncan rules that both are not joined together and suggested that they take each section one at a time. Diocese of Pittsburgh also speaks in favor of deleting both four and five paragraphs.
Bishop Duncan says that there is no objection to paragraphs 1-3. Bishop Duncan is calling the assembly to ratify paragraphs 1-3. It is ratified unanimously.
Bishop Bena spoke to keeping the paragraphs 4-5. Bob Duncan called for a vote. Overwhelming vote in favor, with paragraphs 4-5 a minority voting no, which I would presume included delegates the Dioceses of Ft. Worth, Pittsburgh, and Northern Florida in formation.
3:40 Provincial Council spent time last night seeking whether they could tweak the foundation principles and they found that it would open it all up, but for one section, where they agreed to change the Constitution to say that there are seven principles, not eight since the Jerusalem Declaration in now addressed in the canons.
Diocese of Pittsburgh - Article 1:6:
6. We receive The Book of Common Prayer as set forth by the Church of England in 1662, together with the Ordinal attached to the same, as a standard for Anglican doctrine and discipline, and, with the Books which preceded it, as the standard for the Anglican tradition of worship.
The question had to do with the Book of the Common Prayer is meant to combined with the Articles of Religion as the standard of doctrine, discipline, and worship. This is really interesting, because it raises the Articles of Religion to the same level as the Book of Common Prayer. Article 1:7 reads:
7. We receive the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion of 1571, taken in their literal and grammatical sense, as expressing the Anglican response to certain doctrinal issues controverted at that time, and as expressing fundamental principles of authentic Anglican belief.
Article 3:1 is changed:
The mission of the Province is so to present Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit that people everywhere will come to put their trust in God through Him, know Him as Savior and serve Him as Lord in the fellowship of the Church. The chief agents of this mission to extend the Kingdom of God are the people of God.
The substitution now is "The mission of the Province is so to extend the Kingdom of God by so presenting Jesus Christ..." as a way of strengthening a more Trinitarian language into the Article.
Article III with the change is adopted. Article IV is adopted.
There is now a short break to here about mission opportunities. Bishop Bena is talking about healing opportunities for Armed Services personnel with three-day Christian retreats, including issues of combat stress.
Article V is adopted.
Article VI is adopted.
Article VII is adopted, with a minor change of changing the method from the Constitution.
Article VIII is adopted.
Article IX has a change: Adds a setence "and carries out such other duties and responsibilities as may be provided by canon," regarding the role of the Archbishop.
Article IX is adopted.
Another break on mission.
Another slight change in Article X where the phrase "one quarter of" before the phrase "the episcopal members of the Provincial Council." A question has asked if the diocese will decide who are the active and non-active bishops. Bishop Duncan said the dioceses make that determination.
Article X and XI are adopted. Now attention turns to the Article on Property (Article XII) which is resoundly and loudly adopted.
Article XIII with a minor correction (changing the word "agree" to "agrees) is adopted.
Article XIV is adopted.
Another mission break.
We now move to the Final Article, but someon has risen from his chair and gone to the mic for Article XV. The delegate is from the Reformed Episcopal Church (North Eastern Canada). Says that it seems inconsistent with how it had been represented. The chancellor says that there is clarity in a canon. The Final Article is is ratified with one nay.
The session ends with standing ovation and the doxology.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has sent the Rt. Rev'd Santosh Marray, retired bishop of the Seychelles (2005-2008) in the Province of the Indian Ocean, as his official pastoral visitor to the Anglican Church of North America Provincial Assembly in Ft. Worth, TX. Bishop Marray, was born in Guyana and is a former rector in the Diocese of Florida. He is a member of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Pastoral Visitor Programme started this past February.
Bishop Duncan has also been interviewed by the BBC and includes some comments about Rowan Williams here.
Dallas/Fort Worth – The Anglican Church in North America Provincial Council has endorsed the Anglican Covenant and expressed solidarity with the Communion Partners.
The Covenant is a four-part document that outlines the basics of the Christian faith as Anglicans have historically understood and practiced it. It also provides for accountability among Communion members. The Covenant was initiated by the 2005 Windsor Report which in turn was prompted by the crisis in the Anglican Communion created by the deviation from Biblical teaching and morality in North America.
On Sunday 22 June 2009, the Provincial Council unanimously adopting the following resolution:
Resolution on the Anglican Communion Covenant
Resolved, under provisions of Canon I.1.1 of the Constitution and Canons, the Provincial Council of the Anglican Church in North America expresses its readiness to adopt the proposed Anglican Communion Covenant (Ridley Cambridge Draft) at an appropriate future meeting of the Provincial Council.
Further Resolved, that the Provincial Council of the Anglican Church in North America expresses its solidarity with the Communion Partner Bishops in North America in the hope that individual dioceses and other churches [Covenant 4.1.5] might be encouraged to adopt the Anglican Communion Covenant whether or not the Provinces of which they are a part have chosen to do so.
Unanimously adopted by the Provincial Council of the Anglican Church in North America at its meeting on the Third Sunday after Pentecost, 21 June A.D. 2009.
The Communion Partners is a group of Episcopal Church bishops and clergy who are working for a return to orthodoxy within that Church. They are strong supporters of the Covenant and have been very involved in the Covenant development process.
I'm here at Reagan National Airport in DC waiting for my flight to Dallas/Ft. Worth. Right now it appears that the plane is full and they are taking volunteers to give up their seats, but the flights they are offering are for much later tonight. I'm waiting for friends, though, and wonder if they may be seatless?
I haven't been to Ft. Worth - I've technically been to Dallas, but really all I saw was the airport and the hotel. That was for "Plano/Dallas" in 2003 following the rather catastrophic Minneapolis General Convention when thousands of Episcopalians descended for the historic meeting in Dallas. Originally it had been slated to be in Plano, but the numbers quickly grew overwhelming the venue there and was moved to a hotel in Dallas.
The new Anglican Church of North America is launching their Assembly in Ft. Worth - actually in Bedford, Texas. Yesterday the ACNA Governance Task Force was slated to meet to go over the proposed Constitution and Canons after receiving more input and review from local parishes and what may eventually be dioceses in ACNA. It will be interesting to see what modifications they make after the review.
I'll be posting reports here at the cafe, as well as videos and photos and I plan to try out "Live TV" while in Ft. Worth on Ustream or another provider where you can also participate via twitter or live chat as well as video. This will be a testing time so it could prove interesting! Stay tuned!
Friends have not yet arrived - I hope they are not seatless! Stay tuned for reports of the drama as we report here at the Cafe!
Martyn Minns recalls the moment he knew he had to leave the Episcopal Church, the U.S. branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion. It was 2005. He was rector of Truro Church in Fairfax, Va., and he was talking with a young family who told him they could no longer attend a church that accepted gay bishops or diverged from what they called Orthodox Christianity.
"As I looked at them, I realized that I had a decision to make," he says. "Either I moved with them into a rather uncertain future, or I lost the heart of the congregation. So for me it was a matter of, 'Do I want the church of the future, or the church of the past?' "
Soon after that, Minns' church bolted from the American Episcopal Church and aligned itself with the conservative archbishop of the Anglican province of Nigeria. Now he and other church leaders representing more than 700 congregations, four dioceses and up to 100,000 churchgoers are meeting in Bedford, Texas. They hope to form a new Anglican province in the U.S. — one that would rival the Episcopal Church.
Mainline Church Irked, Not Worried
The Rev. Ryan Reed of St. Vincent's Cathedral, which is hosting the Bedford conference, says conservatives have tried to stay in the "big tent" of Anglicanism.
"The problem," Reed says, "is in the last 30 years, the boundaries of that tent, or those views, have expanded so far that you can find leadership in the Episcopal Church that is radically not Christian in terms of their understanding of the cross, the Resurrection, the uniqueness of Christ, the authority of Scripture."
Reed says the Episcopal Church is following culture, not the Bible. When it ordained a gay bishop in 2003, he says, the conservatives finally decided to offer an alternative. That view irks — but does not worry — leaders in the mainline church.
"The folks that are gathering in Texas represent a small, conservative fringe within the Episcopal Church," says Susan Russell, a minister at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, Calif., and a leader in the church's gay rights movement.
"Their goal has been to vote the American Episcopal Church off the Anglican island," she says. "They failed at that over and over again, and now they're trying to re-create a new province in their own image."
Breakaway Province Unlikely To Be Recognized
Russell believes they won't succeed this time, either. For one thing, she says, they would probably need the approval of two-thirds of the 38 Anglican leaders around the world to create a separate Anglican province in the United States. Currently, only a handful of those leaders have signed on publicly. Plus, she says, leaders of the breakaway faction would need the recognition of the archbishop of Canterbury — and that hasn't happened.
"It would be as if Sarah Palin were to take a small, but vocal, percentage of very conservative Republicans and decide that they were going to create a parallel United States without having the White House at the center," Russell says.
George Pitcher, an Anglican priest at St. Bride's Anglican Church in London and religion editor at the Daily Telegraph, agrees. He says the communion welcomes conservative views.
But, he says, "when they want to say this is the one true way, and we want to impose it on all Anglicans, then it's at that stage that the broadly tolerant Anglican Communion says, 'Well that's not the way we do things.' "
Conservative Churches Growing
In the past, a number of conservative groups have left the worldwide communion over things like women's ordination or the prayer book. And they've shrunk into virtual irrelevance.
But this time, it might be different, says religion historian David L. Holmes at the College of William and Mary. He says the American conservatives have the backing of many leaders in Africa and South America, who represent more than half of all Anglicans worldwide.
Moreover, Holmes says, the Episcopal Church has shrunk 40 percent in little more than a generation, whereas these conservative churches are growing.
"My sense would be if the Episcopal Church continued to lose members in a striking way, and this new group kept gaining members, it would be a new ballgame," he says.
Minns says he is not expecting the conservatives will succeed overnight.
"I think it will take a while," he says. "These things normally do. These provinces take sometimes decades to be recognized, so we're not holding our breath on that."
But Minns does believe time, demographics and theology are on their side.
Read it all here. Audio will be online. Stay tuned.
It's interesting to see how this article is written, as though they are the ones being expelled, when in fact - it's quite the other way around.
There was a last-minute attempt to replace the current president of the Daughters of the King in Province III since she is a member of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, but that challenge was resoundingly defeated by the voting-membership at the last meeting of Province III. The great majority of the Daughters, Episcopalian and Anglican voted together to re-elect the Provincial president. It wasn't about politics, it was about service. We serve the King.
The Presiding Bishop may want to think about that. It's not about her, it's about the King.
It's interesting to see this strategy underway as the same group that set up this website is now attempting to expel Daughters from the Order, denying them their seats and votes in the General Assembly. Currently all Daughters are permitted to vote. All the Daughters will vote - unless this attempt to deny some of the Daughters their seat and vote in the General Assembly. This type of an article is so far from what we experienced at the Province III retreat it causes me to grieve.
What the article doesn't say is that the Daughters of the King is actually a separate 501(c)(3) organization, though the polity is a religious order, the legal structure is not within TEC. It is not officially part of the Episcopal Church structure. It has long enjoyed a very special relationship with The Episcopal Church and it was out of that relationship that Daughters reached across the divide to bring in others in the Order who recognize the historic episcopate. It was the vision of the Order to reach across the barriers and make peace. Those bridges have been built, forged by prayer and common service and a commitment to the Great Commission. It is about prayer and evangelism and service and that is not accomplished by a trick of pulling up the drawbridge and filling up the moat.
In fact, it is the vision of the Daughters of the King within the 501(c)(3) organization which was founded by a remarkable Episcopalian woman to reach out to denominations that recognize the historic Episcopate. The Daughters together will vote how they will move forward in mission.
The Order includes Episcopal members - but it is the Daughters who are in the Episcopal Church, not the Order. The structures are legally separate. The article gives the impression that the Order is within the structures of The Episcopal Church, but that is incorrect. It is a separate organization long affiliated with The Episcopal Church, but is it's own organization and a 501(c)(3) organization.
I don't know if the Presiding Bishop will continue to appoint a chaplain or not - that is for the Order to decide. But it is surprising to see this public display to hold on to power rather than pray for the Daughters to do what is good for the Order's mission. Why us that? She seems unwilling to allow the Daughters themselves to choose their chaplain - and why is that? What matters, what really matters is the mission - isn't it?
Isn't it?
The Order is not a drawbridge designed to keep selected sisters out. It is not a closed society. In fact, the Order is a bridge designed to bring more to Jesus. Jesus. Not Katharine Jefferts Schori or anyone else. I don't know why she's intervening rather than applauding the freedom to vote. It's not about her. It's about Jesus. We are Daughters of the King.
In Province III we have had an amazing experience of renewal and reconciliation at our annual retreats (read more about about the most recent one here), including the one this past May. Through the remarkable vision of one of the visionary leaders of Province III, the late Barbara Banks, we stepped away from trying to solve the current crisis through politics and instead fell on our knees in prayer. Barbara knew she didn't have much time left and she spent much of the last months of her life planning this spring retreat - a lasting legacy of a vision that we be made one, united in prayer in our bond in Jesus Christ.
We are Daughters of the King.
It is that vision that I pray will spread across this land - to the Presiding Bishop herself, it is my prayer, my hope for us all that we will embrace one another and not expel anyone - not the Anglican, or the Lutherans, or the Catholics, or the Episcopalian outside the walls. It is not about being Episcopalian - it's about being Daughters of the King.
Please join me and members of the Order as we pray that this earnest call for renewal will spread to Anaheim this summer when the DOK General Assembly will meet. We need to call this for what it is - and call on the Lord to break through and make us one.
Read more about the Province III retreat here. You can read more about the Daughters of the King at their official website here. You can see the website set up by a group of Episcopalians here.
I'm going to put this up again because this was our prayer, the prayer of the Province III Assembly of the Order of the Daughters of the King. It was Barbara's prayer. Come, Lord Jesus. May it be so!
UPDATE:
The National Council of the Order of the Daughters of the King responds to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. The letter was received by the Presiding Bishop this morning:
June 18, 2009 The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori Episcopal Church Center 815 Second Avenue New York, NY 10017
Dear Bishop Jefferts Schori:
Thank you for your thoughtful response to a letter from Ruth Annette Mills, of the Diocese of Nevada—a distinguished lady who has been a Daughter fifty years. She deserves respect and attention from all her sisters. Although I have not seen Ruth’s letter, your response indicates that she believes the Order of the Daughters of the King is proposing amendments that will cut its ties with the Episcopal Church. I am grieved that she has been misled by this idea. It is simply false, fueled by rumors and fears. Let me explain.
The Daughters have twice rejected a proposal to become ecumenical by allowing chapters in any denomination that practices Christian baptism. The first time, in 1997, the proposal was put forward by a committee that included two future presidents, Sue Schlanbusch and the late Joan Millard. After extensive debate, the proposal was decisively rejected. It was again put forward six years later, and tabled, with a request for a survey on the subject. The survey results were collected by the present chair of the bylaws committee, Lena Nealley. We know from reading the results that Daughters rejected the ecumenical option, and the committee has avoided that path. Instead the amendments seek to clarify the status of women who are already members under our present bylaws, and would still be members if none of the proposed amendments were adopted.
My shorthand description of the Order is that we are “Episcopal Plus”—that is, “distinctively Episcopal,” as the early handbooks phrase it, while continually planting chapters in sister Churches. The membership statistics reported at our last Council meeting listed the overwhelming number of members as Episcopalians: 25,145 of an estimated total 28,462. The next largest number is for overseas members, approximately 2500 Daughters in 15 countries. Their membership is not novel—the Order began founding chapters in Anglican churches overseas in the 19th century. When such chapters multiply in any particular country, they develop their own governing structure and leadership, and US Daughters continue to encourage them as much as we are able.
The recent fears and controversy revolve around the relatively small numbers of Anglican, Roman Catholic, and Lutheran chapters in the US: the October report listed 720, 97, and 18 members respectively, totaling less than 3% of the entire membership. As you may know, our present bylaws give chapters in Churches in the historic episcopate (other than those in the Episcopal church) the option of forming a national governing structure parallel to the Episcopal structure, just as overseas chapters organize when they have reached critical mass within their country. Although our bylaws have allowed Roman Catholic members since the mid-eighties, the expected growth in their numbers has not occurred, and they clearly are not able to organize as a national entity. A couple years ago the elected DOK leadership asked Anglican Daughters in the US to explore forming a national governing structure of their own, since it looked as if they might soon reach a number that would make that possible. They did explore that possibility and have rejected it in favor of forming a completely new Order with a different name for Anglican Daughters. A majority of our Anglican members will probably leave the Order in the coming year to join a new Order for Anglican women, unaffiliated with the Daughters of the King.
In short, far from receiving a flood of new members who might change the character of the Order, as some appear to think, we expect to say a sad goodbye to long-time members whose congregations have left the Episcopal Church. At the same time most of us want to assure the Roman Catholic Daughters and any Anglican or Lutheran Daughters that remain that although they are a minority we recognize them as valued members of the Order.
The Daughters of the King are praying for the upcoming General Convention, for you personally, and for all the delegates and bishops who will participate. Daughters in the Diocese of Iowa have prepared a seven-day cycle of prayers for us to use during the three weeks of Triennial and Convention.
In the latest Royal Cross both our president, Joan Dalrymple, and the Triennial Chair, Phyllis Easley, urge members to participate in the Prayer Vigil. These are not the actions of a sinister cabal intent on cutting the Order’s ties with the Episcopal Church. We may be perplexed at times, but the Daughters still seek first of all to serve our King and Saviour, Jesus Christ, and work out our vows to pray and serve within our local congregations. For most of us in the United States, that means a local Episcopal congregation and diocese. Please believe that severing our multiple connections with the Episcopal Church is not an option the Daughters will consider in Anaheim.
Again, thank you for your attention and your prayers.
For His Sake, Grace Sears, Secretary The Order of the Daughters of the King
Greg Griffith has posted a video that is must-see over at SF. It totally resonates here at the Cafe and is worth taking the time to ponder very carefully. Grab your bag of popcorn and watch as Clay Shirky explains:
WATERTOWN, Conn. -- Christ Episcopal Church in Watertown has seen everything, from baptisms to weddings to funerals, but after centuries of services, it's saying goodbye.
But worshippers at the church, which can be seen from anywhere on the Watertown Green and dates back to the 18th century, were told Sunday that the church is closing.
"It's pretty much part of Watertown," resident Judy Charbonneau said. "It's been here for years."
The decision to close the church came from the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut.
"There was, like, five or 10 minutes of, 'Oh my God,' and suddenly, 'OK, what are we going to do next?'" said the Rev. Stanley Kemmerer.
"We're closing access to a building for fiscal prudence, and at the same time are working with the faith community of 30 or so folks to discern their next steps as a group in a variety of possible formations and settings," the diocese said in a statement.
"It's simply that the congregation has not grown rapidly enough in a short time to be where it needed to be to take things over," Kemmerer said.
Kemmerer said it costs about $150,000 a year to run the church.
He said the church had split off from the main congregation because of the national Episcopal Church's stance on gays and other issues. When that happened, he said, there were about three parishioners left. Now there are about 40.
The church would need more than 200 to be able to make ends meet, Kemmerer said. He said he plans to make that happen, even if it's under a different roof.
Yes, it is Stravinsky. Would you want to get the note wrong? In this clip, he is conducting in his 80s. "Music praises God," Stravinsky said. "Music is well or better able to praise him than the building of the church and all its decoration; it is the Church's greatest ornament."
That being said, Stravinsky's unconventional major seventh chord in his arrangement of the Star-Spangled Banner in 1940 led to his arrest by the Boston police for violating a federal law that prohibited the "reharmonization" of the National Anthem. Who knew you could be arrested for playing at a major seventh?
Here he is in 1961 conducting Firdbird, followed by a contemporary rehearsal of the same piece:
In fact, when Stravinsky's Rite of Spring premiered, it actually provoked a riot. Here's Wiki:
At the start with the opening bassoon solo, the audience began to boo loudly due to the slight discord in the background notes behind the bassoon's opening melody. There were loud arguments in the audience between supporters and opponents of the work. These were soon followed by shouts and fistfights in the aisles. The unrest in the audience eventually degenerated into a riot. The Paris police arrived by intermission, but they restored only limited order. Chaos reigned for the remainder of the performance, and Stravinsky himself was so upset on account of its reception that he fled the theater in mid-scene, reportedly crying. Fellow composer Camille Saint-Saëns famously stormed out of the première (though Stravinsky later said "I do not know who invented the story that he was present at, but soon walked out of, the premiere.") allegedly infuriated over the misuse of the bassoon in the ballet's opening bars.
Stravinsky ran backstage, where Diaghilev was turning the lights on and off in an attempt to try to calm the audience. Nijinsky stood on a chair, leaned out (far enough that Stravinsky had to grab his coat-tail), and shouted counts to the dancers, who were unable to hear the orchestra.
Here is the Rite of Spring. No rioting, please:
One really ought to fill one's iPod with Stravinsky before setting off to Anaheim this summer. Just saying.
The Listening Process, also known as the "Continuing Indaba Project," was announced last month at the Kingston, Jamaica meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council after a briefing by the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Anglican Communion Office (ACO). The staff of the ACO, under the direction of the Archbishop of Canterbury, announced that a $1.5 million gift was given to fund this project-a gift 2-3 times the size of any previous gift received by the Anglican Communion Office for its work, and at a time when financial reports concede diminishing giving and reserves for the troubled Communion. The delegates to the Anglican Consultative Council were told that the money was coming from a grant through the Satcher Health Leadership Institute at the Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia.
After subsequent questioning at press conferences, it turns out that the Satcher Institute is not the source of the $1.5 million dollars.
So where did the money come from? The Rev. Marta Weeks, a retired Episcopal priest from the diocese of Southeast Florida, has donated $1.5 million to fund the entire project through 2011. Weeks and her late husband have supported a wide variety of causes and educational institutions. As noteworthy as her gifts are, her beliefs on the issues the Anglican Communion is dealing with are even more significant. In January of 2000, she signed the Religious Declaration on Sexuality, Morality, Justice, and Healing which calls for a "sexual ethic focused on personal relationships and social justice rather than particular sexual acts. All persons have the right and responsibility to lead sexual lives that express love, justice, mutuality, commitment, consent, and pleasure." This sexual ethic:
"applies to all persons, without regard to sex, gender, color, age, bodily condition, marital status, or sexual orientation." It calls for "full inclusion of women and sexual minorities in congregational life, including their ordination and the blessing of same sex unions" as well as "a faith-based commitment to sexual and reproductive rights, including access to voluntary contraception, abortion, and HIV/STD prevention and treatment." [emphasis added]
After questions arose about the source of the funding, the ACO admitted the gift came from Weeks and issued a disclaimer from her that the funds were given without any strings attached. But subsequent contradictory and confusing statements by the ACO, Weeks and the Satcher Institute raise serious questions about the influence associated with this gift and the institution administering it.
As an Episcopalian interloper studying at a Methodist seminary, I get the question a lot from my puzzled friends. Each time I’m asked, part of me wants to launch into a mini-primer on Anglican ecclesiology - to wit, that Episcopalians are Anglicans, since the Episcopal church is just the American province of the global Anglican communion. Which means that, technically, the question shouldn’t even make sense - it’s sort of like asking, “Are you American, or Texan?”
But, of course, I know just what the question means - it does make sense, because it reflects the sad divisions that have roiled the church over the past five years. Quite simply and sensibly, my Methodist friends want to know whether I’m a member of the liberal Episcopal church, or one of the conservative Anglican groups that broke off. And as saddening as it is to admit, I’ve come to think that their common-sense perception is more accurate than my attempts at ecclesiological theory. Their question can only be asked, and answered, because of the reality on the ground in the United States: Episcopalians are one thing, and Anglicans are another.
Popular understanding is usually much wiser than theoretical wishful-thinking, and nowhere more so than here. The divisions in the church have led the American public to attach the meanings to the words Episcopalian and Anglican that they actually bear in their usage - namely, that to be an Episcopalian means to be a member of an pro-gay, autonomous American denomination, more liturgical than most churches but firmly within the theological orbit of liberal Protestantism. To be an Anglican, by contrast, means to be part of a conservative evangelical church with bishops, connected somehow with Africa and opposed to homosexuality. The definitions have by now become quite distinct and firmly fixed in the national lexicon - ask almost any church-going American what the words mean, and you will get an answer something like the above.
Some Episcopalians and Anglicans (myself included) strongly dislike these characterizations - to be genuinely Episcopalian, they believe, means to be in fellowship with the Anglican communion, and to be authentically Anglican is to be part of a global communion of catholic Christians united by creedal orthodoxy and a commitment to read Scripture, pray, and worship together in the historic Anglican tradition. But although this sounds wonderful in theory, it is simply not what has happened, by and large, in the American context. Because of what’s taken place over the past five years, Episcopalian is now understood to be a term set in opposition to Anglican, and Anglican refers not to a global catholic communion but rather to an American-African evangelical phenomenon.
Whether we think the words ought to bear these meanings is not the point - my point is that this is what the words actually do mean, in newspapers and conversations and pulpits across the country.
Take, for instance, the widely publicized formation just this month of a new conservative Anglican province - the so-called Anglican Church in North America, with Robert Duncan as its new archbishop and primate. By taking the name Anglican for themselves, the clear implication is that the Anglican Church of Canada and the Episcopal Church are not in fact authentically Anglican, since they need to be completely replaced. In this, they are only following the practice of previous breakaway groups, such as the Nigerian-based CANA (Convocation of Anglicans in North America) and the Rwandan-based AMiA (Anglican Mission in America). The commonplace notion that Anglican means "not Episcopalian" is no coincidence; this is precisely the conclusion that the average church-going American would reasonably draw from following the news.
Moreover, the vision of Anglicanism here in play clearly gives very little weight to catholic order and global communion. The new Anglican church was created, as it were, by fiat - Duncan’s forthcoming elevation as archbishop, and the new group’s status as an Anglican province, are thus far only self-declared realities. And although Duncan’s group and his supporters have asked for approval from the global Anglican instruments of communion, they have also made it clear that they do not consider such approval to be necessary. Duncan and his allies enjoy the support of five evangelical Anglican primates, mostly African and all associated with the confessional GAFCON movement. This is, forthrightly, all the approval that the new church supposes itself to need; apart from this, Duncan’s group considers itself authorized to go it on its own. If ordinary Americans are expected to suppose that Anglican means something other than a conservative evangelical movement with liturgy and bishops, it cannot be from reading the daily headlines.
Episcopalians, for their part, genuinely do see themselves first and foremost as an autonomous, liberal American denomination. Their election of Gene Robinson as the church’s first openly gay bishop, of course, along with their practice (in many dioceses) of liturgically blessing same-sex unions, has led to a great deal of turmoil. But despite being asked many times by the Anglican instruments of communion to reverse course for the sake of Anglican unity, Episcopalians show little sign of doing so. By and large, Episcopalians like Bishop Robinson; as one friend of mine remarked, the thing about Robinson isn’t that he’s theologically unique as an Episcopalian, it’s that he’s so typical. Most Episcopalians are very content with their church’s position on homosexuality, as well as with the church’s general doctrinal haziness; such things are not about to change anytime soon. Even though holding to such positions may well mean walking apart from other Anglicans, the majority of the church views this as an unfortunate but acceptable necessity. In short, it seems clear that for most Episcopalians, the core of their identity lies elsewhere than their status as Anglicans.
All in all, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the commonplace definitions of Anglican and Episcopalian in the American public lexicon have their roots not simply in confusion or misunderstanding, but in what has actually happened on the ground. Many may view these realities as unfortunate, but that does not change the fact that they have indeed become realities. If these words are to change in their popular meaning, they will have to change also in fact. And to do so will mean fighting an uphill battle against the forces that have given them their current definitions.
The Constitution and Canons enhance the role of the Laity in both governance and mission The term “Laity” is derived from the phrase “people of God.” The Constitution and the Canons show a structure created from the “bottom up,” with the people of God and the congregations into which they gather as the basic agents for carrying out the mission of the Province to follow the Great Commission and carry the Good News to a hurting world.
At the local level, by tradition the entire vestry, except for the Rector, is made up of lay people. The role of the laity in diocesan structures, including parish vestries, is left up to each diocese, but it is expected that each diocese will wisely incorporate the laity into its governance as has been the case in other Anglican Churches.
The Provincial Council, the Executive Committee and the Assembly all have at least 50% of their members chosen from the laity. And with the addition of youth delegates to the Provincial Assembly, the Assembly will have well over 50% representation by the laity. These facts alone constitute an extremely significant change from former modes of governance where Bishop and clergy voting by orders could overrule the will of the laity. A number of Provincial officers and positions on the various courts, including the court for the trial of a bishop, will be also held by the laity.
In light of this significant role in governance and in responsibility for mission, it was deemed appropriate to outline in the canons what is reasonably expected of each lay person to bring the people of God to Christian maturity and equip them for their calling to ministry.
The Canons intentionally provide substantial flexibility, recognizing the diversity that exists among the partners that are coming together into union. Authority not yielded to the Province by individual dioceses is reserved to the same. It follows, under principle of subsidiarity, that heavy responsibility rests upon the dioceses and other member jurisdictions to establish by their own constitutions and canons the role of the laity in an orderly system of diocesan governance. The enhanced role of the laity in the Constitution and Canons of the ACNA will provide a framework to do so.
The Rev. Travis S. Boline, Anglican Church of Kenya and the Governance Task Force of the ACNA
Concerning the Clergy While the responsibility for carrying out the mission of the Church rests on all of its members, the responsibility for the spiritual health of the Church rests mainly with its clergy. Accordingly, in the Canons, the GTF has sought to be clear regarding the response of the church to those called by God to ordained ministry, those ordained and those chosen as bishops for the whole Church.
The Canons set forth the standards for candidates for ordination. They also declare the requirements and responsibilities of its clergy - deacons, priests and bishops alike. Those standards, requirements and responsibilities are based on Biblical principles. (See, Title III). The application and administration of those standards, requirements and responsibilities are left to the dioceses, and accountability to them has been written into the Canons with new clarity. (See, Title IV, Canon 2). The GTF sees the Canons as an appropriate and adequate foundation for the Church to live out and guard the faith once delivered to the saints. The GTF recognizes that no manner of legislation can ever substitute for sound theological formation and training of our clergy and for loving and forbearing hearts of our laity, all given and maintained by our gracious God in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Mr. Wicks Stephens Esq., Member of the Drafting Committee of The Governance Task Force of the ACNA
A mode for electing bishops that is Godly, prayerful and thoroughly Anglican Canon III.8.4, which covers the election of bishops, states that dioceses put forward a name or names for consent or selection by the College of Bishops. “Bishops shall be chosen by a diocese in conformance with the constitution and canons of the Diocese....” Thus, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, dioceses establish their own procedures as long as they are consistent with the ACNA Constitution and Canons. They may elect and certify one candidate to the College, or they may certify two or three nominees from which the College may select one. While this “latter practice is commended to all Dioceses,” and while a “newly formed” body shall “normally” nominate two or three candidates, the plain reading of this canon is that such practice is encouraged, but not required.
Under the principle of subsidiarity a newly formed or forming Diocese may choose the process by which it nominatescandidates for bishop. One such newly forming diocese, Western Anglicans, submitted the names of three candidates to its assembly for a vote, and forwarded the sealed results to the College of Bishops. The College of Bishops may prayerfully consider those results as part of their discernment. In this way, there is both a democratic participation in the process, and a prayerful submission that can minimize the kind of deceitful politicking that has characterized episcopal elections in North America.
On this mode of electing bishops, the Canons are well within the bounds of Anglican practice. In fact, this is the typical method for the election of bishops in Global South provinces such as the Church of Uganda. While this may seem a radical innovation and departure from our “democratic” election processes in North America, it also reflects lessons learned from the culture wars. Prior unfortunate experiences have taught us that the laity and clergy of a diocese can be deceived through the typical political “vetting” processes and speeches into electing a bishop whom they think is orthodox and who subsequently betrays them. The provision for final election by the College of Bishops is a safeguard against this kind of politicking and outright deceit that has destroyed more than a few dioceses in TEC and the Anglican Church of Canada. Note also, that if a bishop-elect or nominees are rejected by the College, the College informs the Diocese of this non-selection. It has no authority to select a bishop for a diocese that has not been recommended to it by the Diocese.
The Rev. Jim McCaslin, Anglican Diocese in the Southeast and Governance Task Force of the ACNA
BB NOTE: I do have some issues with some of this - I thought it would move away from the generalities and get into specifics. That said, I am glad to see it published - it does give the delegates the opportunity to prayerfully consider the intentions of the drafters, even if the current draft may give a different impression to the leadership of future dioceses. That is helpful. Very helpful.
I must say that I really do have an issue, though. Before Diane Knippers died she told me to be watchful regarding the place of the laity in future leadership. I took that as a charge. Therefore, I take issue then with this particular quote regarding the election of local bishops:
"Prior unfortunate experiences have taught us that the laity and clergy of a diocese can be deceived through the typical political “vetting” processes and speeches into electing a bishop whom they think is orthodox and who subsequently betrays them."
Turning control over to bishops to pick our bishops does not solve the problem. The laity still have no say in the choosing of the archbishop - which is incredibly misguided, probably with the best of intentions - but I'm sorry, this is not the global south, this is the United States of America. For example, the same thing can happen when we elect our senators. The same thing does happen. Is the solution for Virginia to send three senators up to the Hill and have the United States Congress pick one of the three senators for us? You know what that looks like and it comes across the same in this proposal - the electorate is stupid. Will senators be immune to the same kind of politicking and back room bargaining? Of course not - and neither will bishops. This type of attitude by what I am sure - and for the record, I am sure - are well-meaning clergy and bishops toward the laity and local clergy (do they really think we're all so inept that we can't be responsible, that we can't be entrusted to pick our own bishops, is that what we've learned from all this?) comes across as elitist and paternalistic - as if the laity are mere children.
ANY process will be open to betrayal. Taking the full responsibility of the election of their bishop away from the laity and local clergy will only succeed in teaching the laity to stay disengaged. If an idiot is picked by the College of Bishops, then the laity will shrug their shoulders and say, "well, he wasn't our first choice" and off we go to the next bake sale.
The laity must be engaged and if we're too stupid to be engaged then we deserve the bishops we elect. If the College of Bishops thinks that the candidate is an idiot, than black-ball him and the diocese will try again. We don't need to super-spiritualize this, as if the College of Bishops has a direct pipeline to God and the local diocesan leadership is stopped up with stupidity. It's time for us all to grow up.
When Kevin Joyce, the 29-year-old pastor of the nondenominational Imagine Fellowship in San Antonio, Texas, looks out at his congregation during his Sunday sermons, he sees “a lot of illuminated faces.”
But it’s not the word of God that’s lighting them up. It’s their smartphone screens.
“We hold our service in a movie theater and keep it dark so we can protect the screen,” says Joyce, who not only encourages his congregation to use Twitter and "tweet" in church, but projects the live Twitter stream on a giant screen during services. “When I look out, I’ll see a lot of people texting and the screens on their phones light up their faces.”
Welcome to the 3G(od) network, where social media have become as vital a communication tool for clergy and congregations as the traditional post-sermon coffee hour. While not all churches have gone as far as to incorporate real-time Twitter streams into their Sunday services, many are using Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, LinkedIn and other social networking sites to get the word (or, rather, “the Word”) out there.
In April, interactive marketing firm Sojo, Inc. surveyed 145 churches with memberships between 500 and 25,000 and found that 32 percent of them said they use Facebook, 16 percent are on MySpace and 10 percent are on Twitter, with many more chomping at the bit to sign up for the popular micro-blogging site.
Last month, Wall Street's Trinity Church used Twitter to perform the Passion Play on Good Friday, with congregation members using Twitter names such as "Pontius_Pilate," "ServingGirl," "Mary_Mother_Of" and "_JesusChrist."
Even the Vatican threw its large hat into the ring recently with a special YouTube channel, Facebook application and the newly launched Web portal "Pope2You."
“Social media is the new public square,” says Tim Schenck, a 40-year-old parish priest who blogs, is on Facebook and recently started tweeting. “Clergy used to have informal conversations with parishioners in barbershops and at Woolworth’s. Now much of this is done online.”
Schenck, rector at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., says he thinks of social networking sites as an important supplement, but not a replacement, for traditional ministerial outreach.
“I can’t e-mail someone Communion. I can’t tell them ‘Double click for salvation,’ ” he says. “But it’s a way for me to connect on a regular basis with my parishioners. And it allows me to extend the pulpit by reaching out to a much broader audience than I see on Sunday morning.”
While some churches take a minimalistic approach, using Facebook or Twitter to publicize potlucks or prayer groups or pass along a verse or affirmation of the day, others see it as a part of a larger, almost corporate-style mission.
“I approached the elders in our congregation about having a deacon of social media,” says Daniel Johnson, Jr., a 39-year-old IT developer and new media professional who attends the Cincinnati Church of Christ.
“They could not only help with the overall brand presence, but also help educate members and families about how to be effective and safe in using social media. Social media has a place in worship and outreach just as it does in business.”
Keeping churches relevant Staying current and connected isn’t just about branding, though, says Kim Gregson, assistant professor of the television/radio department at Ithaca College in New York. It’s also about survival.
“Everybody needs to reach the next generation, to give them a sense of belonging,” she says. “And online is where younger people live. It’s where they get their information, make their social connections, plan their weekends. You have to be there, you have to be in front of them. There’s a realization that if you don’t do these things, you’ll become forgotten.”
Of course, a congregation’s social media skill sets — and tolerance for new media — varies.
Joyce’s church, which skews young, purposefully brands itself as “the church where you can Twitter,” a designation that manages to both attract and repel certain groups.
“People who are more ‘churched’ will come in and check it out and find it’s too distracting and move on,” says Joyce. “That’s okay. We tell them, this is who we are and this is what we’re about.”
Schenck’s Episcopal congregation, on the other hand, is a mix of young families and older, long-time church goers. As a result, he uses social media to connect during the week, but keeps his pulpit unplugged so as not to increase an already existing tech divide.
“Most of it is generational rather than economic in our church, but a tech divide can potentially lead to an ‘in’ group versus an ‘out’ group and that can be dangerous,” he says. “We can’t forget those who still don’t have e-mail.”
For the most part, though, churches seem to be embracing social media with the heartiness of a Baptist handshake, with Twitter gaining particular attention, according to Jonathan Acuff of the blog StuffChristiansLike.net.
“The big pastors at the mega-churches are starting to Twitter now and pastors are even using it to take questions during the service,” says the 33-year-old from Alpharetta, Ga. “Churches are starting to understand that it’s a way to engage with people in the audience.”
Kicked out for tweeting Not all churches are becoming Twitter-vangelists overnight, though.
Alexis Martin Neely, a 35-year-old entrepreneur from Hermosa Beach, Calif., says that she was recently kicked out of her church for tweeting.
“I was in the back of the sanctuary tweeting the sermon and an usher came over and told me I couldn’t do that there,” says Neely, who attends the Agape International Spiritual Church. “They thought I was violating the copyright, like I was recording it somehow. I got the feeling they didn’t understand what Twitter was.”
She’s since gotten the go-ahead to live-tweet all her pastor's sermons, but even with the blessing of clergy, some people feel church is where you connect with your maker, not your friends or followers.
“I’m on Twitter and Facebook and I embrace technology every day, but there are places where you need space and one of those places is your church or temple,” says Mina Sirkin, a 42-year-old estate planning lawyer from Woodland Hills, Calif.
“If you’re tweeting away on your cell phone, it not only takes away from your personal presence in that moment, where you’re connecting with your creator, it takes away something from the people sitting around you, too.”
Alan Byrd, a 39-year-old marketing and PR entrepreneur from Apopka, Fla., says his tweets during church have raised a few eyebrows, but he feels getting the word out during that moment of inspiration takes precedence over everything.
“My wife doesn’t approve of my tweeting in church and at a prayer breakfast, I’ve had people say ‘You’ve got to learn to put your phone away, Alan,’ ” he says. “But the way I look at it, if two people out of my 2,000 followers have a closer relationship with God because of it, isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing?”
Concern over inappropriate tweets While some people worry that Twitter is alienating certain members of the congregation and others praise the increased outreach capability, there’s a third aspect to Twitter that some find disconcerting: the medium’s lack of control.
Kevin Joyce says that while he’s not concerned about someone posting inappropriate comments during one of his church’s live Twitter streams, others have raised the issue.
“People will ask me ‘What if someone says something bad? What if they say the F-word and it’s right there on the screen for everyone to read?’” he says. “Potentially it could happen, but it doesn’t worry me. If they’re part of our church and they do that, we can help them through that. And if they’re not a part of the church and just coming to a Sunday service to yank my chain, I’m not going to worry about it.”
Unfortunately, chain yankers (or “griefers,” as social media expert Kim Gregson calls them) can sometimes throw a monkey wrench into a connected congregation.
“There are people who just get pleasure out of messing you up,” says Gregson, who’s studied various forms of social media, including the online virtual world of Second Life.
“We’ve seen that in Second Life where someone will show up at a Muslim service as a giant pig or something. If churches are having a live Twitter feed, there is a potential for them to be visited by griefers. Someone could get on and pose as Satan or tweet ‘This is God and I hate you.’ ”
While the potential for both griefers and global outreach are there, it’s probably best to remember programs such as Twitter, are, well, newly christened. Sorting out the benefits — and the bugs — is still, as the Rev. Schenck of New York says, a “work in progress for all of us.”
“I think that all clergy are trying to determine the right balance as well as the boundaries and limitations of social media,” he says. “But for me, the Christian faith is all about connectivity. There’s no reason to think that Jesus wouldn’t have Facebooked or twittered if he came into the world now. Can you imagine his killer status updates? ‘Jesus is walking on water and freaking out his disciples.’ ”
Steve Wood is on site at Holy Trinity Brompton in London (transit strike and all!) for the International Alpha Conference. I attended an Alpha International Conference about ten years ago and loved it (I was the only American there, if you can believe it, and my pal for the week turned out to be the lone representative from Moscow) - and it's now exploded in growth - I mean exploded! 800 delegates - including at least 75 bishops - from over 100 countries. Steve posted a short clip from his second row vantage point behind a couple of Lutherans from the talk by Bishop N.T. Wright - who reminds us that it's still all about Jesus.
Last month I attended a meeting of Episcopal clergy. Most of us were middle-aged and elderly, longtime denizens of parish ministry. We spent some time talking about the Scriptures for that Sunday. Then I asked them what they thought of the Rev. Kevin G. Thew Forrester (got to be Episcopalian, with that name), a controversial bishop candidate in the Diocese of Northern Michigan.
Only one or two of them had ever heard of Forrester. When I told them that the main issue with him, and the one outraging many in the Episcopal blogosphere, was his interest in taking a red pen to many of the fundamentals of creedal Christianity, they seemed incredulous, as though a Martian space ship had landed in the parish hall.
Among the mainstream media, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s Frank Lockwood is perhaps the journalist who has spent the most time investigating the Forrester nomination (see Mollie’s and Terry’s previous posts). Lockwood has written extensively about the Forrester affair, going so far as to poll Episcopal Standing Committees (the boards that oversee each dioceses) to see how they would vote.
What Lockwood has done so well is to illuminate something that gets lost in the uproar over defections from the Episcopal Church over ordination of gays and same-sex blessings, and its oft-stormy relationship with the rest of the Anglican Communion. Doctrinally speaking, the denomination is by no means monolithic.
It includes at least this many subsets. Doctrinal conservatives (though a shrinking number) who disapprove of gay ordination and often women’s ordination. Doctrinal conservatives who are OK with ordaining women but find ordaining gay’s a bridge too far. Some who consider themselves orthodox according to the creeds (and this one is probably hardest for conservatives to fathom) who approve of ordaining gays and allowing the blessing of same sex relationships. Liberals (which certainly includes some bishops) who think a little ferment is good for the church and don’t mind losing a few phrases of the Nicene Creed. Liberals who would like to rewrite the Creeds (which apparently includes Forrester). Then there is a group who are hard to pin down on creedal orthodoxy but can’t stand bad ecclesiastical process (Forrester was the only candidate on the ballot). And I know I’ve left some people out.
As Terry noted a few months ago, this is a doctrinal story that’s getting big play among conservatives (and from Lockwood’s editors, apparently), and relatively little attention from the rest of the mainstream press. Lockwood has a straightforward, just-the-facts story about the candidate’s rejection by the majority of diocesan Standing Committees (diocesan oversight boards). He sums up the charges many critics make against Forrester:
Critics said Thew Forrester altered the denomination’s baptismal covenant to make it more closely reflect his own personal theological views. He likewise rewrote the church’s Easter Vigil and reworked the Apostles’ Creed. Critics said the changes removed or obscured key Christian teachings about the atoning work of Jesus Christ on the cross, the problem of sin, the will of God and the identity of Jesus as the eternally divine and only-begotten Son of God.
Thew Forrester said the changes were needed to keep the church relevant in the 21st century and that they reflected popular Christian beliefs that predated the Middle Ages.
Then he adds that Forrester’s supporters assert that his beliefs were “sufficiently mainstream” (sufficient for who?). Lockwood continues by making a critical point, one that I wish he’d explored at greater length here. “Opposition to Thew Forrester cut across left-right theological and political divides, uniting people with different views on gay ordination and other hot button issues.” These include standing committees in the Bible Belt and Los Angeles, New York and Hawaii, said Lockwood. For a more lengthy exploration of Forrester’s theology and a critique by Anglican theologian J.I. Packer, turn to a recent Forrester story by the same writer posted on Arkansas Online. A few paragraphs from that story illuminate how great the gulf within the denomination can be.
The bishop of West Texas, the right Rev. Gary Lillibridge, says Thew Forrester’s liturgies “omit or obscure what are, for us, nonnegotiable Christian beliefs.”
A letter, written by Lillibridge and his diocesan standing committee, expresses sympathy for the plight of the Northern Michigan diocese. “But we have a larger responsibility to the whole Church, and we are convinced that his consecration would further weaken the Episcopal Church’s unity and mission.”
Regent College theology professor J.I. Packer, an Anglican based in Vancouver, British Columbia, said Thew Forrester’s teachings put him “right outside the circle of Christianity.’
But Frank Guthrie, president of the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Indianapolis, said he’s hesitant, as a lay person, to challenge Thew Forrester’s theology or to second-guess the people of Northern Michigan.
Another Lockwood article on the same topic, this one written for Christianity Today, will be of particular interest to conservative audiences. It includes more quotes from conservatives both within and outside the denomination. These voices include South Carolina Episcopal theologian Kendall Harmon, the general superintendent of the Assemblies of God, George O. Wood and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary head Albert Mohler. I find Harmon’s argument that most of the internal opposition is driven mostly by process interesting, although I’m not sure that I agree.
The sands do seem to be shifting. We could see analysis such as this one and others like Anglican Centrist as illustrations that the Episcopal Church is fragmenting. It takes authoritarian movements to keep such an organization from fragmentation, but the cost is severe and since TEC is a volunteer-based organization and authoritarian-style decision-making will succeed in keeping new members out while those unwilling to play by the authoritarian rules will flee one way or the other.
But the heart of the issues - which are in fact about identity - remain fragmented. The problem is not solved and now it appears it's no longer even contained.
If General Convention moves further to fragment an all ready fragmenting church, it's difficult to know how many Episcopal Churches we'll end up with in the end. Four dioceses are all ready missing (with puppet dioceses put in their place extra-canonically by the Presiding Bishop's litigation team) and the lackadaisical acknowledgement on the presence of the Archbishop of Canterbury at the upcoming General Convention reveals an indifference on the part of the current leadership causes even the socially liberal orthodox to break ranks with the free thinkers and veteran street fighters of General Convention. It will be interesting to see how the Episcopal Free Thinkers and the Consultation street fighters appeal to get them to remain in line. The process and election of a Buddhist-inclined bishop seems to have been a bridge too far, a line in the shifting sand that a good many will not cross when social politics are not used as a weapon. The heart of the great dividing issue is exposed. It is about identity and the decisions taken by the Episcopal Church continue to separate it not only from its own members by from the wider Christian community. Bishop Frade's recent ill-advised media explosion is only the tip of the iceberg.
Is this all an aberration or just the latest in a series of events, the only difference now is that the world is watching.
Bob Dylan wrote "the carpet too is moving under you" and Anglican Centrist is noticing that the Episcopal Free-Thinkers (EFT) are getting some major push-back from the Ample & Generous Orthodoxites (AGO) with the apparent failure of the Bishop-elect of Northern Michigan to gain the number of consents necessary to be made a bishop. The carpet is moving all right. In fact, the carpet may have left the room.
Meanwhile, amongst much wailing and gnashing of teeth, the Episcopal House of Bishops is meeting behind closed-doors to figure out just what to do next as General Convention seems poised to bring the house down in Anaheim. So far the AGO-aligned Chair, Bishop Henry Parsley is resisting any outside interference to internal HOB discussions - no, not even from Louie himself - and what's up with that?
Are things so happy in Whoville after all? And yes, over there in the wings are the Communion Partners who have not forgotten the ill-advised EFTs sifting through privileged attorney-bishop e-mails and uploading the correspondence for public consumption. They've been the recipients of late of the sort of spewing that used to be reserved for the Voting Departed. The Communion Partners stay and get pies in the face. They glance about the room and see AGO-friendlies looking on with sympathy. Guess Dylan gets it right on that one too.
What if the Thew Forrester-vote reveals just how large the AGO wing really is in the Episcopal Church? The Presiding Bishop backed the bishop-elect of Northern Michigan - process, theology, the whole basket of zen. If dusty Anglican theology makes a grand re-entrance into the Episcopal Church polity (and musing are that the post-Boomers are far more interested then their aging Boomer siblings and the Millennials have actually of late gone missing, why - for all his rhetoric - even the President of the United States won't cross the line either - and what's up with that?) what does this loss say to her prestige and support base? Is there a crack in the wall or is it time to ring up the Little Dutch Boy?
Several of the leading members of what I will call the 'establishment Left' are quite upset with the lack of consents in the election of Thew Forrester. They are beginning to cry, 'witch hunt,' and 'theological oppression.' Others are beginning to cry, 'but he's actually orthodox.' Still others, 'this is the beginning of the end of true intellectualism in the Church.' Still others seem to have begun a process of shaming those 'fellow liberals' who voted against Thew Forrester.
What we are seeing is the Gap between parties in the Episcopal Church who have not historically been seen to be different. The party of theological 'free thinkers' who have eschewed since the 1960s any appreciation for theological and liturgical coherence are awakening to see that there are also Episcopalians who favor the ample and generous orthodoxy of the Prayer Book and Hymnal, and are looking for a more inclusive church, but who are not looking to tweak, revise, redact or avoid the core elements of the faith, or make revision and innovation the constant modus operandi of the church either.
The party of folks who want to keep things loose, open, and 'challenging' -- are finding new resistance from those who want to keep things theologically and liturgically coherent, in and of themselves and in line with centuries of faith and practice, as well as with the global Anglican Communion.
"The Scroll" - the legendary draft of Jack Kerouac's On The Road was published last year. Kerouac's mythical scroll - where he taped together all the pages of his draft of his legendary work and rolled it into a scroll that he then unfurled (much like we see William Wilberforce do in Parliament in the film Amazing Grace) to his rather stunned agent. The draft was later edited and embellished, the original names changed to fictitious ones and published as On The Road.The scroll was bought at auction not long ago and was seen for the first time at the New York Public Library. Now it's been published and a Kerouac-blogger offers his review - in his own beat-ee cummings-style.
i finally had a chance to sit down and read jack kerouac's "on the road" in its original unadulterated form ("on the road: the original scroll"). the fiftieth anniverary edition (2007) sat on the bookshelf for well over a year. in the meantime i read "jack kerouac's american journey: the real life odyssey of 'on the road'" as a refresher on the actual road trips. it was worth the wait because the original scroll version equalled the novel it was "fictionalized" into. i would never suggest that anyone should bypass "on the road" in favor of the scroll, but i will say that for any serious fan of kerouac, the scroll is an essential supplement to the novel.
the legend that kerouac knocked off the book in a three week benzedrine fueled marathon eating and sleeping in front of his typewriter - is just that, a myth. kerouac did spend three straight weeks in april, 1952, typing the manuscript that is now affectionately referred to, with almost biblical reverence, as the "scroll." the "scroll" was actually a series of taped together sheets of paper - and, without diminishing the myth, was retyped into a conventional manuscript by kerouac himself after he dramatically unrolled it for the effect it had on his shocked agent.
but it was not a spontaneous outpouring of prose. keroauc spent the time assembling (on a high of constant cups of coffee) the thousands of words and pre-written scenes that populated his work notebooks and looseleaf treatments into one continuous non-ficition retelling of the road trips he took with neal cassidy in the years from 1947 until 1950. in one sense, when truman capote tossed off what he thought was the ultimate insult to keroauc, "you don't write, you type write," he was correct. kerouac had already written on the road - and the assembly and transcription became the myth of spontaneous prose!
while the sheer physicality of the scroll is impressive, the actual text kerouac typed out stands on its on. i was lucky enough to see the scroll when it was exhibited at the new york public library last year - an imposing relic of the myth (and well worth going to see if the exhibit goes back on the road - can't help that one). but reading the narrative with the original names, original places, unadorned by the subsequently grafted literary flourishes (shame on you jack - "first thought, best thought") is a jarring juxtaposition.
on one level the differences between the scroll and novel are practically insignificant (pseudonyms and altered place names). yet as a behind the scene glimpse at the emergence of a mature kerouac voice - light years beyond the gray flannel writer of "the town and city" - it's a priceless document of the writer developing his craft. to venture off on a beatific synoptic tangent, it's almost as startling as reading the gospel of mark - and then witnessing the retelling via the gospels of matthew and luke. the same narrative, but unique perspectives.
too bad there isn't a proto-"huck finn" to compare with final version of twain's masterpiece. with "on the road," the transformation from autobiography to autobiographical fiction is more than a change in names and places. the scroll contains kerouac's direct alterations, insertions and cuts to transition from the narrative to a fictionalized account. then there are his pure "literary embellishments." the most jarring, to create the literary road novel is this little pretension: "what did they call such young people in goethe's germany?"
reading the scroll, which itself wasn't kerouac's first draft - but the sum of various starts and stops with different versions of the narrative that he finally assembled in that one document is an eye-opening experience. the booked also included four essays to introduce the road trips and development of the scroll. i read the essays after i finished the scroll because i didn't want them to influence my first take on the material.
don't pass up the chance to read the undiluted version of "on the road."
Read it all here. You get your copy of this edition here.
Here's the membership list of the Anglican Church of North American (ACNA) Governance Task Force which has prepared a draft Constitution and Canons for ratification at the ACNA Assembly later this month.
Governance Task Force
Hugo Blankingship, Esq., Chair, CANA Philip Ashey+, Esq., Secretary, AAC Larry Bausch+ FIFNA Travis Boline+ KENYA Jerry Cimijotti+ S. CONE Kevin Donlon+ ANGLICAN MISSION +Robert Duncan S. CONE Cheryl Chang, Esq. ANIC Bill Gandenberger+ S. CONE +Royal Grote REC +John Guernsey UGANDA Matt Kennedy+ AAC +Martyn Minns CANA
+Bill Murdoch KENYA +Chuck Murphy ANGLICAN MISSION Jim McCaslin+ KENYA Ron Speers, Esq. UGANDA Scott Ward, Esq. CANA Barclay Mayo+ ACiC Wick Stephens, Esq. S. CONE Scott Ward, Esq. CANA Robert Weaver, Esq. S. CONE
Bono and The Edge of U2 perform All I Want Is You at St. Remo 2000.
Bono's Italian in the introduction to the performance at the San Remo Festival in 2000 is reported to be translated as:
Thank you very much to the Pope. Mr. D'Alema (Prime Minister of Italy), thank you very much for your promise. Mr. Berlusconi, please help Mr. D'Alema to help Jubilee 2000. This is not politics but is the people's life. For the Italian people, we sing a song, "All I Want Is You."
The Oregonian asks Katharine Jefferts Schori about the crisis that is tearing apart the Anglican Communion at its seams, leading four Episcopal Dioceses to leave The Episcopal Church and the formation of a new Anglican province in North America later this month while TEC spends millions in the courts:
Q: Oregon seems far removed from the big Episcopal controversy over gay ordinations --
A: That's a good thing. The controversy isn't that big; it's just noisy in some places.
Barring a last minute change of heart by opponents, it appears certain that Episcopal Church leaders have rejected the consecration of a bishop-elect who denies traditional Christian teachings about sin, salvation, and Christ's atoning death at Calvary.
Evangelicals inside and outside the Episcopal Church say they would have been concerned if Kevin Thew Forrester had been given a ceremonial shepherd's staff and a sacred charge to "feed and tend the flock of Christ" in the Diocese of Northern Michigan, where he was elected on February 21. But few are seeing the rejection as a cause to celebrate.
According to church rules, elections of bishops must be confirmed by a majority of the church's House of Bishops (though not all members are allowed to vote) and a majority of its 111 diocesan governing boards, known as standing committees. While the results will not be official until mid-July, a majority of standing committees have voted to withhold consent, according to a survey by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Unofficial surveys show the bishop-elect trailing badly among bishops as well.
Thew Forrester, who has rewritten the church's baptismal covenant, the Apostles' Creed, and the Book of Common Prayer's Easter Vigil liturgy to remove historic Christian doctrines, would be the first bishop-elect to be vetoed by denominational leaders since at least the 1930s, according to the church's Office of Communication.
The 2.3-million-member Episcopal Church has had bishops who have denied core Christian doctrines like the Trinity, the Virgin Birth, and the Resurrection of Jesus. But the most prominent bishops to make such claims (such as John Shelby Spong and James Pike) reportedly did not do so until after they had been made bishop.
Critics on the theological left and the right said Thew Forrester's abandonment of church doctrine and liturgy, as contained in the Book of Common Prayer, placed him too far outside the mainstream to serve as a bishop and a successor to the Apostles.
Thew Forrester's rejection of atonement theology and his claims that the crucifixion was not the will of God were particularly troubling to some Episcopalians. According to Thew Forrester, Christ's blood doesn't wash away sin and Christ's death doesn't redeem and restore humanity. Jesus doesn't make us one with God, but simply reveals to us that we're already and always one with God, the bishop-elect maintains.
Such doctrinal innovations were too much for some bishops.
"There are a few things that are absolutely non-negotiable in the Christian faith because without them it ceases to be the Christian faith," said Bishop of West Texas Gary R. Lillibridge.
But a Thew Forrester supporter, Wyoming Bishop Bruce Caldwell, said Thew Forrester's theology "stretches us, but not to the point of breaking."
The bishop-elect defended his liturgical and theological changes, saying they reflected the "continually evolving" Christian faith.
"What we've done is quite responsible and appropriate, and indeed the church needs to do it in order to stay relevant in the 21st century," he said.
In addition to rejecting orthodox Christian teachings about the Cross, Thew Forrester denies that Satan exists, calls the Qur'an the Word of God, describes sin as being blind to our own goodness, and questions whether Jesus is truly the only begotten Son of God. A student of Zen Buddhism, Thew Forrester took Buddhist lay ordination vows and adopted a new Buddhist name—Genpo—meaning "way of universal wisdom."
Critics charged that Thew Forrester had also altered Christian liturgies to add Buddhist, Unitarian-Universalist, and New Age principles.
In a message posted on his blog, Bishop of Bethlehem (Pennsylvania) Paul V. Marshall warned that the denomination's failure to uphold historic Christian teachings had made it an embarrassment.
"As a Church we are increasingly a laughing-stock … because we do not consistently proclaim a solid core, words as simple as 'all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,' yet 'God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself,'" Marshall wrote.
Thew Forrester's theological and liturgical innovations are too extreme for a majority of the Episcopal Church, said Greg Griffith, founder of the conservative Anglican website StandFirmInFaith.com. But that doesn't mean that the Episcopal Church is ready to embrace the faith once delivered to the saints, he added.
"All the Episcopal Church has done is to say that someone who is clearly not a Christian may not be one of its bishops," Griffith said. "It may be history in the making, but it's hardly a grand or noble achievement, and certainly not a signal that the Episcopal Church is returning to orthodoxy."
"In any other church—evangelical, Catholic, Orthodox, Pentecostal—this person wouldn't get to go to seminary, let alone be able to lead" an entire regional body, said Kendall Harmon, canon theologian of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina. The fact that a diocese chose Thew Forrester and that nearly 30 standing committees have voted to confirm him is troubling, Harmon said.
Harmon and other theological conservatives also noted that the opposition to Thew Forrester is fragmented. A few oppose him because he was the only candidate for bishop on the ballot. Others say he should have gone before the proper channels before rewriting the Apostles' Creed and baptismal covenant. Only a minority oppose Thew Forrester because they believe the changes are contrary to Christian teaching, Harmon said.
"This is not something to celebrate. It's something to be sad about. It reveals a deeply, deeply unhealthy church," he said.
But Bill Carroll, rector at Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd in Athens, Ohio, says the vote may be a turning point for his denomination. "I think history will remember this as the point when the Episcopal Church began to show some backbone about basic Christian doctrine," he wrote in a comments thread at EpiscopalCafe.com. "For too long, we have allowed our respect for difference to mean anything goes. There are boundaries."
Christian leaders outside the Episcopal Church said the church's handling of Thew Forrester has implications beyond the denomination.
"If a so-called bishop does not agree with the central elements of the Christian faith, then he should not call himself a Christian, let alone a bishop—nor should a church ordain him. He is an apostate from the Faith; and a church that ordains such a one is also apostate," said George O. Wood, general superintendent of the Assemblies of God.
Southern Baptist Theological Seminary President Albert Mohler agrees.
"The difference between orthodoxy and heresy is of vital importance to every evangelical believer," he said. "We should feel grief and pain whenever we see a church that is involved in this kind of basic theological turmoil and where we hear the truth of the gospel denied, because it compromises the gospel witness of Christians around the world."
Friday’s Wall Street Journal carries a report on the state of Steve Jobs’ health that makes his condition last January — before he went on a six month medical leave — sound more desperate than Apple (AAPL) let on at the time.
“He was one real sick guy,” an unnamed source told the Journal. “Fundamentally he was starving to death over a nine-month period. He couldn’t digest protein. [But] he took corrective action.”
According to this source — who is said to have seen Apple’s CEO in recent weeks — Jobs’ recovery “is coming along” and he should be able to return to work before the end of June, as scheduled.
The same source says that some Apple directors have been getting weekly updates on Jobs’ health from his physician.
Jobs has come to Apple headquarters occasionally since his medical leave began, according to the Journal. Independently, the Italian website setteB.IT reported last week that several people spotted Jobs entering the main gate of the Apple Campus on May 27 to attend a meeting.
A few days earlier, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak told another Journal reporter that Jobs sounded “healthy, energetic” when he spoke to him by telephone.
The Journal’s latest report comes four days before Apple’s annual World Wide Developers Conference. The keynote at last year’s WWDC — the last delivered by Jobs — was the first time he appeared in public looking dangerously thin. He skipped MacWorld this year, and his marketing vice president Phil Schiller is scheduled to deliver the keynote next week.
The Journal also reported on speculation that Jobs might make a surprise appearance during the presentation next Monday, but didn’t reach any conclusion.
ACC-14 has received mixed reviews from the members of the Primates Standing Committee, with some archbishops saying the May 2-12 meeting was marked by honest dialogue and healing, while others saw it as a fraud.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams told a May 12 press conference the meeting had produced mixed results. While the work of two years in preparing an Anglican Covenant had been temporarily turned aside, and effectively defeated conservatives charged, there had been less tension in Kingston than at ACC 13 in Nottingham due to the “healing effect of time; the issues are not quite as raw,” Dr. Williams said.
However, he conceded that ACC-14 “hasn’t necessarily dealt with the problems that face the communion, once and for all,” but did “deepen our sense of obligation” to one another within the Communion.
The Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, Dr. Katherine Jefferts Schori told the Episcopal News Service she was encouraged by the discussions and by the time spent on issues apart from the disputes over doctrine and discipline that had “made the communion most neuralgic.”
“We are indeed reminded that we are united in the work that we share and the challenges we share,” Bishop Jefferts Schori said, adding “we leave this meeting of the ACC with hope for the future and the reality and realization that we have hard work ahead of us.”
The Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia, Archbishop Phillip Aspinall of Brisbane—a member of the Primates Standing Committee—saw the meeting of delegates from the 38 provinces of the Anglican Communion as a happy, healing time, noting “we worked together in an atmosphere of honesty, openness and vulnerability.”
He conceded that there “were some heated moments but it was a bit like a crucible. The heat was unmistakable but necessary to refine thinking and clarify understanding.”
Author of the resolution adopted by the meeting that called for further work on section 4 of the Anglican Covenant, effectively delaying its roll out for a year, Dr. Aspinall admitted the debate over the proposed Anglican Covenant was challenging, but discounted reports that some of the delegates were confused by the parliamentary proceedings.
“One of the highlights of ACC-14 for me was the spirit with which discernment about these critical issues took place. There was truth telling in love and there was continuity between the discernment groups and resolutions. In the plenary sessions there was straight talking but also gracious restraint in the interests of the whole Communion,” he said.
Dr. Mouneer Anis, the President Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East and Bishop of Egypt was less sanguine. As a member of the Primates Standing Committee he had travelled to Kingston with “hope and anticipation” but was disappointed by the “manipulative process” used to scuttle the Covenant.
“All that was required from the ACC was to agree to send the whole text of the Covenant to the Provinces for discussion and adoption,” he said, but the Episcopal Church and its allies “were strongly opposing the idea of the Covenant especially section 4,” which enumerated its disciplinary procedures.
Dr. Anis faulted the organization of the meeting and its leadership, saying the structures imposed on ACC 14 “helped to undermine the Covenant supporting voices.”
He noted the resolutions committee was composed of five delegates, three of whom were from the Episcopal Church, Scotland and New Zealand “which strongly oppose the Covenant,” while the fourth member, the Moderator of the Church of South India Bishop John Gladstone had “made it clear” that his church could not “adopt an Anglican Covenant because they are a union of different churches.” Going in to the debate, Dr. Anis observed, of the five delegates preparing the resolution, only the delegate from Ghana came from a province in favor of the Covenant.
The small group format was also used to stymie the will of the delegates and sink the Covenant. While the small groups permitted all delegates to share their views, “each group did not know the views of the other groups.”
A member of the drafting committee sat in each small group session and was tasked with reporting the sessions view’s to the committee. Dr. Anis stated that all but one of the small groups “were supportive” of the Covenant, but the drafting committee imposed its contrary interpretation upon the meeting.
The slick parliamentary tricks used by opponents of the Covenant discouraged many delegates from the developing world, he said. Reintroducing a motion that had sought to delay the Covenant, after it had been defeated by a vote was a “shock.” “Many of our African and Asian brothers and sisters were confused by this especially after they rejoiced when resolution A was rejected. Then I objected and requested a legal advice in this matter but the chairman decided not to deal with my request.”
In the midst of this “defeat”, Dr. Anis said there remained “a great opportunity to turn around the whole situation. We can do this if we, as dioceses and Provinces, started to discuss, make comments and adopt the Covenant without any further delay.”
The Primate of Uganda, Archbishop Henry Orombi—a member of the Primates Standing Committee, but absent from the meeting—concurred. Speaking to a men’s retreat in the United States, Archbishop Orombi rejected the usurpation of provincial autonomy and authority by the ACC’s standing committee, which had refused to seat a Ugandan delegate, and voiced criticism of the way in which the meeting was organized and governed.
While the ACC was “broken,” he nonetheless urged individual provinces and dioceses to seize the initiative and begin the work of adopting and implementing an Anglican Covenant.
UPDATE: COLORADO SPRINGS, CO – St. George’s Anglican Church (the congregation formerly located at Grace Church and St. Stephen's) issued the following statement in response to the settlement agreement reached with the Diocese of Colorado:
“We are pleased with the settlement, particularly since it relieved our staff and vestry members of the burden and expense of defending against $5 million in unjustified claims brought against them personally by the Diocese of Colorado and The Episcopal Church.
“The settlement reached also means that all the costs associated with maintaining the property of Grace Church and St. Stephens, including payment of the $2,500,000 mortgage, belong to the Episcopal congregation and the Diocese of Colorado.
“Our only remaining obligation is to pay final operational expenses we had incurred during our possession of the property, but were unauthorized to pay until this settled agreement was reached.
“We look forward to fulfilling God’s call to us for mission and ministry.”
The Episcopal Diocese of Colorado and former members have ended their fight over the historic downtown Colorado Springs church, the diocese announced Tuesday.
The decision ends two years of legal struggle over the $17 million Grace Church and St. Stephen's Parish buildings, as well as a number of associated disputes of trusts and other matters associated with their 2007 split.
In March, El Paso County District Judge Larry Schwartz turned the property back to the diocese, relocating about 1,200 former members.
The Colorado Gazette reports that "Diocese officials also said Tuesday that both sides have agreed to dismiss all damage claims and that each side will pay its own attorneys' fees."
The case against the rector Don Armstrong is still pending.
Bishop John Rodgers offers his take on the conversations now underway among the delegates and vestries and others in preparation for the first organizing assembly of the Anglican Church in North America in Ft. Worth later this month. Some of the conversations regarding the proposed ACNA Constitution and Canons are online (here and here) and many are offline in the vestries and assemblies of this new province, as it should be. While I may have some differences of opinion with Bishop John (my views are more in line with these comments from "Anxious Anglican" here at SF), I respect his desire that we move forward and not stagnate or lose momentum.
At the same time, I recognize that we need clarity.
Though there are deep convictions being expressed and articulated (there's amazing writing being produced and discussions underway that at times makes me think of what it may have been like to be in one of those early American taverns in Philadelphia, engaging in robust "discussions" into the wee hours of the morning over the proposed U.S. Constitution - we've actually had a few those), it has not reached the type of acrimony and fear as we see now happening over at the Episcopal Cafe (and now picked up by Thinking Anglicans) concerning the establishment of yet another committee by the Episcopal House of Bishops. And for that, I am thankful.
How do we make sure we don't end up in the same place? Prayer is probably a good place to start. I know it seems simplistic, but it is the first place we go. Praying through scripture, in worship, and in community we come before the Lord and we pray for His people - all of us. And we also pray for those who do not yet know His name. Breakthroughs extraordinarily happen. There are some amazing things being written, conversations underway as preparations continue for the Ft. Worth Assembly, a Great Discernment is in process - but as I learned this past weekend, unity isn't found in agreement on issues or pressure to conform, unity, yes, even clarity is found at the foot of the cross.
At times, the foot of the cross can be a very lonely place, as the disciple John found out. But in the end, he had the last word.
The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen. -Revelation 22:21
I was born in New London, CT. High School: Radford, Honolulu, Hawaii; College: Roger Williams University, Bristol, Rhode Island. Major: BFA Creative Writing; Baptized: Easter Day 1975; Confirmed: North Clairemont UMC, San Diego, CA 1975; Received: Truro Church, Episcopal, Fairfax, VA 1985; Reaffirmed: Sept. 15, 2004 by Lord Carey, 103rd Archbishop of Canterbury; Order of the Daughters of the King; General Conventions: 6; Lambeth Conference: 2008; Book published: The Plot Thickens; ENFP. Trekker. Bob Dylan Concerts: 6.
In SL it's ZoeRose aka BabyBlue (it' starting to get a bit Dylanesque!) but it's me - join us at the Anglican Cathedral for Church in the 21st Century. This is a photo from a recent global Bible Study of the Anglican Ecumenical Society - we're studying Ephesians! Join us!
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