Found on: UK Times Online – Here.

Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent

The Archbishop of Canterbury issued a “profound apology” to the lesbian and gay Christian community today.

In a powerful address to the General Synod, Dr Rowan Williams warned that any schism within the Church would represent a betrayal of God’s mission.

But he made clear that he regretted recent rhetoric in which he has sought to mollify the fears of the traditionalist wing of the church.

The Archbishop is from the Church’s liberal wing and a man who once espoused equal rights for gays within the Church. More recently he has adopted a conservative line for the sake of Church unity.

Today he said: “There are ways of speaking about the question that seem to ignore these human realities or to undervalue them.

“I have been criticised for doing just this and I am profoundly sorry for the carelessness that could give such an impression.”

Addressing the even more contentious debate over gay ordinations — something which threatens to split the Church farther with the expected consecration in May of Canon Mary Glasspool, a lesbian, as a bishop in Los Angeles — Dr Williams said it had not been helped by those who ignored the fact that many worshippers were gay, as well as many “sacrificial and exemplary priests”.

He made it clear that there was blame on all sides of the argument that has brought the Church to the brink of splitting. He pleaded for Anglicans angry over gays and women bishops to cease fighting, admitting that he and other bishops might have to settle for a two-tier communion.

In his wide-ranging address at Church House Westminster, Dr Williams said that the ordination of women bishops should not go ahead at the expense of the Church’s Anglican Catholic wing, which is currently assessing an offer from the Pope to move over to Rome into a new Anglican Ordinariate.

Dr Williams admitted: “Most hold that the ordination of women as bishops is good, something that will enhance our faithfulness to Christ and our integrity in mission.”

But this good was jeopardised by the potential loss of traditionalists and some evangelicals who oppose women bishops.

Referring to proposals to give women bishops a lesser level of authority, he said the reform should not happen if it is done in such a way that that will “corrupt it or compromise it fatally”.

Dr Williams said that attacks on the Anglican Covenant, a new unity document intended to find a way to keep the 38 provinces under one umbrella, were mistaken.

“There is no supreme court envisaged and the constitutional liberties of each province are explicitly safeguarded,” he said.

Referring to tomorrow’s debate tabled by a lay member from the Chichester diocese calling for the Church of England to recognise the breakaway new traditionalist church in the US, he said: “Certain decisions made by some provinces impact so heavily on the conscience and mission of others that fellowship is strained or shattered and trust destroyed.

“The present effect of this is chaos — local schisms, outside interventions, all the unedifying stuff you will be hearing about, from both sides, in the debate on Lorna Ashworth’s motion.”

John Bowen has written an article about The Meeting House, why it is so successful and why Anglicans find that so irritating.

Some, of course, would think that 8,000 people showing up for worship, even in a cinema, would naturally be a good thing. What could there possibly be to criticise? Well, for a start, from an Anglican point-of-view, it is not liturgical worship. There is a lot of singing (led by a local worship band), followed by a pastoral prayer and announcements, and then a 45-minute sermon, broadcast on the big screen from the church’s headquarters in Oakville. Then we go home. So there is no liturgical shape or content to the service. Neither is the service (usually) Eucharistic. I was there once when there was a Eucharist, but it was in the last five minutes, tacked on at the end almost as an afterthought, and again with virtually no liturgical framework.

But, if we are honest, there is one thing that irritates us more than all of these combined: it is that The Meeting House is successful. Successful in attracting people—a lot of people, and a lot of young people at that—successful in holding on to (not all but many) of them, and successful in opening and filling new churches. If there is one thing that rankles with us, it is that kind of success.

He goes on to enumerate the aspects of the Meeting House that Anglican parishes might consider emulating in order to grow: use leadership gifts wisely; Christian education; home groups; rented worship space; discourage spectator Christianity; humility.

As is usually the case in this kind of analysis, two important points are missing:

1. The meeting House actually believes what it is peddling. There is no Anglican dithering about the meaning of the concepts of Resurrection, substitutionary atonement, the divinity and uniqueness of Christ, the sinfulness of man, the reality of salvation, heaven and hell. The Anglican Church of Canada has for the most part abandoned this Gospel.
2. The reason the Meeting House wants to draw in people is because of point 1, not because it wants to get bigger. The Anglican Church of Canada wants to draw in people in order to get bigger so that it can continue its middle-class social club.

In its more earnest moments the ACoC does engage in its favourite pipe-dream of immanentising the eschaton and it even hires people to help.

Rachel Jordan has some advice for Christians who believe that someone else is going to build the kingdom of God here on Earth. “There isn’t a Plan B – you’re it,” she says. “You are the people God has chosen to be his agents right here, right now.”

It still has nothing to do with the Gospel.

But first Canterbury:

Canada’s leading female Anglican cleric has courted controversy at a major church conference in Britain by predicting the eventual rise of a woman as archbishop of Canterbury.

“The signposts are pointing in one direction,” former Edmonton Bishop Victoria Matthews told Reuters yesterday during a global gathering of Anglican bishops at the once-a-decade Lambeth Conference. “I would be very surprised if it wasn’t accepted worldwide.”

Bishop Matthews, whose selection in February as the bishop of Christchurch, New Zealand, sparked an uproar among conservative Anglicans in that country, also shot back at Vatican officials who have complained the Church of England’s July 8 decision to begin appointing female bishops poses “a further obstacle for reconciliation” between Catholics and Anglicans.

“With the greatest respect, the Vatican has to understand the Anglican Communion is not synonymous with the Church of England,” Bishop Matthews said in the interview. “The Anglican Communion has had women in the episcopate for about 20 years. They really need to do their homework and realize that the communion is 38 provinces and not one with satellites. That is a pretty significant error.”

And here she is, prepared and ready.

So they’ve only just noticed?  All along most of them have either been silent or have been accusing us of being small-minded and ignorant.  Churchmouse Campanologist came out against our ‘betters’ in July 2009.

The Telegraph says:

It is the first time the Church’s leaders – by no means Eurosceptics – have made public such detailed criticism of the European institutions that govern much of life in Britain today.

The submission by the House of Bishops Europe Panel was published on Thursday in response to a document called EU 2020, a strategy to make the 27-state union a ’smarter, greener social market’ following the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty …

In reply the bishops, led by the Rt Rev Christopher Hill, the Bishop of Guildford, make a series of highly critical points about the EU itself and its remoteness from ordinary people.

They say: ‘The European institutional public sphere is largely a public discourse for elites, it is a sphere in which citizens remain uninvolved. This has in turn contributed to the EU’s democratic deficit.

‘The solutions to today’s challenges must come from society if they are to meet people’s needs. Europe’s citizens have to be placed more squarely at the centre of the agenda.’

This is unusual.  So few C of E bishops speak out.  Thank goodness for Bishops Sentamu and Nazir-Ali, both of minority groups yet with the bottle to speak up on our behalf.  On February 4, 2010, the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, warned about taking tolerance too far. 

I don’t know when this ‘Christians must be tolerant’ notion came into being, anyway.  It seems to be a leftist meme employed only by them and other self-serving opponents to the Christian faith.  Respond with kindness wherever possible, yes, but always stand up for the faith and rebuke and exhort as necessary!  We are not doormats. We are here to defend the Church, which Jesus Christ instituted.

The Telegraph reports that Dr Sentamu addressed the Newcastle City Council:

Dr John Sentamu warned that differences over areas such as immigration and funding of public services are just being ‘thrust into the margins’ where they ‘fester’ rather than being talked about openly.

He claimed the Government is trying to ‘remove religion from public life’ in the name of tolerance, and force people to keep their faith behind closed doors.

The Archbishop, the second most senior cleric in the Church of England, also echoed Pope Benedict XVI’s criticism of the Equality Bill this week as an ‘unjust’ restriction on religious freedom.

He added:

‘This is symptomatic of a trend which has intensified in Britain over the past fifty years in the name of tolerance.

‘That is, an attempt to remove religion from public life. And in the process, tolerance, which is supposed to be the tool to help us deal with difference and disagreement has instead, become a negative virtue – a means of diminishment and marginalisation.’

I know some in the elite and they say what a certain infamous European of the 1930s and 1940s advocated: faith at home and in church — nowhere else.  Are these people Christians?  No, they object to the faith and wish to hear nothing about it, even in passing, from their friends.  ’Keep it to yourself’,'  I’ve been told in no uncertain terms by people I’ve known well for nearly 30 years.

Dr Sentamu explained:

‘Tolerance has become a restricting quality – a grudging “putting up – with” rather that a positive means of building a caring, peaceful society.

‘The problem with this is that it does not give us the means of voicing and dealing constructively with differences.

‘We give people private space but do not encourage public discussion and debate on key areas which are seen as “difficult” such as religion, immigration, the optimum funding for public services. In consequence, these areas of difference are thrust into the margins where they do not go away but instead, tend to fester.’

Yet, the C of E at large does just that.  They have just issued an instruction that clergy are not to invite BNP (British heirs to the aforesaid European) to participate in debates or events on Anglican Church grounds prior to this year’s General Election in the UK.  Last year, the C of E forbade clergy and employees from being members of that political party, a move which Dr Sentamu supported.  I can’t imagine that any would, anyway, so I still question whether that announcement was necessary.  Last year, we had local elections and the vicar told us not to vote for ‘extremist parties’.  Well, although he stated it in the plural, we know he meant only one. 

I, for one, would love to see our vicar debate someone from the BNP prior to the election.  All vicars should.  In fact, the C of E instruction should be to invite the BNP and engage them in public discourse on election issues.  Let us hear what the BNP have to say to a clergyman.  It is the best way to deflate the party in the eyes of the electorate.

To do otherwise does exactly what Dr Sentamu was criticising (but, nonetheless, supporting).  I would like to think that he and Dr Nazir-Ali, even though they are from racial minorities, would have the bottle to debate the BNP, together or individually.

PDF format: communion_ACNA

DOC format: communion_ACNA

James Coder is a layman in the Diocese of Europe, Church of England

Should the Church of England remain in communion with The Episcopal Church while failing to enter full communion with the ACNA, I fear we shall be inducing “fundamentalism” within our own church, and outside of it.

“Fundamentalism” is indeed a “loaded word” – it is also highly pejorative, but I believe that it’s probably the most fit word to describe what a likely effect will be of a prolonged period of time continuing in full communion with The Episcopal Church, without entering such with the ACNA. Indeed, I believe that entering full communion with ACNA will do a great deal to stem the tide of fundamentalism which will likely come from our continuing communion relationship with The Episcopal Church.

Many have alleged that the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church has denied the resurrection and the divinity of Christ; in a separate paper, I investigate these claims and have endeavoured to show that, while she has never denied such in simple words, she has indeed made statements which amount to denials of the church’s doctrines of the resurrection and of the divinity of Christ.1 Moreover, there has been little outcry within TEC itself regarding this situation. It is at times denied; and as far as I know, even the Communion Partner bishops have not seen fit to address it in proposed resolutions for this last General Convention of TEC, perhaps afraid of repercussions – or perhaps simply acknowledging the futility of their presence within General Convention. But what is telling here is that no significant faction within TEC has undertaken a visible effort to address this situation. It seems that faith in the risen Christ within TEC has been profoundly undermined.

The Episcopal Church has long been associated with various forms of “extremism,” utterly serious breaches of church discipline with little response, and other things which seriously offend individuals and churches with which we would like to maintain good relations – advocacy of the legality of partial birth abortion, clergy members writing liturgies involving such things as Asherah worship or group sex, continual practice of clown eucharists despite vehement protest, to name but a few. And of course, it has prompted a great deal of anger with its policy on consecrating actively gay bishops.

These things have become well-known to many in other denominations, as sites which are critical of such trends within the Episcopal Church have become widely read across denominations, with the site http://standfirminfaith.com sometimes exceeding the internet traffic of the whole site of The Episcopal Church itself.2

However, all of the things are, in my opinion, of very little concern compared to the spectre of a church losing its faith in the risen Christ.

Though churches or individuals may consider these things to be undesirable in themselves, they also feel: these things are also undesirable because they would undermine our faith in Christ and relationship with Him – which in a certain sense, is the whole point of refraining from such things.

I engage in online ministry, and have noted an increase in such comments on the net as “you can’t be a Christian and be an Episcopalian or Anglican” by persons from other churches. Friends of mine report such remarks being made in face-to-face conversations. Though I wish persons saying such things would educate themselves on the matter so as to have a more articulate way of describing the situation other than “you can’t be a Christian …” etc., I do find this trend highly disturbing.

A few weeks ago Giles Fraser noted in a blog posting his disappointment at how speakers were sometimes required to sign a statement of faith before being allowed to give papers or sermons at Christian Union events. I fear that this trend will only increase if the Church of England has as its sole communion partner in the United States a church whose Presiding Bishop can reasonably be said to have denied the doctrines of the resurrection and the divinity of Christ. I fear that persons within our church will be more inclined to hold fast to particularist doctrines, principles, and practices in situations where dialog is more in order, simply because they fear for the corruption in the church. I fear that persons and Christian institutions outside of our church, witnessing that the Church of England is in full Communion with The Episcopal Church but not its Christologically sound counterpart, will also be more inclined to avoid certain types of stimulating reading, to throw up unnecessary obstacles to ecumenical cooperation and understanding, and to generally act in ways characteristic of one who feels that one’s church’s teachings, practices, and faith are in danger of being undermined.

In undertaking ecumenical online ministry as an Anglican layman, I have already felt such effects, and expect them to increase with time. Situations have arisen where initial enthusiasm for coming together in Christ was replaced with skepticism, or complete avoidance, when it was discovered that I am Anglican.

If our church is to enter communion with the ACNA, we will be doing a number of things:

1We will enter a communion partnership with a group of people who is able to help us in addressing the very earnest situation within The Episcopal Church

2It will be more apparent to our members, and those with whom we have ecumenical ties, that we are serious about our Christology, in having engaged a Christologically sound Anglican church on the same territory as TEC, thus enabling us to carry out our mission of transformation there which has become direly necessary.

3It will be more clear to the world that it is simply false that the word “Anglican” means nothing more than “people who get together from time to time, but hold no common faith.” That we are not a confessional church, that we are not “particularist” on non-kerygma issues, but that we do indeed hold high our faith in the Gospel and those things which bind all Trinitarian Christians. We will make more clear to the world that we believe: that though faith is not simply a series of propositions or intellectual assertions, it does have a cognitive dimension, and includes beliefs, rather than being simply characterized by emotive utterances aimed at motivating adherents to undertake actions according to a given ethical framework. In emphasizing that faith does indeed engage our minds, and our beliefs, we will be doing a great deal in vouchsafing responsible scholarship, and ecumenical understanding of what binds all of us together who are in Christ. And we will be encouraging genuine discourse and engagement, with all the work and patience this entails, in the place of rhetoric characterized by emotive or political soundbytes.

The ACNA has in its ranks many who are excellent church planters, evangelists, scholars, and persons who are capable of engaging in productive ecumenical dialog. They understand our formularies, and what it means to be a creedal, but non-confessional church body. In this new digital age which has come upon us, a great deal of work can be done across parochial and diocesan boundaries in ministry – simply by the creation of compelling materials, and stimulation of dialog in internet-based fora. It is no longer necessary to physically enter a parish building in order to reach out to members of that parish. I would suggest that through mission cooperation with the ACNA, a great deal can be done to reach out to those members of the Episcopal Church who are doubting, and wondering if Christ may indeed be more than a set of ethical principles, and a warm, affirming ethos for fostering adherence to such principles. That the words in their prayer books may address realities which are more than poetic descriptions of people working together for a noble cause. That their neighbors sitting in the pews of other churches might not be “leaving their brains at the door” when they express a faith in the risen Christ, but may indeed be worshiping and serving their sovereign Lord. That the unity that we have in Christ with Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Eastern Orthodox, Baptist, Pentecostalist, Anabaptist Christians – may include an agenda of social action, but is infinitely more than just that.

And I fear that if we do not acknowledge that there is a great need here, and take on a communion partnership with a capable church which is in that very mission field we must address, as long as TEC remains in communion with us – that we will sow anxiety, doctrinal particularism, and ecumenical isolation, by appearing to ignore a grave challenge to our own faith, and to the faith of Trinitarian Christianity at large.

This is the “fundamentalism” which I fear, should we fail to embrace the opportunity to enter into communion with the ACNA.

Did you know that original sin is understood differently in Western culture in contrast with the understanding in Eastern / Oriental culture? Fr. Ernesto gives a correct rendering of both understandings, as well as segueing into some information on vampires and werewolves.  You can read his book review on his blog found in my blogroll.

Fr. Orthoduck, aka Fr. Ernesto Obregon, has a soft spot for science fiction. He recently posted a book review of Never Ceese. This book deals with vampirism and lycanthropy (human vampires and werewolves).  He makes a real and valid connection, believe it or not, with the theology of original sin as understood in the East and in the West.

Post by Fr. Ernesto on Orthocuban, Feb. 8, 2010

So, you do not know why the book, Never Ceese, fits the worldview of Roman Catholic Christianity? Well, let Father Orthoduck tell you. But, let Father Orthoduck warn you that there is some heavy theology ahead.

OK, here is the theology. All Christians agree that the Fall has damaged humanity, but they do not agree on what it all means.  Both the East and the West agree that Free Will has been damaged, as versus the Pelagians who insisted that Free Will was undamaged. The West, by and large, has gone with Saint Augustine of Hippo’s version of what the Fall has meant. The West has a conception of Original Sin which the East has nicknamed Original Guilt. Now, the details are not important for the purposes of this post. Suffice it to say that the transmission of Original Sin, or hereditary guilt, was physical transmission. The transmission of this hereditary guilt is a form of traducianism:

In Christian theology, traducianism is a doctrine about the origin of the soul (or synonymously, “spirit”), in one of the biblical uses of word to mean the immaterial aspect of man (Genesis 35:18, Matthew 10:28). Traducianism means that this immaterial aspect is transmitted through natural generation along with the body, the material aspect of man. That is, an individual’s soul is derived from the souls of the individual’s parents. This implies that only the soul of Adam was created directly by God (with Eve’s substance, material and immaterial, being taken from out of Adam), in contrast with creationism (not to be confused with creationism as a belief about the origin of the material universe), which holds that all souls are created directly by God (with Eve’s substance, material and immaterial, being taken from out of Adam).

Thus, in traducianism, the act of begetting a child transmits a body that is composed of both the father and the mother (and this was pre-genetics, too). It also transmits a soul, “derived from the souls of the individual’s parents,” but, in the West, it also transmits sin. Let Father Orthoduck be clear, in the West, it is not simply a damaged human nature that is transmitted, sin and guilt are transmitted. (This is not the way in which either Eastern or Oriental Orthodoxy explain it.) This means that, for the West, the child is a sinner from the day of its conception, while it is still in the womb, before it has done anything right or wrong, and is deserving of hell. This is why the Roman Catholic doctrine of limbo developed. The thought of a baby who is stillborn or dies within a few days of birth being condemned to hell was repugnant to many theologians, and so limbo was a place where a baby (and others, but that is another discussion) could live out eternity in happiness but never be able to experience the joy of God’s presence. (All Protestants have a different explanation for babies. Some Calvinists are willing to say that babies of non-believers may indeed go to hell. Eastern and Oriental Orthodox do not have that problem since they do not believe in Original Guilt.)

SPOILER ALERT DO NOT READ IF YOU PLAN TO READ NEVER CEESE

OK, with that background, let’s look at the transmission of either vampirism or lycanthropy on the book Never Ceese. In the book, both vampirism and lycanthropy are the result of a two fold process. On the physical side, part one of the process appears to be the transmission of pluripotent cells which become or are stem cells of different types and do the physical job of transforming the genetics of the affected person into either werewolf or vampire. A vampire has more pluripotent cells than a werewolf. But, the transmission is not merely that of physical characteristics. Rather, as in traducianism, there is a transmission of an immaterial aspect, and that is what is labeled the “curse” in the book. And, just like in the Western conception of Original Sin, the person who has been attacked is automatically guilty of sin and worthy of hell despite the fact that they have personally done nothing to deserve this punishment. (Neither Eastern nor Oriental Orthodoxy would agree with this conception.) This is a very Augustinian conception.

Father Orthoduck will say that there is a twist to the book Never Ceese that is neither Orthodox nor Roman Catholic nor Protestant. And that is the idea that the curse becomes permanent if you pass on the curse. This means that passing on the curse is the equivalent of the unforgivable sin. Matthew 3 says, “But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” This is the only twist in the book that slightly disappoints Father Orthoduck. He would have preferred that the book would have been written in such a way that passing on the curse would have required a much stronger act of abnegation rather than being unforgivable. On the other hand, Father Orthoduck must admit that it certainly adds some significant dynamic tension to the book to realize that once one curses someone else one is going to hell with no hope of reprieve. But . . . but . . . but, uhm, that is not a very Christian conception of sin and forgiveness.

There are other touches in the book that put it in the realm of an Eastern Orthodox or Roman Catholic conception of how the world works. These are touches that would not be present in Protestantism. Nevertheless, Father Orthoduck will not cover those in this post.

Two comments on Orthocuban relating to original sin.  Check out his site for more exchanges,  Fr, Orthohippo

FrGregACCA says:

8 February 2010 at 11:28

One small correction: while it would seem that Augustinian “original guilt” would logically entail traducianism and/or vice-versa, the RCC explicitly denies traducianism, maintaining that each human soul is created separately and independently by God at the moment of conception.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15014a.htm

Reply

Fr. Orthoduck says:

8 February 2010 at 12:02

Now I find that very interesting. I did not realize that they specifically deny traducianism. This means that God creates each soul separately and independently and then . . . uhm . . . how does that soul become stained with Original Sin? If it is by “contact” with flesh, then that is still a form of traducianism in which the clean unstained soul is “infected” and damaged by the physical body. If God deliberately stains the created soul (or creates it impaired) because of Adam’s sin, then, uhm, does that not make God the author of evil? It would also make Federal Theology the only possible way to understand salvation. If God imputes the created soul with evil, well, that is one of the big arguments that the East has with the West.

I do notice that they do point out that Generationism is more common in the East, though I will point out that New Advent has the tendency to vastly minimize any viewpoints with which they do not agree. The Popes, etc, that they cite against Generationism are, uhm, not exactly major citations, but individual letters and private opinions. This is a long way from a condemnation of generationism.

via Never Ceese and Augustinian Original Sin | OrthoCuban.

PDF version of this article: PB_Christology

.doc version of this article: PB_Christology

(note: this article was written to accompany a piece advising the Church of England to endorse a synod motion expressing a desire for full communion with the ACNA, for the sake of preventing a rise of “fundamentalism” – James Coder is a layman in the Diocese of Europe, Church of England)

I write this with a sadness which probably few readers will comprehend. Nonetheless, I write it, because I can not find any treatment of this subject that deals with the subject matter in an extensive fashion; what I have found so far are just a few quotes, and a few statements regarding what the authors believe the Presiding Bishop to have said, and to have accomplished with her words. It is important to understand what the Presiding Bishop has said, and what she has not said; what it implies, and what it does not imply. I assume others have neglected to do so simply because this is such an utterly depressing matter, and because the writer of such an article will surely draw a great deal abuse from those who care more about loyalty to The Episcopal Church than about the church’s teachings on Christ.

Some in the Communion seem to take it as a “fact” that the Presiding Bishop has denied the resurrection and the divinity of Christ; others passionately assert that she never has. The reality of the matter lies somewhere between the two.

The texts I draw from are very well-known statements of the Presiding Bishop; they have been officially brought to the attention of Archbishop Williams in an open letter from Archbishop Akinola, almost precisely one year ago. It must be presumed that Presiding Bishop Schori has been aware of them for some time, though she has chosen not to respond to them.

My conclusion here in both cases is: Schori most definitely never, at any time, denies these outright, in simple, “literalist” words; however, her words can indeed be reasonably taken to deny the doctrines of the Church on both matters. And those who say that she denies the divinity of Christ or the resurrection, assumably, mean to assert that she denies the doctrines of the church on these matters, rather than making “flat” denials.

1. The Resurrection

From an article on the subsite at EpiscopalChurch.org on the Presiding Bishop, “SAN DIEGO: Diocese welcomes Presiding Bishop; mission focus central” – http://episcopalchurch.org/78695_96294_ENG_HTM.htm

She described etymology of words, shedding new light on familiar topics. “Science is a word that means knowing. Faith and religion ask questions about meaning. Science asks questions about mechanism and connection,” she said. “They can be essential important partners in the human endeavor of knowing. Einstein said, ‘Religion without science is blind; science without faith limps.’” She spoke about the importance of one informing the other and the enormities that result when they don’t.

…Asked about the literal story of Easter and the Resurrection, Jefferts Schori said, “I think Easter is most profoundly about meaning, not mechanism.”

What we shall see here is how Presiding Bishop Schori, with an adept rhetorical sleight of hand, brings us to the conclusion that the bodily resurrection of Christ is unimportant (though as a metaphor, and as a sublime thought, most certainly has a rich potential for describing life and motivating action).

Here, Presiding Bishop Schori is asked whether she believes in the Resurrection – the “literal story of Easter and the Resurrection,” i.e., the bodily resurrection of Christ – proclaimed even in the Gospel of Mark if one does not accept 16:9-20 (contra Spong).

PB Schori has already framed a context for the question she is asked, supposedly before the question itself was asked. In order to deal with PB Schori’s answer, we will also have to look at how she distinguishes science from religion.

Schori associates science with “mechanism” and religion with “meaning.” This is a simplistic and very awkward way of framing the issue. For all her concern with etymology, this is an odd choice, with mechanism’s origin in the Greek makhana or mekhane, “device, means.” The Greek is already quite related to our modern notion of “machine” – a device by which one does something. Science does frequently depict naturally occurring phenomena as “mechanisms” – schematically outlining various stages or processes as if they were interlinked parts of a greater apparatus. In relating science to mechanism, Schori is basically telling us that science is answering the “how” question as in, “how do things work?”

She is not associating science with being or the truth or falsity of a given state of affairs as one “traditionally” does with science and knowledge (scientia), knowledge commonly being defined philosophically as true justified belief. Rather she associates it primarily with the explanation of how anything’s interacting parts or phases contribute to that thing’s existence as a whole – whether or not the thing is known to exist, or not.

This awkward way of describing things seems to be reducing the great question of being and truth to one of “mere mechanics.” Nonetheless it is important to remember: when, in this context, Schori refers to “mechanism,” she is speaking of science, knowledge, and thereby also: true, justified belief – i.e., how we as people interact with truth (we do not say we have “truth” in our minds – the human “equivalent” or “correspondent” of truth is belief – we do not “true these things to be true,” rather we “believe these things to be true”).

This is then contrasted with: meaning.

This is again awkward. Presumably she does not intend with this the sense of “meaning” as – the definition or connotation of a word, or the linguistic referent of a sentence; nor does she mean intention in the sense of meaning to do a particular thing. She is in the more murky area of something like “existential meaning” – or rather, the whole group of things which we do, or should, associate with that thing, or possibly those things which we should draw as consequences and significations from the particular thing referenced.

To her credit, these are things which strike at the very base of our use of language, and are thus difficult to articulate; philosophers and linguists have written untold numbers of books attempting to better pad out these types of distinctions in order to better clarify what we “mean” when we “mean” something. In a certain sense, all human speech and cognition is metaphorical, in the sense of referring one thing (a word or image) to another. But we nonetheless do understand sentences, and can grasp which things are being referred to, when people communicate with us. It remains nonetheless problematic that the Presiding Bishop has chosen to deal with such weighty issues in such naïve and thus potentially misleading categories.

So what do we have, then, when she tells us, when asked whether the Resurrection occurred or not, she answers: “I think Easter is most profoundly about meaning, not mechanism”?

She is telling us that the bodily resurrection is not important. This is indeed part of the “is” question – the question, “did it really happen?” – the question “is the state of affairs which we describe as the bodily resurrection of Christ true or false?” She does so by implying that the appropriate way of approaching this question is with the meaning / mechanism distinction which she first articulated and which we describe above. In doing so, she is encouraging to see the “meaning” as distinct from the “mechanism,” and separate this “meaning” from the question: “did it really happen?” – and inviting us to choose “meaning” over the truth of its occurrence. Furthermore, she is inviting us to consider the actual occurrence of the bodily resurrection of Christ as a matter of mere “mechanism” – something which can be ignored in the same way that we don’t need a thorough knowledge of the inner workings of a watch, in order to be able to tell what time it is. Also, the truth value of the occurrence of the resurrection, as “mechanism,” seems to be something which could only be grasped by a specialist with intimate knowledge of the complicated inner parts of such a mechanism, and thus not for appreciation by average laypeople and clergymen who are not scholars in the relevant details. The actual occurrence – like some obtuse mechanism, or diagram of a complicated chemical reaction – need not be of importance to our faith, and indeed, is not of importance to those who practice “religion,” but is rather a matter of consideration for “science.” The bodily resurrection of Christ, itself, is not of importance to religious faith; however, the Resurrection resonates with meaning of new life, irrespective of the petty concerns of dogmatic biblical literalists regarding something which might or might not have have happened nearly two thousand years ago.

With this sweeping gesture, she is able to make peace between the parties in her church who believe that it did happen, and those who believe it didn’t: it simply doesn’t matter, we can all just focus on what we agree on – that there is a very deep meaning to be found in the “Easter event,” whatever it was which may have actually taken place.

It is not in the scope of this paper to describe why this is not acceptable to Trinitarian Christianity, and why the bodily resurrection itself cannot be divorced from supposed meanings derived from a possible bodily resurrection, or a resurrection as metaphor. If you are reading this paper and you are asking yourself what this could be, please ask your pastor – and if your pastor tells you “it’s complicated,” or himself does not quite understand why the resurrection of Christ itself cannot be meaningfully separated from the significations ascribed to the resurrection – I would urge you to find a different pastor, and to do so immediately.

What Presiding Bishop Schori has done here can reasonably be said to amount to a denial of the church’s doctrine of the resurrection. Trinitarian Christians believe not only that Christ rose from the dead, but also that this fact is tremendously important – even central – to our faith in Christ. This does not mean that anyone in the church wishes to consign you to eternal damnation if you do not believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ. But it most certainly means that this is something which we commend to belief and which we lovingly encourage – in whichever way we can – be it through incarnational ministry of love in demonstrating the power of Christ, through moving aside intellectual obstacles to the understanding and acceptance of this teaching by reasoned engagement, or through prayer – we most certainly do commend this to belief, as a faith in Christ without a faith in His resurrection is tantamount to denying one of the essential aspects of who He is. This is, then, an area in which your faith can grow.

As the importance of the bodily resurrection and its necessity in a complete faith is a part and parcel of the church’s doctrine of the resurrection, Schori is indeed denying the church’s doctrine of the resurrection by denying its importance, even though she most definitely never, to my knowledge, has ever denied that Christ rose from the dead, or explicitly denied the fact of the bodily resurrection of Christ.

So: when people say – “She has denied the resurrection” – what they mean is, that she has denied the church’s teaching of the resurrection; if they mean that she explicitly ever says that Christ did not, bodily, rise from the dead – then I believe that they are wrong, and should be corrected with a more nuanced indication of what it is which she does, and does not, deny, and in how she does it. It is important for people to have a proper understanding, since this is such a weighty issue, and it can be damaging indeed when people are led to believe one thing, only to find out later that it was wrong.

II. The Divinity of Christ

From “A Wing and a Prayer: An Interview with Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori,” Parabola Magazine, Spring 2007 issue (http://anglicanecumenicalsociety.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/perabola_bishop.pdf – downloaded originally from episcopalchurch.org, though no longer available there):

P: What does someone do when they believe that Jesus is divine but that some things that are defined as creeds – that Mary was a virgin, for example – don’t seem right? Can one still be a faithful Christian?
BK: I hope that’s an invitation to a deeper encounter …

… Again, those creeds are not about checking off a bunch of propositions. They are about giving our heart to a sense that Jesus shows us what it looks like to be a divine human being …

… If you begin to explore the literary context of the first century and the couple of hundred years on either side, the way that someone told a story about a great figure was to say “this one was born of the gods.” That is what we’re saying. This carpenter from Nazareth or Bethlehem – and there are different stories about where he comes from – shows us what a godly human being looks like, shows us God come among us. We have affirmed ever since then in this tradition that each one of us is the image of God. We are all the sons and daughters of God. I think there is an invitation to look below a superficial minimization to what the story is really about. It makes some people very uncomfortable to do that, I recognize.

In this case, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori is not asked about the divinity of Christ, this is assumed by the interviewer – the question rather concerns the virgin birth, which the Presiding Bishop answers in the spaces between the ellipses which I have left out, as I’m not dealing with this particular issue in this paper.

As in the case of the resurrection, the Presiding Bishop does not say “Jesus is not divine” – I highly doubt she would ever do that. However, what she does here essentially “redefines” divinity to the point that when she says, “Jesus is divine,” she means something entirely different – in some senses, perhaps even diametrically opposed – to what the church teaches about the divinity of Christ. So she does not deny that Jesus is God in so many words. Instead she is re-defining the meaning of “God” into something which means: a superbly good man. So when she says, “Jesus is God,” what she means is: Jesus was a man, albeit a superbly good one.

The Presiding Bishop is referencing the issue of divinity when she says: ‘the way that someone told a story about a great figure was to say “this one was born of the gods.” That is what we’re saying.’ First off, note that it is in the context of a story – a fictitious one, a myth or fable. Does she mean that when we speak of God, we are engaging in fable? This is implied but not stated so we will move on. She also asserts that this is “what we are saying” – “we” perhaps being the first person singular for herself, or perhaps she means The Episcopal Church. The trope she is using to reference divinity is identified with “a great figure” – divinity is equivalent to being one who is “great” or exceedingly good.
This by itself is still not denying that Jesus is God in the Trinitarian sense, as we believe that Jesus was fully human, and this is in no contradiction with Jesus being God. What it does, however, in re-defining the word God to mean, basically, “a superbly good person,” is to shift the meaning of God into something which is entirely human (albeit superbly good, like e.g. Martin Luther King Jr. or Ghandi). This denies the church’s teaching regarding the divinity of Christ, since the church teaches that to be God is something very different from what it means to be a man – and that this is not simply a difference in ethical superiority or moral achievement, or even a state of higher consciousness.

One might hold out the hope that elsewhere, the Presiding Bishop would make statements regarding the divinity of Christ which unequivocally state that Jesus is God – with all those attributes of God which Trinitarian theology ascribe to God. However, this is highly problematic, as I show in the Appendix about the hermeneutic necessary in dealing with the Presiding Bishop’s statements. The Presiding Bishop is capable of using metaphorical language masking as “ordinary” language meaning things highly different from what we expect them to mean, even in the most mundane and “normal” of circumstances where all contexts seem to signify that “literal,” non-metaphorical language is to be expected, as outlined in the Appendix to this paper.

It is further difficult since God here is being associated with ethical performance, ethos (a social situation promoting an ethic, including aspirations, stimulation to good works, community cooperation, self-affirmation and other such things which might not strictly fall into the category of “ethics”) and other such characteristics of a “great figure” – she mentions later in the article, e.g., a “higher consciousness” characteristic of such a “great figure.” All of these are things which can be abundantly and richly described with lofty metaphors and superlatives. E.g., in the Presiding Bishop’s talks on Christ in Dallas of December 2009, she says that Christ brings “eternal healing.” The words reference temporality – a condition which is unending, with “eternal” – and another attribute which we associate with Christ, with the word “healing.” However, an ethic can also be described as “healing” – our sad world would already be “healed” of a great deal if we all were to take more seriously any one of the ten commandments, for example … and if we truly believe in the legitimacy of the ethical principles we espouse, then of course, we take such things to be “eternal.” There is also ample room for interpreting other physical and human / social / ethical phenomena as “eternal” if one is simply a bit creative.

Inspiring as they are, ++Schori’s Dallas talks on Christ also fit firmly into this reductionism, in particular her words about the “divinization” of men – though this would be a matter for another paper. But to sum things up – we “become divine” by corporately following the ethical code – “divine” here is simply a replacement term for the word “good” or “morally virtuous.” The word “God” and “Christ” are simply terms that we can use in the place of “good” or “just,” with no clear delineation separating this theology from agnosticism or atheism. “God wants us to …” becomes a replacement term for: “our church wants you to …”.

A little over a century ago, it was not necessary to ask if someone believed in the “bodily resurrection” – it was assumed that with the word “resurrection,” one referred to Christ’s body. We now enter the difficult scenario where one needs to append all sorts of new words and qualifications in order to understand what someone believes. Today “bodily resurrection” might also mean, à la Spong, the resurrection of a “spiritual body,” which itself leads to the notion that Jesus was “raised into the meaning of God” – i.e., the “meaning” of the word “God” changed since many people began associating this word “God” with the teachings and actions of the man Jesus – nothing more than a change in semantics or popular associations.

Throughout the years I have read many of the Presiding Bishop’s statements on Christ. I have not found any which can not be reducible to human ethics and ethos – no statement which makes abundantly clear that she dissociates herself from the view that the divinity of Christ has no reality outside of mankind alone (or possibly, mankind and physical nature together). If she indeed does believe Christ to be more than simply an alternative word for a human ethic and ethos – she has had every opportunity to do so, and to clarify this statement which has provoked so much grief amongst Trinitarian Christians who have had to deal with these words coming from a church head. This statement has been widely quoted in complaints regarding her Christology published by Anglican and Episcopal churches, and was also listed in the remarks of the Presiding Bishop in the report prepared for Archbishop Williams distributed in the open letter by Archbishop Akinola of February 10 last year (page 5), so Presiding Bishop Schori has had about a year to respond to it. Though she claimed in a radio interview that the Christology of The Episcopal Church is fully orthodox in October 2008 (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95429960) in order to counter claims that reasons other than the sexuality debate were causing parishes and dioceses to leave TEC, she has never, to my knowledge, made a statement about Christ which is not consistent with reducing the meaning of “divinity” to an ethics and ethos, nor has she offered to clarify th intent of this particular statement. The Presiding Bishop should know the great anguish her apparent denials of the divinity of Christ and the resurrection are bringing to Christians both within and without her church; and she most certainly knows also that it is a reason cited by some dioceses and parishes for leaving The Episcopal Church. If she indeed does not deny the church teachings on these matters, she could bring a great deal of peace by making clear statements.

So: when people say, “she has denied the divinity of Christ,” they do not mean: she has said “Jesus is not the Son of God,” or “Christ is not divine.” What they mean is: she has denied the church’s doctrine of the divinity of Christ, by re-defining “divinity” as to mean a quality of “a great figure,” something which references an ethic and an ethos, rather than those things which the church teaches us about God.

III. An historic situation for world Christianity

It should be noted: whatever moral value one attaches to this state of affairs – one needn’t necessarily then point a finger of blame primarily at Presiding Bishop Schori herself. A great deal of the responsibility here is held by the first diocesan committee which recommended her for ordination, by the diocese of Nevada for consecrating her, by General Assembly for having elected her as Presiding Bishop, and for The Episcopal Church at large, for not having called her to further accountability in exploring her own faith, or at least in further explaining, or possibly even retracting, her statements. And of course, the entire Anglican Communion is also mutually responsible for this state of affairs, as Presiding Bishop Schori is one of our Primates, and we hold that bishops are bishops for the whole Church. If you find something here blameworthy, gentle reader, and you are a member of the Anglican Communion – if there is any blame to be had here, then you share it.

I know of no church claiming to be Trinitarian since the Ecumenical Councils of the first millennium whose leader has gone to such an extent in denying the church doctrines of the resurrection and the divinity of Christ as The Episcopal Church, nor of any world group claiming to be Trinitarian Christians like the Anglican Communion, to seat a church leader who as done so amongst its highest level of leaders as we have done in our Primates’ Meeting. It seems to be that we have brought about a situation which is truly unique in world history.

It is a situation in which Trinitarian churches may well decide that they can no longer deal with the Communion with a gentle witness of compassion, and that the time has come for a love which is more disciplinarian in nature. I find it difficult to compellingly argue against such a choice. We have not heeded their gentle love and might now only respond to the rod.

APPENDIX I:

A problematic hermeneutical situation with the current Presiding Bishop and The Episcopal Church today

Shortly after the election of the Presiding Bishop at the 2006 General Convention of The Episcopal Church, Terry A. Ward did some research into the list of her credentials in the booklet published by the Joint Nominating Committee for the Election of the Presiding Bishop, which was distributed in order to introduce General Convention members to the candidates for the position and to help them make informed choices in casting their votes – http://www.episcopalchurch.org/documents/PB.Booklet.EnglishFinal.pdf . Terry Ward discovered that the credentials listed for Bishop Schori included six years, from 1994-2000, as “Dean” of the “Good Samaritan School of Theology Corvallis, OR” – but could find no mention of this school on the webpages of ECUSA, the Oregon or Nevada Dioceses, The Church of the Good Samaritan of Corvallis, the Episcopal Church Annual, or the city directory of Corvallis. He contacted her with some questions, and later published his questions and her responses, all unedited. The questions revealed that there was no “Good Samaritan School of Theology” as one might expect in the sense of an academic institution, but this was rather, as she answered, “the then-rector’s term for all adult education programs, both internally and externally focused,” at the Church of the Good Samaritan. Episcopal Church records (http://www.episcopalchurch.org/growth_60791_ENG_HTM.htm?menupage=50929) show this to be a parish with worship attendance varying from about 250 people in 1998 (earliest year records available to public) to about 210 in 2000. She nowhere justifies the use of the title of “Dean” to describe her role, which most certainly adds to the deception here – her position was apparently as coordinator or organizer of such activities. The article was also picked up by WorldNetDaily, a web news source with a very large circulation. The Presiding Bishop was not asked where the information came from – whether she provided it herself, or someone else was responsible for the information in the booklet – she does not provide the information on her own accord either, so we do not know.

Though this became well-known amongst some Episcopalians, never was an inquest made known, nor any clarification offered by The Episcopal Church of which I am aware, in addition to this clarification offered by the Presiding Bishop herself. One would think that in any corporation where a board elected someone for a position, if the elected candidate was found to have been elected on the basis of highly misleading (in this case, with a strong appearance of deliberately misleading) curriculum vitae information and this fact made known to the public, that corporation would at least commission an inquest into the source of the error in the information to provide transparence and accountability, and to assure concerned parties that such deceit – be it purposeful or perhaps unintended – was not dealt with lightly. In absence of such a commission, one would expect members or stake holders to demand such an inquest, and perhaps even a new vote with improved information.

Neither of these took place to any noticeable extent in The Episcopal Church. It seems that the Church remained entirely happy with this little deception (albeit, possibly unintentional) and saw no reason to present to its constituency or the wider world an indication of earnestness and honesty – or at least, a respect of the bounds of the metaphorical when it comes to plain speech – when it comes to the presentation of information. The sad consequence of a lack of action on this front is that we have no assurances that the Presiding Bishop will not, with slight justification (such as the rather cute term used by her rector for this program), embroider reality by using terms like “dean of a school of theology” for such things as “adult education coordinator at a church which has about 250 in worship attendance.” And sadly, if she is willing to use such bold metaphors for such pedestrian, “concrete” things as a curriculum vitae, where the general expectation is straight-forward language, when this comes to the arena of theology, how much more might she likely to do so, if she was unapologetic for the disinformation provided, and not called to accountability by her own church? Furthermore, if The Episcopal Church corporately lets slide such a blunder in the very election of its Presiding Bishop, in misinforming General Convention, how much more likely will it take liberties with embroidering commonly-understood words when dealing with those less intimately connected to the church than its own General Convention – especially parties with whom it is in tension or even vehement disagreement?

The sad result is when dealing with information disseminated by The Episcopal Church and its leading authorities, it becomes very difficult to know how one should interpret the words before one. Are they rather ambitious metaphors describing something considerably different from what the text leads one to expect? Do they contain purposefully misleading vocabulary? One hopes for the best. The situation is all the more exasperating when dealing with issues of theology, where a generous use of metaphor is already expected, though even in theology, norms, albeit unwritten, exist to assure that the communicating parties actually understand one another, but are very easily transgressed when a prominent motive for persuasion or advocacy is present.

I myself am inclined to believe that in some sense, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori herself is a kind of victim – albeit one who should have known better, given her great intelligence – of the crisis in meaning brought about by the popularity of Bishop Spong’s deliberate re-defining so many terms of Christian belief. This is a habit with far-reaching consequences – one which ultimately, in this case, is perhaps erasing sensitivity when it comes to the bounds of propriety of metaphor in speech, to the point that language which was once “common” and clearly understandable, becomes so confabulated with accessory meanings and willful skewings that the bounds of clarity and trust are pushed to their outer limits. The Presiding Bishop seems to have had a liking for Spong’s method, as her diocese invited him to be the facilitator of a clergy conference when she was diocesan bishop of Nevada in 2003 (http://web.archive.org/web/20040717062941/http://www.nvdiocese.org/FISHTALES/ARCHIVES/Tales03.04.html).

APPENDIX II:

Expected Rebuttals

1. Unfair use of quotes

You can not conclude that PB Schori denies the resurrection or the divinity of Christ without reviewing all of her writings and statements; simply selecting two as you do here is not enough.

As you note here, a goodly number of pages was required for each of these statements to unravel what, exactly, it is which they are saying, and what they imply. Presiding Bishop Schori is not known for speaking in clear terms when she is talking about Christ, or God. I have read many of her statements, and from them, selected two which seem to me the most indicative of what she believes about the resurrection and of the divnity of Christ. Others trying to summarize the situation in TEC have collected a large number of different quotes; I found it better to deal with just two which I found more clear than the others, with some analysis. It is indeed possible that she has roundly affirmed what the church teaches about either of these without lapsing into denyability or metaphors which could be construed to mean something other than what the church teaches. However, I doubt this, as I would have expected a loyal Episcopalian who cares about Trinitarian theology to have brought this to our general attention on the web.

The statements here have also been “around” for a long time, some of the “favorites” in demonstrating the problems of Christology within TEC; however, they have never been explicated, and since they both are rather odd constructions, it is easy to miss their significance. At any rate, given the fact that they are quoted in the context of churches leaving TEC, and were part of official, public communication between a primate of the Communion and Archbishop Williams, it is exceedingly odd that Presiding Bishop Schori has not returned to these statements specifically and either explicated her intentions, or provided us with statements which are exceedingly clear about her intentions.

If you happen to know of a statement of PB Schori which clearly states her belief in the resurrection or the divinity of Christ, please do let me know. However, simple affirmations: “we believe in the divinity of Christ” do not suffice – she makes clear here that she views the divinity of Christ as subject to re-interpretation into something which is not divine at all, and she has made clear that she can refer to the resurrection without affirming whether Christ rose bodily from the dead or not.

People are alleging that PB Schori denies the divinity of Christ; they allege that she denies the resurrection; and others vehemently deny that she denies these things. What I am trying to do here is set out the case of those that allege denial, and show that though she does not deny these things as such (and I am very clear about that), that what she is saying can reasonably be taken to be a denial of the church doctrines of these things. This already is enough. A bishop should not make statements which are so easily susceptible to a reasonable claim of a denial of church doctrine. This in itself is already a great tragedy, even if the Presiding Bishop does indeed believe in the bodily resurrection, and in the divinity of Christ.

In other places, Presiding Bishop Schori articulates herself differently with regards to Christ. For example, at the recent Dallas discussions on Christ, she has some very inspiring words to offer her audience, which would not have prompted me to wonder if she is simply reducing everything to an ethic and an ethos. However, her talks also did not include any material which definitively signal a break with the view that God can be reduced to ethics / ethos. During the questioning session at the end, a question regarding the bodily resurrection prompted from her an answer which is a great improvement upon the text presented here: she affirmed that Christ’s disciples believed that He rose from the dead. However, the question asked was whether she believes this. In affirming that the disciples believed this, she is at least not following in the footsteps of Spong. But knowing the great anxiety her words regarding the resurrection have brought the church, if she truly believes in the bodily resurrection, should have been less evasive and simply replied: “Yes.”

I must admit that this paper presents a rather “one-sided” view of the Presiding Bishop’s view of Christ. It does not acknowledge her glowing words (albeit, nonetheless subject to reductivism) as in the Dallas discussions. This is not, however, the intent of this paper.

2. She says the creed

PB Schori affirms the resurrection and the divinity of Christ each time she says the creed.

For considerable time now, some clergy people, when speaking of “the resurrection,” are speaking of something other than the bodily resurrection of Christ – cf. Bishop Spong on the resurrection. The same applies for “the divinity of Christ.” These are simply different things, different referents – when the church refers to “the resurrection,” the church refers to Christ’s being bodily raised from the dead. If Presiding Bishop Schori, in referring to “the resurrection,” refers to “the transformative power we all have when we work together,” she and I are not referring to the same thing, even though what I refer to may in some way imply that to which she refers. Thus – though the Presiding Bishop may say, “on the third day He rose again,” she is not affirming the resurrection – she is affirming a social goal (a very noble one, but one which is not the same as the resurrection).

I may be wrong here – she may truly believe in, and affirm, the resurrection – and I hope that I am wrong. But I have never heard her speak to the contrary. It is not normally our place to “go prying” into what people “really believe” – but as a bishop, her faith needs to be public, and I think her words which I have outlined here speak for themselves.

3. It couldn’t have been a physical body

The resurrection couldn’t have been “the recussitation of a physical body” because Jesus was able to walk through walls after the resurrection; this must be some kind of spirit or spiritual body.

Our contemporary distinction between the “spiritual” and the “physical” is not what New Testament writers had in mind when speaking of “the spirit.” For this reason when I speak of “bodily resurrection,” I do not stipulate either a “physical” or a “spiritual” body – with “body” I mean, that which is absent when the young man tells Mary Magdalene, “He is not here.” We do not know much about Christ’s body after the resurrection; neither do we need to know, but a bodily resurrection is important for incarnational theology and for how we consider Christ being both God and man. See also I Cor. 15.

4. Other churches have the same problem.

Clergy members of other churches have also been known to deny the resurrection or the divinity of Christ.

They have. Churches deal with a lack of faith in their clergy members in different ways; however, all Trinitarian churches consider a falling away from faith of their clergy from the tenets of the creeds to be a tragedy – and I suppose, “officially,” TEC would as well. However, none have this problem to a degree which even approximates it as it is present in TEC, and never has the leader of a significant Trinitarian church, to my knowledge, done this to the extent that PB Schori has.

5. You want us to stop thinking.

We are a thinking people, and this requires a freedom of thought which we can’t have if we are required to ascribe to dogmas.

I am a great fan of thought. If your mind tells you that it is most definitely unacceptable for you to believe in the divinity of Christ or the resurrection, it’s probably not time for you to believe in these things, and you should find a thinking person who does believe in them to discuss your intellectual qualms and obstacles to faith. And keep on thinking, and fellowshipping with others who can help you grow in faith, as faith is not cognition alone. You do not have to believe these things, and your church should not take away your intellectual freedom. But if you do not believe these things or can not teach them, you should not be teaching in Trinitarian churches – these are things which the church decided a long time ago, in a process which itself involved a great deal of thinking, and is no less noble or astute than our own thinking processes. If we discover by rational means that there is adequate ground for revising the decisions of the ecumenical councils, we come together as churches, and in a dialogical and intersubjective process, come to a new consensus in a new ecumenical council. This has not occurred, however, in the last millenium; and a great deal of ecumenical dialog and joint ministry will need to take place before this takes place again (if our Lord does not come first).

6. She is simply, and legitimately, emphasizing the humanity of Jesus

We believe that Jesus is fully human, and there are ancient traditions which emphasize this.

We must continue to emphasize the full humanity of Christ. However, this does not entail asserting that Christ’s divinity is reducible to His humanity, nor does it mean that we should reduce our notion of God to a human ethos and ethic, or that to “be God” simply means, to be “a great figure.” This could well be a beginning point of a person on the way to understanding God and embracing faith; and such a person should not be dissuaded with threats of hellfire or damnation for his lack of belief. But simply teaching such, in the absence of what Christ told us about Himself, is not befitting the ministry of a bishop. Bishops must at the very least make clear that there is more to the story, and there is more to Christ which we must learn to embrace in faith; one of their primary tasks is defending the faith, and this is not the same as evangelism, or “planting” faith. Bishops need to learn how to articulate the full faith of the church; though they may feel they are more compelling if they merely articulate a part of it, this is not an option, and they do better in unconvincingly articulating a full faith, then they do compellingly articulating only a part of it.

7. Only a flat denial should concern us

If she never says, “The resurrection never happened,” or “Jesus is not the Son of God,” why is there all this concern? She doesn’t exclude these things outright.

In a way, “deconstructing” or “redefining” the resurrection or the divinity of Christ can be much worse than simply denying either of these. Suppose I am a government minister tasked with ensuring freedom of speech. I begin my term of office by writing how freedom of speech is underappreciated – how simply walking through the park, going to a movie, or choosing my wardrobe communicates things to other people, and are also things which should be celebrated as a part of freedom of speech. And that mere words are a very trivial, impoverished way of looking at free speech. But I never mention the importance of protecting words, verbal or printed forms of communication, from censorship, in my expansive praise of freedom of speech. Then, at a time when the government begins censoring newspapers and public speech, I am silent, but continue in my flowery orations about our great freedoms to walk through parks, style our hair the way we want to, wear unique clothing combinations, etc. etc.. I’ve set a precedent, and other government officials are effusive in their praise of the wonderful freedom of speech we all have, while continuing blatant censorship – and never saying, “we are against free speech.” Eventually, the notion of “free speech” would be lost, and identified purely with non-verbal self expression such as fashion statements, even though the notion of “free speech” seems to have been expanded, rather than reduced. Government ministers would be able to sign on freely to “endorsing free speech,” and at some point the public’s very notion of the importance of the freedom of verbal communication would be eroded.

Had I simply announced that I was “against free speech,” the public would patiently wait out the period of time I was in office, thinking I had a rather unique and odd view of things given my job, and hope that the next minister tasked with ensuring freedom of speech actually did believe in free speech. But as I have undermined the very concept of freedom of speech, my influence reaches far beyond my office, to all persons using the word “free speech.” People complaining about censorship would be countered the objection: “but we have free speech here!” – and if they continued, would be reprimanded for insisting on an outdated, irrelevant, moralizing and “literalist” notion of free speech which pales in comparison to the more expansive, not exclusively verbal notion of free speech which also allows us to wear our hair any way we want it, and dress in creative, deeply communicative ways, and that verbal expression isn’t important since they’re just words anyways. And that furthermore we have no right to try to “define” such a lofty ideal as free speech to “fit our particular agenda.”

When I told people, that I was a great supporter of free speech, their best reply would be: no, you deny free speech, since you do nothing about censorship, which it is your job to prevent; and the freedom to dress as one wishes, though laudable, is not itself the same as “free speech.”

This tactic is thus even more effective in removing the phenomenon of free speech from society than simply, and honestly, coming out against it. Likewise, replacing the meaning of “the resurrection” with an ethic or social program is more dangerous and dreadful for a bishop, than simply flatly denying it. Indeed, it probably fits better with Paul’s warning in Galatians 1 than a simple denial, since the one thing is brought in under the cloak of the other thing to replace it – thus bringing “another gospel” into the church.

Orwell’s book 1984 is the text people usually refer to, when discussing this phenomenon.

I have noticed lately that there is considerable interest in the Shroud of Turin within parts of the Anglican Communion. It is not surprising. The famous author of Honest to God, Bishop A. T. Robinson, came to believe it was authentic. I have given talks in many Episcopal churches.

Susan Press, writing in the Yorkshire Evening post, tells us.

One of the most controversial mysteries in religious history is to be explored at a church in Leeds.

St Theresa’s, in Cross Gates, is set to showcase a full-size copy of the Turin Shroud in an intriguing exhibition outlining its hotly-contested story.

For well over 100 years, believers have contended that the linen shroud is the actual cloth placed on the body of Jesus Christ at the time of his burial.

Sceptics argue that the world-famous artefact post-dates the Crucifixion by more than a thousand years.

But on Sunday, February 14, regular churchgoers and the general public will be able to carry out their own investigations with the chance to see an exact replica of the shroud.

It has been provided by Pam Moon, who is one of only four people in the world to own a copy.

Mrs Moon, who lives in Staffordshire, will also be giving two talks about the Shroud at noon and 3pm to anyone interested in finding out more.

St Theresa’s parishioner Mrs Mary Wilkinson, 65, came across the intriguing exhibit on a visit to Tamworth, where Vicar’s wife Mrs Moon resides.

She said: "Whatever people think about it, and I know there are many opinions, there is no doubt this is the image of a man who was crucified and as Lent begins that is something for all of us to contemplate."

A booklet outlining the story of the Shroud will also be on sale and people visiting the exhibition are asked to make a donation to church funds.

The original Turin Shroud is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, Italy.
The striking image which captured the world’s imagination was first observed on the evening of May 28, 1898, when amateur photographer Secondo Pia, was allowed to photograph it.

The Roman Catholic Church has never formally endorsed or rejected the shroud, but in 1958 Pope Pius XII approved of the image in association with the Roman Catholic devotion to the Holy Face of Jesus.

The exhibition, which will be on show from 8am till 3pm on Sunday February 14, is to move on to Westminster RC Cathedral later in the year.

Turin Shroud replica on show in Leeds church – Yorkshire Evening Post

We had our Quinquennial last Wednesday. Oh the joys of being Anglican and living in the world of archdeacons, Septuagesima and antidisestablishmentarianism.  But thankfully a Quinquennial is not as complex as any of these: is just a five year anniversary. And it’s the shorthand for a five yearly inspection of church property. In this case it was of the Vicarage. It’s the diocese’s way of ensuring that essential maintenance is done on crumbling Vicarages at regular intervals.

So we had a visit from our excellent diocesan architect and he went round making a note of the broken door handles and peeling external paint. He gave us the good news of the four year double glazing programme to which have now been added. Meaning that we should get double glazing in about a year’s time. So we’ve another year of pretty iced window photos to come. And he admired our wood burning stoves and wrote a long list of works. These then have to be quoted against, go up to a diocesan committee and then get commissioned. My vicar’s wife friend, Snap, who lives in a different diocese, says her work, already identified, won’t be started on until September. The joys of ministry. But at least it’s in the pipeline.

Us soon! I hope.

As the architect left, a surveyor for the insulation company commissioned by WarmZone arrived. He went round our cold bits and has promised loft and cavity wall insulation before Easter. So although we’ll not have the double glazing, we should be properly insulated next winter. After our visit from Seema the other week, we were under the impression that we’d get this work done for a bargain £49.

But it seems things are turning out even better for us – npower are now funding the project completely for all payers of council tax in Sandwell. So if you live near me you can get this help for nothing. Gratis. Wonderful.

But not if you’re my friend Tink. She applied for help from WarmZone, but her private landlord has declined to have anything done. She tells me that although they offered the loft and cavity wall insulation for free, because they declined to provide a free boiler as well, her landlord decided not to have any work at all.

In the meantime, Tink continues to pay higher bills for energy than all her neighbours, living in council owned property in the same terrace. And there’s nothing she can do about it apart from continue to bid for a council house, just as she’s been doing for the last two years. Sometimes I have reason to be thankful for the Church of England.

A few weeks ago, T.C. wrote asked about the nature of the Lord’s Supper, and whether he should be taking it weekly. I was a bit late to the party, so I decided not to participate in the comments there.

Now regarding the nature of the Eucharist, I am of the opinion that beyond terminology, there is very little difference between transubstantiation, consubstantiation, and ’spiritual presence’. As far as I’m concerned, they are diverging ways of describing the same thing, for people who feel different things are important. I’m sure there’s a book somewhere that disagrees with me, and if you know that book, then let me know, and I’ll read it, and be proven wrong. But I nevertheless am convinced they mean the same thing: That Christ is mysteriously present in the Eucharist, and hence, that the Eucharist is special in the way that we commune with God through it.

The only reason for frequency in the Eucharist is this special communion. And as Christians, we desire closer and regular communion with God, and so, to me, frequency of the Eucharist is vital. My (Anglican) church performs Eucharist twice-daily, if you chose to accept it. If I had the time, I probably would.

This doesn’t mean that there aren’t other ways to commune with God: I believe that there are many ways, some intensely religious (prayer, or meditation, or even ecstatic religious experience), and some are not (through people, through places), to commune with God. It is simply that, for whatever reason, Christ chose to give us a special way to commune with him.

Now, to me the true difference between Roman Catholic, Lutheran and Reformed views of the Eucharist is whether or not a priest is a necessary link in this process. Now, I don’t really believe that. And one reason is what made me follow up on T.C.’s post so late on:

To me, cooking from scratch for friends and family is deeply spiritual, a kind of lay celebration of the Eucharist. There is something wonderfully intimate about sitting around the table with a feast of food I cooked with good friends that moves me more than anything that happens on Sunday morning. I probably shouldn’t say such things, given that I want to be a priest one day.

To me, the reason that the priest cannot be a necessary link, is this concept of a lay Eucharist. This is something that should be encouraged and acknowledged by the churches, as a sacramental aspect to the lives of Christians is very important to me. Just as, it is not important to me what type of cracker or wine is used, or (to be honest) how the wine and bread is disseminated (although I have my preferences, and my reasons for them).

So, given the special communion of the Eucharist, what do you think the place of a ‘lay Eucharist’, one brought on through an act of hospitality, has in the life of the church?

James B. Jordan discusses various types of Protestantism in his essay, “The Three Faces of Protestantism” (in The Sociology of the Church):

The three faces of Protestantism were, and are, the imperial or nationalistic face, the sectarian or drop-out face, and the catholic face. The Reformers can fairly easily, though roughly, be divided into these three groups. There were drop-out anabaptists; there were those who looked to the state for reformation; and there were those who sought to reform the church in a catholic manner, apart from the state. In brief, the Lutheran and the Anglicans tended to be magisterial in their approach, setting the prince or the king over against the Pope of Rome. Calvin and Bucer, along with some of the other Swiss Reformers, focussed more on a reformation of the Catholic church, and avoided nationalism. (137-138)

He continues a little later in the same essay:

It is for this reason that Bucer especially spent himself in one meeting after another, colloquy upon colloquy, with Anabaptists, Lutherans, and Roman Catholics, striving to prevent the splitting and fragmentation of Christ’s church. One, holy, catholic, “international” church was the dream of Bucer and of Calvin, but it was not to be. Thus there are no churches named for Bucer or for Calvin, for their work and thought has gone out into the church catholic at large. (143)

Rowan Williams says something similar in his short but provocative work, Why Study the Past?:

As for unity across local frontiers, attitudes and theologies varied. As we have seen, Lutherans argued for baptism as the sole determining factor in regard to belonging in the Church; but they also repudiated formal sacramental fellowship with those who held different doctrines about the eucharist. Churches of Calvinist heritage tended to see the details of local church administration as legitimately variable, but assumed both doctrinal unanimity on certain points and a recognisable practice of discipline freely exercised by the Church’s leadership. While Lutherans tended to solve the unity question at a local level by a theology of the authority of the ruler, Calvinists were readier to look to a sort of ‘Protestant International’, as it has been called, a loose alliance of churches with the same general style of governance and theology. The Reformed Church of England, despite its apparently Lutheran attitude to the monarch, tended to identify with this latter model of international fellowship (not confederation). Some of the bitter controversies that divided it had to do with the extent to which its discipline and form of ministry were really recognisable to ‘the best Reformed churches’ abroad. (81)

This goal seems to have vanished among the conservative heirs of the Reformers, sadly, while those who eagerly embrace ecumenism seem to have on one point or another usually conceded the Roman Catholic arguments from the time of the Reformation are correct.

Is this not a worthwhile goal? Should Protestant churches today be concerned with not offending their Protestant sister churches on matters of less-than-essential importance? Or is visible unity on an international level not essential to the mission of the church?

What thinkest thou?

When I became a Christian, the final decision was simple. I felt like the thief on the cross with nothing to offer but sin, no recourse to good works to fall back on and, thus, no hope of earned salvation. I knew I was doomed without the only salvation that was on offer – the one from Jesus. There were no trappings, no liturgical requirements, no formularies, rituals or recitations, just a “remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

In the current Anglican strife, what has become apparent is the desperation of each party to be included in the category “Anglican” while convincing everyone that the opposition should not. It is so pervasive that it raises the suspicion that being Anglican is more important than being Christian – perhaps because Anglicanism as it is practised in the West has become a buffer against the exigencies of real Christianity.

The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada are determined that the ACNA not be recognised by the Archbishop of Canterbury and they are busy trying to sabotage the private member’s motion asking the CofE to recognise the ACNA. Such recognition would help confirm the “Anglicanism” of the ACNA, a confirmation TEC and  the ACoC are determined to derail at all costs.

For my part, I think the meanderings of Rowan Williams have the aroma of an institution long dead and now in an advanced state of decay; the vitality in the institutional Anglican Church is centred in Africa where to be Anglican also means to be Christian.

A similar parochial obsession is in evidence in the Archbishop of York’s declaring that ex-Anglicans who join the Roman Catholic Church as part of the Pope’s Ordinariate Scheme will not be “proper Catholics” – a contention roundly repudiated by at least some Catholics – as if such a thing bore the weight of eternal significance.

To solve the “who are the real Anglicans” problem, it might be best for Christian Anglicans to leave Western Anglicanism to bury its dead and take a new name: Aflicans, perhaps.

So who are the real Anglicans? Who cares.

“It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion.”

- Dean William Inge (1860-1954) Anglican priest, professor of divinity at Cambridge, and Dean of Saint Paul’s Cathedral.

Warning… This post is probably full of errors in the detail of things. I don’t have time to know details so forgive me. I’m happy to be corrected, but please don’t accuse me of trying to intentionally misrepresent anything.

We go to an Anglican church, we are members of the Church of England. The Anglican church (pretty much) used to be a part of the Roman Catholic church, then two things happened at pretty much the same time:

1. Our king (Henry VIII) wanted to get divorced (and married again).
2. People actually started reading the bible and discovered that the teaching of the Roman Catholic church was way off.

So Henry declared himself to be head of the church as opposed to the Pope, and Anglicanism begun. Then it stopped after his son Edward died and (bloody) Mary, who was a Roman Catholic became queen. Then she died and her sister Elizabeth (a protestant) became queen. She did a lot to try and get people to stop burning each other and try and get along. And that’s the flavour with which the Anglican church has bounced along for the last 400ish years. The general theology has been Protestant, but the philosophy has been to try and avoid burning each other when we disagree. When the British Empire grew, lots of Anglican churches got placed in countries around the world. Put them all together and you have the Anglican Communion.

I’ve continued to think about my reaction to Holy Women, Holy Men. My earlier post is here. It was initiated on Friday when I went on Episcopal Cafe and found no mention of the Martyrs of Japan and instead a quotation from a work on Anne Hutchinson. I think I’ve figured it out. I’ve not read it carefully. It’s not available in print and I haven’t been interested enough to go back to the materials presented at General Convention. So, my only exposure to it is through Episcopal Cafe.

Speaking to the Soul provides no historical context for Williams and Hutchinson, no discussion of what influenced them. There’s nothing that would help a non-expert make any sense of their relation to Anglicanism, why they are worth commemorating, and how their commemoration might enrich our current life as a communion.

To me, that reeks of arrogance–assuming that anyone who is of interest religiously or spiritually is inherently worth recognizing by Anglicans and worth coopting.

Granted, I come to this as someone from an outsider background whose academic specialty was religious outsiders. Still, I think it more hubris than humility to pay lipservice to the diversity within Christianity without acknowledging it, and without acknowledging the deep differences that persist between the Anglican tradition and others, like the Baptists, of whom Williams was one of the leading lights.

How often do you see real Plain people on television? There’s the occasional news story, usually sensational, and then there’s – nothing.

Do you watch Cake Boss? It is a reality show about a bakery in Hoboken, New Jersey, run by a large family of Italian background. They are an excitable, quick-tempered group who seem to love each other and have a good time while bickering over how to make cakes and run the business. The cakes are incredible, often beautiful, and usually monstrously large. They put together cakes to feed thousands!

In a recent episode, the pater familias and his brother-in-law had to take a delivery truck full of cake from New Jersey to North Carolina. They for some unknown reason got way off the highway. I’ve driven that route many times, and never got lost in Lancaster County. You get on the Interstate, you keep going, you get there. I’ve never been detoured through Pennsylvania.

The two men claim to be hopelessly lost. Their camera crew is equally lost. They pull into a farm driveway and begin to argue. The map seems to be no help, since they don’t know what road they are on. Slowly, a horse-drawn buggy approaches. They are certain that asking directions will be futile, that this Amishman will not know where the highway is.

In desperation, they ask directions and he points out to them that they have a ways to go Southward before they’ll find North Carolina. They are still excited, arguing, blaming each other. He sits quietly in the buggy, patiently waiting for them to finish. Without any further argument from them, he says he’ll show them the right way to go. Within minutes, slowly following the horse, they are back on the right road.

Screaming, shouting and arguing did not get the job done. It probably delayed the directions they needed to go the right way. A few seconds of patience would have set them right. They needed to listen, and then follow – slowly – the guide before them.

It’s a bit of a Christian metaphor, isn’t it?

I suspect I posted something on this last summer in the run-up to General Convention. There is a major revision in the works for Lesser Feasts and Fasts, which is the liturgical book dealing with commemorations of the saints and other notable figures in the history of Christianity and the history of the Episcopal Church. There has been some debate about the inclusion of this or that figure (John Muir, who wasn’t a conventional Christian by any stretch of the imagination), people who left Anglicanism for the Roman Catholic Church, like John Henry Newman, and many more.

My sense when I first looked through Holy Women, Holy Men was that it was something of a politically-correct attempt to acknowledge everyone who has made an important, or not so important, contribution to contemporary religion and culture. There are two aspects of it that deeply bother me. First, the expansion of commemorations. One of the things the Protestant Reformation did was simplify the religious calendar, removing the commemorations of many saints from the annual ritual year. Now we are back where we were in the Middle Ages. Perhaps that’s not so bad, but on the other hand a proliferation of commemorations might lead to the lessening importance of the whole enterprise.

Secondly, I am deeply concerned about what I suppose I should call religious imperialism. One of my most memorable moments from the time I spent teaching History of Christianity in an Episcopal Seminary was when a student commented after our discussion of Erasmus, “He was an Anglican.”

Well, no.  He wasn’t an Anglican, he remained a Catholic and died one. As I was reading on Episcopal Cafe the entry on Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson yesterday, I sensed the same thing. To adopt or assimilate members of other denominations or Christian traditions, or even from other religious traditions, seems to me rather arrogant. Williams challenged not only the Puritan orthodoxy of colonial New England, he would have been equally vocal against the Church of England. To learn from and respect those who would have had deep disagreements with Anglicanism is one thing, to place them in our ritual calendar is quite another.

I presume the goal is to honor their contribution and their faith; but how can we do that authentically by eliding the deep differences between themselves and us?

in celebration, here is rev. gene robinson, bishop of the episcopal diocese of new hampshire, speaking on why religion matters in the quest for gay civil rights.  this man is a wonderful example of true christian faith and makes me proud to be episcopalian.

From the Sacramento Bee:

To parishioners in her small Sacramento congregation, Elizabeth English is their Catholic priest: She presides over their Sunday Mass, leads them during Communion and baptizes their babies.

To the Roman Catholic Church, English symbolizes a topic that church leaders consider closed: the ordination of women priests…

Last week, English joined a Nobel Peace Prize nominee who is also a priest and about 150 others at St. Mark’s Methodist Church in Sacramento to discuss the ordination of women priests.

This kind of thing explains, in part, why Catholics are not Roman Catholics.  We do not believe that Catholicism is a genus of which we are one species.  Following the genus/species concept to its logical conclusion gets us to articles like this one where all kinds of nonsensical statements are possible such as the meaningless expression “female Catholic priest.”  To borrow an expression from the old “new math,” this is not only an empty set, but an oxymoron.  But this meaninglessness is de rigeur among many Anglicans and others who have an unquenchable need for self-validation.  Affirming Catholicism is a fine example of it.  AC does anything but affirm Catholicism.  In fact it supplants and corrupts the idea of Catholicism into a matter of style empty of essential substance.  So, too with women priests.  Carrying the false logic forward one could easily envision a future atheistic sect which  calls itself Catholic because its leaders still wear pointy hats, or something.

But, Catholicism is not an idea at all.  It is a concrete organic reality transmitted generation to generation through an unbroken line of sacramental relations. It cannot be reduced to some set of practices or rules or even teachings, as important as these dimensions are.  Thus, there is no way to abstract some aspects, imitate them and then claim that one has the same reality.

Can you say episcopoi vagantes?

I got asked this question a lot this week: “How many Plain Anglicans are there?” I guesstimated that world-wide we number about five hundred. Now I’m not so sure how good that number is; I probably counted people who aren’t officially Anglican, and some who aren’t officially Plain. It’s not as if we need to sign a confession or a covenant to be Anglican or Plain, but it is a matter of self-identity.

I’ve never been too concerned about whether my friends are Anglican, Plain, or Anglican Plain. How we live in witness to Christ and fulfill His mission in this world is the real issue. Some of us are called to be the visible witneses, to put our sincerity on the line and let people see that Christians can be what they say they are. (Most of the time, or at least without failing some of the time. All have fallen short of the glory of God!) Plain does mean that any hypocrisy will be very visible to the world. We stand for the apostolic Christian faith, the first century church translated to our own day, and when we fall short of the apostolic model, people know it. So we are called to be sincere, to be fully informed, to be mindful, and to pray, pray, pray for help at all times. I certainly do not want to shame my Lord or the others who carry His name.

How to define what it is to be Plain? Our variety of practices is great, yet we are united in faith. We are, mostly, people called through the witness of the Anabaptists and the Quakers, we are convicted of Biblical principles of life, we are generally traditional in lifestyle. We don’t all agree on doctrine or practice; we do agree on the conviction of conscience. I think I work at keeping a balance between open-heartedness and the way of Christ, so that I am not in error and do not accept error from others.

As Christians who are Plain, almost Plain, or just living a life of simplicity and faith, our practices in appearance range from my austere Plain to a feminine simplicity of others, with men who are in the category mostly in the Mennonite or Conservative Quaker mold. Some of are noticably Plain, others less so. Some of us could be identified as belonging to a specific group, others not. It is not a concern for me; we don’t have an ordnung and likely never will.

Are you called to Plain or the simple life? If so, how will that express itself? In your daily life? In your household? In your appearance? If you are a seeker in this mode of faith, be assured that there is love and support along the way. No one expects that you will turn out as a finished product overnight; most of us have worked at our expressions over years!

But welcome; there is room for all.

The fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.  – Carl Sandberg (a Chicagoan), ‘The Fog’

Yesterday’s post discussed how ecclesiastical error comes in on little cat’s feet with a pleading of victimisation.   

I just had a look at the recently published ‘God’s Call and Our Response’, a paper on the Chicago Consultation of the Episcopal Church (TEC).  What an interesting document.  Charles Porterfield Krauth would have had a field day with it.    

Here are just a few insights regarding this rationale for ordaining practicing and partnered LGBT church members to the priesthood and episcopacy:   

- discussing ‘full’ inclusion and participation (p. 5):    

We have been wrongly tempted to believe that we must choose between relationships in the worldwide Anglican Communion and full participation of all of our baptized sisters and brothers, including those who are LGBT. The legislative watershed of D025 signaled the General Convention’s move beyond this false choice; it is our hope that these essays will be instrumental in providing theological and historical perspectives that might allow all Episcopalians to move forward together.    

Observe the rhetoric and vocabulary employed here: ‘wrongly tempted’, ‘relationships’, ‘full participation’, ‘baptized sisters and brothers’, ‘false choice’, ‘perspectives’, ‘move forward together’.    

‘Wrongly tempted’ and ‘false choice’ condemn doing the right thing and now TEC has walked straight into the error of ordinaining LGBTs.  St Paul said that same-sex relations, along with fornication, spell death in the life to come (Romans 1:26-32, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10).  So, there are many faithful in the pews considering these verses.  Whilst they are happy to welcome LGBTs into their parish life, they draw the line at ordaining those in relationships.  ’Relationships’, ‘full participation’ and ‘baptised sisters and brothers’ are designed to appeal to the reader’s emotions, as if to say: ‘You wouldn’t refuse a family member a seat at your table now, would you?’  They intimate some sort of discrimination and bias.  ‘Perspectives’ is an interesting choice of word, seemingly inoffensive, obscuring the error.   

- comparing LGBT ordination to that of blacks or women (p. 6):   

The use of ‘tension’ is particularly popular with postmodernists.  Citing ‘tension’ suddenly makes that ‘experience’ seem more ‘authentic’ and ‘honest’:   

We are born with our God-given skin colour and that should not be a determining factor in suitability for ordination. The same holds for most disabilities (p. 10). As far as women go, the jury is out as far as many Episcopalians are concerned, especially those troubled by the subsequent feminisation of the Church and fall in attendance.  For them, particularly Reformed Anglicans who adhere to sola scriptura, women’s ordination has always been a non-starter according to St Paul’s Epistles (1 Cor 14:33b-40, 1 Tim 2:11-15, 1 Cor 11:3) and the difficulty of obeying the ‘hard saying’ (John 6:55, 60).     

- no confession (profession) of faith in the Anglican Church (pp. 11, 22):   

Whoa!  Stop right there!  We have the 39 Articles which spell out our beliefs quite clearly.  Oh, yes, the Episcopal Church says those are but historical (code for ‘obsolete’) documents.   

This is completely wrong but beautifully expressed. Yet, it’s no wonder TEC is in its present state. You can read a number of posts on the 39 Articles at Philip Veitch’s Reformation Anglicanism (see my Blogroll).  (If this link doesn’t work, just type in ‘39 Articles’ in Mr Veitch’s Search bar.)   

- amazingly, given the above, not every candidate for a bishopric is qualified (p. 13):   

And there certainly may arise times when the consent process serves as a check on a diocese electing a bishop who has been otherwise demonstrated unfit, e.g., by undisclosed abusive behavior or advocating theological positions clearly outside the norms of Anglican practice.   

Two pages earlier this particular essay states that the TEC apparently has no theology other than consecrating and dispensing the sacraments.  So, how can their hierarchy determine ‘theological positions’?  Please stop the cant!   

- seemingly good for the Holy Spirit, not to mention ourselves (pp. 15, 20):   

Give over!   

Who among us proposes to know what the Holy Spirit deems to be ’good’?   

Whether in ordained ministry or in any other moment of prayerful deliberation, divine grace invites us to act with confidence when something seems good to us, trusting that it also, by that same grace, seems good to the Holy Spirit as well.   

What if I say that a jug of high-test cocktails sounds good just about now?  I deem that ‘good’ because it will satisfy me and make me quietly tight, therefore happy.  Yes, that ’something seems good to’ me.  Yet, would you say that such an act is truly ‘good’ and that the Holy Spirit would deem it good? Certainly not. What the authors of these essays are forgetting is that we are all inherently sinful, under the cosh of what Calvinists call total depravity.  We have no impulse other than the sinful one.  Yet, God, through His grace, is merciful and works goodness through us via the Holy Spirit.  Now, supposing this essay were advocating the ordination and elevation to the episcopacy of paedophiles, murderers, adulterers and thieves?  What would you say then?     

How does the TEC know it is operating under ‘divine grace’ and that their decision is pleasing to the Holy Spirit?  Only those speaking and acting in error think so.    

- the appeal to ‘justice’ (p. 22):   

Hmm, another false rhetorical flourish.  Note the use of the word ’victims’ and the comparison of apartheid to objection to LGBT ordination:   

No, those who object believe it goes against God’s revealed Word.  Yet, they happily befriend and work with LGBTs in church life and service.  Ordination is the sticking point.  Most African Christians consider homosexuality an abomination.  This came through loud and clear to the ELCA, which ignored these pleas last summer.      

- the Church’s purpose on earth (p. 23):   

In the end, “communion” is really about God’s mission and ours—the never-ending struggle for shalom that is the fruit of justice and that is both God’s promise and our hope.   

No, it is to fulfil the Divine Commission (Matt. 28:18-20):   

‘Therefore, go into the whole world and preach the gospel, teaching everything I have commanded and baptizing the nations in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.’   

- because we are baptised, we are eligible for every church office (p. 26):   

Effectively, that’s what this says — I’ve been reading it over and over in disbelief:   

Revolution, baby!  Che lives!    

What this woman is forgetting is that being baptised doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to heaven.  The promise of eternal life accompanies it, provided you can keep up your end of the bargain by not becoming dead in sin (different from ‘dead to sin’, which is what we all would hope to achieve in our lifetimes).  On her rationale, we might as well ordain anyone who asks, including the seriously unrepentant reprobate.   

Well, what do I know? I’m a mere layperson, not a theologian or a professor emeritus. This is just to point out how seductive error is and how persuasive its proponents can be. See for yourself.

Two photos which contrast the range of architecture found in the table below:

To give a measuring stick as to the adherents of the various denominations in the U. S. A., here is a selective, approximate, list as of 2004. These estimates include children.

1.  78,000,000     Catholic, all sorts

2.  47,000,000     Baptist, all varieties

3.  20,000,000     Methodist, all sorts

4.  13,500,000     Lutheran, all sorts

7.   5.000,000      Episcopal and anglican, all sorts

?    3,000,000      Orthodox, all sorts, less than 1%  of total USA population.

THE EPISCOPAL CHURH in America reports over 8000 congregations. The name distribution is very similar to that of the Catholic Church.

Saint names are chosen by over 50% parishes.  The top individual names are Christ (with variations) followed by Trinity. One significant difference is that Mary is infrequent in contrast to Catholic nomenclature.

THE ANGLICAN CHURCH IN NORTH AMERICA This body is brand new in 2009, and composed of a number of predecessor churches with quite varied backgrounds.  Many of its parishioners and clergy come out of the Episcopal tradition. One large group left the Episcopal fold over 130 years ago, while other groups are newly come out.

In general, Saint names make up less than 40% overall.  Mary is extremely rare. Christ is the most popular name, although closely bunched with many other choices.

METHODIST What becomes clear when examining Methodist church names is that First  Methodist  Church is by far the most popular name distantly followed by Trinity,  together accounting for just under 10 %. The reason that these two names comprise so low a percentage is that most Methodist churches are place named, i. e. geographical location such as city or street.

BAPTIST Baptist churches are from so many different church bodies, as well as independent Baptist churches, it is difficult to get exact counts. Geographical choices such as town, city, street, etc., are even higher than found among Methodists.

I found very few First Baptist Churches. In both churches the emphasis historically has been on place evangelism, so it is a logical extension of their theologies.

Jenna Lyle in the Christian Post:

LONDON – Religion is being removed from public life in Britain under the guise of tolerance, the Archbishop of York has warned.

Delivering the inaugural City of Peace lecture to Newcastle City Council Wednesday night, Dr. John Sentamu warned that tolerance was in danger of becoming a “negative virtue” resulting in “narrowness” and “oppression.”

“Tolerance has become a restricting quality – a grudging ‘putting up with’ rather that a positive means of building a caring, peaceful society,” he said. “The problem with this is that it does not give us the means of voicing and dealing constructively with differences."

Full article: Religion Being Marginalized in Name of Tolerance, Warns Anglican Leader | Christianpost.com

The 10th Annual AMiA Winter Conference in Greensboro North Carolina was amazing. Over 30 Canadians joined the 1,400+ participants from across North America and around the world.  This was our 8th Anglican Mission Winter Conference as Canadians, first beginning in Jan 2003 at Pawley Island, South Carolina.

You are encouraged to join us next year in Greensboro NC for the 11th Annual Anglican Mission Winter Conference on Feb 9th to 12th 2011. Click on the following pdf link to view pictures from the Winter Conference.

Canadian_WC_Photos

When Pius IX was concerned about Modernism in the 19th century, so was a notable Lutheran minister in the United States.

The Revd Charles Porterfield Krauth was a learned man.  Indeed, his father, also a Lutheran clergyman, was a university president.  Krauth was concerned about the dilution of American Lutheranism and wrote the Akron-Galesburg Rule which stated that only Lutheran pastors could preach from Lutheran pulpits and that only Lutherans could receive the Lord’s Supper at Lutheran altars.  Krauth and his conservative followers eventually formed the General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in 1867. (Not to be confused with the present-day ELCA!) Most of the original state synods involved have over the years evolved and separated, the best known being the LCMS (Missouri) and WELS (Wisconsin).

in 1872 Krauth wrote his most famous work, The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology.  What the late Fr John Neuhaus — a convert to Catholicism from the LCMS — called Neuhaus’s Law was actually taken from Krauth’s description of ecclesiastical error. 

What Krauth wrote is just as true now as it was then. Note how he describes error coming in quite innocently and asking for tolerance (emphasis mine):

But the practical result of this principle [of the church tolerating within her bosom those who claim she is teaching error] is one on which there is no need of speculating; it works in one unvarying way. When error is admitted into the Church, it will be found that the stages of its progress are always three. It begins by asking toleration. Its friends say to the majority: You need not be afraid of us; we are few, and weak; only let us alone; we shall not disturb the faith of others. The church has her standards of doctrine; of course we shall never interfere with them; we ask only for ourselves to be spared interference with our private opinions. Indulged in this for a time, error goes on to assert equal rights. Truth and error are two balancing forces. The Church shall do nothing which looks like deciding between them; that would be partiality. It is bigotry to assert any superior right for the truth. We are to agree to differ, and any favoring of the truth, because it is truth, is partisanship. What the friends of truth and error hold in common is fundamental. Anything on which they differ is ipso facto non-essential. Anybody who makes account of such a thing is a disturber of the peace of the church. Truth and error are two co-ordinate powers and the great secret of church-statesmanship is to preserve the balance between them. From this point error soon goes on to its natural end, which is to assert supremacy. Truth started with tolerating, it comes to be merely tolerated, and that only for a time. Error claims a preference for its judgments on all disputed points. It puts men into positions, not as at first in spite of their departure from the Church’s faith, but in consequence of it. Their recommendation is that they repudiate that faith, and poistion is given them to teach others to repudiate it, and to make them skilful in combating it. (From The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1872, pp. 195-96.)

This strategy was the same for the Lutheran Church that Krauth examined, the Presbyterian Church that Gresham Machen encountered in the 1920s (we haven’t had that story yet), Vatican II in the Catholic Church, institutional changes in the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion as well as changes in the theology of evangelical churches and, last year, the resolution approved in the ELCA.  It is rampant.  It is no different to a cancer.

This time-honoured formula is guaranteed to work every time.  So, watch for the wolf in sheep’s clothing disguised as a pitiful, marginal victim.  It was a symptom of modernism and it is a symptom of postmodernism.  Be very careful of what ‘new idea’ you are asked to accept at church, be it rules, liturgy, music, sermons.  If your inner fundamentalist says ‘no’ when you hear them, please listen to that little voice and turn away.  These can potentially — and often do — go against your denomination’s teachings and confessions of faith, both of which are based on Scripture. 

Follow truth, not the crowd.