Links to South Carolina posts – latest first in each section: (Last Updated January 25th 2012 at 10:00 p.m. Eastern)
IMPORTANT NOTE – SEE LATEST NEWS and BISHOP’S LETTER and PRAYER
FURTHER IMPORTANT NOTE – SEE here and here and here

Videos from MERE ANGLICANISM 2012 are here [NEW]

Materials From the Diocese of SC:

South Carolina Standing Committee Responds to Letter of Province IV Bishops December 12, 2011 at 11:33 am

Bishop Lawrence Writes to the Diocese About Disciplinary Board Decision
November 29, 2011 at 3:28 pm
South Carolina Releases Correspondence Relating to Josephine Hicks, Church Attorney
October 13, 2011

S.C. Bishop and Clergy of the Diocese Meet on “Serious Charges” Made Against Bishop Lawrence
October 12, 2011

A look back to a 2006 Mark Lawrence Address ”“ “Who are these birds that can sing in the dark?”
October 8, 2011

****Urgent Message from the Diocese of South Carolina Bishop and Standing Committee****
Originally posted October 5, 2011 – reposted Oct. 10, 2011

South Carolina Bishop and Standing Committee Respond to Actions of Executive Council
October 3, 2011

Analysis and Commentary

Province IV Bishops Release Statement Concerning Meeting with Bishop Lawrence
December 15, 2011 at 11:15 am

A S.C. Layman who worked as a College President Writes Bishop Daniel and the Province IV Bishops
December 13, 2011 at 11:35 am

Shay Gaillard””Purple Shirts Proof-texting in Public
December 8, 2011 at 9:01 am

Province IV Bishops Seek a Meeting with South Carolina Bp. Lawrence
December 5, 2011 at 4:25 pm

Kendall Harmon Answers Media Questions on the Disciplinary Committee””S.C. Bishop Matter
December 5, 2011 at 7:00 am

Anglican Communion Institute””South Carolina: The Disciplinary Board Decides
December 1, 2011 at 11:16 am

Lent and Beyond offers Thanksgiving for the Report from South Carolina
December 1, 2011 at 7:49 am

A Living Church Editorial on the Mark Lawrence News from the Bishops Disciplinary Board
November 29, 2011 at 11:30 am

(Liv. Ch.) Disciplinary Board of Bishops is Unable to Certify Abandonment Against Mark Lawrence
November 28, 2011 at 5:05 pm

GetReligion Critiques the recent Charleston, S. C., Newspaper piece on the Episcopal Fracas
November 25, 2011

(Living Church) Mark Lawrence: ”˜The Bishop Brings the Crozier’
November 23, 2011 at 3:50 pm

An AP Article on Bishop Mark Lawrence and the Diocese of South Carolina
November 23, 2011 at 11:40 am

Local paper Article: “S.C. Episcopal Diocese releases property claim”
November 21, 2011 at 12:25 pm

(Church Times) Harriet Baber””The Episcopal Church is alienating its own members
November 20, 2011 at 7:15 am

What was announced at the South Carolina Clergy Conference this past Tuesday Evening
November 19, 2011 at 9:00 am

A Serious Prayer request for the South Carolina Clergy Conference This week
November 14, 2011 at 4:55 am

Bishop C. FitzSimons Allison””Shrinking Jesus and Betraying the Faith
November 11, 2011 at 8:19 am

Leander Harding on the Mark Lawrence Investigation””Choose Inclusive Justice
October 27, 2011 at 6:19 am

Gavin Dunbar on the Mark Lawrence Investigation””Southern Discomfort
October 27, 2011 at 6:00 am

Diocese of Upper South Carolina Convention Passes Resolution on the Mark Lawrence Investigation
October 25, 2011

A.S. Haley””Conflicts Galore on the Disciplinary Board for Bishops with regard to the S.C. Matter
October 22, 2011 at 2:00 pm

The Bishop of Tasmania Writes in Support of Bishop Mark Lawrence
October 21, 2011 at 6:00 am

(Anglican Communion Institute) South Carolina: The Church Needs Transparency
October 20, 2011 at 6:07 pm

(The State) The Bishop of Upper South Carolina on the Mark Lawrence Investigation
October 19, 2011 at 5:22 pm

(Mark McCall)””South Carolina: Upholding The Church’s Discipline By Upholding The Constitution
October 18, 2011 at 7:38 am

A.S. Haley on the Further Revelations in the South Carolina Episcopal Investigation
October 17, 2011 at 9:04 pm

(Living Church) Attorney J.B. Burtch Returns to Bishop Mark Lawrence Case
October 17, 2011

Anglican Unscripted Episode 14
October 17, 2011

A.S. Haley Responds to An Embarrassingly Inaccurate Piece by Andrew Gerns on the S.C. Matter
October 17, 2011

CEN””Evangelical bishop under assault in America
October 14, 2011 at 5:36 pm

(Living Church) Episcopal Church Attorney in South Carolina Matter Recuses Herself
October 14, 2011 at 3:35 pm

A.S. Haley on the Disciplinary Board, Their Chosen Lawyer, and the South Carolina Process
October 14, 2011 at 8:21 am

Charles Alley””The Injustice of it All!
October 14, 2011 at 1:31 pm

Living Church””Bishop: Attorney Never on Disciplinary Board
October 13, 2011

Robert Clawson Chimes in on the Disciplinary Proceedings involving Mark Lawrence
October 13, 2011

A.S. Haley on Bishop Henderson’s Statement regarding procedure in the Bishop Mark Lawrence Matter
October 12, 2011

Anglican Communion Institute on the Continuing S.C. Story””Title IV: Abandonment Without Offense?
October 12, 2011

(Living Church) Bishop Henderson Explains His Understanding of the Disciplinary Board’s Duty
October 12, 2011

Anglican Unscripted Episode 13
October 10, 2011

Dale Matson””Rowan Williams And The Deposition Of Bishop Lawrence
October 7, 2011

ACI says Presiding Bishop Had to be Involved in the S.C. Actions if the Canons Were Followed
October 7, 2011

A.S. Haley””Clearing up Misconceptions about the Diocese of South Carolina ‘Charges’
October 6, 2011

A.S. Haley on South Carolina””Episcopal Church Foments Strife and Civil War
October 6, 2011

Living Church””Board Hears Case against Bishop Lawrence
October 5, 2011

(ACI) A Response to the reported Title IV Disciplinary process begun against Bishop Mark Lawrence
October 5, 2011

A.S. Haley””What if the TEC Foundations Were not Designed for the Current Structure?
October 3, 2011

The Dangers of Church Centralization: Some Remarks on the Proposed Changes in the TEC Constitution
October 3, 2011

A.S. Haley””TEC Executive Council Fires on the Diocese of South Carolina
Sept. 30, 2011

Other Resources

South Carolina: Praying for the Diocesan Leadership
October 6, 2011

Prayer Resources for those praying for Bishop Mark Lawrence and South Carolina

Seeing Jesus with Bishop Mark Lawrence
October 16, 2011

Title IV Canons

Press and Other Reports

(ENS) Province IV bishops call meeting with colleague ”˜honest, forthright’
December 15, 2011 at 4:02 pm

(Christian Post) Episcopal Church Clears South Carolina Bishop of Violating Principles
December 2, 2011 at 6:15 am

Reuters Article on Disciplinary Board Decisions vis a vis Bishop Mark Lawrence
November 30, 2011 at 6:00 pm

Local Paper Article on Disciplinary Board Decisions vis a vis Bishop Mark Lawrence
30, 2011 at 3:02 pm

The ENS story on the Disciplinary Board dismissing abandonment complaint against Mark Lawrence
November 29, 2011 at 6:15 am

Nicholas Beasley (Upper South Carolina) Chimes In
October 19, 2011 at 4:45 pm

Another (longish) AP article on The Episcopal Church’s South Carolina Investigation
October 16, 2011

(Times and Democrat) Orangeburg, S.C., Area Episcopal clergy: Probe ”˜not a healthy situation’
October 14, 2011 at 7:45 am

Another AP Story on the South Carolina Clergy Meeting Tuesday
(AP) Diocese of SC clergy discuss allegations against bishop
October 12, 2011

Local Paper””Episcopal Church investigates Bishop Mark Lawrence
October 6, 2011

An ENS Story””S.C. bishop investigated on charges he has abandoned the Episcopal Church
October 5, 2011

An AP Story””S.C. Bishop said to have abandoned Episcopal church
October 5, 2011

Given this situation, we would make the following points and raise the following questions:

1. ACI has defended not only a collaborative understanding of the Instruments of Unity, but their integrity as well. The failure of the ABC publicly to state that the Dar es Salaam Communiqué is alive and well has been injurious to our common life. It has also been intimated in certain quarters that the adjudication of the Communiqué will be undertaken by a Joint Steering Committee of the Primates and the ACC. We trust that this rumor is mistaken. The Primates have worked hard and declared their intention, and their recommendations and requests are fully within their remit as an Instrument with enhanced responsibility, whose present character was requested by other Instruments of Communion. Lacking any clear understanding of the precise fate of the Communiqué has left the field open for manipulation and the multiplication of other initiatives, borne of fear, concern, power balancing and so on.

2. ACI has sought to work with the Windsor Report, the Covenant, and within the US, the Windsor Bishops. One can watch with curiosity and concern the proliferating of various groups within the conservative ranks, most recently, a Common Cause College of Bishops (as proposed), CANA, and others. The Anglican Communion Network would appear to have split into those bishops now headed toward the Common Cause College, and those who wish to continue on the Windsor path. But to the degree that the Windsor Bishops have no clarity about the future of the Primates’ Tanzanian Communiqué, and hence a comprehensive, ordered response to their Communion life in troubled times, they will collapse altogether. Indeed, one wonders what role they might be expected to exercise in the light of such unclarity.

3. It is our understanding that the recent issuing of Lambeth invitations was done in the light of organizational concerns and the timing of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s leave. The ways in which the Archbishop has reserved to himself all manner of options, discernment, and counsel regarding the ultimate character of invitations–which is his right to do–means that speculation about the character of the conference is bound to be only that. Still, it is speculation capable of generating unease and reaction that is not always constructive.

Read it all.

So what happened? How did it all fall apart? Clearly, Gene Robinson was a watershed, and with it went a lot of other matters building up and associated, often in profound and logical ways, with the seemingly radical change in sexual discipline that General Convention 2003 represented. But “doctrine” alone doesn’t explain the tidal shift in relationships.

The central problem, I believe ”“ one noted by both Windsor and Primates — is the loss of “trust”: trust among Anglican churches was broken, and by and large, the initiative for this breaking (although not wholly) has come from one direction. In sum, TEC and her leaders broke trust with the Communion, and Global South leaders and conservatives within and outside TEC lost “trust” in the American church and her leaders. This is related to TEC’s changed doctrine and discipline; but, as I said, only partly. One can navigate doctrinal difference and dispute, even of the most essential kind, if there is a trusted means of doing so. The real issue has been the sense that TEC is no longer what she was, that her word is not worth anything, that she cannot keep promises, that she is no longer trustworthy and therefore she that cannot be dealt with consistently and openly in terms of discussions and common counsel. The doctrinal and disciplinary dispute of the present is “irreconcilable” not only because the divergences at issue are vast, but because there is no commonly coherent means of resolving them. The difference between 1970’s and the 2000’s is that in 1970, for all the suspicions and even dislike and outright worries about its liberalism, ECUSA was still “trusted”; now she is not.

And why was ECUSA trusted then, and TEC is no longer trusted now? In brief, because TEC has lost her bearings within a coherent history others once recognized; because she no longer evidences a consistent character others once encountered; and because she is no longer engaged in a committed Christian discussion of critical matters in a Christian way with her Anglican sisters and brothers she once pursued. This claim is now worth unpacking.

One major debate today ”“ and it has emerged only now, but necessarily and essentially ”“ is over the identity of the Episcopal Church’s history, and thereby the church’s historical character. The debate has been attached to a new argument that has been promoted of late by, e.g. the House of Bishops, and that has also been taken up by the House’s allies and apologists. The argument is that TEC has an exceptional character vis a vis the rest of the Communion: she is a “democratic” church. And this “democratic” character means that the church is governed by a comprehensive set of representatives well-beyond the episcopal order, committed to “liberative praxis”, to breaking the shackles of colonialist imperialism, to upholding the needs and aspirations of oppressed and marginalized peoples, and to working to fulfill the inclusivist project (or “mission”) of God to bring all people, whatever their condition and social status, into a reconciled and egalitarian participation within the Church’s authoritative order. This articulated self-identity has been used to justify the direction taken by TEC’s General Convention on matters of sexual morals and discipline (not to mention other elements like “open communion”), even when this direction has gone counter to previously stated hopes, claims and promises.

Now, this newly argued Episcopalian identity may indeed be a hope for some or even for many. But it in no way represents the historical character of TEC in a purely factual or sociologically tethered fashion. The new progressive liberative identity is a constructed or invented history that is being foisted on the church by its proponents through the mechanisms of political rhetoric and strategic procedure. But it does not reflect what TEC has in fact been, or even is today (leaving aside the question of whether it is faithful to the Gospel of the Scriptures itself, which, in many crucial respects, I believe it is not).

Read it all.

From here:

Some Anglicans, especially critics of the authority of the Primates Meeting as an Instrument of Unity/Communion, have tended to see the four Instruments of Communion as competitors. There is no evidence that this view is held by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is himself an Instrument, and who presides at the Lambeth Conference, the Primates Meeting and the Anglican Consultative Council. Clearly he views the Instruments as mutually encouraging, even as they have a specific and discrete identity and remit.

It has been the consistent position of ACI, going back to ”˜To Mend the Net,’ that the specific authority given to the Archbishop of Canterbury is that of gathering and inviting. And the place where that authority is his alone is the Lambeth Conference invitations.

But there is no evidence whatsoever that in making invitations for the 2008 Conference, +Canterbury has set aside or ignored the authority of the other Instruments.

It needs also to be underscored that the response of the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church to the requests of the most recent Primates Meeting says nothing probative in any way about the vitality and purchase of these requests. The means for providing regularization of various emergency extra-territorial ”˜missionary’ initiatives is the Pastoral Council Scheme and the Primatial Vicar. It is not the job of the Archbishop of Canterbury unilaterally to declare the regularization of these initiatives by inviting the bishops acting in such a status to the Lambeth Conference. That would be to reject the work of the Primates Meeting still alive and waiting final prosecution ”“ especially in the light of how the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church finally responds as of 30 September 2007.

It is tempting to wish to see individual initiatives, individual bishops, and individual Instruments as more definitive than others, and this instinct is alive on both ends of the Communion spectrum. What we are in fact seeing is the unfolding of a specific Anglican Communion polity, now come of age, and its hallmark is the mutual cooperation of four Instruments of Unity. The timing is such that the recent statement of the Archbishop of Canterbury is being given a specific kind of enhancement, but that may be misleading. In no way does his action in signaling an intention about present and future invitations stand over against the work of the other Instruments of Communion, and we can be sure he and his counselors have had this foremost in their minds.

We also wish to note the language of his statement””and this has not been properly emphasized due to concerns about CANA or New Hampshire””which points to the assumption that those Bishops attending do so with a commitment to the Instruments of Communion, and the statements and actions emanating from them. So far as we are concerned, the best indication of the mind of the Instruments in this season of disarray and challenge is what the Dar communiqué called the Camp Allen Principles: because these reaffirm Lambeth 1.10, Dromantine, The Windsor Report, and the serial statements and actions of all four Instruments.

It is our view that the efficient working of the Lambeth Conference, which is the desire of the Archbishop of Canterbury, needs an assumed commitment to these principles, if the meeting is not to be distracted and politicized according to this or that discrete concern or cause. We hope that the language used by the Archbishop of Canterbury at this juncture will receive specific commentary and elaboration. We believe we hear him rightly and trust that this perspective represents what is best for the healthy working of the Anglican Communion and the mission of Jesus Christ in this part of his Body the Church.