Part One is here and part Two is there.

Read it all.

One of the most critical leadership strategies I have tried to live day in and day out as your Rector is to make sure that our theology drives every single thing we do together. Gospel-Holy Spirit driven theology that is clearly evident in our preaching, teaching and all we do. For instance, the goal of our instructed Eucharist was to enrich our worship by realizing the theological ”˜whys’ of why we do what we do in worship.

One of the most profound learnings for me during our day of Clarity and Charity was a simple vacuum of any coherent theology coming from the Presiding Bishop. There was no there-there, no center of theological gravity. The most often repeated word from her was experience. Re-evaluating marriage, Scripture, the uniqueness of Jesus Christ through our own experience. I felt as if the head of the Unitarian church was at the microphone and not the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church.

This idea of our own experience kept coming up to the point that finally at the end of the question and answer session I went to the microphone and stated to the P.B. that I am a happily married man of twelve years, but that as a priest in a very difficult ecclesiastical marriage with the church, feeling as if the Bride of Christ (the church) has become completely unfaithful with little or no fidelity. Imagine if my wife were to come home and say”¦. “Al, I think we should abandon the marital vows and base our marriage on our experiences of what feels right and wrong, in fact out of that experience Al, I think we should have an open marriage. I know it’s out of the box thinking but experientially it just feels like the right thing to do!” If that were agreed to, our marriage would inevitably end in destruction, not to mention the damage done to the countless relationships surrounding the marriage. So it is when we use our experience to trump Scriptural authority. I ended my time at the microphone asking the question of where in the world do we go from here now that we have once again and with clarity been exposed to our massive differences? The question was never answered.

Well, where do we go from here? How can we together move forward if one side of the relationship has no theological moorings? This juncture should drive each one of us to our knees in prayer, praying that Jesus Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit would make clear our future. As you pray that prayer, please pray for the Gospel unity of this Diocese and the leadership of Bishop Mark Lawrence.

Read it all.

Dear Bp. Jefferts Schori,

I am an Episcopal priest in the Diocese of South Carolina and attended the [recent] meeting on Monday with you at St. Andrews, Mt. Pleasant. As I was rising to speak, time was called so I did not have an opportunity to offer my thoughts to you and those of us gathered.

First, thank you for your willingness to come and be with us. It seems always essential to meet face-to-face when there is conflict, mistrust and disagreement between parties. So, I am glad for the opportunity provided us to meet with you and listen to you in person. Perhaps you were able to listen to us as well.

I certainly won’t attempt to speak all that is on my mind, but as a 3rd generation Episcopal priest, the angst and sadness I feel for this province of the Anglican Communion could not be any deeper. I’ve written you once before about this, in fact””the only two occasions I have ever felt called to communicate with the Presiding Bishop. The perspective I offer is this. A majority of Episcopalians has chosen new directions with regards to an understanding of the primacy of Scripture and Biblical authority, with regards to the uniqueness and supremacy of Jesus Christ and his saving work, and finally with regards to marriage of same-sex persons. (If you only agree that it is the last of these three, the rest written below still can stand.)The side you are on has won the political battle for the high ground. Now that your battle has been won, one of the most urgent questions that remain is how to treat the losers. One can continue to wield power and simply beat us into submission or drive us out of the family. One can use every jot and tittle of the letter of the law to demean, belittle and thoroughly bind us by forceful, aggressive litigation and by a ”˜take no prisoners’ mentality. In other words, we are being told to do it the way the winners would have it or face various forms of reprisal. For those of us on the loser’s side, it is embarrassing, humiliating and heart-rending.

As Dr. [Kendall] Harmon highlighted on Monday [February 25th], this is not about 45 parishes. It is countless more! I have hundreds in my parish alone who are still in the Episcopal Church, but barely hanging on. For me, the operative word is thousands. That is the word for the winners to remember. There are thousands upon thousands who have left the Episcopal Church, are leaving the Episcopal Church, or simply have totally detached from the Episcopal Church solely for the reasons of General Convention decisions of the past decade. Thousands, tens of thousands, are spiritually dislocated and have lost their spiritual home””exiles, in other words. Are the winners certain they wish to jettison them all?

And yet as I read Episcopal Life or read quotations from Executive Council or from the Presiding Bishop’s office, I read that all is fine, there is great ministry going on (And I believe that is true in spite of the circumstances, but not relevant to the issues at hand.), and this is a little storm soon to pass over. I’ve been hearing that since 2000, but I do not believe it is true. Neither do I believe the storm is abating as I believe I heard you suggest on Monday.

Is there another alternative that the winners might choose in how they might treat the losers? Is there a Christ-alternative that rises above the law that transcends usual human behaviors that would be life-giving for all? I believe there is! It has not been heeded thus far because of the unwillingness to move from power to love. But, the gospel finally stands only on a measure of love whose depth is as wide and deep as the measure of the cross of Jesus Christ.

Dr. Paul Zahl in his book Grace in Practice writes:

”¦the case I know best, has occurred in relation to the loss of status on the part of the ”˜orthodox’ or ”˜conservative’ minority of the Episcopal Church in relation to the struggle over human sexuality”¦.The interest of it here is not in the issue of Christian social ethics that precipitated it, but in the political defeat of a minority by a majority in an institutional church, and the way this defeat played out. No mercy was given. The result was total loss and splitting.

This is what happened. A victory in the form of a political vote was won, and the winning group was unable to assure the losers that a place would remain for dissidents within a comprehensive church. The minority appealed to the majority for ”˜space’ or toleration: a place of safety, a ”˜no-fly’ sector within the American Episcopal Church. This was not granted, and the spin-out of the long process of applications for such a place of safety is a paper trail worthy of study. But the victors, to whom the losers constantly appealed, did not give grace. Formal concession was never granted. The result was a species of martyrdom for ”˜conservative’ Episcopalian Christians. The formal result was a long-term hemorrhage, and the end of what had once been an uneasy but official unity. (p. 230)

I would offer that this is clearly the perception of thousands of present and former Episcopal Christians. As a presbyter of the Church I appeal to your high office, Bp. Jefferts Schori, to seek for ways of creating space for us to co-exist while we sort out the turmoil of disparate views of sexuality, Biblical authority, the supremacy of Christ. What the winners are doing is not working. Oliver Cromwell’s plea to his adversaries applies here to the winners yet again, ”˜I beseech thee by the bowels of Christ, could ye be wrong?’

In Christ,

–(The Rev.) Mike Lumpkin is rector, Saint Paul’s, Summerville, South Carolina

My hope was that the audio and/or video would be able to be released publically so that people could form their own conclusions based on their interaction with the material. Unfortunately because some of the participants chose to share details of a quite personal and intimate nature that is not going to be possible. I hope to have more on this as time and schedule allows–KSH.

“I am very struck by our inability to communicate.”

–Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori toward the very end of the session today with active clergy of the diocese of South Carolina

Particularly in a period of contestation about the role of the Presiding Bishop it is crucial to keep in mind the peculiar polity of TEC. Bishop Stanton of Dallas has been clearest about this in questioning the option of alternative Episcopal Oversight given that specific limitations already inhere in the office of Presiding Bishop. No metropolitan powers are attached to this office. More recently, in the Diocese of South Carolina we witnessed appropriate attention to the limits this Church has imposed, in the course of its history, on the role of the Presiding Bishop. The Diocese of South Carolina did so, in other words, not as an act of revenge nor in a position of questionable advocacy, but in full compliance with the Canons of TEC.

Read it all.

From here:

After hearing about the five primates’ intentions to boycott Lambeth, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said February 15 that the conference will be diminished by their absence, and I imagine that they themselves will miss a gift they might have otherwise received. After hearing about the five primates’ intentions to boycott Lambeth, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said February 15 that the conference “will be diminished by their absence, and I imagine that they themselves will miss a gift they might have otherwise received.

Read it all.

On February 12, it was announced that the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church had accepted four bishop’s renunciation of ordained ministry and included in the list of bishops was the Rt. Rev’d David Bena, Suffragan Bishop of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America (CANA).

CANA Bishop Martyn Minns responded by saying, “This announcement is misleading because Bishop Bena has most definitely not renounced his ordained ministry nor has he been ”˜deprived of the right to exercise the gifts and spiritual authority as a Minister of God’s Word and Sacraments conferred on him in Ordinations’ as stated in the news release. Bishop Bena is a faithful bishop in good standing within the Anglican Communion and continues to fully exercise his ordained ministry.”

“The background to this action is that on February 1, 2007, Bishop Bena was transferred from the Diocese of Albany to the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) to serve in CANA. On March 6, he wrote to the Presiding Bishop to advise her of this action and to resign from the Episcopal Church House of Bishops. In his letter he stated that, ”˜In transferring from one Province of the Anglican Communion to another, I do declare that I am neither renouncing my Orders as a bishop, nor am I abandoning the Communion of the Church.’

“In a letter dated March 13, 2007, the Presiding Bishop wrote back thanking him for his letter ”˜informing me that you have been enrolled in the Anglican Province of Nigeria. I have informed the Secretary of the House of Bishops and the Recorder of Ordinations that by this action you are no longer a member of the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church nor are you enrolled as person in any order of the Episcopal Church.’ She also wrote that it was her prayer, ”˜that God may bless us both in a ministry of reconciliation.’

“One year later to now describe his action as a ”˜renunciation of ordained ministry’ is confusing at best and at odds with the Presiding Bishop’s earlier response. Bishop Bena’s resignation from the Episcopal Church came after a season of discernment during which he came to the conclusion that the Episcopal Church no longer embraced the Gospel that he had been called to proclaim nor taught the ”˜faith once and for all delivered to the saints.’ His desire was to continue his ordained ministry but within another branch of the Anglican Communion and this he continues to do so with great effectiveness within CANA.”

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has accepted four bishops’ renunciations of ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church, a senior representative of her office has confirmed.

The Rev. Dr. Charles Robertson, canon to the Presiding Bishop, said the Presiding Bishop — in letters dated January 23 and sent to related General Convention, diocesan, pension and deployment offices — has accepted the renunciations made by David J. Bena, resigned bishop suffragan of the Diocese of Albany, N.Y.; Andrew H. Fairfield, resigned bishop of the Fargo-based Diocese of North Dakota; and Howard S. Meeks, resigned bishop of the Diocese of Western Michigan, based near Kalamazoo.

A similar letter was sent January 14 regarding the renunciation made by Jeffrey N. Steenson, resigned bishop of the Diocese of Rio Grande, an Albuquerque-based jurisdiction encompassing New Mexico and a portion of Southwest Texas including El Paso.

Read it all.

Chicago’s new Episcopal bishop and the church’s national leader sent a clear message Sunday about where they stand on gay clergy, a smoldering issue that threatens to tear apart the denomination.

Wrapping up a five-day tour in honor of Jeffrey Lee, the new Chicago bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori declared that the American church will not stand alone in its support of gay clergy during an international meeting in July in Lambeth, England.

“Many more [bishops] than you might expect are sympathetic,” Jefferts Schori, the presiding Episcopal bishop, told parishioners at St. Nicholas Church in Elk Grove Village. “They are not, however, the loudest voices.”

Later in Chicago, Lee was seated at St. James Cathedral and reminded audience members of their call to ministry by virtue of their baptism, not their liberal or conservative interpretations of Scripture.

“That’s one of the tragedies afflicting the church right now,” he said. “So many of us seem to think that salvation depends on our theological correctness.”

Read it all.

A national Episcopal leader visited Bakersfield Thursday, heard believers’ concerns about the San Joaquin Diocese’s recent secession from the church and appointed a local clergyman as a temporary missionary priest to serve Bakersfield area believers.

He also said the national church considers the diocese’s Dec. 8 decision to place itself under overseas Anglican rule illegal.

The Rev. Canon Robert Moore, of Seattle, who was appointed by the Episcopal Church’s presiding bishop, the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, as an “interim pastoral presence” in the San Joaquin Valley, spent the day in the greater Bakersfield area as part of a five-day “listening tour” that will culminate in a valley-wide conference in Hanford on Saturday.

At a Thursday night gathering of 60 to 70 believers and clergy at First Congregational Church and hosted by Remain Episcopal in the Diocese of San Joaquin, a faith community opposed to the split, Moore received hearty applause when he announced he had appointed the Rev. Tim Vivian, a Bakersfield resident, to a “temporary pastoral position as missionary priest under my direct supervision, which puts him within the jurisdiction of the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.”

Read it all.

Question: I would just simply respond to say that that’s true as I look to my brother next to me and say, you’re doing something wrong. But as a church, as a body, we’ve been given authority in Holy Scripture to say that these things are abhorent to God. And we’ve also been given a duty to share that because those that haven’t heard the Good News are truly perishing and without the Gospel of Christ they are perishing. And if we, out of fear of offense, fail to give them the Gospel, then we are accomplices in their death. We’ve been given an enormous responsibility and an enormous trust by our Lord, and I think we shirk it when we deny what’s written in Scripture.

Bishop Katharine: My understanding of the essential k_?___ , the central proclamation of Jesus, is that God loves you. Jesus came to show us that. Jesus gave his life to show us that, and we can argue about the details beyond that. I won’t disagree with you that proclaiming the Gospel is the centerpiece of what we do. I would continue to have conversation with you, I hope, about how we impose our particular understandings of aspects of that ? . And I think that’s been the struggle of the Christian journey from the beginning.

Watch it all or read the transcript or both.

It would be easier to let U.S. conservatives secede to join another Anglican province without a fight, said Jefferts Schori, “but I don’t think that’s a faithful thing to do.”

Episcopal leaders are stewards of church property and assets, protecting past generations’ legacies and passing them on to future Episcopalians, according to the presiding bishop. Allowing congregations to walk away with church property condones “bad behavior,” she said.

“In a sense it’s related to the old ecclesiastical behavior toward child abuse,” when priests essentially looked the other way, she said.

“Bad behavior must be confronted.”

But Jefferts Schori can be “heavy handed” in her treatment of conservative bishops and churches who’ve left or distanced themselves from the church, said the Rev. Neal Michell, canon for strategic development in the Diocese of Dallas.

Earlier this month, Episcopal leaders, including Jefferts Schori, charged two conservative bishops with “abandonment,” barring San Joaquin

(Calif.) Bishop John-David Schofield from active ministry and threatening similar action against Bishop Bob Duncan of Pittsburgh.

Both [Neal] Michell and [Kendall] Harmon also criticized the presiding bishop’s decision to become involved in a legal battle between the Diocese of Virginia and 11 churches that have split to join Nigerian Anglicans.

“To be so directly and explicitly and publicly and intentionally involved in these processes is terribly counterproductive to the church’s mission,” said Harmon.

Read it all.

Watch and/or read it all.

An Episcopal committee says that conservative Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan has “abandoned the communion of this church” ”” a potential first step toward stripping him of religious authority in the denomination.

The committee blocked the national Episcopal Church from imposing the penalty of “inhibition,” which would have barred him from performing religious duties. But the Episcopal House of Bishops is expected to consider imposing the punishment near the end of this year.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, who notified Duncan that he had abandoned the communion on Tuesday, told Duncan that she sought permission to inhibit him.

Read it all.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts-Schori of the Episcopal Church has warned Bishop Robert Duncan of Pittsburgh that he has been declared out of communion with the Episcopal Church and is danger of being removed from office if he does not abandon his efforts to realign the diocese with an Anglican province outside the United States.

Earlier today the Associated Press distributed a story claiming that Bishop Duncan had been banned from his duties. In fact, a key committee of three bishops on Friday had refused Bishop Jefferts-Schori’s request to take immediate action against Bishop Duncan.

“He has not been inhibited,” church spokesman Neva Rae Fox said today, using a technical term for banning a bishop from exercising his duties.

“What the presiding bishop has done is informed him that the Title IV Committee has looked into the situation and has said that he has abandoned the communion of the church.”

Read it all.

Read it carefully and read it all.

First, there is PEP’s Progressive Episcopalians See Review Committee Action As Providing Reconciliation Opportunity. Next, George Conger has Bid to depose US Bishop backfires. Read them both.

Bishop Jack Leo Iker of Fort Worth informed The Living Church on Jan. 15 that he has received a second letter from Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori threatening him with new disciplinary action.

“Unlike her November letter, it did not imply a charge of ”˜abandonment of the communion of this church’, but it said that I would be liable for charges of violation of my ordination vows if I continue ”˜any encouragement of such a belief’ (i.e. that parishes and dioceses can leave The Episcopal Church),” Bishop Iker said.

Read it all.

Here is one letter:

October 23, 2007

Dear Dr. Keenan,

Thank you for your letter, and the concerns you raise. Let me recommend that, as a veterinarian, you might wish to begin with Bruce Bagemihl’s exhaustive study Biological Exuberance. I cannot respond in detail to studies which are not cited.

Science is not the only basis by which many people in this church are coming to the conclusion that homosexual orientation is a given (a matter of creation) and that it may be possible to bless it as a reflection of God’s image in creation. Many, many faithful people (of both homosexual and heterosexual orientation) have the direct experience of seeing the fruits of the faithful, committed, monogamous, life-long and life-giving relationships of persons of the same sex. That mode is in fact the way in which many if not most Christians experience the reality of God at work in their lives – they see Christ-like lives in those around them.

You claim that those who come to such conclusions are taking an unbiblical stance. Many said the same of those who advocated for a more generous pastoral response to those whose marriages had ended in divorce. Even though Jesus had very direct words on the subject, the church as a whole changed its teaching and pastoral practice in regard to remarriage following divorce. The change had more to do with personal experience, and a broader understanding of the whole of the biblical tradition, than it did with one or two verses of the Bible. When we have, within the tradition, clear summaries of the teaching of that tradition as “love God and love your neighbor as yourself,” many would find it possible to take a broader reading than what appears to be the plain sense of one or two verses.

May your ministry be a blessing. I remain

Your servant in Christ,

Katharine Jefferts Schori

Read them all.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori testified by way of a televised deposition that lasted some 54 minutes. She was courteous yet clear in her conviction that CANA congregations had no right to leave the Church and take the property. When pressed to offer some negotiated settlement on property she was clear that The Episcopal Church would not negotiate with a church from another country coming into a diocese and competing with that established diocese. Asked to explain, she stated this violated current and ancient practice. Polity in all parts of the Anglican world has been for a bishop in one area to get permission from the bishop in another before going there to perform any type of ministerial function. She saw the establishment of parallel parishes and their vocal criticism of The Episcopal Church as confusing to the public and harmful to the church.

Presiding Bishop Katharine was reminded that she had signed the statement of the Primates at the Dar es Salaam meeting. It required The Episcopal Church to repent and pledge to renounce the practice of consecrating homosexual bishops and blessing same-gender “unions” or marriages. She responded that she signed to indicate that the statement represented what transpired. She indicated that she had no authority to bind the bishops or The Episcopal Church to such a statement.

Finally, when asked how she could support legal action against CANA churches when the Primates and the Archbishop of Canterbury had urged the church to settle disputes over church property within the church rather than through the courts, she responded, “I have a duty to protect the assets and the integrity of The Episcopal Church.”

Read it all.

Bishop Schofield said, “Even though the American Church is threatening us with all sorts of things, they no longer have jurisdiction over us.”

The decision to split came after several years of disagreements over same-sex unions and the roles of homosexuals in the national church. Bishop Schofield says the Valley’s view of the Bible is more traditional and orthodox.

“We’re dealing with two different teams with two different rules for the game” said Schofield. Schofield also said those differences could easily turn into a battle over who has legal ownership of the church and estates in the Valley. “Unfortunately, the liberal side is mean and ugly and going for the money and the big time” said Schofield.

After news of the split the national church issued a statement saying a lawsuit could be filed if Schofield and his congregations try to keep Episcopal Church property. But Schofield said the national church wasn’t there when he and other clergy raised money for church and the property within those sanctuaries.

Read it all (or watch the video).

“I think we continue to muddle along with enthusiasm,” Jefferts Schori said. “You can’t say it’s not enthusiastic. I look at the shift in terms of relationships across the communion in the last 10 or 15 years and I’m enormously heartened by that. Far more dioceses and congregations in this church have partnerships with the communion than was true a number of years ago, and in that sense the Anglican Communion on the ground is alive and real and growing in vitality because people are engaged in mission work together in the broadest sense.

“Yes, there is some conflict in the highest governing levels in the Anglican Communion,” she said. “The reality is that mission work is growing and increasing.”

Read it all.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori on January 11 inhibited Diocese of San Joaquin Bishop John-David Schofield.

In the text of the inhibition, Jefferts Schori wrote: “I hereby inhibit the said Bishop Schofield and order that from and after 5:00 p.m. PST, Friday, January 11, 2008, he cease from exercising the gifts of ordination in the ordained ministry of this Church; and pursuant to Canon IV.15, I order him from and after that time to cease all ‘episcopal, ministerial, and canonical acts, except as relate to the administration of the temporal affairs of the Diocese of San Joaquin,’ until this Inhibition is terminated pursuant to Canon IV.9(2) or superseded by decision of the House of Bishops.”

Jefferts Schori acted after the Title IV Review Committee certified that Schofield had abandoned the communion of the Episcopal Church.

On January 9, Upper South Carolina Bishop Dorsey Henderson, committee chair, wrote to Jefferts Schori, telling her that the nine-member committee had met that day and that a majority agreed that the documentation provided to them “demonstrated that Bishop Schofield has abandoned the communion of this Church by an open renunciation of the Doctrine, Discipline or Worship of this Church.”

Read it all.

What we have here is an attempt to pull British bishops out and into open combat with conservatives in Africa, South America, Asia and other parts of the 70-million-member Anglican Communion. The presiding bishop has played the England card in a high-stakes game of ecclesiastical poker inside the Church of England.

The tensions were already rising, as Canterbury prepares for its once-a-decade global Lambeth Conference of bishops, this coming July 20-Aug. 3. Conservatives are planning their own Global Anglican Future Conference, June 15-22 in Jerusalem.

Thus, it was symbolic that Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams recently presided at a closed-door Eucharist in London for the Clergy Consultation, a support network for gay Anglican clergy, seminarians, monks and nuns. The Times of London offered this detail: “Secrecy was so tight that a list of names attending was sent to Lambeth Palace with orders that it be shredded as soon as Dr. Williams had read it.”

Meanwhile, a few liberal activists have focused on the leader of the one U.S. diocese that has — so far — voted to cut its ties to the national church.

Read the whole thing.

Under Bishop Jefferts Schori, who served as Bishop of Nevada from 2000 until her installation as primate in November 2006, parishes were free to conduct same-sex blessings if the rector and vestry consented. Bishop Edwards said he believes the Anglican Communion has not come to consensus on the theological permissibility of invoking a blessing in the name of the church on a same-sex union. He said his policy will be similar to one commended by House of Bishops of the Anglican Church of Canada, which said that anything short of a liturgical blessing is appropriate at this time.

“It is not appropriate for us to proclaim that blessing without consensus,” Bishop Edwards said. “We are free to pray for each other and to invite God’s grace on their behalf, anything that does not constitute a blessing in the name of the church.”

Bishop Edwards said he was comfortable identifying himself as a “Windsor Bishop” as described in Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams’ Advent letter to the primates. He is adamantly opposed to the first draft of the proposed Anglican Covenant.

“I would not want to nail myself to the Windsor Report as an infallible document, but I do see it as the best vehicle for holding the Communion together,” he said. “Line me up with what Bishop Katharine and the House of Bishops did in New Orleans.”

Read it all.

Listen to it all (starts just past 45 minutes in and goes about 8 minutes. Please note that the BBC description of what “concessions” TEC made is most innaccurate, as has been noted in numerous pieces on the blog, as for example here. In addition, a related news story to the radio interview is here.

A friend emailed me this–see what you make of it–KSH.

Protocol 142/07

December 25, 2007
The Nativity of Christ

What shall we offer You, O Christ,
Who for our sakes has appeared on earth as a man?
(From the Vespers of the Nativity)

To the Most Reverend Hierarchs, the Reverend Priests and Deacons, the Monks and Nuns, the Presidents and Members of the Parish Councils of the Greek Orthodox Communities, the Distinguished Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Day, Afternoon, and Church Schools, the Philoptochos Sisterhoods, the Youth, the Hellenic Organizations, and the entire Greek Orthodox Family in America

Beloved Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

On this glorious day of the Feast of the Nativity of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ we celebrate the truly historical, universal, and eternal event of His Incarnation. It is historical, for at the divinely appointed time He entered our human history by being conceived and formed in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and was born of her in a cave in Bethlehem. It is universal because the Son of God, the divine Logos of Creation, took upon himself human flesh and blood so that He might redeem us and all of the universe from the burden of sin and death. His Incarnation and birth has eternal significance because through His life, we are offered life, not just a mortal and earthly life, but unending life. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). The gift of the Lord and the gift of life are the greatest offerings presented to humankind. God the Father gave his Son, and the Son gave Himself so that we might be restored to the life and communion for which we were created.

It is in this gift that we see and experience the true nature of giving. First, our Lord gave himself freely. He did this because of His great love for us. Jesus became like us in every way with the exception of sin. He began his life in the womb, then as an infant. He endured temptation, suffering and death, and He affirmed the power of faith through His Resurrection. In this revelation of God¹s love, our Lord has given completely, freely, and willingly so that we might be saved.

Second, Christ offered himself in humility. He did not enter this world in all of the trappings of royalty and might. He did not come seeking fame, political power, and wealth. It would appear that He came in weakness and obscurity and that His meager beginnings would be no match for worldly authority. But in His humility was His power. In entering our humanity, our Lord exalted what had been made low by sin and death. As the Son of God Incarnate, He affirmed the divine imprint on our creation and our lives. Through His birth, life, teaching, and miracles He baffled the so-called wise of this world, brought down pride and spiritual arrogance, and illumined the path of truth so that all might enter His kingdom.

Third, the offering of our Lord was one of peace. His compassionate sacrifice of himself was not accomplished through violence. His birth signified that His cause was life, and even through His death He revealed His power to give and uphold life. The peace offered by Christ is an enduring peace that is experienced and sustained not by the sword, but through faith and love.

Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Let us contemplate what our Lord has offered to us, especially during this time of year when we give to one another. Giving can and should be a blessed and beautiful act toward others when we know the true nature of giving. Our Lord has given to us freely, and in humility and love. In the challenges of our lives and the uncertainty of our world He gives us peace. What can we offer to Him and to one another? In our celebration of this great Feast of the Nativity, we can affirm our faith in Him. We can and should offer all of our being for His glory and service, sharing in the life, love, and peace that will be ours for all eternity.

With paternal love in Christ,

+DEMETRIOS
Archbishop of America

———————————————————–

The Presiding Bishop’s Christmas message 2007

(ENS)

Eyes to see

Finding Immanuel as immigrant, wanderer, child

In what form will you find the Christ child this year? The fact of the Incarnation in a weak and helpless babe says something significant about where we focus our search. I am convinced that it is part of our call to exercise a “preferential option” on behalf of the poor, weak, sick, and marginalized. The long arc of biblical thinking and theologizing has to do with seeing God’s care for those who have no other helper. Indeed, Jesus is understood as that helper for all who fail, by the world’s terms, to save themselves. More accurately, we understand that Jesus is that helper for all.

One of the great gifts of the way in which those in our cultural surroundings celebrate Christmas is the focus on children and on those who have few human helpers. We delight in the wonder of children as Christmas approaches, and many of us make an extra effort to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, and care for the needy. The challenge is to let our seasonal “seeing” transform the way we meet our neighbors through the rest of the year, and through all the coming years.

How might we begin to see that child in those around us: strangers and aliens (both Immanuel and Immigrants); wanderers (Homeless, like Mary and Joseph, for whom there was no room); widows and orphans (Social Outcasts); babe born in Bethlehem (Palestinian and Israeli alike; or the boy babies whom both Pharaoh and Herod sought to kill); divine feeder of thousands (Soup Kitchen worker); and savior of the world (Peacemaker, Bringer of Justice for All, Reconciler, Just and Gracious Lawgiver…). If God comes among us as a helpless child, then the divine presence is truly all around us. Where will you meet Jesus this Christmas?

(Hat tip: ykw)