“A bit of a rant” he calls it. Read it all and notice carefully where the argument really lies.

(Please note the the document quoted has already been posted earlier this week–KSH)

Anglicanism is a tradition that makes decisions on the basis of practice rather than confession. We are a church that determines membership and status by behavior rather than by belief.

–The Rev. Canon Gary R. Hall in God’s Call and Our Response

[Patrick] Gray’s arrival at the end of October coincided with a painful split in the church. More than half the congregation broke away to form Christ the Redeemer Anglican Church, in the former St. Alphonsus Catholic church in Beverly.

Its founders left Christ Church over what they called the “moral drift” of the Episcopal Church, where liberals and conservatives have been deeply divided over issues such as the consecration of an openly gay bishop. Some conservatives opted to leave.

Gray said he knew what he was getting into when he took the job, and less than three months after the breakup, he thinks most of his flock is adjusting to the new reality.

“There’s always a lament, but I think people are happy here now,” he said.

While attendance at the church’s three Sunday services used to number about 500, now about 200 of the faithful show up. Gray conceded that’s a hit spiritually and financially.

Read it all.

Read it all (30 page pdf).

The Rt. Rev Kenneth L. Price, Jr.

Dear Bishop Price,

We were gratified to read, in your letter of January 20, that you were writing in a conciliatory spirit. As you know, a number of us in the Diocese have been working diligently with those in your fold to find helpful ways of moving forward in this difficult season. As the Standing Committee of the Diocese, we heartily endorse your desire for conversation with us, especially if it leads to concrete ways in which we might work through our mutual misunderstandings and divisions. For our part, we in the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh continue to be eager to welcome back those parishes and clergy who have left our diocese. As you know, we continue to recognize the orders of those clergy who have left the diocese and make no claim on the property of parishes who are in your fold, making any transition back to us a simple transaction.

To this end, we would be grateful if a few of us, clergy and lay leaders in the diocese, could meet with you at your earliest convenience to see how we might together forge a better way forward, particularly concerning the litigation that is currently before the courts.

It would be most helpful to all if we could discuss our mutual hopes, desires and concerns for the future in a way that created space for reconciliation in the truth of the Gospel and mission in the Diocese of Pittsburgh.

In Christ,

The Standing Committee, The Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh

The Rev. Karen Stevenson, President
Mrs. Gladys Hunt-Mason
The Rev. Geoffrey Chapman
Mr. Kenneth Herbst
The Rev. Jonathan Millard
Mr. William Roemer
The Rev. Daniel Crawford
Mr. Stuart Simpson

Jack Iker, the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, was tired of fighting his church. As a conservative and traditionalist, he had long disagreed with its practice of ordaining women priests. He was deeply dismayed by its more recent consecration of a gay bishop, its policy of blessing same-sex unions, and its movement away from the Biblical teaching that salvation comes only through Jesus Christ. These changes, he felt, were all proof that his denomination had lost its way. And so, on November 15, 2008, after fifteen years as a bishop, Iker left the Episcopal Church.

But he did not leave alone. He took most of the Diocese of Fort Worth with him: 48 churches, 15,000 parishioners, and more than 58 clergy. The loyalist minority who did not follow him made up only 8 churches. And in a startling assertion of temporal power against a centuries-old establishment, Iker announced that he and his flock would be keeping their assets””hundreds of millions of dollars of real estate, buildings, and investments””the legacy of a century and a half of worship. He was leaving, in other words, but he wasn’t going anywhere.

Read it carefully and read it all.

From here:

Dear Colleagues:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I trust this finds each of you well as we begin our shared journey into the new year, and in these days following the Epiphany. This is being written after much prayer and reflection, and is sent as an expression of my personal concern. Please know this is not an attempt to speak on behalf of my companion Communion Partner Bishops, nor any of those who signed the Anaheim Statement at General Convention 2009. I speak for myself.

This week we began receiving a flurry of “consent forms,” and I have found this to rest heavy on my heart, due to the fact that this present process is impacted by the integrity of the Anaheim Statement. As many will recall, this statement was made to express with “the same honesty and clarity” of the House, our position with respect to the life of the Church and the wider Anglican Communion. In the statement, we shared in making a commitment of reaffirmation with respect to our place within the Communion and the preservation of these relationships; to the doctrine, discipline and worship of Christ as this Church has received them; our commitment to the three moratoria requested of us by the Instruments of Communion; the process that has lead to the recent release of the Anglican Communion Covenant with our hope of working towards its implementation; and to “continue in the apostles teaching and fellowship.”

A reading of the Anaheim Statement will provide a fuller understanding of the breadth and depth of that which we presented before the House of Bishops on July 16, 2009, and then made witness to by virtue of our signatures. [A copy of the Anaheim Statement including the names is attached in two different formats.]

Why am I raising this before you this day? Sadly, there has been action taken of late with respect to some episcopal elections, that in turn are an affront to what has been expressed through the Anaheim Statement. I trust each of you will review the statement as you prayerfully make your decision on the consents before you. This having been said, please know that I cannot and will not consent to the elections before us that are in contradiction to that which we have affirmed, and in the words of Jude, I appeal “to you to contend for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints.” [Jude 3]

Faithfully in the Light of Christ,

–(The Rt. Rev.) Bruce MacPherson is Bishop of Western Louisiana

The Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh’s new bishop, Kenneth L. Price, is seeking face-to-face meetings with area congregations that left the Episcopal Church over issues ranging from abortion to the consecration of a non-celibate gay bishop.

Read it all.

A desert tranquility surrounds the buildings of the Anglican Church of the Good Shepherd in San Angelo. Mesquite trees shade its parking lot and sway in the breeze, a broad expanse of rolling grass and dirt spreads out to the east of the buildings, and a large cross adorns the side of one of the walls, while ivy creeps up others.

This peaceful domain, however, has been the field of a legal battle for more than two years. And now the congregation of the Good Shepherd has been left in limbo after Judge Blair Cherry ruled in favor of giving the property to the Diocese of Northwest Texas.

“We’re just waiting and watching and praying,” said Stanley Burdock, the pastor of the Anglican Church of the Good Shepherd. “It’s an unfortunate situation, and we can trust to God to bring it to its appointed conclusion, although we don’t know what that conclusion will be.”

Read the while thing.

In the face of the tragedy in Haiti, I want to make a proposal. It’s not a realistic proposal, I grant; but it is a serious one. My proposal is this: that all those Anglicans involved in litigation amongst one another in North America ”” both in the Episcopal Church and those outside of TEC; in the Anglican Church of Canada, and those outside ”” herewith cease all court battles over property. And, having done this, they do two further things:

a. devote the forecast amount they were planning to spend on such litigation to the rebuilding of the Episcopal Church and its people in Haiti; and

b. sit down with one another, prayerfully and for however long it takes, and with whatever mediating and facilitating presence they accept, and agree to a mutually agreed process for dealing with contested property.

Read it all.

Read it all.

The 120-day processes by which bishops and standing committees of the 110 dioceses of the Episcopal Church are asked to provide formal consent to the December 2009 elections of two bishops suffragan in the Diocese of Los Angeles opened on January 5 and January 8, officials have confirmed.

“This is now a period of reflection, prayer and discernment among the bishops and standing committees,” Diocesan Bishop J. Jon Bruno said of the consent process as it officially opened. “Our diocesan officers and bishops-elect will honor this process by postponing public comment, including media interviews, until after the required consents are received. We give thanks that the Holy Spirit is at work as the Church moves forward.”

Read it all.

The breakaway from Christ Episcopal Church was part of a major rupture in the Episcopal Church of North America as conservatives rebelled against the ordination of homosexual priests and other trends in the church.

In the past decade, Africa has become a spiritual center for many Anglicans who have divorced themselves from the national Episcopal Church over divergent views on homosexuality and biblical interpretation, said Frank Kirkpatrick, a professor of religion at Trinity College in Hartford, and author of the book “The Episcopal Church in Crisis: How Sex, the Bible and Authority are Dividing the Faithful.”

When dozens of congregations, like Christ Church in Watertown, broke with the national church, their leaders surrendered their religious authority as Episcopalians, he said. African dioceses, which have led the more conservative wing of the international Anglican Communion, continued to recognize the worshippers and consecrate former Episcopalian priests to lead them.

But for Bywater, his spiritual connection to Tanzania is the result of a personal journey, rather than a political one. He said that unlike other priests who are recognized by an African diocese, he is actually an ordained priest within an African diocese.

Read it all.

The Granite State is the fifth state to allow same-sex couples to marry, joining Connecticut, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Iowa.

Ms. [“Betsy”] Hess, who holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Montana at Missoula, maintains a private practice in Berlin, and the Rev. [“Ellie”] McLaughlin, who earned a Ph.D. in medieval history at Harvard University, is the retired rector of St. Barnabas and a parishioner at St. Paul’s, Lancaster.

They described his role as an “unspeakable honor ”” a thrill.”

Bishop Robinson welcomed a congregation of well over 100 people ”” parishioners, the couple’s family members, Randolph neighbors, friends, and other clergy ”” to St. Barnabas and the City of Berlin. He recalled that when now-retired Bishop Douglas Theuner met with the parish in 2001 to tell them that he had found them a priest who was prepared to fill its vacant pulpit, he had alerted them to the fact that the Rev. McLaughlin had a life partner ”” another woman.

“You took a chance on her and loved both of them,” Bishop Robinson marveled. “You learned that God believes in love.

“I’m so proud,” the Bishop said, noting that the Berlin parish had blown away all preconceptions.

Read the whole article from the Winnisquam Echo.

I will take comments on this submitted by email only to at KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com.

The latest budgetary statement available from the ECUSA finance site is the (as yet unaudited) report for November 2009. With eleven-twelfths of the year’s income and expenses booked, the picture of ECUSA’s finances is becoming clear. ECUSA is no longer fulfilling its mission as a church. Its mission operations have been scaled back severely. The greatly reduced expenses help keep ECUSA’s deficit from being so large — and they help bury the unbudgeted drain caused by 815’s subsidies to the dioceses engaged in litigation over property. Meanwhile, ECUSA is able to show an operating “surplus” in part because — are you surprised? — its revenues from the Government are up….

Read the whole blog entry.

The Rev. David Moyer, the outspoken former Episcopal priest who unsuccessfully sued his bishop in 2008 for sacking him, has filed a malpractice lawsuit against the lawyer who represented him – often free – for many years in his battles with the diocese.

The suit, filed in Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, alleges that prominent Philadelphia litigator John Lewis and the firm of Montgomery, McCracken, Walker & Rhoads failed to adequately represent Moyer in the unusual trial against Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. and then failed to file an appeal when the jury rejected their claim.

Moyer and the Church of the Good Shepherd in Rosemont – where he serves as rector despite his ouster by the diocese in 2002 – are seeking millions of dollars in compensation for the legal costs of the trial and what they say is damage to Moyer’s and the parish’s reputations.

The lawsuit has sharply divided the Main Line parish, however, and angered some of Moyer’s conservative supporters around the diocese who supported his public challenges to liberal trends in the Episcopal Church.

Read it all.

My point is not that we shouldn’t be good stewards of the earth. We ought to be. The problem is that for two years running, green politics has eclipsed any mention of the whole pattern of human sin and redemption that forms the core of orthodox Christian belief. What we are seeing is the creation of a new, green religion, under the rubric of Christianity. Christianity includes Schori’s concern for the earth. The question is whether Schori’s green religion includes Christianity, with its broader sense of human sin and disability and its willingness to discuss how sin separates people from God.

The New Testament does not read, “God so tolerated the world that he sent his only begotten son.” The word is “loved.” That love did not include tolerating sinful conduct, but rather the destruction of sin as a barrier to God, so that human beings could become capable of love. By substituting tolerance and inclusivity for love, and largely ignoring sin as a problem, the Episcopal church is creating another “Christianity,” and another reality.

I am afraid the new Episcopal Church will replace the sometimes angry and urgent Jesus of the Bible, who invited his followers to take up their crosses and follow him, with an idea of general benevolence and personal holiness. Jesus will be portrayed as a pop-culture Buddha. I hope this doesn’t happen. Although a Roman Catholic, I was more involved in my wife’s Episcopal Church, over the last decade, than my own, and I learned to value the Episcopal Church’s contribution to the world. I am afraid it will turn into what Flannery O’Connor, in The Violent Bear It Away, called the church without Christ, “where the lame don’t walk, the blind don’t see, and what’s dead stays that way.”

Read it all.

When reviewing the major religion news stories in the Fort Worth area over the past year, one subject kept rising to the top ”” the Episcopalian split.

Two groups of Episcopalians ”” the breakaway group led by Bishop Jack Iker and the other that voted to stay in the national Episcopal Church ”” went separate ways, each claiming the title Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth.

Members of Iker’s group voted to leave the Episcopal Church, saying it has strayed from biblical principles in many ways, including ordaining an openly gay man, Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

Area Episcopalians who stayed in the national church reorganized the Fort Worth diocese, naming a provisional bishop, now the Right Rev. C. Wallis Ohl, to replace Iker. Also, they, along with the national church, filed suit in Tarrant County’s 141st District Court, seeking that Iker’s group give up all church property in the 24-county diocese.

Read it all.

…true encouragement comes from honesty before God and self and the strength of purpose to serve in the face of disappointment or uncertainty. Or so it should. I know a young person who sneered at the faith of an Episcopalian ”“ a more conservative person ”“ who chose to leave TEC for another set of ecclesial structures. “You would do such a thing”, this young person said to him: “yours is the generation, after all, who invented no-fault divorce”. In fact, in this case, the complaint was less directed at a purported hypocrite, than at what he perceived to be the witness of an impotent God, unable to garner the sacrificial steadiness of His adherents. But either way, faith is scandalized by those who do not have the strength, nor certainly seek the strength, to stand in the face of upheaval.

I will come back to this at the close of my remarks: honesty need be neither angry, miserable, nor defeatist. It should be the seed for hope, because it is the first and necessary turn to God who alone saves.

What is the difficult thing to speak, honestly? It is this: the Episcopal Church, as it has been known through the past two centuries, is no more, in any substantive sense. TEC is simply no longer the church filled with even the strength of purpose we saw only 10 years ago ”“ yes, even then, a church with a good deal of vital diversity and disagreement; but a seeming sense of restraint over pressing these in ways that overwhelmed witness and mission. And as a result, even then, it was church that was growing in outreach and faith. That church, shimmering still with some of the vibrancy of love spent for the Gospel seen140 years before, even 90 years before, is now gone. And TEC will not survive in any real continuity with this past and its gifts.

This is something we must face. To be sure, I am not speaking here of this or that diocese or bishop or congregation or clergy person within TEC: there are many through whose service the Gospel shines bright and the witness of the Kingdom flourishes. I am speaking of an institution as a whole ”“ not even in terms of its legal corporation, but in terms of its character and Christian substance given flesh in the Spirit’s mission.

Read it all carefully.

I want to stress, please, that people in the comments interact with what Ephraim is arguing for and actually saying. Comments not doing so will be dispacted into the ether. Many thanks–KSH.

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

The Anglican Covenant is now in its “final” form, and it has been distributed to the Provinces of the Communion for their consideration. It is not greatly different from the third draft that we saw several months ago. I believe that the first three sections are an excellent – truly excellent – summary of what Anglicans believe and have in common. The full text is available at: http://www.anglicancommunion.org/commission/covenant/final/text.cfm

Section four is in a sense what the whole exercise has been about. The drafting of this Covenant was first proposed in the 2004 Windsor Report which was produced in response to the Primates’ concerns over the election and consecration of an openly non-celibate gay man as Bishop of New Hampshire.

It has been a lengthy process, and it will not be concluded soon. But section four of the Covenant outlines a process by which the majority of the Communion might be able to declare that a given action on the part of one of its member Churches (such as the consecration of an openly non-celibate homosexual bishop) is or would be “incompatible with the Covenant” and there might then be “relational consequences.”

From the beginning of the Covenant drafting process the Archbishop of Canterbury has been clear that he hoped we would create a Covenant that each member Province could voluntarily decide to “opt into” or not. He has envisioned a “two tier” or “two track” Communion in which those Provinces that choose to “opt into” the Covenant remain in “constituent membership” in the Communion, and those Provinces that “opt out” of the Covenant move into “associate membership” – something which he has compared to the status of the Methodist Church: it has an Anglican heritage, but it is really a separate denomination.

The Episcopal Church’s Executive Council has said that the earliest time in which TEC as a whole can officially consider the Covenant is the General Convention of 2012. But, in his response to my inquiry on behalf of our Diocesan Board, the Archbishop of Canterbury has said that dioceses are certainly free to “affirm” the Covenant if and when they choose to do so.

The Covenant has created a procedure by which those Provinces that “opt into” it can take action on behalf of the Communion as a whole to declare that certain actions are outside the bounds of our corporate life, and while the “relational consequences” are not spelled out in the Covenant itself, they clearly are foreshadowed by those Provinces which have declared “impaired” or “broken” communion with The Episcopal Church over the consecration of the Bishop of New Hampshire.

Both our Diocesan Board and our Standing Committee have already affirmed the first three sections of the Covenant, and there is a Resolution to be considered by our 41st Convention next month to do likewise. Now that the fourth section has been finalized Fr. Eric Turner (who proposed the original Resolution) will offer a substitute Resolution that the Convention affirm the Covenant as a whole.

I have repeatedly said that I believe the only hope for the Anglican Communion is in following the Archbishop’s lead in drafting and adopting this Covenant. I now urge the delegates to Convention to study it and affirm it on January 30.

It remains my personal commitment to uphold the Covenant, and I give you my assurance, again, that I will never consent to the election of a bishop (or for that matter a priest or deacon) living in a relationship of sexual intimacy other than marriage as the Book of Common Prayer defines and understands it (one man and one woman, in Christ).

Warmest regards in our Lord,

–(The Rt. Rev.) John W. Howe is Bishop of Central Florida

Bearing on the church’s position is a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences that concluded: “Intuiting God’s beliefs on important issues may not produce an independent guide, but may instead serve as an echo chamber to validate and justify (a Christian’s) own beliefs.” In bumper sticker phraseology: “I said it; God believes it; that settles it.”

This phenomenon contributes to a nasty situation when the individual’s physical rejection of homosexuality or abortion — to name two — become, as the eminent philosopher Martha Nussbaum puts it, projective disgust toward others. This leads to regarding a group of people as inferior or evil, even to the point of wanting to kill or maim them.

Read it all.

(Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ):

As we approach the nativity of Christ, we need to remember the admonition of the angels to the shepherds: “Be not afraid.”

The Episcopal Church, a member of the Anglican Communion, for more than the past 30 years has been working on gradual, full incorporation of gay and lesbian people. We have worked to be people of gracious restraint for all these years and have now come to a place in our lives that is normal evolutionary change which compels us to move from tolerance to full inclusion.

As with racial and cultural divides, we can look to the great words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who calls us not to fall prey to the insidious drug of gradualism. Indeed, as he said in his speech titled “I Have a Dream”: “This is no time … to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism …. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.”

We must move forward and respect the dignity of all human beings which is called for in our Baptismal Covenant and canons.

The Diocese of Los Angeles has acted in good faith and is moving forward in supporting the full inclusion and full humanity of all people in the Church. Thus, we celebrate the elections of Diane Jardine Bruce and Mary Douglas Glasspool as our next Bishops Suffragan called to share in the work of a strong episcopal team serving this Diocese and all of God’s people.

–(The Rt. Rev.) J. Jon Bruno is Bishop of Los Angeles

The following resolution was passed by the Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion meeting in London on 15-18 December, and approved for public distribution.

Resolved that, in the light of:

1. The recent episcopal nomination in the Diocese of Los Angeles of a partnered lesbian candidate
2. The decisions in a number of US and Canadian dioceses to proceed with formal ceremonies of same-sex blessings
3. Continuing cross-jurisdictional activity within the Communion

The Standing Committee strongly reaffirm Resolution 14.09 of ACC 14 supporting the three moratoria proposed by the Windsor Report and the associated request for gracious restraint in respect of actions that endanger the unity of the Anglican Communion by going against the declared view of the Instruments of Communion.

On behalf of the staff and former Sr. Warden’s we wish to thank you for your faithful commitment to engage the discernment process this fall. While the question before our congregation was a serious and sobering one, the depth and richness of the materials and sermons combined with your participation in LifeGroups has worked to deepen our corporate understanding of the Lord’s direction in our life and the call upon this parish, so, thank you.

Last night we gathered to count the response forms and by a 93% ”“ 6% margin the congregation has overwhelmingly recommended that St. Andrew’s affiliate with the Anglican Church in North America and separate from The Episcopal Church.

Read it all..

Read the whole thing.

Needless to say — once spelled out like that, the goals that Bishop Lawrence lays out are ambitious. He wants to both protect and educate more thoroughly his own diocese, mobilize his laity, differentiate the diocese strikingly from TEC’s heretical actions, and reach out to others throughout TEC and the Anglican Communion, building strategic clusters of individuals, parishes, dioceses, and provinces.

To do that, as nearly as I can see, he will need to accrue some significant funding and allies, as well as producing 1) some excellent communication tools [for more Internet, video, and email communication, along with ads and direct mail pieces with excellent mailing lists], 2) event planning throughout the country, and 3) discipleship tools for laity. All of those things help to circumvent the “information gatekeepers” whether they be rectors in his own diocese, bishops in other dioceses, or ENS and 815.

But do his proposals offer any glimmers of hope to folks trapped in dioceses ruled by heterodox bishops and clergy?

I believe they do, for people both in excellent parishes [but not dioceses] and people in not so great dioceses or parishes.

Read it all.

What many people do not know, and others, I’m afraid, choose to ignore, is the legal independence of the Episcopal Church from other jurisdictions. In fact, it was in Chestertown, Maryland, in 1780, that a convention of clergy and laymen began the process of making an American Church separate from the Church of England, in the spirit of our declaration of political independence of 1776.

After that, the Archbishop of Canterbury had no more legal jurisdiction in this nation than King George III, the “Supreme Governor” of the established Church of England. So when Archbishop Rowan Williams says that he regrets Canon Glasspool’s election and urges the American church to reject her, he does not speak in any official capacity.

Read it all.

A Statement from the Vestry of Christ Episcopal Church
Accokeek, Maryland
August 2009 (Made earlier but released now–KSH)

Christ Church was established in 1698 and has consistently sought to be faithful to the teachings of the Church catholic””as found in the Scriptures, the Creeds and the Book of Common Prayer””as this Church has received them.

We reaffirm our commitment to the teaching of human sexuality as revealed in the Holy Scriptures and affirmed by the Church catholic: sexual intimacy is a gift and mystery which God has designed to be expressed solely in the covenant of marriage between one man and one woman. All are called to chastity; some are called to celibacy. Consequently, all who are ordained are likewise called to live according to
these standards. We also reaffirm our commitment to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ in word and deed to Accokeek and the whole world.

Therefore, we reject resolutions D025 and C056 of General Convention 2009. Whether prescriptive or descriptive, they will not repair the broken bridges in the Anglican Communion, whose fabric is torn at its deepest level. They demonstrate an unwillingness to observe two of the moratoria which all four Instruments of Unity have asked for. They violate the explicit teaching of the Communion regarding human sexuality, especially as expressed in the 1998 Lambeth Conference resolution 1.10. They ignore the consensus of Christians throughout all time. They stand in contradiction to the explicit teaching of Scripture regarding human sexuality. And in particular, C056 violates the Episcopal Church’s own canons concerning the Covenant of Marriage. Therefore, we repudiate these resolutions and dissociate ourselves from them and their consequences.

We emphasize that we believe we are upholding the teaching of human sexuality which God has revealed. This teaching is entirely harmonious with the proclamation of the good news of God in Jesus Christ: that God’s love for all people””whether male or female, rich or poor, gay or straight””is ferociously manifest in Jesus’ cross and resurrection.

Lastly, we commend the work, at various levels within the Communion, on the Anglican Covenant and welcome the opportunity to review, study and sign its final draft.

From here:

Like many other Dioceses across the Episcopal Church, we will soon consider the election of Canon Mary Glasspool as Bishop Suffragan of the Diocese of Los Angeles. We pledge to do so prayerfully, recognizing, as the Archbishop of Canterbury stated, that our decision “will have very important implications” for the future of the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion.

We regret the recent statement by the Bishop of Los Angeles, The Rt. Rev. John Bruno, that withholding consent because of Canon Glasspool’s sexuality “would be a violation of the canons of this church.” The theme of the most recent General Convention, hosted by the Diocese of Los Angeles, was “Ubuntu.” At that convention the Presiding Bishop invited the Church “into a larger and more expansive way of understanding identity in community.” We thus find the threat of canonical discipline, however veiled or unintended, sadly ironic to the call of living in community despite our differences, even differences on the subject of human sexuality.

For our part, we pledge to respectfully and prayerfully consider Canon Glasspool’s election, not only in light of her qualifications, but also in light of our valued place in the Anglican Communion and the call of the proposed Covenant to act in continuity and consonance with Scripture and the catholic and apostolic faith, order, and tradition, as received by the Churches of the Anglican Communion. We encourage other Standing Committees in the Episcopal Church do the same, pledging our prayers for Canon Glasspool, Bishop Bruno, The Diocese of Los Angeles, and the Episcopal Church.

But a common complaint of American and European conservatives against Muslims is that Islam itself is a monolithic faith unsuitable for the pluralistic West. We don’t have to accept this characterization of Islam to recognize that it is close to what Anglican traditionalists are advocating for their own church.

Besides, if ever a church were rooted less in timeless truths than in historic particularities, it is Anglicanism, and the Episcopal wing of Anglicanism most of all. Anglicanism began, after all, because the pope would not sanctify Henry VIII’s divorce, and Henry used the opportunity to seize the church and all its properties. Episcopalianism began when the leaders of the American Revolution (two-thirds of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were active or, like George Washington, nominal Anglicans) realized they could hardly stay religiously affiliated with a church headed by the very king against whom they were rebelling secularly.

Given the schismatic and distinctly secular nature of Anglicanism’s and Episcopalianism’s origins, the pending ordination of L.A.’s lesbian bishop seems well within the church tradition. A faith rooted in the denial of papal authority and kingly authority, a faith that in the United States has increasingly championed egalitarian principles, should hardly be cowed by contingent bigotries masquerading as universal truths.

Read it all.