The Diocese of Milwaukee will sue the congregation of St. Edmund’s Church, Elm Grove, in order to ensure that the church property remains available for worship by Episcopalians, said the Rt. Rev. Steven Miller, Bishop of Milwaukee.
In a letter dated Jan. 4, Bishop Miller wrote that he had been “discourteously rebuffed” when he sought to meet with the parish leadership on several occasions during the past month and that he saddened by the decision made by some members of St. Edmund’s to “disaffiliate from a diocese where their theological convictions are respected.”
I despair of TEC dioceses trying to confiscate property that has been cared for by the local congregation. Legal proceedings against Christians are discouraged if not actually forbidden by St. Paul (see I Cor 6). It is a most appalling witness to a gospel which is supposed to bring reconciliation.
The present state of TEC reminds me of the words of Howard Johnson in ‘Global Odyssey” (1963) where he says that PECUSA translated into one of the Asiatic languages becomes “the society of brawling overseers”. May God deliver us from such.
Jimmy Hamilton-Brown