Finally, for those who are alienated within the Episcopal Church, the aim of the “professionally mediated discussion” has already been determined: “WCG believes that the advent of schemes such as the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme instituted by the Presiding Bishop in the United States should be sufficient to provide for the care of those alienated within the Episcopal Church from recent developments.”[4] (emphasis added)
According to this recommendation of the WCG, those within TEC will have two alternatives to choose from: a Communion Partners Fellowship scheme that has no details as yet beyond DEPO and mere fellowship, or an Episcopal Visitors scheme imposed by the Presiding Bishop. What is the point of gathering those alienated by TEC for a “professionally mediated conversation” when the results have already been pre-determined? Is it an opportunity for further indoctrination in the false gospel of TEC? Or institutional loyalty? Or simply an exercise designed to wear down their resistance to false teaching?
This report from the WCG is the culmination of five years of conversation, dialogue, schemes, reports, and committees that have all failed to adequately address the crisis before us. These efforts have failed in part because they have not adequately talked with or heard from those most hurt by this crisis, those persecuted orthodox Anglicans in North America. Skeptics will be forgiven for recognizing in these WCG recommendations the same processes that have failed to hold the Communion together, and the same processes of delay that TEC will take advantage of while imposing a false gospel at home and throughout the rest of the Communion.
RE: “WCG believes that the advent of schemes such as the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme instituted by the Presiding Bishop in the United States should be sufficient to provide for the care of those alienated within the Episcopal Church from recent developments.”
Well duh — obviously it’s “sufficient” . . . until those alienated within the Episcopal Church leave. ; > )
And if they leave, then, well . . . they’re just divisive anyway, or “the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme” would have been sufficient to keep them in TEC in the first place.
I think the entire thing could be rather easy to answer. One of the orthodox bishops remaining in TEC ( [i]e.g.[/i] +Lawrence ) should re-introduce GC-03 resolution B-001 verbatim to the House of Bishops.
If it passes and laity concur, there is perhaps a basis for “conversation” (professionally mediated or not). If it’s close, there’s at least basis for highly-guarded hope. If the numbers look like they did six years ago there’s no point in maintaining even a charade of continuance … in false hope that GC-12, or GC-15, or GC-18, might somehow be better.
Anglican Communion to orthodox faithful in TEC: Get lost.
Thanks for caring, guys.
Mediation – that must be a Genpo concept. The AC is toast. Wonder if it will even get a footnote in the history books. Great job, Rowan and fellow travelers of the ECUSA/TEC/GCC/EO-PAC!
Might the result have been different if ++Orombi had foregone the New Wineskins conference and attended the ACC meeting?
[blockquote]”WCG believes that the advent of schemes such as the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme instituted by the Presiding Bishop in the United States should be sufficient to provide for the care of those alienated within the Episcopal Church from recent developments.”[/blockquote]
On what evidence did they base this conclusion?
#6, IIRC, the WCG conclusions about sufficiency have been published for some time. ++Orambi’s presence this week would have only provided the opportunity to futher address the failure and the changing nature of the WCG these past few years, but I doubt much he could cause change.
Looking back, the official acceptance under the pressure of the ABC of the HOB meeting in New Orleans as “sufficiently” meeting the Primates’s directives from Dar was likely the turning point in how the AC will deal with heresy. In the AC appearance is worth more than substance. Fortunately for the church universal not everyone bows to that compromise.
Well, all this is process for the sake of process. It will make a good “book mark” for those who need cover. “We’re still working on this reconciliation”.
For those of you who believe that this Windsor process will bear fruit through an accountable covenant someday, please tell me where you find any hope for communion discipline or accountability in all of these fruitless confabs?
Meanwhile, the ACNA simply needs to move forward so that Gospel mission can replace organizational introspection as the Guiding Light for life in our congregation. “Let goods and kindred go, this mortal life also; the body they may kill, God’s Truth abideth still. His Kingdom is forever”
RE: “Might the result have been different if ++Orombi had foregone the New Wineskins conference and attended the ACC meeting?”
No, we can be assured of that by the previous meetings — many — of which Orombi was a part, exhibit #49 being the Dar meeting of the Primates. There comes a time when one realizes that all the meetings in the world will not matter to the final outcome, and one moves on and refuses to be used any longer.
As I’ve said for years now, Rowan guages “success” by whether people all “come to the table and continue talking and listening.”
Long ago, the Primates who cared about such matters needed to cease “coming to the table and talking” — in other words, cease engaging in a charade that is only designed to be a faux *demonstration of unity in the gospel* where there is none. Rowan’s rhetoric has been *consistently* that we all still share the same gospel — and one can see this by the fact that everybody keeps showing up for the meetings.
There won’t be resolution — if ever — as long as Rowan is the ABC. So the question is . . . what profitably can be worked at during his tenure that does not concern “resolution” or anything like that? There are, depending on where one is strategically, lots of things that groups of bishops, clergy, and laity can work at, both inside and outside the Communion, while waiting on Rowan’s retirement.
RE: “On what evidence did they base this conclusion [that the advent of schemes such as the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme instituted by the Presiding Bishop in the United States should be sufficient to provide for the care of those alienated within the Episcopal Church]?
Simple. The folks who find the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme adequate, told them it would be adequate. And the rest who don’t find it adequate will leave or do other things.
QED. ; > )
ACC-14 signifies that all of the Instruments of Unity have now failed to discipline TEC and the Canadians for their provocations since 2003. To review:
1. ABC: has consistently used his powers to shield TEC, primarily by preventing the other Instruments from acting.
2. Primates Meetings: A clear majority tried to discipline TEC several times, but the will of the majority was thwarted by the ABC, either personally or by using people he controls within the small, but real, international Anglican bureaucracy.
3. Lambeth: Indabaed to paralysis.
4. ACC: Equated border crossings with TEC’s drift away from the Faith, and refused to acknowedge TEC’s violations of the same sex blessings, etc. or TEC’s aggressive litigation. ACC-14 froze out both ACNA and the orthodox people still in TEC, all while permitting TEC seat and voice. Of course, TEC is using that seat and voice to sabotage the Covenant, procedurally and substantively.
So at last, six years after CG 2003, we know that the Instruments, individually and collectively, will not help the situation in North America. They will not.
So where does that leave us? Help will come, but not through the Instruments. I think that the authors of the article are referring to that when they say that structural shifts in the Communion are inevitable. It is still premature to know how Anglicanism will look (if it exists at all) after the coming changes.
ACNA may be the answer, or part of the answer, but I do not think that any of this is evidence that one should either leave or stay in TEC. The institutional church exists to bring individual souls to God, and not the other way around. The Holy Spirit will continue to call and guide the faithful whether they are in TEC, ACNA, or any non-Anglican church.
I agree wholeheartedly with Stuart Smith (#9) and Sarah Hey’s #10. But I’ll just add that Fr. Phil Ashey’s incisive and lucid dissection of what’s wrong with the whole PV scheme is “sufficient” evidence as to why the liberal powers that be in the ACO and the JSC desperately wanted to exclude him from this important meeting.
What we are seeing is yet more “clarity” about the future of the AC, as if any were needed. The tear in the fabric of the AC just keeps getting wider and deeper, while the series of endless and fruitless meetings and futile discussions goes on and on.
Stuart, thanks for reminding us of the stirring ending of Luther’s great hallmark hymn, Ein Feste Burg. I emphatically agree with you. The time for talking is over, it’s time to ACT and choose sides. “Let goods and kindred go…”
David Handy+
RE: “Fr. Phil Ashey’s incisive and lucid dissection of what’s wrong with the whole PV scheme is “sufficient†evidence as to why the liberal powers that be in the ACO and the JSC desperately wanted to exclude him from this important meeting. . . . ”
Not sure how that follows. Plenty of folks like me wouldn’t want a member of the ACNA on a Communion instrument either. It was a ludicrous and odd attempt in the first place.
What would happen if we had a year long moratorium on “meetings” by all the “instruments”? What did we ever do as Christians before all of these deliberations? How has the Faith and witness of the Body of Christ benefited from ACCs gatherings? I’m trying to imagine a life of ordained ministry in which I was continuously meeting with every group within my parish to talk about procedure and the process of future communications…but, never actually worshipping/teaching/serving/evangelizing/fellowshipping! Just one day of wall to wall “meetings” after another! It’s almost too painful to contemplate. Yet, that seems to be the life of the Anglican communion: meetings, meetings, meetings; words, words, words; statements, statements, statements. Sound and fury signifiying….nothing!
Yes, Stuart (#15) not only meeting after meeting, but each meeting thinks that they have to issue a report (Windsor, etc) and that the report will make a difference. What a sham and a huge waste of not only time but money!!!
#12, I applaud your listing of refusals of all instruments to deal (or be allowed to deal) with the torn fabric of the communion. It would appear, as David+ indicates in #14, that the tear is simply widening. But what is to be done? My feelings are that this is a play that simply has to be “played out.” The forms and outlines of the play are being held in place by the 4 instruments, espcially the ABC, and the play will only end when all characters have been introduced and fully explored and have completed their parts in the play. ACNA has just been introduced as a new character, for instance, and its part will have to be explored and completed. GAFCON, as a new character, will have to complete its part. If TEC’s ASA and money continues to diminish, its part will necessarily diminish. The growth of GS will increase its part. But the play, called the Anglican Communion, will continue for a long time. As humans, we are simply too impatient for its conclusion. And unfortunately, we are not only the audience, we are also the chorus … most difficult roles to play simultaneously. None of us have any definitive answers, because being the audience and the chorus, we are not the playwright. But we shall have to trust the One who is the playwright, if we are to bring the play to a just and right conclusion.
All we can do, IMHO, is just keep on truckin in our own space for God and our neighbors. Peace to all. Billy
[u]7. Dcn Dale[/u],
You asked [blockquote]On what evidence did they base this conclusion?[/blockquote] Surely, sir, you jest. They are Bishops, meeting at, General Convention. Evidence? [b]They don’t need no stinking evidence![/b]
Pax et bonum,
Keith Töpfer
#17 – The Playwright gave us His Script. This play’s been in production and acted out for a couple of thousand years…but sometimes pretty badly. When the the original script…and the notes left by the original directors, cast and crew are used, the play has been successful and profitable. However, now and then (like now) egomaniax try to write their own or a new play and incorporate acting, styles and lines that aren’t in the book. As a result, the play bombs, ticket sales drop and the play in that theatre ends.
Phil+, if you had not been unseated what would you have proposed as a solution or even a minority report toward a solution for those “alienated” with TECUSA?
Although I disagree with Sarah’s answer, “The folks who find the Communion Partners Fellowship and the Episcopal Visitors scheme adequate, told them it would be adequate”, at least in one paragraph she suggested what is the only way to move things along, and that is, “There are, depending on where one is strategically, lots of things that groups of bishops, clergy, and laity can work at, both inside and outside the Communion”, which also translates to inside and outside TECUSA.
And I might add that the testy little attempt in the report to equate and apply the meaning of terms between an American colloquial phrase (“holding tank”) and an English phrase was quite unnecessary, and somewhat sophomoric.
In fact, as I read and re-read the report I can’t help but have the sense that whole purpose of the report was to tell folks in TECUSA to give up and get out, no matter Who told you to stay.
I post this with some inconclusion about purpose and agenda of the report from these guys.
Sarah? Thoughts more than what you have already posted?
The report of the WCG spoke of Pastoral Visitors. The recent discussion in Jamaica likewise speaks of PVs. Two of these PVs were present in Houston. PVs are not Episcopal Visitors. PVs exist within a context of a covenant, a covenant with an intact Section 4 (this is, with the capacity of dioceses et al to affirm the covenant and so differentiate as Anglican Communion linked in explicit ways), and so here the CP notion is close to hand (recall the commotion over the content of private emails appearing recently). At no point has CP sought to link PVs solely to its logic, though Fr Ashey seems to believe ACNA was specifically ignored by the first visit of the PVs to VTS. Greater clarity is probably needed on whether ACNA is going to affirm and sign the covenant, and so whether PVs might be a desirable way forward. But that of course is tied up with the fate of the covenant as we are now watching that, and also what the place of ACNA might be in the light of that and also of its own sense of its future.
#18. Martial Artist,
[blockquote]They don’t need no stinking evidence![/blockquote] You mean they are taking it on “Faith”. I thought they were big on the evidence thing since they are so fond of viewing through the lens of science.
The Anglican Communion can and should never be compared to a ‘play’. This is Christ’s Church we are talking about. You don’t wait a season and discuss for a season as to whether it is a good time to prune the vines. There is no argument there. The farmer who dithers over his crops runs the risk of further damage to his produce.
He doesn’t listen to those who would say, wait Mr. Farmer, lets talk about methods of farming first. Let’s make sure that we are all in tune with each other and allow all of us to accept the use of the new and innovative fertilizers which we bought from China to work.
Our farming manual is very clear about taking care of the crops and we risk ruin if we don’t follow the instructions we were given from the start.
Dr. Seitz (#21),
Thanks for dropping in and making a clarifying comment. Personally, as you would expect since I’m a fervent supporter of the ACNA, I think the whole Covenant idea is a case of doing “too little, too late,” and that the whole PV plan is woefully inadequate. Nonetheless, I honor you and the others who are bravely attempting to pursue the CP approach.
Sarah (#15),
I was trying to be succinct, and it’s not surprising that my logic was perhaps hard to follow. What I meant in my #14 was simply that the kind of incisive and articulate analysis that Fr. Ashey gave us of the ABoC’s presentation of the WCG report illustrates why the powers that be in the AC didn’t want such a vocal and persuasive critic among the official delegates, if it could be helped. Of course, it’s not really about Fr. Phil Ashey, as if he were that important or that threatening to the ACO. It appears to have been a symbolic gesture, much as Uganda’s choice to send him as their clergy delegate was a symbolic (and provocative) gesture. Whether his selection was just foolish (in terms of church politics) and needlessly provocative is certainly debatable, but it has served to provide more clarity now, hasn’t it?
I’ll just repeat here what I’ve said often before. The deplorable lack of leadership by the ABoC has left a vaccuum at the center of the AC, but that vaccuum inevitably is being filled by others who aren’t afraid to lead. And as far as I’m concerned, the bold and visionary ++Henry Orombi is one of the most impressive and influential of those men who are displaying the undaunted courage and unswerving faith that is called for in those fateful times. I’m proud to attend a Ugandan church when I’m in Richmond. I would gladly follow ++Orombi (and +John Guernsey) through fire and high water. I wouldn’t follow the ABoC to the grocery store.
David Handy+
Oops, I see now that my earlier post was #13, and Sarah’s response was #14.
David Handy+
#23, sorry you don’t like my metaphor. But I believe you have misinterpreted it. No one is saying there is any waiting or delay. The characters (ACNA, GAFCON, TEC, CofE, ABC, ACC, HOB, Integrity, et al) are doing what they are going to do, when they decide to do it. All of us pewsitters and the priests are basically at their mercy, unless we decide to withdraw completely. We are the chorus in the sense that we can warn of coming events or report what has occurred. Otherwise, we are just part of the times, with only the input on blogs and our interactions in our own churches and dioceses to make us a part of what is going on. Unless one leaves the AC, one is going to be a part of this play until the end. You talk of vine pruning, but each character wants to prune the other characters’ vines, in all sincerity. You say this is not a play, we have to get on with the business of Christ’s Church, but each character believes sincerely that is what he/she/they are doing. The ABC believes he is doing Christ’s work by trying to hold the whole mess together until God shows us the way forward (and he believes that way is the covenant). TEC believes it is doing that by creating a place of justice for all, including homosexual persons. ACNA believes it is doing that by upholding God’s law. Some of us don’t know what to do, so we sit and pray and try to discern what God’s will is for us each day and try to love our neighbors as Christ loved us, and hope we are doing what is right. In the meantime, the play goes on around us, and we in the audience watch it, and we in the chorus, report it on the blogs and at our churches and in our diocesan meetings. Short of exiting the theater, you have not choice but to be a part of the play.
#26 – “TEC believes it is doing that by creating a place of justice for all, including homosexual persons.”
There is the first fallacy: There are no ‘homosexual persons’…There are just people with disoriented identities and misdirected sexual responses, that is, conditioned responses toward persons of the same sex.
God does not discriminate or exclude anyone:
I Corinthians 6:9-20 states this in no uncertain terms.
On this issue, and in other theological areas, TEC is not in accord with God’s word and God’s definition of love, truth and justice.
TEC does not agree with the Church of 2000 years or with science and statistics.
TEC is not even being loving to bless sin and to call evil good. This leaves people in slavery to sin, vulnerable the effects of sin which statistics show are increased risks of relational and emotional instability, depression, addiction, suicide, dependency, disease and death. Approval and affirmation of homosexuality has not decreased, but increased the statistical probability of these outcomes.
The ABC, CoE and other Western provinces that also approve and promote these lifestyles are not helping, but harming the people who have these (disoriented identities, misdirected) feelings toward persons of the same-sex.
If there is literally such a thing as killing with kindness and this is one example.
It is a travesty of justice for the Church to suppress and deny the truth of God’s redemption and healing power and to approve of sin. Read Romans 1:18-32 which states this in no uncertain terms.
A Church that does so becomes an instrument of harm, deception and evil in God’s eyes according to Scripture.
Sarah, why are you so ‘angry’ or ‘hostile’ toward those who have left TEC?
It would seem they ought to garner the same respect you demand for those who stay in TEC.
Isn’t everyone basically on the same team?
#28. Unashamed Anglican,
[blockquote]Sarah, why are you so ‘angry’ or ‘hostile’ toward those who have left TEC?[/blockquote] I know you addressed the question to Sarah but I would like to say as a “leaver” that I have never had a sense that Sarah was angry at leavers except when leavers question why she and others have stayed. Otherwise I have never seen her less than respectful of leavers.
UnashamedAnglican, if you are referring to criticism as “anger” or “hostility” than you might just as well ask why I am “angry” or “hostile” toward those who have stayed! I try to articulate my concerns and criticisms objectively about both stayers and leavers, and do not accept in the least your assertioni that I am “hostile” or “angry” with those who have left TEC. Indeed, if one were going to judge by the pounds of ink I have spilled in criticism and analysis, one would have to tip the hat towards “hostility” and “anger” towards Communion Partners, or the ACI — and I have some very well-respected allies and friends at least in the former.
Pointing out that people in the US who have left TEC are no longer members of the Communion, even though they have remained connected to a province of same Communion, is not only verifiably true by the Communion [as I have demonstrated time and time again on this and other blogs], but admitted as true by many people who have left TEC. So if you are referring to my appropriate analysis of the rhetorical, TEC-like sophistry of *some* of those who have left TEC, I stand completely behind that.
Further, I would not want Matt Kennedy, who is a dear friend of mine, to attempt to gatecrash the ACC meeting under Kenya — and I do not believe that he would accuse me of “hostility” or “anger” towards him. Finally, I have near and dear relatives who are “leavers.”
No, your question merely demonstrates that you do not like critical analysis or simple statements of belief — and that also is quite TEC-like. Are you sure you’ve “really left” since you sound so eerily similar to the progressive activists?
Sarah, that feels to me like a hostile response, it certainly makes me feel unsafe—so I am not criticizing you, but just telling you how I experience those words.
Sarah, I think what has surprised me about your responses on this thread is your seeming inability to separate out your personal beliefs (I don’t want a member of ACNA representing the Anglican Communion) with your ability to analyze the issue impartially on a strategic basis.
You normally seem to excel at the latter and plenty of times have affirmed revisionists’ strategies even while making clear you don’t support them – but you have recognized the shrewdness of their strategies. It is thus odd to see you heap such scorn on the ACNA’s strategies.
I do find the attempt to seat Ashey+ as the clergy rep from Uganda as being a bit odd, but I actually have to applaud it for the clarity it has provided, especially when it has been demonstrated that a clear precedent was set back in 1999 that member provinces have full freedom to determine who represents them at ACC. (TEC was allowed to seat Mark Dyer, even though he had been retired for 5 years in clear contradiction to the ACC rules that retired clergy or bishops are no longer eligible.) So, ++Uganda’s move is brilliant in exposing hypocrisy.
On an idealist level, I could wish ++Uganda were not playing such political games, but sadly, they appear to be needed in the current context – it is the only language that many in the Communion seem to understand.
Sarah, I should add that I’m not trying to say that people MUST agree with ++Uganda’s strategy.
I’d welcome hearing from you why it is wrong from a strategic level. But you don’t seem to have analyzed it from that perspective, which is very unlike you. I think that’s why some seem to be sensing hostility.
It seems you’ve let your personal disapproval of ACNA or the need to prove that ACNA is not in the Anglican Communion become the focus of your comments rather than actually addressing the action of what Uganda has attempted. Put yourself in Uganda’s shoes, as you so often seem to do… “Of course group X is welcome to do X, Y or Z” you so often write. “I don’t support them, but I wish them well in their attempt to achieve their goals” is the type of thing you write frequently. Yet you have said nothing of the sort re: Uganda’s action here. Can you see any merit to their strategy? I’d really like to know.
It seems to me that Sarah’s analysis has hit the nail directly on the head regarding Uganda’s action. Sarah is very consistent in her analysis — I’ve never known her to be otherwise — and has taken care to keep emotion at bay. I’m rather surprised by those who don’t — or who can’t for some reason — recognize that.
Unashamed Anglican, I am not responsible for your feelings — but they appear to spring from analytical responses or objective criticism, and thus it is fruitless for us to further converse. Anything I said would no doubt make you “feel unsafe.” ; > )
Nevertheless, I continue to state that I do not accept your assertions of my “hostility” or “anger” simply because I clearly state my own beliefs and point out facts.
Hi KarenB — you ask above about my beliefs that the ACNA strategy of attempting to gate-crash a Communion instrument were not strategically well-done.
Leaving aside the issues — which I have pointed out time and time again [i]and consistently and droningly so[/i] for three years now of members and non-members of TEC attempting to redefine the Communion as “anybody who says they’re ‘in the Communion'” — I do indeed think the “strategy” was foolish and ridiculous. [Just as a reminder, I’ve also thought and pointed out publicly that some ACI and CP strategies were foolish and ridiculous too.]
First off, there was no “exposure of hypocricy” in my — and many others — opinions. The folks in my diocese for instance, who are certainly my allies and friends, don’t notice or believe there was an “exposure of hypocricy” either. This isn’t just a “personal eccentric opinion” of mine — it’s the personal opinions of many many other conservative TECans as they watched the ludicrous display of the “Tales From The ACC Fringe” play out over the past week. I’m not going to name names, as I can’t speak for them, but you would certainly recognize those names.
The difference between Dyer and Ashey is that Dyer was an actual member of the Anglican Communion.
It’s clear that now the instruments are going to tighten up on participation by people [i]simply because of the intense conflicts in the Communion, including the issues of ACNA claims of Communion membership.[/i] Not to mention Bishop Robinson.
There’s no question that things were footloose and fancy free in 1999 — I’ll bet there were not just one violation of the rules with Dyer, but many others. But can’t you see, KarenB, that we have a whole new level of problem with people who aren’t members of the Communion being a part of the Instruments of Communion? After all, the AMiA, for instance, never sent over a “Rwandan representative” back then — although I can certainly guarantee you that he would have been promptly and soundly rejected then as well, [not to mention if a province attempted to insert an Islamic imam or Wiccan priest as “their representative” with the claim that there were no written-down rules addressing that matter in the Constitution of the ACC.] And the same thing is true for the TEC canons. TEC canons were not nearly so closely scrutinized a decade ago as they are now. You know and I know that all sorts of irregularities in consents for bishop elections, for instance, were rampant back in the good old days.
But the fact is that [i]were the ACNA members actually accepted as members of the Communion you would de facto have approved a new parallel province in the US[/i]. Obviously . . . that’s not what those instruments want!
Consider, Karen — the exact same loud cries of “hypocricy” and “where’s the precedent” and “how could theys” were bellowed about the exclusion of Gene Robinson from Lambeth too.
Let’s look, then, strategically, at what has actually been accomplished by the gambit, the outcome of which all parties could have predicted
Even die-hard, fundamentalist, radical, right-wing homophobes like me — and there are a lot of us out here — think it was an outlandish display and also a demonstration of desperation.
Obviously revisionists think it was ridiculous and a good source for mockery — although certainly we shouldn’t make of that all that much, since their disapproval is usually a good thing.
Moderates are faintly embarrassed by the whole thing.
The only people I can think of who think it was “a great idea” — in a consistent bunch that is — are some [not all] members of the ACNA.
I don’t look at this as any sort of “oh boy, the ABC has embarrassed himself now” or “look at the bad old ACC”. I look on it as “what on earth was the ACNA thinking — other than, of course . . . ‘let’s make a scene — that’ll be fun!'”
Let me grant something though.
Some people like you, KarenB, approve of this. That’s fine. I’m not too worried over the incident, other than to correct the usual sophistries that some people pull out of their hat, like boilerplate, about their own redefinitions of the Anglican Communion.
But what it does is highlight in stark clarity the immense divide between 1) the conservative folks I hang out with — many of whom will leave TEC over the next three years, and 2) many leaders of the ACNA. Those people who do leave TEC over the next three years will now have another reason — sort of just another straw — not to consider the ACNA but instead to consider, say, Eastern Orthodoxy.
Is that really a good thing, KarenB? Maybe so — I’ve always said that reality and clarity are better than self-deceit or denial.
I’ve learned a lot watching the past week, believe me.
I don’t hold it against people who believe differently about this incident — I’m okay with your believing differently. But I am stating very clearly what I believe about the incident, in response to your questions.
I can see no good at all, strategically, that has come from this attempt.
RE: “It seems you’ve let your personal disapproval of ACNA or the need to prove that ACNA is not in the Anglican Communion become the focus of your comments rather than actually addressing the action of what Uganda has attempted.”
PS: I do not at all “personally disapprove” of the ACNA — indeed I have guided many towards it who 1) cannot remain a member of TEC and 2) wish to remain Anglican outside of TEC. Just one week ago I gave that kind of counsel to a friend of mine who is out of TEC, personally giving her my analysis of the various parts of the ACNA and which one probably is right for her. That is — as I’ve made crystal clear in blogland — a constant activity for me, and nothing unusual.
Further, I do not “need to prove” anything about the ACNA’s status with regards to the Anglican Communion. The Communion continues to make that pretty clear already. But I do feel impelled to publicly point out when conservatives — my allies — engage in sophistic rhetoric that is on a par with Schori, Beers, and Chane. It’s one of the many shocking disappointments I have with *some* conservative allies both within and without TEC. It appears that an individual may leave TEC — but 815’s very wicked and immoral responses do not leave the individual.
Sarah, I have no idea if you’ll come back to check this thread. I’ve been offline since Thursday afternoon and am just now catching up. I don’t think I have anything much to offer in terms of a counter response.
I mostly wanted to let you know I appreciate your replies. My questions were genuine, not merely meant to somehow cheerlead for ACNA or what Uganda did. Some things ACNA has done have enouraged me, other things troubled me. My support of ACNA has always been because of my hopes for real partnership and common mission between the evangelical Anglican wing and the Global South.
Re: your last sentence of #37, I’m not sure I’d phrase it the same way you did. I don’t know that it’s a question of some “spirit of 815” continuing to affect some ACNA leaders. Rather I’d say it’s fallen human nature, period, and it infects folks who’ve never had anything to do with TEC as well.
ACNA and its leaders are in a tough tough place. On one hand, many of their leaders have spent years fighting TEC and as such have had to operate in the realm of spin and back room machinations, attempting to out TEC TEC, etc. There may be too much of that still evident in ACNA’s DNA. However, I think there is an opposite danger too – in the rush away from all that is TEC and could possibly resemble TEC, perhaps there are babies being thrown out with the bathwater. I certainly have heard some ACNA folks expressing concerns with some of ACNA’s proposed canons and structures along those lines, wishing it kept some of TEC’s features. It’s a pretty impossible situation really, and needs much prayer.