The passage of Resolution D025 by the General Convention of 2009 is a repudiation of Holy Scripture as the church has received and understood it ecumenically in the East and West. It is also a clear rejection of the mutual responsibility and interdependence to which we are called as Anglicans. That it is also a snub to the Archbishop of Canterbury this week while General Synod is occurring in York only adds insult to injury.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, the BBC, the New York Times and Integrity all see what is being done here. There are now some participants in the 76th General Convention who are trying to pretend that a yes to D025 is NOT a no to B033. Jesus’ statement about letting your yes be yes and your no be no is apt here. These types of attempted obfuscations are utterly unconvincing. The Bishop of Arizona rightly noted in his blog that D025 was “a defacto repudiation of” B033.
The presuppositions of Resolution D025 are revealing. For a whole series of recent General Conventions resolutions have been passed which are thought to be descriptive by some, but understood to be prescriptive by others. The 2007 Primates Communique spoke to this tendency when they stated “they deeply regret a lack of clarity”on the part of the 75th General Convention.
What is particularly noteworthy, however, is that Episcopal Church Resolutions and claimed stances said to be descriptive at one time are more and more interpreted to be prescriptive thereafter. Now, in Resolution D025, the descriptive and the prescriptive have merged. You could hear this clearly in the floor debates in the two Houses where speakers insisted “This is who we are!”
Those involved in pastoral care know that when a relationship is deeply frayed when one or other party insists “this is who I am” the outcome will be disastrous. The same will be the case with D025, both inside the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion.
D025 is the proud assertion of a church of self-authentication and radical autonomy.
It is a particularly ugly sight.
–The Rev. Dr. Kendall S. Harmon is Canon Theologian of the Diocese of South Carolina
Comments from the backup blog:
RomeAnglican said…
Well put, Kendall.
8:16 AM
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Blogger david+ said…
Thank you for this very charitable analysis. Accurate, insightful and devastating, yes, but charitable as well.
8:18 AM
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Blogger Dale Matson said…
Kendall,
Articulate and insightful. This is especially true about your comment about “This is who I am.” It is this coupled with what I would term “…and it is blessed.” is what bothers me. There is no understanding of the need for repentance. There is even a continued dishonesty in the resolution to portray themselves as one thing to those on the inside and another to those in the Anglican Communion. Frankly TEC wants it both ways. It cannot be who it is now claiming to be and Anglican also. So, it is only a partial honesty which is still dishonest at best.
8:43 AM
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Blogger t19elves said…
Dale Matson:
Half the truth masquerading as the whole truth is an untruth.
Interestingly, this is the way a lot of heresy has worked in the church’s history.
Kendall
8:55 AM
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Blogger Dale Matson said…
This whole idea of a dynamic unfolding revelation of God apart from Scripture and Tradition started in the Garden of Eden with the “New Gospel” of the Serpent. “Did God really say that”?
9:42 AM