Back on July 16th the Presiding Bishop and Bonnie Anderson wrote Archbishop Rowan Williams about the General Convention. (An ENS article on this is here). This, however, in a flurry of confusion inside the Episcopal Church’s leadership as to exactly what had occurred, even though such confusion was not shared by the majority of the mainstream media and the Episcopal Church activists for the new theology of human sexuality, was not enough.
So on July 17th the Presiding Bishop and Bonnie Anderson wrote Archbishop Rowan Williams again about the General Convention. (An ENS article on that is there).
Can anyone name a time previously in Episcopal Church history when this has occurred? It not only looks desperate but it speaks poorly to the level of clarity in what is being done. If you need to explain your explanations, if you need to use words and then more words to explain your words, the issue of what you are actually doing and why comes even more strongly to the fore. Let your yes be yes and your no be no as a standard is being missed, and for a Christian community that is a very sad thing indeed–KSH.
I think that the leaders pushing the agenda in TEC have used the lack of clarity and ambiguity to their advantage for so long with it working that they felt they could go to the well yet another time (or two). The problem is that eventually everyone catches on. I don’t know if this was understood consciously or whether the fact that it has worked well for them so long it has become the standard.
I was surprised that even mainstream media, who in general are very liberal pushing the same agenda, not only caught on but also reported on the speaking with forked tongue mode.
As far as it being a Christian community, it would be nice to know what TEC really believes these days since they couldn’t agree with the basics of evangelism. Deleting the Evangelism posts (even though we question who they had filling those posts) in favor of litigation budget points out that Jesus Christ as the mission is not a goal. Those who are called to stay in TEC have to know clearly how to define their mission in witnessing Christ within TEC as well as to the world at large. Not easy, but Jesus never said it would be.
Unfortunately, I am afraid that her Most Reveredship made it perfectly clear what her vision of TEC believes in her opening address. There is no room for sinners (heretics?) like NW Bob, whose only hope is in the saving grace of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Kendall,
Do you really not know why, or are you just afraid to say what the real motivation must have been? It is obvious, to me, at least that the reason these two ladies wrote twice was so they could impart the correct Spin on the events of General Convention. It is almost as if they believe that +++Rowan is too naive to figure these things out for himself. My guess is that they were trying to provide talking points for the revisionist apparatchiks in the Communion Office to help try to persuade the Archbishop that all is well and that the Epiescopal Church General Convention did not, once again, salute him with the Middle Finger of Dismissal after his plea for General Convention to restrain itself!
Postmodernists with differing understandings of the words on different days, if not in different seconds; what else?
Dear All,
Why are there two letters?
The first is about D025.
The second is about C056.
What’s wrong with that?
#5, I noted that, also, and understood, therefore, why there we two letters. But what is interesting how immediate the letters were sent; obviously, these two believed they had to write to Ab of C to explain what they (and GC) had done. When has that happened before?
It is obvious from the letters that they knew exactly what they had done, and that it was in conflict with what he had asked them not to do at the beginning of the convention, and they were trying to tell him they hadn’t done what they, in fact, knew they had. As the Bp of Olympia said, if anyone says nothing has changed, they are being dishonest.
Bonnie and +Katherine said we didn’t overturn the B033 moratorium you asked us to continue, we only said to all of our bishops, the canon are what they are, so use them at your discretion – so, Abof C, only if someone actually does elect and consecrate another gay bishop in TEC can anyone say the moratorium is no longer in effect.
And we didn’t authorize SSBs, we only said that bishops can provide generous pastoral responses to any requests they receive for SSBs (including SSBs if that is what you decide to do), especially in those states where SS unions are legal. And, oh yeah, by the way, we also did authorize the creation of rites for SSBs and the search for any theology we can find to support it (even though that is what we were supposed to have done with that paper, “To Set Our Hope on Christ,” that we delivered to the ACC a few years back.
Think the AbofC bought it? Think AborC thinks Bonnie and +Kate think he is a mushroom?
Dr. Harmon, wasn’t it Shakespeare that referred to it as “protesteth too much”?!!