Starting on Thursday in New Orleans, Episcopal bishops will take up the most direct demand yet that they reverse course: Anglican leaders want an unequivocal pledge that Episcopalians won’t consecrate another gay bishop or approve official prayers for same-gender couples. If the church fails to do so by Sept. 30, their full membership in the Anglican Communion could be lost.
“I think the bishops are going to stand up and say, `Going backward is not one of our options,'” said Wade of the Washington diocese, who has led church legislative committees on liturgy and Anglican relations. “I don’t think there’s going to be a backing down.”
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams is taking the rare step of meeting privately with the bishops on the first two days of their closed-door talks. The Anglican spiritual leader faces a real danger that the communion, nearly five centuries old, could break up on his watch.
“I’m working very hard to stop that happening,” he told The Daily Telegraph of London.
Wow! The AP got it correct that it is about Scripture–and illustrated the differences rather clearly.
I recommend–
40 Days of Anglican Prayer
Prayers at Lent & Beyond
George Woodliff’s call for prayer and fasting tomorrow
Based on what Bishop Charles Jenkins told the New Orleans paper it looks like Frank Wade is not correct about some of the bishops anyway. They seem to be trying to make Anglican fudge instead.
[blockquote]Within the Episcopal Church, most parishioners either accept gay relationships or don’t want to split up over homosexuality.
However, a small minority of Episcopal traditionalists are fed up with church leaders.[/blockquote]
Where in the world do these statements come from??? There has been no accurate polling of the laity since the 1980’s. Griswold squashed the last attempt to do this in the late 90’s.
This reporter is just making up statements.
815/pecusa leadership is capable of telling the truth. Here we go again: “According to the national church, 55 of its more than 7,000 parishes have either already left or voted to leave the denomination, with 11 others losing a significant number of members and clergy. Episcopal conservatives contend the losses are much higher.”
Talk about an inch at a time. At least they’ve moved off the 45 number.
That should be incapable above.
As for the poll business–If a poll were taken of Episcopalians today would it include former Episcopalians who felt reluctantly driven from the Church to Catholicism, Orthodoxy, or Evangelical Protestantism by the radical, unorthodox, virtually unChristian turn the Episcopal Church has taken.
The problem is more than a different interpretation of the Bible. What we are faced with in America is tremendous pressure to remove God entirely from all areas of social life. God is being displaced by self, and the Father’s chastizement by license to do whatever we want.
The elves were offline last night and busy with other things this morning. We apologize for not being able to catch and delete Biff’s obscene comment earlier.
Biff, you’re in 5-day suspension. We’ll review your status next week.
Besides deleting Biff’s comments on this thread, we’ve deleted all the comments that focused on Biff’s obscene remark.
Thanks to other commenters for their concern. PLEASE do e-mail us if you see other problems. This poor elf is by her lonesome moderating comments for a few days. Elflady is off gallivanting and Kendall is busy with handling press inquiries, etc. So, we may well miss things.
–elfgirl
Thanks Elfgirl. It is all too easy to take your fine work for granted. Hang in there, you are both appreciated and in my prayers.
Dear Elfgirl
Thanks for your prompt action. T1:9 was the last place I expected to see such a comment.
I am afraid that over the next few days some commenters are going to get very hot under the collar over different things, particularly as the news from New Orleans arrives in bits and pieces, and of course not forgetting that the Sept 30th ‘deadline’ is fast approaching. We should all be slow to comment as the events unfold.
Once again, thanks for all your hard work. Is there any way that you could make someone else an elf for a few days to give you some assistance? You do have magical powers, don’t you? 😉