Q: Tell me about this meeting in Pittsburgh. What are you and all these groups trying to accomplish here?
A: There are 10 jurisdictions who have been working together, a growing number, we started as six in 2004, who have committed to make common cause for the gospel of Jesus Christ, the gospel as it has been received, and to make common cause for a biblical, missionary and united Anglicanism in North America. We are fragments, like some of us represent fragments, dioceses of the Episcopal Church that can’t go down the road that the Episcopal Church is on, can’t leave the faith once delivered, and other fragments [are] folks who as long as 134 years ago actually found themselves put out of the Episcopal Church because of their stand on the gospel and their belief that the Episcopal Church was shifting and wavering and moving away from its’ reformation position. This meeting is a meeting in which these fragments, as bishops, and for the first time it’s all the bishops of these 10 fragments from the US and Canada, they are together and we’re together and what we’ve done is agree to the way in which we’ll move forward, move forward forming a federation of the Common Cause Partners, pushing that schedule along, and before too long appealing to provinces within the communion to recognize this federation as a new ecclesiastical structure in the States, the very thing that a number of the primates just a year ago in September called for from Kigali as they looked to the problems in the US church and to the wavering and wandering of the majority.
Q: So the goal here is to create an alternative Anglican structure?
A: The goal has been to bring together all of those who stand on scripture, who stand with the tradition, who are committed to mission and who can’t bring themselves to separate from what Christians have always believed. So we’re working together as bishops, forming a college of bishops, again first ever meeting here, who can work together in mission. We’ve shared all kinds of ministry initiatives together, from ministry to youth, all kinds of exciting things with postmoderns to work with the global church in relief and development to the more ordinary matters of church planting. Indeed one of the calls of this conference was for us together to plant 1000 new churches, which would be quite something to see.
What I’d like to know is: who paid for this meeting in Pittsburgh? Did those bishop in attendance who are bishops in the Episcopal Church use Church funds for this event? Regardless of whether they believe themselves to be right, they are clearly acting against their consecration vows. It would also be interesting to know who attended to their pastoral duties while they were in Pittsburgh, since there may be significant cost for these “substitutes” if any.
Duh. This meeting was paid for by the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. Everyone knows that.
2 – of which I am a member, I have my shirt….
I don’t have a shirt yet. Is that why I haven’t received my check? I’m hearing that the reason we believe as we do is because the IRD is paying us…
#1 – At this point I don’t think they have violated any Canon. They made a statement of their intentions. It is like the PB saying “We are not going backwards” when she discusses SSBs and non-celibate Bishops. I don’t see any calls for her to step down in the face of statements clearly in violation of many doctrines of the Anglican Communion.
RickD must be a comedian. No offense, but would the absence of a diocesan bishop for 3 days in the middle of the week ever incur “significant” costs?
Anon Layperson,
It depends on your definition of “significant” (recall that I bracketed that with “may” and “if any”). There’s certainly some cost for travel and hospitality, and presumably three days of four bishops counts for something. And of course, there’s the difficult-to-quantify cost of the responsibilities of their positions that they did not fulfill during that time.
What’s clear is that these bishops (referring to the 4 in the Episcopal Church) did not fulfill their responsibilities as elected bishops of the Episcopal Church by participating in the HOB meetings. They left the HOB meeting when it was time to do the real work, and re-clustered in a place where they didn’t have to hear anyone but themselves. That one of their main purposes was to undermine their consecration vows might be funny, if it were not so shameful.
Rick C, I thank God that these gentlemen have the courage to do the right thing and stand up for the truth. I pray for their succcess and long to see a faithful Anglican church in the USA. TEC leadeship disgusts me, as they have ruined something dear and beautiful that once was one of the most important things in my life.