In the hierarchy of church law, the Constitution is at the top. Then comes the Book of Common Prayer, with its rubrics and liturgies which require two successive meetings of General Convention to be changed. Last come the Canons, or bylaws, which may be adopted by vote of a single General Convention.
If Canons (bylaws) are enacted which are contrary to the Constitution or the Book of Common Prayer, what is one to do? How can one follow canons which are contrary to the Church’s higher law, and still claim to “accede” to the Constitution of the Church?
This is the constitutional dilemma which now, thanks to the misguided zeal of General Convention 2009 and its predecessors, confronts every diocese in the Church, and not just the Diocese of South Carolina. The latest General Convention adopted far-ranging changes to the Title IV disciplinary canons of the Church. There is no rational way in which any sane person, viewing the changes as a whole, can conclude that all of the changes so made are consistent with the provisions in ECUSA’s Constitution.
Whether one agrees with him or not (and I do), Haley is easily one of the most perceptive and intelligent commentators out there.
As always, The Curmudgeon is spot-on. Mrs Schori presumes to assume an uncanonical status (ie ‘Chief Pastor’) and power (I decline to use the word ‘authority’) which none -not any, ever- of her predecessors were so presumptuous as to even imagine or fantasize. I put this down to a combination of a lack of adequate knowledge of things ecclesiastical, a naturally authoritarian temperament, and a paucity of native ability which she overcame through an act of mere affirmative action by the HoB, thereby raising her to an eminence to which she is patently unsuited. By her fruits you will know her.
Technically, this will only become a crisis when there coalesces within TEC a group that has sufficient power to fight back. A group of separatists on a mountain in Montana is not a crisis. Seven states seceding from the Union is a crisis. It could also become a crisis if a secular court decides against TEC based upon TECs own violations of its Canon Law. So long as this only involves the continuing war to drive orthodoxy from TEC, then no one within TEC who matters will see it as a crisis. They will see it as a temporary expedient employed to crush the rebellion. They will naively expect the executive to lay down her powers when the shooting stops. She isn’t going to.
I wonder about scenarios like this. Since KJS has acquired metropolitan powers, I wonder if she might order whole dioceses disbanded, and their assets liquidated on order to pay the bills she is accumulating. TEC is going to have a whole bunch of redundant dioceses in the near future, and that will constitute a greater crisis than the War of Orthodox Suppression. Certainly, an argument can be made that emergency powers would be needed to help TEC navigate that difficult time as well.
One crisis follows another, and TEC will choose submission to tyranny or Civil War on a scale it has yet to see.
carl
She has acquired “metropolitan powers”, which is a shocking thing, since it is like those conferred on bishops these days. The only thing which stops at lot of bishops from going authoritarian these days is fear of the losses of membership and revenues which would ensue. Mrs Schori seems to feel that she’s immune from such trivial consequences.
Unless TEC’s Constitution has been amended, I don’t believe anyone has given her the right or the authority to assume the position of a metropolitan, nor the authority to exercise such powers, and that further means that TEC’s Executive Committee does not have the authority to [i]give[/i] her that authority without the approval of General Convention via an amendment of the Constitution. Are there sufficient grounds for removing her from office? I think that there are.
The PB continues to operate without the rules while her opposition attempt to counter her actions within the rules. Any military strategist can tell you who will conquer.
It may be time to remove the white gloves and toss aside the rules that seem, daily, to allow the dismantling of TEC. Haley (PBUH) is an exception, but there seem to be too many lawyers and too few angry Christians.
Or there are too many people in TEC with their heads buried in the sand and who just don’t care, as long as they have a place to go to on Sunday morning where they can feel good about themselves, with a nice coffee hour afterward.
I believe the Gospel declares that a house divided against itself in America goes right on listening, voting, and acting as if nothing was wrong. It does say that, doesn’t it? Larry
I doubt whether the Archbishops of Canterbury and York have or have excercised the power to suspend a bishop they deem guilty of error. Certainly there have been times when such authority might have been useful, but all that was possible was a public rebuke.
I’ve heard a rumor that the Diocese of Dallas is considering taking actions similar to those SC has just done. Perhaps other CP dioceses will too.
However, it’s important to note that not all dioceses have a provision in their diocesan canons that formally commits them to accede to the Canons as well as the Constitution of TEC (as Kendall helpfully pointed out in his recent interview on Anglican TV). But the bottom line (legally speaking) is clear: [i]Are dioceses independent entities and is TEC a voluntary association of dioceses or not??[/i]
Can anyone shed any light on how other conservative dioceses might act? With the July 1st, 2011 date of implementation of those awful Title IV canons looming in the not-so-distant future, they don’t have much time to wait and see what happens to SC.
David Handy+
#7, I think you partially answered your own question in #5, but there is the other big issue here. I believe you are right in that there are grounds for her removal, but she will probably say “I didn’t give myself these powers, General Convention did,” even if it gets that far, which it probably will not. The only problem is that the very people who could remove her support her.