Bishop Franklin issued a Pastoral Letter addressing marriage equality to be read in all congregations on Sunday, July 24. The letter authorizes priests who wish to officiate at the marriage of a gay or lesbian couple to do so.
“As your Bishop, I believe that I am acting out of the tradition of the VIA MEDIA, the middle way, which has been a key to the identity of our Church for centuries. We do not all have to agree to remain in one diocesan community.”
Bishop Franklin arrived at his decision following a very intentional listening process involving a wide variety of diocesan clergy and lay leaders whose opinions covered the whole spectrum of thought on this issue.
1. “the key to the identity of our Church” = VIA MEDIA
2. this is our “tradition”
3. “I believe I am acting” in this tradition
4. I am your Bishop, who believes these things
Doesn’t instill much confidence, though he does seem to be searching for some kind of warrant.
It’s every man for himself now. Scrounge around, find a warrant, publish it, say you “believe it” and roll the dice.
‘Let me not to the course of free love admit impediments’
[blockquote] “In the matter of the ordination of women to the priesthood, diaconate, and episcopate: some parishes in our diocese accepted this quickly. Others took their time. But we stayed together. So it is my hope on marriage equality.” [/blockquote]
Except that you didn’t “stay together”, dear bishop. Many people have left your diocese and others in TEC because they were not listened to on a series of issues, and because the course you have followed is fundamentally divisive and schismatic.
At least its a good thing that the bishop is ordering his pastoral letter to be read in all the churches in his diocese. Now the liberals are open about what they are doing. The result will be, of course, yet more people walking out and not coming back.
This is characteristic of liberals. Those in other jurisdictions, particularly England, should take note: To begin with, the liberals don’t admit what they are doing, and they try to work by stealth. They pour scorn on any suggestion that one thing will lead to another, and on any suggestion that the liberals are hell-bent (literally) on fundamentally transforming the church into a secular progressive club. They claim to be part of orthodox christianity, and they exploit differences between orthodox christians (catholic/evangelical, high church/low church) wherever possible in a cynical manner.
What is happening now in USA will happen in each of those other places too, unless the Anglican churches there are diligent to uncover the real aims of these people and expose them.
Here is the ‘brave new logic’ as articulated by +Rochester. Friends, everyone is in a hurry now to play catch up and not be left behind. One assumes the Bishop of the dying diocese of WNY has phoned his neighbour.
‘Common Prayer’ is now something on a horizon, not something genuinely common and held in trust by all. It must ‘catch up.’
New Reality.
“It will take some time for the language of both the Book of Common Prayer and the Canons of the Episcopal Church to catch up to this new reality.”
#5 is in response to
http://www.episcopalrochester.org/dfc/newsdetail_2/329
I continue to wonder if some bishops ever read the stats for their own diocese. Can he possibly be calling 2002 thrugh 2009 a period of staying together? The Dio lost 31.8 percent of Members, 34.2 percent of ASA, and a decline of 29.7 percent in inflation adjusted Plate & Pledge. I ranked the Dio at 94 of 95 considered. Also, Marriages declined 35.2 percent and Infant Baptisms declined 48.8 percent. Make a wild guess how SS Marriages will work out. Statmann
RE: “But we stayed together. So it is my hope on marriage equality.â€
Well, it looks as if your hope has already been dashed, Bishop.
Not only did TEC lose 1/3 of its membership from the time it approved of women’s ordination, but from 1999 to 2009, membership plunged in Western New York from 19,000 to 11,000 and ASA equally plummeted from 6000 to under 4000.
Seriously — does Bishop Franklin believe that his people are entirely ignorant of the past 10 years?
Does he believe that parishioners don’t look around them and see that their parishes have declined [i]by fully 1/3[/i]????
What on earth is he smoking?
It’s just . . . embarrassing. He’s like a Dilbert boss.
What a disgraceful sham. Any CEO who bloviated proudly about how “we have stayed together” when he’s lost 1/3 of his customers would be fired asap. Stockholders would be calling for his head on a platter due to his [i]abject and utter failure[/i].
And there’s just no way there aren’t senior and junior wardens in that diocese who aren’t either snickering or frustrated or both when they ready those delusional words.
I feel that it goes without saying that it was not smart for him to quote Paul, one of the biggest opponents of homosexuality in the Bible, when supporting it. Kinda makes him look like he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
I look forward to a pastoral letter declaring the area of the former diocese of Western New York to be a mission field.
2 Timothy 4:3
For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.
I might add that the use of another heresy (WO) to justify the latest is really rather funny….at least it would be if it were not so serious
“I continue to wonder if some bishops ever read the stats for their own diocese”.
Obviously the libs don’t.
“He’s like a Dilbert boss”.
And we all know there are many more out there like him.
Yes, the contrast re: what would happen to a secular corporate CEO presiding over this type of failure is, uh, glaring.
The other thing that amazes is the erastianism inherent in these speedy accommodations. Well, the civil law has changed, and now we have the reason for immediate action. At least +Sisk has some vestigial sense that the church itself probably ought to have a view (So he has a kind of boutique arrangement for his flock). This is after all strictly speaking against the national canons (as presently written). So civil law here trumps canon law as the Bishops speak of ‘catching up’ to the ‘new reality.’
#11 guest says it all. Well done!
In the Faith,
NW Bob
When did the Middle move all the way over to the left?