The segment description is as follows:
George Conger and Kevin Kallsen bring you back to the “new media” of the 1980’s in their “On this day in History” segment. They also discuss the use of analogies and their place in a violent world. Alan Haley discusses some specifics from the court case in the Anglican Diocese of San Joaquin; and our guest Bishop this week is Bishop Iker from the Diocese of Fort Worth. Bishop Iker brings news from the Fort Worth law suit and the new heat record for DFW.
Watch it all.
I haven’t had a chance to listen to the last third of this, but two things struck me about the part that I did spend time with: 1) The portion that discusses the TEC Presiding Bishop’s visit to Zimbabwe seemed, at best, mischievously hyperbolic and, at worst, deliberatively distortive, although carried out with chuckle-chuckle demeanor that took some of the edge off, at least superficially. Messrs. Conger and Kallsen seemed to feel it would be at least entertaining to let their listeners believe that the PB had drawn a parallel between the beatings, murders, and thuggery of the Mugabe regime and events in the US Anglican community regarding the property disputes. I have only the ENS account to go by (as did George and Kevin, apparently), but it was very clear to me that the analogy KJS made was to the eviction of Anglicans from their church by a Bishop who essentially started a new denomination for his own purposes (he is clearly a Mugabe stooge). Mr. Conger, in his prefatory remarks even described it that way. The PB was in no way saying Bishops Iker or Schofield were orchestrating “hits” or beatings of opponents, and the chuckles really can’t make it right to imply that. She said that in America, continuing Episcopalians who have lost their churches, hopefully temporarily, to groups who have left to realign with other denominations, can relate to the sense of loss our brethren in Zimbabwe feel over the loss of their places of worship. That’s it. The motivations behind the evictions are quite different, and I don’t think the PB would have the slightest quibble with Messrs. Conger and Kallsen that the situation in Zimbabwe is far more dark and dire. That she went to that benighted area and showed solidarity with our friends there is, as Mr. Conger acknowledged, a good thing. That’s the main story.
The second notable point I took from the part I listened to was Mr. Haley’s acknowledgement that the correct reaction to being in a church with which one is not comfortable theologically (or for any other reason) is simply to leave and find (or found) a church that meets your needs and requirements. (My recollection is that the quote is something like: “what you do when you don’t like a church you’re in is to go find another.” – that may not be verbatim, but I think it’s generally accurate). This is, of course, the very core of the property disputes. When people (including, presumably, Bishop Schofield, me, or anyone else) find that a church is not meeting their spiritual or personal needs for any reason – doctrinally, personally, lack of air conditioning, etc. – one leaves and finds a church more conducive to spiritual sustenance, personal comfort, whatever. I respect Mr. Haley’s thoughts very much, and to hear him embrace this simple, but, I submit, controlling principle should, if adopted more widely, do much to hasten the end of wasteful litigation that has encumbered the Anglican community in the United States. There is a very simple and direct way to deal with a church whose actions are unacceptable: leave. His context, of course, was that once Bishop Schofield and people of like mind had declared a new, non-Episcopalian diocese in California, those Episcopalians who were unhappy with the new arrangements could simply leave and find a new church. But the validity of the principle works rather well in both directions and that it is extremely important to have someone as respected as Mr. Haley articulate it openly. This is, at root, precisely the issue in all property disputes, whether they have arisen at the parish or diocesan level.
It seems to me that reading the ENS article:
[blockquote]A crippled nation at the mercy of tyrannical leaders, Zimbabwe is home to a persecuted yet resilient community of Anglicans who’ve been victimized, intimidated and run out of their own churches by a state-supported renegade bishop and his allies.
Yet, despite being excluded from all worship spaces in Harare, “the Anglican church is growing, filled with joy, and looking outward,” Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori told Episcopal News Service following a July 29-31 visit to Zimbabwe to show support and solidarity to its beleaguered Anglicans.
“They have experienced the same kind of thing as congregations in Fort Worth and San Joaquin,” she noted, referring to attempts by former leaders in those places to take ownership of diocesan property and leave loyal Episcopalians without a spiritual home.[/blockquote]
that the PB did indeed seek to do exactly what has been pointed to in this Anglican TV report and indeed George Conger’s article in the Church of England Newspaper; that indeed the Presiding Bishop was indeed seeking to score a cheap shot by comparing the situation in the US with that in Zimbabwe.
But I think there is a much more serious problem here than perhaps you or ATV have picked up on:
When Kunonga broke off from Central Africa he quoted what he termed the corruption of the Anglican Communion in tolerating the unbiblical actions of The Episcopal Church as justifying his actions. Since then things have just got worse and worse for Zimbabwe Anglicans. Norbert Kunonga, backed by Mugabe’s police has been expelling Anglican priests and congregations from their churches. The visit and intervention of the PB in this situation will probably make life even harder for the Zimbabwe Anglicans. A propaganda coup has been handed to Kunonga by the linkage of the remaining Zimbabwe Anglicans publicly with TEC.
Whose idea was this? Does anyone consider the impact on the lives of others or is the propaganda opportunity the only thing that matters to 815?
I read the quoted passage as referring to the eviction of continuing Episcopalians from their churches by groups that set up their own denomination in the US in opposition to TEC, Pageantmaster. I think the allusion is valid on a superficial level, and is perhaps useful in establishing a basis for empathy with events in the Anglican community in Zimbabwe, but certainly would agree with anyone (as I am sure KJS also would agree, that the motivation of the departing groups is vastly different.
But I agree with you that there may be a far more serious problem. Obviously, if Kunonga is saying that his actions are motivated and/or justified by opposition to actions of the Episcopal Church in the United States, as opposed to being just an extension of Mugabe thuggery into the realm of the church, one would hope that TEC would have weighed the appearances of showing up on this particular doorstep at this particular time.
#3
[blockquote]Obviously, if Kunonga is saying that his actions are motivated and/or justified by opposition to actions of the Episcopal Church in the United States, as opposed to being just an extension of Mugabe thuggery into the realm of the church, one would hope that TEC would have weighed the appearances of showing up on this particular doorstep at this particular time[/blockquote]
Thuggery is part of life in Zimbabwe, but yes, that is indeed what Kunonga has been saying. It goes back to a provincial synod in Central Africa Province reported in September 2007 in the Harare Herald. The original article seems to no longer link but I found a copy here [penultimate article].
So yes, that is exactly what Kunonga has been saying, that the US and Western churches have been using their money to promote immoral behaviour and that the Province of Central Africa went along with it. So the PB turning up right now, in the middle of the worst persecution of Anglicans in Zimbabwe, hands him a propaganda coup.
But I imagine this will be water off a duck’s back to the whiney spoilt inhabitants of 815 complaining to anyone who will listen that TEC congregations in a free United States face anything like what the Zimbabweans are going through; and others will be left to pay the price of their arrogance and their hubris
Here is what Zimbabwean Anglicans are facing day in, day out – nothing to do with what any whiney Episcopalian faces at home.
I think a lot of us who have been tossed out of our churches are unhappy about it, PM, but we do try not to be “whiney”. It is traumatic, but it has had its benefits in focussing us on the value of worship without the distraction of beautiful physical surroundings. It has taught us much about what things were like for the early Christian community. I hope “whiney” isn’t the major takeaway of the experience for us or for you.