Episcopalians nationwide are watching as leaders and delegates of the Episcopal Church’s Pittsburgh Diocese converge on Johnstown today to consider separating from their national affiliation.
“It is like my parents are getting divorced,” said Cindy Leap, parishioner at St. Mark’s Episcopalian Church in Johnstown. “I have to pick whether to go with my mommy or daddy.”
A constant struggle over beliefs is deeply affecting local and national congregations, said the Rev. Mark Zimmerman of St. Francis in-the-Fields Episcopal Church near Somerset.
“This is not about the Episcopal Church. There is nobody who is not going to be touched by this,” he said.
“Every major denomination in America is wrestling with this issue. Even though it takes us out of our comfort zone, we have to wrestle with it.
“God is calling us to take a stand.”
Of course it is about TEC. TO say it isi not is like saying that your hanging is not about your crime, the judge and jury, it’s about the entire American legl system. Wake up,Rev Z.
[blockquote]The diocese’s parishes then could join a more conservative group, the worldwide Anglican Communion, rather than its American arm.[/blockquote]
Sounds like the local paper assigned a sports or entertainment writer to report this major religion story.
w.w.
The problem with this statement is that it sounds fine as half the story. What is missing is whether the church is willing to condone and leave you in your sin and brokenness.
I am told that the key vote will come this afternoon.
Pray for Pittsburgh.
I feel sorry for Cindy Leap. But the image of a divorce is misleading. There’s a difference between an amicable divorce and the breadwinner abandoning the family for a whore. Then returning only to say he’s taking the house and leaving you with nothing. Leave. Now.
I also feel compassion for Cindy, since I actually experienced the true devastation of family break up in my early teens. However, the real problem is not the metaphorical presentation of choosing between church parents; it is a far deeper decision, effecting a much longer reality than our comfort in this world.
So, the shame of this whole “terrible choice”, that seems to haunt the undecided, is that there is no clarity in the hearts and minds of so many who have sat beneath the impact of the Gospel of Christ and his kingdom for so long without so much as making so important a decision to follow so wonderful a Savior. And so, they now, in the very last hours of the day run scrambling to find oil to fill their lamps as the bridegroom approaches and takes the other five virgins with him into the marriage feast….
Every church “takes you as you are”. But they don’t make Bishops out of just anybody. They “take you”, but bring you to Christ, who died a horrible death so that you could be “taken as you are”. And He makes you a new person.
bl
If it is to be said that ECUSA “takes you as you are” it must also be affirmed that it also leaves you as you were. The US Postal System, the county library, the local volunteer fire department all take me as I am. I expect more from my church. Even the YMCA expects some level of improvement once it is involoved.
“god is calling us to take a stand.”
God told me that sometimes it’s ok to sit down.
#8 – Steve, without the postal system, the library and the fire department, we’d be much worse than we are. Comparing the church to those institutions is actually quite flattering. If only churches did as much as these institutions rather than fight over sex.