[blockquote] The Diocese of San Joaquin
The Episcopal Church continues in Central California amid a current change in diocesan leadership.[/blockquote]
I find myself at a loss for words. In a sick way, it’s quite funny, and in many other ways it is simply not funny at all.
BRAVO? No, I don’t think that’s the word I’m groping for, although one of the meanings of “bravo” is a hired assassin. That definition doesn’t work, either.
When almost 100% of an entire diocese votes to disaffiliate from the national church, and when individual parishes and parishioners throughout the country are disaffiliating, and when “The Episcopal Church” pretends that nothing is happening – BRAVO is not the word. “Change in diocesan leadership?” No, it would seem that this diocese has very strong leadership, stronger than that of TEC.
BRAVO
Pronunciation: ˈbrä-(ËŒ)vÅ, brä-ˈvÅ
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural bravos
: a shout of approval —often used interjectionally in applauding a performance
=========
Using arguably the more widely recognized definition of “Bravo” I stick by my applause for TEC in contextualizing the “schism du jour” within the history of Anglican in America in today’s ad AND in offering words of hope to those looking to move forward in faith:
[i]The Episcopal Church is emerging stronger for its insistence that all are welcome and full participants in Christ’s body. If this Christmas you are seeking a faith community that welcomes diversity of opinion and room for many voices building on more than four centuries of history, please consider visiting an Episcopal Church congregation near you.[/i]
Thanks for the chance to point to this [url=http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/2007/12/christmas-message-from-integrity.html]Christmas Message[/url] you might have missed — it’s all ABOUT Jesus: the Reason for the Season!
It started out as a Diocese of California up in San Francisco (diocese still carries that name, just like the U.C. Berkeley Campus is “Cal”).
But, unlike the Universities, don’t be surprised if TEC in CA shrinks back to one big diocese with bureaucrats in the major cities answering to a potentate of some sort in S.F. or L.A. All that trust money and liquidated property will run out one of these days.
Sorry to pour cold water on a well-intentioned advertisement, but this ad misses the mark for a couple of reasons.
1. Unchurched folks really don’t identify with dioceses. This is church-speak to people who don’t really consider visiting a given church because of the particular diocese it is a part of.
2. It seems less than charitable to raise the issue to the departure of San Joaquin in a newspaper ad, particularly at this time of year.
3. Do people go to a church at this time of year looking for a faith-social services agency? That’s what this ad seems to say. I suspect if they’re going to visit a church they will look for a place where they can encounter the presence of God in their time of need or spiritual vulnerability.
18th Century
Although some colonial members of the Church of England were loyalists during the Revolutionary War, as far as I know all of the colonial parishes disaffiliated from the Church of England. Did any of them remain? Schism du jour, ou schism du siècle?
19th Century
Under the leadership of Bp. Levi Silliman Ives, the diocese of North Carolina ALMOST disaffiliated to join with the Bishop of Rome. That didn’t happen, Ives went home to Rome, and was deposed. Most parishioners today don’t even know about the Oxford Movement or the goings-on in North Carolina.
The Southern dioceses did disaffiliate from the national church in the War Between the States under the leadership of Bishops Polk and Elliott. The national church took no real action other than to count them absent at General Convention, making the post-war reunion quite easy. Schism du jour, ou schism du siècle?
I don’t think an entire diocese has disaffiliated since then. When the Reformed Episcopal Church and the other splinter groups were formed, they took individuals and parishes, but not an entire diocese.
21st Century
Schism is as schism does. If a formal schism is in progress, who is in schism with whom? From a GLOBAL perspective, it seems that some of the leadership of The Episcopal Church have chosen to de-emphasize “that which has been believed in all places, at all times, by all people,” furthermore claiming that their idiosyncratic beliefs and practices are correct and that the rest of Christendom is in error. That’s a classic formula for schism.
Certainly, the actions of these people do seem to be tearing The Episcopal Church apart from the rest of the Christian world. Certainly, #5, I pray for unity and healing before there is another schism du siècle. But, by pretending that nothing has happened in San Joaquin, the newspaper ad utterly marginalizes those who would build their faith on 20 centuries of orthodox Christianity.
That Integrity should applaud this ad tells us how little interest Integrity has in any religion. The ad draws a picture of a “religion ” that is bland, colorless,and tasteless: It is without an identity as a religion, but is instead the repository of a specific agenda, like a safe deposit box into which one places one’s valuables because the box is protected, though the thing itself is without intrinsic meaning. For Integrity, then, TEC has become a utilitarian device, an expediency of a very useful sort, for the protection of homosexuality. There is no need to believe in safe deposit boxes; one will do as well as another. And if this bank fails -as it appears to be doing – then another bank will be found and it will do as well as the former.
Homosexuality is therefore looking for protection for its peculiar practices. Its hope is, that with time, its safe deposit contents will increase in value in the marketplace, when they can cash them into the prevailing currency in order to buy and sell them in a favorable climate. There is of course some real reason for Integrity to hope this will be the case.
However, all of this has nothing to do with Christianity, and it never has, precisely as many men became Catholic priests because the benefits of the seminary were so great, the protection so thorough, and the freedom from Christian inhibitions so complete. For these men, homosexuality license was worth a Mass, and TEC occupies the same relationship with Integrity. We know that this is not mere speculation because Integrity has made it clear that, as to SSM, e.g., they intend to pursue their own course regardless of what the larger church says or does. So religion has become a kind of disguise, a safe place to hide, as a safe deposit box, clean and bright, stainless and locked, in the aseptic air of the bank vault, the sanctuary of everything solid, enduring, and American, may lend its ambience to the tawdriest of materials contained therein. And Integrity may be right here as well. Larry
There is no evidence to support the idea that Sir Francis Drake landed at Point Reyes.
The idea that Sir Fancis Drake landed at Point Reyes is based on The so-called Drake’s Plate of Brass, a forgery that purports to be the brass plaque that Francis Drake posted upon landing in Northern California in 1579. The plaque was proven to be a forgery in 2003.
You would think TEC would check their facts more carefully, oh wait I forgot that the truth is entirely subjective, and based on personal experience, junk science and wishful thinking.
[i]A longstanding commitment to environmental care, the Millennium
Development Goals, and the eradication of global poverty mark the
ministries of the Diocese of Northern California…[/i]
Oh, and many of us like to think that Jesus Christ has something to do with it as well. But who am I to pick nits. I don’t quarrel with the MDGs (really noble goals), merely the undue priority placed on them.
What I don’t like about TEC advertising is that it always ends up focusing on some liberal differential, some pet project of 815. There was that TV commercial that played up WO (“In TEC women don’t just kneel at the altar, we stand behind it”). At least one advertisement by a parish in my diocese about GLBT inclusion. And now this one about my diocese’s commitment to the MDGs. They’re never about our history (I do appreciate that part of this ad) or really about who we are as Episcopalians. They only serve to highlight some pet project that the liberals think will draw more, well frankly, more liberals and people “turned off” by traditional Christianity. In short, modern TEC’s evangelism seems almost entirely focused on liberals and disaffected Catholics.
#17, you’re absolutely correct. Local tradition has it the landing was at Drake’s Bay (hence its name), but we really don’t know (though I must admit I’ve always loved the map of Nova Albion in the library of St. Columba’s, Inverness). The forged plate incident tried to suggest it was actually inside the Golden Gate in San Pablo Bay. No site on the Pacific Coast exactly matches Drake’s description. One historian has even argued that it was as far south as the Channel Islands (on ethnographic evidence of the Indians described, and the fact that Drake was using pirated Spanish charts that were notorious for exaggerating latitude and would make him think he was farther North than he actually was). But the historical community is not convinced either way.
Ouch – reading the above sounds like some people aren’t having a very happy Advent! Cool off folks – enjoy the blessings of this season. Can we not have peace, even on T19, for just a few days around Christmas?
Okay, Ms Russell: If it’s “about Jesus,” as you say, then why does the piece about the Diocese of Northern California place so much emphasis on the environment, while saying NOT ONE SINGLE WORD about Jesus Christ?
Susan do you think that they will attract thousands of gays and lesbian with this advert? I don’t think, in they said the thousands of Gay people would join TEC. Susan where are all these people? Why they are not join TEC? Feliz Navidad.
#18 Alta, I have long been interested in Drake, & admire his daring, though not his piracy. But surely a man capable of sailing a ship round the world in the 16th century would not seriously misjudge his latitude in the northern hemisphere? Longitude certainly, in those days before we had good time-pieces, but his latitude measurements should have been quite accurate.
Wilfred #22. Yours is one of the reasons I and other historians are skeptical of the Channel Islands theory. I was just offering one theory to illustrate the uncertainty, even in the historical community, as to where Drake landed. I’d like to think it was Drakes, Tomales, or Bodega Bay. But I’m biased, I love the Marin and Sonoma Coast.
Rob k, make it about the Eucharist, make it about Baptism, make it about Common Prayer, make it about the Via Media (in the traditional sense of Reformed Catholicism). Make it about Jesus. Don’t make it about programs and buzzwords. “A longstanding commitment to the renewal of creation through our Lord Jesus Christ, the environmental care of God’s creation, the Millennium Development Goals as methods of promoting God’s justice, and the eradication of the suffering and poverty God’s children all over the world, mark the ministries of the Diocese of Northern California…” I could live with that. “A longstanging commitment to the Gospel of Christ, environmental care….” I could even live with that.
Wonderful ad! Merry Christmas.
BRAVO!
[blockquote] The Diocese of San Joaquin
The Episcopal Church continues in Central California amid a current change in diocesan leadership.[/blockquote]
I find myself at a loss for words. In a sick way, it’s quite funny, and in many other ways it is simply not funny at all.
BRAVO? No, I don’t think that’s the word I’m groping for, although one of the meanings of “bravo” is a hired assassin. That definition doesn’t work, either.
When almost 100% of an entire diocese votes to disaffiliate from the national church, and when individual parishes and parishioners throughout the country are disaffiliating, and when “The Episcopal Church” pretends that nothing is happening – BRAVO is not the word. “Change in diocesan leadership?” No, it would seem that this diocese has very strong leadership, stronger than that of TEC.
[i] Comment edited by elf for unnecessary sarcasm. [/i]
BRAVO
Pronunciation: ˈbrä-(ËŒ)vÅ, brä-ˈvÅ
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural bravos
: a shout of approval —often used interjectionally in applauding a performance
=========
Using arguably the more widely recognized definition of “Bravo” I stick by my applause for TEC in contextualizing the “schism du jour” within the history of Anglican in America in today’s ad AND in offering words of hope to those looking to move forward in faith:
[i]The Episcopal Church is emerging stronger for its insistence that all are welcome and full participants in Christ’s body. If this Christmas you are seeking a faith community that welcomes diversity of opinion and room for many voices building on more than four centuries of history, please consider visiting an Episcopal Church congregation near you.[/i]
Again … BRAVO!
(And Merry Christmas!)
Number of times this ad uses the word “Episcopal”: 12
Number of times this ad uses the words “Christ,” or “Jesus,” or “God,” or “Lord”: 3
We can see where TEC’s focus is. It’s on itself.
Yet where Christ is high and lifted up, He will draw all peoples to Himself.
Please, TEC, less talk about you. More talk about Jesus, the savior of the world.
Thanks for the chance to point to this [url=http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/2007/12/christmas-message-from-integrity.html]Christmas Message[/url] you might have missed — it’s all ABOUT Jesus: the Reason for the Season!
Enjoy! And Merry Christmas!
The same ad appears in today’s [i] Fresno Bee [/i]. It covers nearly half, top to bottom, of page A12.
[blockquote]The Episcopal Church is emerging stronger for its insistence that all are welcome and full participants in Christ’s body.[/blockquote]
Delusional.
It started out as a Diocese of California up in San Francisco (diocese still carries that name, just like the U.C. Berkeley Campus is “Cal”).
But, unlike the Universities, don’t be surprised if TEC in CA shrinks back to one big diocese with bureaucrats in the major cities answering to a potentate of some sort in S.F. or L.A. All that trust money and liquidated property will run out one of these days.
Good ad. Although a YouTube Video might reach more people.
It translates the Christian story to those who don’t speak Christianese.
Wow.
An ad for unitarian social workers at their finest.
No need for a cross or a manger here.
Sorry to pour cold water on a well-intentioned advertisement, but this ad misses the mark for a couple of reasons.
1. Unchurched folks really don’t identify with dioceses. This is church-speak to people who don’t really consider visiting a given church because of the particular diocese it is a part of.
2. It seems less than charitable to raise the issue to the departure of San Joaquin in a newspaper ad, particularly at this time of year.
3. Do people go to a church at this time of year looking for a faith-social services agency? That’s what this ad seems to say. I suspect if they’re going to visit a church they will look for a place where they can encounter the presence of God in their time of need or spiritual vulnerability.
Schism du jour, eh?
18th Century
Although some colonial members of the Church of England were loyalists during the Revolutionary War, as far as I know all of the colonial parishes disaffiliated from the Church of England. Did any of them remain? Schism du jour, ou schism du siècle?
19th Century
Under the leadership of Bp. Levi Silliman Ives, the diocese of North Carolina ALMOST disaffiliated to join with the Bishop of Rome. That didn’t happen, Ives went home to Rome, and was deposed. Most parishioners today don’t even know about the Oxford Movement or the goings-on in North Carolina.
The Southern dioceses did disaffiliate from the national church in the War Between the States under the leadership of Bishops Polk and Elliott. The national church took no real action other than to count them absent at General Convention, making the post-war reunion quite easy. Schism du jour, ou schism du siècle?
I don’t think an entire diocese has disaffiliated since then. When the Reformed Episcopal Church and the other splinter groups were formed, they took individuals and parishes, but not an entire diocese.
21st Century
Schism is as schism does. If a formal schism is in progress, who is in schism with whom? From a GLOBAL perspective, it seems that some of the leadership of The Episcopal Church have chosen to de-emphasize “that which has been believed in all places, at all times, by all people,” furthermore claiming that their idiosyncratic beliefs and practices are correct and that the rest of Christendom is in error. That’s a classic formula for schism.
Certainly, the actions of these people do seem to be tearing The Episcopal Church apart from the rest of the Christian world. Certainly, #5, I pray for unity and healing before there is another schism du siècle. But, by pretending that nothing has happened in San Joaquin, the newspaper ad utterly marginalizes those who would build their faith on 20 centuries of orthodox Christianity.
Advent blessings!
That Integrity should applaud this ad tells us how little interest Integrity has in any religion. The ad draws a picture of a “religion ” that is bland, colorless,and tasteless: It is without an identity as a religion, but is instead the repository of a specific agenda, like a safe deposit box into which one places one’s valuables because the box is protected, though the thing itself is without intrinsic meaning. For Integrity, then, TEC has become a utilitarian device, an expediency of a very useful sort, for the protection of homosexuality. There is no need to believe in safe deposit boxes; one will do as well as another. And if this bank fails -as it appears to be doing – then another bank will be found and it will do as well as the former.
Homosexuality is therefore looking for protection for its peculiar practices. Its hope is, that with time, its safe deposit contents will increase in value in the marketplace, when they can cash them into the prevailing currency in order to buy and sell them in a favorable climate. There is of course some real reason for Integrity to hope this will be the case.
However, all of this has nothing to do with Christianity, and it never has, precisely as many men became Catholic priests because the benefits of the seminary were so great, the protection so thorough, and the freedom from Christian inhibitions so complete. For these men, homosexuality license was worth a Mass, and TEC occupies the same relationship with Integrity. We know that this is not mere speculation because Integrity has made it clear that, as to SSM, e.g., they intend to pursue their own course regardless of what the larger church says or does. So religion has become a kind of disguise, a safe place to hide, as a safe deposit box, clean and bright, stainless and locked, in the aseptic air of the bank vault, the sanctuary of everything solid, enduring, and American, may lend its ambience to the tawdriest of materials contained therein. And Integrity may be right here as well. Larry
Jeffersonian,
you are right — “delusional” is much more appropriate than “bravo”.
sad.
Jim Elliott <><
There is no evidence to support the idea that Sir Francis Drake landed at Point Reyes.
The idea that Sir Fancis Drake landed at Point Reyes is based on The so-called Drake’s Plate of Brass, a forgery that purports to be the brass plaque that Francis Drake posted upon landing in Northern California in 1579. The plaque was proven to be a forgery in 2003.
You would think TEC would check their facts more carefully, oh wait I forgot that the truth is entirely subjective, and based on personal experience, junk science and wishful thinking.
[i]A longstanding commitment to environmental care, the Millennium
Development Goals, and the eradication of global poverty mark the
ministries of the Diocese of Northern California…[/i]
Oh, and many of us like to think that Jesus Christ has something to do with it as well. But who am I to pick nits. I don’t quarrel with the MDGs (really noble goals), merely the undue priority placed on them.
What I don’t like about TEC advertising is that it always ends up focusing on some liberal differential, some pet project of 815. There was that TV commercial that played up WO (“In TEC women don’t just kneel at the altar, we stand behind it”). At least one advertisement by a parish in my diocese about GLBT inclusion. And now this one about my diocese’s commitment to the MDGs. They’re never about our history (I do appreciate that part of this ad) or really about who we are as Episcopalians. They only serve to highlight some pet project that the liberals think will draw more, well frankly, more liberals and people “turned off” by traditional Christianity. In short, modern TEC’s evangelism seems almost entirely focused on liberals and disaffected Catholics.
#17, you’re absolutely correct. Local tradition has it the landing was at Drake’s Bay (hence its name), but we really don’t know (though I must admit I’ve always loved the map of Nova Albion in the library of St. Columba’s, Inverness). The forged plate incident tried to suggest it was actually inside the Golden Gate in San Pablo Bay. No site on the Pacific Coast exactly matches Drake’s description. One historian has even argued that it was as far south as the Channel Islands (on ethnographic evidence of the Indians described, and the fact that Drake was using pirated Spanish charts that were notorious for exaggerating latitude and would make him think he was farther North than he actually was). But the historical community is not convinced either way.
Ouch – reading the above sounds like some people aren’t having a very happy Advent! Cool off folks – enjoy the blessings of this season. Can we not have peace, even on T19, for just a few days around Christmas?
Okay, Ms Russell: If it’s “about Jesus,” as you say, then why does the piece about the Diocese of Northern California place so much emphasis on the environment, while saying NOT ONE SINGLE WORD about Jesus Christ?
Susan do you think that they will attract thousands of gays and lesbian with this advert? I don’t think, in they said the thousands of Gay people would join TEC. Susan where are all these people? Why they are not join TEC? Feliz Navidad.
#18 Alta, I have long been interested in Drake, & admire his daring, though not his piracy. But surely a man capable of sailing a ship round the world in the 16th century would not seriously misjudge his latitude in the northern hemisphere? Longitude certainly, in those days before we had good time-pieces, but his latitude measurements should have been quite accurate.
How would some of you word an ad for Christmas services in the newspaper? Concrete examples, please. please.
Just one please, sorry.
Wilfred #22. Yours is one of the reasons I and other historians are skeptical of the Channel Islands theory. I was just offering one theory to illustrate the uncertainty, even in the historical community, as to where Drake landed. I’d like to think it was Drakes, Tomales, or Bodega Bay. But I’m biased, I love the Marin and Sonoma Coast.
Rob k, make it about the Eucharist, make it about Baptism, make it about Common Prayer, make it about the Via Media (in the traditional sense of Reformed Catholicism). Make it about Jesus. Don’t make it about programs and buzzwords. “A longstanding commitment to the renewal of creation through our Lord Jesus Christ, the environmental care of God’s creation, the Millennium Development Goals as methods of promoting God’s justice, and the eradication of the suffering and poverty God’s children all over the world, mark the ministries of the Diocese of Northern California…” I could live with that. “A longstanging commitment to the Gospel of Christ, environmental care….” I could even live with that.
Guess we dipped a bit heavy into the chai. Another Dramatic Reading has gone up at BabyBlue. Banjos are welcome.
bb