The executive council of the Episcopal Church met in Linthicum Heights this weekend to discuss topics that included its presence in Cuba, initiatives to address racism and an upcoming national conference in Salt Lake City.
However, the council didn’t discuss a high-ranking Maryland bishop who was recently charged with manslaughter in the death of a bicyclist last month.
The three-day meeting of 70 of the church’s bishops, priests, deacons, laypersons and staff coincides with the latest developments involving the death of bicyclist Thomas Palermo, 41, a married father of two, who was killed Dec. 27 in a crash on Roland Avenue in Baltimore. Bishop Suffragan Heather Elizabeth Cook was identified as the driver. Cook, 58, left the scene of the crash in the 5700 block of Roland Ave. but returned shortly after, police said.
Executive Council isn’t talking about it, and ENS isn’t either. An interesting coincidence.
In fairness, EC obviously has a major problem with finances, judging by Ms Schori’s demands that many of the church’s dioceses be downgraded to Mission status, and her complaints that many diocese are holding out on providing funding to 815.
The disciplinary canons don’t encourage comment. I hope Bishop Cook is receiving some support from the church. She needs a good lawyer and may need some help paying for legal counsel.
And I hope some treatment for the disease of alcoholism will offered her.
I was glad to see the proposed diocesan asking lowered to 15%. I think 10% would be better but there may be some good reasons not to do so.
#4 Historical dioceses like PA and VA have always looked askance at ‘national church’ pretensions, and have kept their giving quite low. So it is not a ‘poor diocese’ or ‘conservative diocese’ issue only. I look forward to seeing the committee charged with evaluating this trying to change the giving in big dioceses like PA and VA. One can throw in Texas as well.
The problem is that TEC is not a hierarchical church in financial terms or other terms, and there is no constitutional warrant for fixed-giving metrics. How do you turn an ‘asking’ into a ‘requirement’ without some genuine warrant to do so? This could be another example of how this shrinking ‘denomination’ is going to continue to do so.
Not to mention #5 that I, like many former Episcopalians, annotated our parish pledges to read that not one penny of our giving was to either go to the Diocesan level or the National level; all to stay within the parish.
So I wonder; if 815 were somehow to mandate a giving, rather than requesting a giving, how would that flow down to the parishioner level? I don’t see how it could. Unless: excommunication for not giving to “she who must be obeyed”?
#6 — one might assume they are assessing the downsize of this kind of scheme, but perhaps not. So, e.g., if they restrict involvement of conservative non-compliance dioceses at GC, in what way would that be a penalty? Throwing conservative dioceses out is something they have wanted to deny (e.g., SC). This is the cost of altering traditional Christian teaching and then insisting all must comply. One sees that Lutherans and Presbyterians have realized this doesn’t make much sense, and so have figured out ways to acknowledge there is a fallout for ‘progressivism.’