Once again, because of the need to deal with historical and expository details, I will divide this post into a further two parts. This one explains how the abuses of the Abandonment Canons (Canons IV.9 and IV. 10) came about; the next post (after a short hiatus while I am away) will chronicle the instances of abuse that have so damaged the polity of The Episcopal Church in recent years. (Since these abuses are well known to all, I hope that this post, by providing the canonical background, will allow others to draw the appropriate conclusions for themselves, without waiting for the details in the next post.)
When principal is involved, be deaf to expediency.”
Commodore Matthew Fontain Maury, USN (1845)
Well done. I especially appreciated the passages regarding inhibition and the lack thereof in re +Cox, +MacBurney and, it would seem, +Duncan. A tyrant runs TEO these days, with a rump of compliant prelates at the ready to rubber-stamp her ukases. No one is safe.
This is truly a catch 22 when the vows a priest takes are contradictory to themselves – when the doctrine, discipline and worship of The Episcopal Church are in contradiction to that of Christ as received by this Church (which could be interpreted to be the Anglican Church as the text does not specify The Episcopal Church) and when the response of the priest does not relate to the question being asked…..
Plus that doctrine and discipline is utterly subject to change at each General Convention. At one time GC would have believed that it was constrained by Scripture (Article XX of the Articles of Religion state: THE Church hath power to decree Rites or Ceremonies, and authority in Controversies of Faith: and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain any thing that is contrary to God’s Word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, although the Church be a witness and a keeper of Holy Writ, yet, as it ought not to decree any thing against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of Salvation.), but no longer.
So a priest takes a vow to conform to one set of rules only to have the rules change…perhaps they should have either taken an oath to follow the rules as written at the time of their ordination, or perhaps they should retake those vows after every change implemented by General Convention…crazy stuff. The rules in 1901 seemed fair and straight-forward enough…the post 1979 world seems clearly unacceptable.
Also, selective enforcement of canons is in itself an abuse. If a District Attorney were to refuse to enforce laws against himself or his buddies (Elliott Spitzer) while at the same time aggressively enforcing them against political enemies, the outcry would be deafening.