This event is a conference for bishops and it seems completely right for this topic to kick off this historic event. But I think that this topic also speaks to the Archbishop’s hope to confront what he has identified as a “major ecclesiological issue.” I think that the Archbishop has given up trying to get our bishops to take an independent stand on the future of the moratorium of same sex blessings for instance, and is now moving to “plan B” and turning his attention to encouraging our bishops to understand their “distinctive charism” as bishops, perhaps in a new way. I envision Archbishop Rowan pondering in, to use his word, “puzzlement” why these bishops of the Episcopal Church don’t just stand up and exercise their authority as bishops like most of the rest of the bishops in the Communion do. Why would our bishops “bind themselves to future direction for the Convention?” Some of us in TEC in the past have thought that perhaps the Archbishop and others in the Anglican Communion do not understand the baptismal covenant that we hold foundational. Perhaps they just don’t “get” the way we choose to govern ourselves; the ministers of the church as the laity, clergy and the bishops, and that at the very core of our beliefs we believe in the God- given gifts of all God’s people, none more important than the other, just gifts differing. We believe that God speaks uniquely through laity, bishops, priests and deacons. This participatory structure in our church allows a fullness of revelation and insight that must not be lost in this important time of discernment. But I think our governance is clearly understood. I just don’t think the Archbishop has much use for it…
At the Lambeth Conference, I believe that the voice of the conformed bishop will be easily heard and affirmed. The prophetic voice will not be easily heard.
[blockquote] Some of us in TEC in the past have thought that perhaps the Archbishop and others in the Anglican Communion do not understand the baptismal covenant that we hold foundational. [/blockquote]
Actually this statement sums up a lot of things
-what the TEC holds as foundational is quite different to what Christians have in the past held as foundational
– their interpretation of the “baptismal covenant” is quite different from the traditional interpretation of the baptismal covenant — which among other things is to do with the remission of sins, the promise to live the life called by Christ, and the life everlasting.
Can it be possible that Ms Anderson is more intelligent and better educated than the Archbishop?
Or is it that he understands TEC polity perfectly well and knows that nothing passes GC without the agreement of the TEC HOB. Can it be that he expects TEC bishops to behave like bishops?
Or is TEC polity or baptismal schizophrenia: Can’t, Won’t, Shan’t?
“I envision Archbishop Rowan pondering in, to use his word, “puzzlement” why these bishops of the Episcopal Church don’t just stand up and exercise their authority as bishops like most of the rest of the bishops in the Communion do. Why would our bishops “bind themselves to future direction for the Convention?” Some of us in TEC in the past have thought that perhaps the Archbishop and others in the Anglican Communion do not understand the baptismal covenant that we hold foundational. Perhaps they just don’t “get” the way we choose to govern ourselves; the ministers of the church as the laity, clergy and the bishops, and that at the very core of our beliefs we believe in the God- given gifts of all God’s people, none more important than the other, just gifts differing. We believe that God speaks uniquely through laity, bishops, priests and deacons. This participatory structure in our church allows a fullness of revelation and insight that must not be lost in this important time of discernment.”
The above statement by the un-ordained lay person Bonnie Anderson is absolutely full of either an ignorance of how episopacies have been run for almost two thousand years or she is wilfully stating her belief that ECUSA is not an episcopacy and therefore not a LEGITIMATE MEMBER of the Church Catholic let alone the Anglican Communion.
The General Convention is nothing more that a group of people, selected for participation by sometimes dubious processes and standards, who meet once every three years.
It is not a synod or college of theologians carefully selected by their ordained peers and seniors to discuss and come to conclusions regarding issues of theology.
As a corporate body, General Convention is incompetent and flawed in matters of theology requiring careful discussion and deep spiritual discernment.
Arrogant isn’t she?
If we hold our [i.e. this most recent] “baptismal covenant to be foundational”, why did we just invent it in 1979?
The thinking is pathological at this point – -what the RCs call “invincible ignorance.”
And yet, #3, bishops as well as laity need accountability and checks and balances against their powers, both theological, political and financial. Isn’t the current problem at least partly one of lack of accountability (of both clergy and laity) to God and each other?
I speak as one who was Methodist before becoming Episcopalian and watched over decades as Jesus Christ was no longer needed or wanted as King, Lord and center of His Church. Sin, repentance, the Cross and Blood, the Fatherhood of God, the true Gospel of power lost favor and was exchanged for social, sexual, political agendas.
I was shocked at the stuff coming out of UMC/NYC -especially the UMW – the goddess sophia, speaking out against laws legislating morality (prostitution, etc).
However, from what I have heard preached in the pulpits and neglected in the pulpits, and from the bishops and neglected by the bishops, the clergy are complicit in this.
I have heard one priest say, as you have, that the laity are the problem…that GC is the place where unscriptural laity agendas are put forth, voted in and given legislative legitimacy.
The votes are about the same in both UMC and TEC clergy and convention bodies…the UMC vote was a hair-breadth in favor of orthodoxy at their GC.
Looks like tolerance is not a good thing after all. Revelation 2:20.
Rowan clearly needs to seek enlightenment from Bonnie, Elizabeth, and the female hit squads who are violating diocesan boundaries to assure compliance with their understanding of ecclesiology. Now, if they can only get the pesky rest of the Anglican Communion in line, they’ll be satisfied. Otherwise, their “prophetic” bit will die on the vine, the consequence of capitulation to the zeitgeist – which is as surely dying as their “prophetic” voices elsewhere condemn America for “political incorrectness”. Can we say, “bipolar”? or “deluded”?
Ms Bonnie’s arguments will become increasingly irrelevant as the laity die off. In a few decades, there will be only bishops left in TEC, plus some clergy who will function as their court retinue.
All of this is consistent with the new “discover the will of God in commmunity” motif for TEC. The GC of TEC utilizes group-think “bible studies” to create a consensus which becomes what the “Spirit” is now saying in the Church. Bonnie Anderson simply practices the gnostic discernment process which, to The ABC and the much of the Global South, is evasive and unaccountable. Once you have yielded to “dialogue” and given yourself permission to discern which Scriptures are acceptable, you have a truly Brave New World of church life. And, small wonder then, that your mission becomes utopian “-isms”, rather than spreading the saving Good News of salvation through Jesus Christ.
I would take Bonnie Anderson’s (and the HoB’s) appeals to our polity and the Baptismal Covenant seriously if they understood and followed our polity and the Baptismal Covenant. The first promise in the Baptismal Covenant is to continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship. If they did that, we would not be having this issue.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
What is so terribly sad about all this pure hubris and talk about empowered laity is the devastation this agenda is having on faithful members of the church across the country.
After thirty years of ordained ministry in TEC I am in touch with lay Episcopalians and Anglicans from sea to shining sea, and the confusion, hurt, and sadness…the loss of members and resulting financial pinch for congregations, the broken relationships, pastoral needs going unmet…the list is endless…makes one wonder if 815 and the HOB have any idea what is going on in the church of which they have gained leadership.
It could be that in their denial they simply don’t see it, or it could as well be that in their obsession there is no limit to the pain 815 is willing for all of us to suffer.
I do know that if we cannot somehow stick together against this cultural spiritual attack against the whole of our church and by which the 815 are themselves afflicted, the sub-divisions and animosity will kill us.
No. 11: You raise an interesting question. We tend to deal with theological questions here–as well as church polity and a bit of ecclesiastical sociology–but maybe some psychology is in order.
I’ve been thinking about what you say and also about the articles concerning reallocation of resources at the Washington National Cathedral–going global while neglecting the garden in their own backyard.
It’s almost as if they (TEC) know they’re down and so they are grasping at the “prophetic” identity to compensate for loss of stature and influence. As if things like numbers of ordinary parishioners and gardens didn’t matter.
Perhaps a little like the Treasury of Virtue that Robert Penn Warren talks about? The (white) South after the Civil War–defeated, devastated–could think that it had “won” because it was morally superior to the North: the Cause was lost, but it was a righteous cause for honor and virtue.
A good bit of wishful thinking there, not to mention whistling in the dark. I don’t know if there are any real parallels or not. I’m just thinking aloud–one of the benefits, I take it, of participating in these threads of conversation.
Well, I shouldn’t have been citing R. P. Warren from memory. “Treasury of Virtue” refers to the North; the “Great Alibi” refers to the South. But in any case both ideas may be suggestive here as we consider our own civil wars–cultural, ecclesiastical– today.
David,
Certainly the devastation from the civil war, all justification aside, still causes considerable pain…and so it will ever be among Anglicans in the United States and literally around the world…I just don’t think the folks at 815 and in the HOB are counting the costs before they attack…and surely if they knew the pain they were causing there is enough of the image of God in their hearts that it would cause them pause…you would think.
#5 Albany*, thanks for that phrase…”invincible ignorance.” I’ll have to remember that.
I wonder what Ms. Bonnie Anderson understands when she answers the covenant question:
[blockquote]”Will you continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers?”[/blockquote]
It’s the first question after reciting the Creed. To continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship does not imply innovating new theology every 10-50 years as TEC seems to have done. For the apostles teaching is far more than reciting the Creed as we can plainly see by picking up our New Testaments.
I would like to think that +Rowan Williams understands the baptismal covenant quite well. The apostles teaching was not their own invention, just as justice and peace are not the creation of human beings/societies. They both are God’s to define, reveal and grant.
Ms. Anderson seems to be arrogating to herself and TEC a position usually rejected by Anglicans–that of an all-encompassing Magisterium to define the faith as well as justice and peace. Justice and peace must flow from the God one believes in.
She might as easily have simply said that she and the Archbishop believe in different gods.
I would like to know which piece of General Convention created the office of “Lay Leader of The Episcopal Church? ” Pun intended, of course. That’s tantamount to saying that the Speaker of the House of Representatives is the REAL President of the United States, and the occupant of the office is just the fugurehead! And how is it that she’s been given so much authority to speak for TEC?
I meant “General Convention legislation.”
Don Armstrong in #11 makes me put the issue in a slightly different light. We know that disillusionment will destroy faith, but when a faith goes, does belief go? What we do know for sure is that when a faith dies, the need for belief remains, but the articles of faith, robbed of their integrity, become superstitition and magic, the product of ignorance acting on belief.
But after that, what remains? I want to quote some of Philip Larkin’s penetrating poem “Church Going.” The narrator, cycling in England, stops at a little church. He admits he does not know why he does this “…Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.”
Yet stop I did: in fact, I often do
And often end much at a loss like this,
Wondering what to look for, wondering ,too,
When churches fall completely out of use
What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep
A few cathedrals chronically on show,
their parchement, plate and pyx in locked cases,
And let the rest, rent free t o rain and sheep.
Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?
Or, after dark, will dubious women come
To make their children touch a particular stone;
Pick simples for a cancer; or on some
Advised night see walking a dead one.
Power of some sort will go on
In games, in riddles, seemingly at random;
But superstition, like belief, must die,
And what remains when disbelief has gone….”
Much as I would like to, I will not quote the rest of the poem, but ask all, and Don Armstrong in particular, the question, What remains when even disbelief has gone? This is a critical question, for if we agree that even disbelief and superstition must die, what takes its place? We agree there can be no vacuum. TEC and the secular world make faith untenable for Americans, and TEC’s blind insistence on tolerance, inclusiveness, multiculturalism, religious equivalency, diversity have become a set of incantations, have they not? How far is this from superstition? TEC will die and secularism will continue to triumph. What then? Is it enough for us to live as Perfect Consumers, “…consumed by that which we were nourished by,” on and on, forever and ever? Larry