I first attended an Episcopal Church a little over 30 years ago. I joined the Episcopal Church 22 years ago, and I was ordained 19 years ago. Looking at the developments that have occurred over this period, someone might draw the analogy that I was a newly commissioned officer who sailed out in a fast speedboat to catch my ship that had already left port; and I took my place as a crew member on the Titanic just moments before it hit the iceberg….
Certainly, the Episcopal Church has been in a state of declining membership and increasing departures from historic, biblical Christianity for virtually the whole time I have been a member. But I always thought that the Anglican Communion would be the Episcopal Church’s salvation, not that the Episcopal Church would be the cause of the Anglican Communion’s destruction. I really never thought it would come to this.
From Dean Munday’s last paragraph:
[blockquote]
But all indications so far are that the Archbishop of Canterbury will do nothing; the assembled bishops will decide nothing; the American Church’s publicity steamroller will roll on; and the various churches of the Communion will follow the American Church’s slide into apostasy–as, indeed, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales already seem poised to do.
[/blockquote]
What is the meaning of [i]apostasy[/i] here? At [i]merriam-webster .com[/i] one finds:
[blockquote]
1 : renunciation of a religious faith
2 : abandonment of a previous loyalty
[/blockquote]
[i]Wikipedia[/i] focuses on [i]renunciation[/i], suggesting that often apostasy devolves from a failure of piety. It says:
[blockquote]
Many religious groups and even some states punish apostates. Apostates may be shunned by the members of their former religious group[1] or worse. This may be the official policy of the religious group or may happen spontaneously, due in some sense to psycho-social factors as well. Historically as well as currently, the offense can be punishable by death. The Catholic Church may in certain circumstances respond to apostasy by excommunicating the apostate, while the traditional holy writings of both Judaism (Deuteronomy 13:6-10) and Islam (al-Bukhari, Diyat, bab 6) demand the death penalty for apostates.
[/blockquote]
Perhaps the good dean meant to say [i]heresy[/i].
“Stabill” – I suspect that Dean Munday is reflecting the entirely justifiable view that apostasy is where heresy lands will eventually land you, hence his term, “slide into apostasy” really means “slide in the inevitable direction of apostasy.”
Alas, I find his views depressingly accurate and have a much similar reaction. I never thought that the leadership of the Anglican Communion would give so much credence to the sentimental and trivializing drivel that lies at the heart of the Homosexual Movement’s ideology. I continue to be amazed that someone endowed with such intelligence and apparent perspicacity as Archbishop Williams would even give the time of day to notions such as “sexual orientation” that cannot withstand a moment’s critical scrutiny. Perhaps he really doesn’t understand just how monumentally shallow all too many of his colleagues from the colonies really are. I don’t know. I don’t get it. Maybe he doesn’t either. This debate should never have been church-dividing because it was never worthy of debate at all. The answer is and always has been too obvious. The Homosexual Movement has neither a philosophical not theological leg to stand on and yet they dominate all conversation. It’s shocking to see how far intellectually the Anglican Communion has sunk. I would never have expected it to come to this either.
Daniel Muth wrote: “Alas, I find his views depressingly accurate and have a much similar reaction.” Ditto. One of the most poignant pieces I’ve read concerning the downfall of a once faithful witness to the gospel, and so straight to the point.
I share his heartbreak as the Lord makes ready to remove this lampstand.
[blockquote]I always thought that the Anglican Communion would be the Episcopal Church’s salvation, not that the Episcopal Church would be the cause of the Anglican Communion’s destruction. I really never thought it would come to this.[/blockquote]
Neither did any of the rest of us, for the reasons Daniel expresses so well in #2. But then, it also strains credulity that the destruction of the Episcopal Church itself was so easy, the work of a very small group within it.
Nor did I think it would come to this. Today I find myself thinking I should have been more attentive to Edward Norman’s [i]Anglican Difficulties[/i] (2004).
Since 1955 the number of clergy in TEC had more than doubled by 2006 while infant baptisms had declined by 63 percent. In 1955 there were about 13 infant baptisms per clergyman and in 2006 there about 2 baptisms per clergyperson. In 2006 there were almost the same number of burials as there were infant baptisms. A sad set of data indeed. Statmann
Beg pardon, Craig, but you did know it would come to this and you have known for years. Am I wrong about this? The evidence has been everywhere. Nor is the destruction of TEC the work of a small group. It is the work of the bulk of TEC who have made Schori et al a reality. The liberals run TEC precisely because there are so many of them, and they fill Lambeth now, as you have seen. And what do we hear over and over, but thqt we must pray for them. Ladies and gentlemen, if God had desired to remedy this festering sore, he would have treated it long ago. Prayer is useless here; this is man’s problem to solve. And we wring our hands and do nothing. LM
LM, my point of reference is perhaps 40 years ago. What we in the pews were guilty of is the apathy that allowed a very small group — remember that the Pikes, Spongs, and Crews were an infinitesimal minority back then — to essentially take it over, SC by SC and seminary by seminary.
But what Dean Munday is referring to here is the dismanteling of the entire Anglican Communion; although the writing has been on the wall for TEC since at least the Righter trial of a decade ago (and I personally would put the date twenty years before that), it really seemed that the Communion would hold together and take some moderately substantive action for self-preservation; God knows the GS Primates tried repeatedly. And GAFCon may result in some interesting structural realignment. But the Communion we grew up with is dead, essentially solely due to TEC and Canterbury’s ACO.