US Bishops drop bid to have Robinson admitted to Lambeth Conference

Canterbury: The push to seat Gene Robinson at Lambeth Conference failed yesterday after the American bishops declined to force the issue. At their July 21 provincial meeting at the Lambeth Conference the American bishops declined to take action on a request by liberal members of their caucus to ask the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, to seat the New Hampshire bishop.

Bishops attending the closed meeting tell ReligiousIntelligence.com that some bishops pushed for Bishop Robinson to be extended an invitation. There followed a substantive discussion of the Robinson issue with several bishops expressing their anger and hurt over his exclusion.

However, the American leadership declined to take up the issue and a growing number of bishops appear to be distancing themselves from the controversial New Hampshire cleric in a bid to avoid conflict with the conference organizers.

Bishop Robinson was forbidden to attend the meeting of his own House of Bishops, writing on his blog the conference organizers do not consider the American meeting to be a meeting of the American House of Bishops but a meeting of American bishops at Lambeth.

Read it all.

Posted in * Anglican - Episcopal, Episcopal Church (TEC), Lambeth 2008, TEC Bishops

10 comments on “US Bishops drop bid to have Robinson admitted to Lambeth Conference

  1. Katherine says:

    This is good news. I particularly like the end of Conger’s report:[blockquote]One bishop told us that the provincial meeting was very much like recent meetings of the House of Bishops, with the issue of Gene Robinson, and disquiet with the proposed Anglican Covenant generating a great deal of passion from some speakers.

    However, he added that the majority of American bishops appeared to be tiring of the focus on the travails of the Bishop of New Hampshire, and were not yet prepared to buck the Archbishop of Canterbury on this topic.[/blockquote]

  2. dwstroudmd+ says:

    Gee, Gene vocally stated that he grasped he might be a troublemaker. Now, if he can grasp that in terms of the AC and not just personally……………………………………………………….

  3. jamesw says:

    From the posted story…

    “As a non-invitee, I will not be allowed on the premises where the meeting is taking place,” Bishop Robinson wrote. “It really puts all of us in a lose-lose position: if I abide by their ruling, I am excluded; if I fight it or simply show up, then I’m the troublemaker and rebel. If the House of Bishops takes some action on this, necessitating a vote, then it divides our House — a further and unnecessary division that I refuse to encourage. So no matter how you slice it, someone loses.”

    and

    However, he added that the majority of American bishops appeared to be tiring of the focus on the travails of the Bishop of New Hampshire…

    From John Howe’s letter to his clergy:

    Fully two-thirds of our time was spent discussing Gene Robinson’s sadness…

    From the Statement of the Sudanese Bishops:

    We strongly oppose developments within the Anglican Church in the USA and Canada in consecrating a practicing homosexual as bishop and in approving a rite for the blessing of same-sex relationships. This has not only caused deep divisions within the Anglican Communion but it has seriously harmed the Church’s witness in Africa and elsewhere…

    And finally, from the definition of a narcississtic personality:

    Narcissistic personality disorder is a condition characterized by an inflated sense of self-importance, need for admiration, extreme self-involvement, and lack of empathy for others.

  4. Cennydd says:

    Any way you cut it, it’s “all about ME, ME, ME,” as far as VGR’s concerned.

  5. Chris Hathaway says:

    Wasn’t VGR a broken satelite with a perverted sense of mission that threatened to destroy the earth in the first Star Trek picture?

  6. Rob Eaton+ says:

    Not only will certain bishops (read moderates and institutional liberals – conservatives already do) begin to distance themselves from +Gene’s antics AND his rending consecration (if the reporter is correct), we should expect to see a further distancing within the House of Bishops itself. And you thought we (TEC) had been through enough pain already.

    RGEaton

  7. gppp says:

    Has anything been heard from NH Epicopalians about being disenfranchised?

  8. Kubla says:

    #: How can New Hampshire be disenfranchised when nobody is voting about anything and no decisions are being made?

  9. Chris Hathaway says:

    No one can be disenfranchised by lack of a bishop being at Lambeth because bishops do not represent their dioceses. They represent Christ, and every bishop is a bishop of the whole church. Therefore, New Hampshire is as much represented in this matter as South Carolina.

  10. Bill Matz says:

    jamesw,thanks for answering the question I posed a few days ago (with the last paragraph).