Earlier this week, Massachusetts Bishop M. Thomas Shaw sent back an e-missive from Lambeth to his flock. Emulating St. Paul (“speaking the truth in love”), Shaw alluded to “some frustration emerging in the conference around how [the indaba groups] are very process oriented and aren’t allowing for the conversations that people are really interested in to take place.” He further noted that “There’s been some controversy over a statement issued by bishops of Sudan and signed by Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul, calling for Gene Robinson’s resignation.”
“It’s going to take us awhile to find our way,” writes Shaw, who spent part of the following day at Buckingham Palace, bantering with Prince Philip. “It seems to me that that’s what we’re doing, finding our way, and for the most part, I think people are being faithful to that.”
My father wasn’t particularly religious and he wasn’t particularly Episcopalian. (Note to my sons: Don’t even think about discussing my religious beliefs in public.) He had a genial demeanor, and I remember him discussing Kit and Frederica Konolige’s classic book, “The Power of Their Glory; America’s Ruling Class: The Episcopalians” with me. The authors, who may have coined the term “Episcocrats,” take a sardonic view of the “Tory Party at prayer,” as Episcopalians are sometimes called.
But my father somehow concluded that, the criticisms notwithstanding, Episcopalians emerged from the book more or less unscathed. “[The authors] seem to think that we are good people, at heart,” he said. Now I wonder if they were right.