CLSD believes our bishop-elect to be a person of integrity and honesty, with evident gifts for gracious listening, inclusive leadership and pastoral care – three of the most urgent needs within the Diocese. We believe he will be faithful to his vows to conform to the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Episcopal Church.
The Telegraph reveals that the secretary general of the C of E General Synod agrees with the presiding bishop of The Episcopal Church. The Secretary General says, “The important thing is that if people go, they are making decisions as individuals. It is not parishes that decide to go to join the ordinariate, it is individuals. It may be all the members of one [parish, but] they can’t take the institutions, the offices, or the assets of the Church of England with them.”
The Vestry of Christ Church, Philadelphia, has discerned that to contribute to the Episcopal Assessment is to agree to and support Charles Bennison’s decision to remain as Diocesan Bishop, and we cannot do so. We encourage the vestries of the parishes in our diocese to join Christ Church in increasing support to the Program Budget [by ending] payment of the Episcopal Assessment.
The Bishop of Lewes has compared the situation of traditionalists in the Church of England to the situation faced by the UK in January 1939. He claims he made no reference to Hitler or the Nazis. As a BBC interviewer points out, he didn’t need to. On January 30, 1939, speaking before the Nazi Reichstag (Parliament), Hitler threatened Jews with annihilation.
As the Episcopal Chust is responsible for its choices, so the Archbishop of Canterbury, the various Anglican Communion structures, and the individual Anglican provinces are each responsible for their choices. If one or more of those entities chooses to “punish” or impair communion with TEC, TEC should recognize that the decision and responsibility for it belong to those who made the decision and not to TEC.
If by “Anglican theology” we mean a set of definitive texts, creeds, and historical documents that sets Anglicans apart from other Christian bodies, we will search in vain to find it. We can, however, find a wide array of theologies being done by Anglicans. And there is a difference. Noting how Anglicans do theology may prove more fruitful than detailing what Anglicans believe.
The Covenant is widely seen as one-sided, aimed at punishing certain provinces for supposed failings while allowing all kinds of other concerns to go unheeded. Less attention has been given to the disturbing approach to unity which ignores the problem of evil.
By now it’s clear that Nancy Pelosi will be passing the speaker’s gavel to Ohio’s John Boehner as the Democrats retained a slight majority over in the Senate. Religion wasn’t a huge issue in the 2010 midterms, but a couple of notable races stand out.
It is certainly true that he had significant concerns; but it is equally true that leaders in our church need the freedom to express their convictions forcefully and to seek to influence the church’s course of action. That is a quality of our church that we cherish.
The point of this audaciously anachronistic title is not to claim Jesus as our own (how very un-Episcopalian that would be!), but to inspire us to see how Jesus is found in the many and varied expressions of faith that two thousand years of Christendom has birthed.