Updated Monday evening
The Rt. Rev. Robert Duncan, Bishop of Pittsburgh, disputes the charge that he has abandoned the Communion of the Episcopal Church and has retained an attorney to answer the charges.
According to a news release from the Diocese of Pittsburgh:
In his response, Bishop Duncan rejected the claim that he had abandoned communion. “I state that I consider myself ‘fully subject to the doctrine, discipline and worship of this Church,’” he wrote. He went on to say. “I have striven to follow the Lord Jesus with all my heart and mind and soul and strength, all the while relying on God’s grace to accomplish what my sinfulness and brokenness otherwise prevent.” And “I have kept my ordination vows – all of them – to the best of my ability, including the vow I made on 28 October 1972 to ‘banish and drive away all strange and erroneous doctrines contrary to God’s Word.’”
Here is a PDF of Bishop Duncan’s letter to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori.
Here is the letter from Duncan’s lawyer to the Chancellor to the Presiding Bishop.
Lionel Deimel responds to Bishop Duncan’s letter here.
Here is our report of the original finding of the Episcopal Church’s Title IV Review Committee.
Updated Monday evening 3/17/08
ENS has a report here. An excerpt:
Duncan’s response lists eight ways he says show that he is “fully subject to the doctrine, discipline and worship of this Church.” Among them is the statement that he has “made no submission to any other authority or jurisdiction.”
Duncan, who is moderator of the Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes, also noted that he has “gathered Anglican fragments together from one hundred and thirty-five years of Episcopal Church division, vastly increasing understanding and cooperation, though preserving the jurisdictional independence of all.”
In late September, Duncan chaired a meeting of a related organization, the Common Cause Council of Bishops during which the group said it would spend what was then the next 15 months developing “an Anglican union,” which they anticipate will be recognized by some Anglican Communion Primates and provinces. Information about the actions taken at this meeting was included in the material submitted to the Title IV Review Committee, the committee of bishops, priests and laity that considers allegations of abandonment of communion.
Lionel Deimel has written a commentary on Bishop Duncan’s letter here.
He writes:
5. I have made no submission to any other authority or jurisdiction.
Again, doing so might bolster the abandonment case, but no one has suggested that Duncan did what he here asserts here he did not do. What he has been doing, however, is working to create a new jurisdiction. His actions suggest that he intends to lead such a jurisdiction, one that is either parallel to The Episcopal Church or a replacement, in the Anglican Communion, for The Episcopal Church.
6. I have gathered Anglican fragments together from one hundred and thirty-five years of Episcopal Church division, vastly increasing understanding and cooperation, though preserving the jurisdictional independence of all.
Finally, in this item, Duncan comes close to addressing the actual charges against him. Ironically, he construes his infractions as virtues. It is not his job, of course, to unite the various “continuing” Episcopal churches, but doing so is not clearly a bad thing. The actual allegation, however, is that Duncan is uniting the various splinter churches to form a jurisdictional rival of The Episcopal Church. Item 6 is actually a partial admission of guilt. Duncan fails to note that the unity he is working to create does not include unity with The Episcopal Church.