Last Saturday, Episcopalian in the Diocese of Albany prayed together, listened to each other, and reached across the divide that afflicts the church these days/ They were trying to build trust and find a new way to negotiate strongly held visions of how to respond to the Gospel.
Albany Via Media invited both Bonnie Anderson, president of the House of Deputies, and Diocesan bishop The Rt. Rev. William Love to take part in a gathering called “‘Can we talk?’: Faith and Diversity in the Episcopal Church” which took place last Saturday afternoon at St. Andrew’s Church, Albany.
Robert Dodd, President of Albany Via Media said “We would like to begin the process of reconciliation.”
Time-Warner’s Capital News 9 channel says:
Dodd says it is time to talk and on Saturday, the President of the Episcopal House of Deputies, Bonnie Anderson, the Bishop of Albany, William Love, and Reverend James Brooks-McDonald of St. Stephens in Schenectady did just that, spending hours with parishioners at a forum in Albany.
“It’s about being together in tension and having different viewpoints in the Episcopal Church and still remain in communion together,” Anderson said.
“I hate to see the Episcopal Church break apart. We all don’t agree on the same things,” said Brooks-McDonald. “But can we live together in our disagreement?”
Marc Perry of the Albany Times-Union reported on the gathering:
Bonnie Anderson, president of the Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies, challenged the more than 200 people gathered at St. Andrew’s in Albany to come up with a model for the national church of how believers of different views can communicate.
“You cannot get on with God’s work until you trust each other,” Anderson said.
Division has fractured the church since the 2003 consecration of V. Gene Robinson as its first openly gay bishop. Speakers at Saturday’s event — a service led by Love followed by a question-and-answer session — stressed unity and communication. But the exchanges were sometimes tense.
The event was organized by Albany Via Media, a group of liberal-to-moderate local Episcopalians. Members generally disagree with Love’s opposition to ordaining gay clergy and blessing same-sex marriages, and they want the Albany diocese to remain in communion with the national church.
“We talk about the struggles of the church, and we seem to think that it all has to do with sex,” Love said during his sermon. “That’s only a symptom of something much deeper. That issue much deeper is God’s word. How is it to be understood? How is it to be interpreted? How is it to be lived out?”
Some speakers told the bishop they felt shut out of diocesan events and publications. Some criticized links to conservative religious Internet sites on the diocesan Web page. One said he wasn’t comfortable being referred to as a “sodomite” or “heretic” on a Web site recommended by the diocese.
Love said he could check the policy regarding links. He also suggested that if the speaker found the material offensive, “Don’t read it.”
That drew loud disapproval from the audience and, later in the session, an apology from Love.
Anderson’s visit attracted attention on several religious Web sites. Some commentators expressed disappointment Love would even participate. On one Web site billed as a place for “traditional Anglicanism in America” and linked to on Albany’s diocesan Web page, a commentator wrote of the bishop: “He may be operating under the adage, ‘Keep your friends close — and your enemies closer.’ ”
In interviews at St. Andrew’s Saturday, though, people on both sides of the ideological divide gave the bishop credit for showing up. A lot of credit.
“This is true Anglicanism, where you come together even with a divergence of views,” said David Kennison, senior warden at St. George’s Church in Schenectady and a former Albany Via Media board member.
The Rev. Peter Schofield, a conservative from Christ Church in Schenectady, said he feels Albany Via Media has been “very disruptive in the diocese.” But he, too, praised Saturday’s service.
“If we did worship together a lot more often than we do, I think we’d have a lot less problems,” he said. “We’re all one in Jesus.”
Read: A fractured church seeking common faith.
Read another article by Perry written before the event here.
This is the Albany Via Media page.
Here is the Capital News 9 story with a link to the video of their story.