Today’s Church Times has coverage of recent events and due to a postal strike in the UK, the whole newspaper is available this week without subscription.
Pat Ashworth Official support for US Bishops, while others doubt
And ‘Parallel Church’ for North America
Barry Morgan New Orleans: the inside story
Andrew Brown Press: Staying at home for the schism
Letters:The Pittsburgh traditionalists are unlikely to be united for long
I love it…..Barry Morgan says TEC HOB “rightly reminded” everyone about the second part of Lambeth 1.10 I wonder if he reminded them about the first part….. You see, people have been “listening” for decades and are still not convinced….not even Rowan Williams’ attempts in the past convinced many to accept people like VGR as vicars/bishops. Now, those who have consistently ignored the first part of Lambeth 1.10 want to lecture us on the second part……this constant demand would have more credibility if there had been more honourable conduct re Lambeth 1.10 on the part of those who want “listening”… Read more »
NP said: “You see, people have been “listening” for decades and are still not convinced” Oh, really. Lambeth 1978, 1988, and 1998 all called for serious listening and study. The Windsor Report called for each province to undertake a Listening Process and submit a report. It is obvious from many of the reports that the 1978 call was ignored, the 1988 call was ignored, the 1998 call was ignored, and in many cases the 2004 call was ignored. I wouldn’t call that ‘listening for decades’. Here are a few samples: http://www.aco.org/listening/reports/provinces.cfm Central Africa – “The Church of the Province of… Read more »
Nobody has to remind us, NP–you and the GS primates do it over and over and over.
Which is why we keep reminding you of the second part, and of how Lambeth resolutions have no “force of law.”
“I wonder if he reminded them about the first part…..” NP, read the article more carefully and you will find your question unnecessary. From the article: “The Committee felt strongly that, just as Windsor had had trenchant things to say to the Episcopal Church, it had also had equally trenchant things to say about interventions by other jurisdictions, and that these should now come to an end. It was felt that if certain Primates called on the Episcopal Church to meet the recommendations of the Windsor report, they themselves could not be exempt from paying attention to some of its… Read more »
“You’re not listening yet —
Perhaps you never will…”
After Vincent (Starry starry night)
Well… I love the clarity and the no-nonsense attitude of the link regarding the ridiculous group that met in Pittsburgh – their basic “polity” seems to preclude any significant long term association between their individual members – we shall see. As to Lambeth 1:10, NP seems to ask us to ignore it in its entirety since some deny half and some the other half, if I read his post correctly. Instead he might consider making some positive suggestions. He would thereby clarify his thoughts. At the moment he seems to be taking cheap potshots that produce primarily smoke and confusion… Read more »
I think the letter about the Common Cause Partnership has it right, that it is only a common cause about one thing. I got the impression from an ordained visitor to our part of the world this week, who works in the US, that there is quite a plurality and even messiness anyway in oversight in the Episcopal Church, which reflects the reality of a diverse Church, but when you are trying to organise a unified response, and you do it with different incursions and splinter groups, it is not likely to produce anything other than the next big crack… Read more »
“The Province is small with few resources and does not have the time to do all things and has needed to set its own priorities and agendas rather than ones that seem to have been manufactured for them.”
So why do they and others have so much time and money to spend flying themselves into other peoples’ provinces and dioceses? How do they make the time to put their noses in other peoples’ bidness?
What unmitigated claptrap.
In regards to ‘listening’, perhaps +Mouneer Anis (who so far is the only dissenting voice to the JSC report) needs to listen just that little bit harder. As a reminder, in 2003 he was reported as saying the following: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1066371,00.html
“Bishop Anis also thought that a slippery slope was being embarked upon. ‘Bisexual orientation,’ he continued, ‘is much more common than homosexual orientation, medically speaking. Will the Church allow the person with bisexual orientation to have a partner from each sex?'”
Let’s hope those listening skills have improved in the last four years.
The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell aspects of our current church life situations may signal – as it has for the USA Military institutions – that unstoppable forces of rationality and change are meeting intransigent forces of institutional braking. For a USA observer, there is more than a touch of the Tennessee Scopes Trial in all of the current realignment statements. Problem is, this fails to bear very useful witness to what Anglicans treasure for reaching across hot button or difficult human divides. The better witness would be for us Anglican believers to say, we will discuss and argue but not… Read more »
I still continue to wonder at the apparent inability of some in the Global South to grasp the meaning of the word moratorium. It does not mean repentance, it does not mean the reversal. It means precisely a halt, until a more positive consensus has been reached — which the Windsor Report appears to expect.
Andrew Brown, you are just soooo wicked.
I laughed until I cried ….
Robert Ian Williams esq is a very conservative Roman Catholic. His letters to the Church Times are always worth reading as he does his research.
The one in this week is a real Bramah
Typically, realignment conservative believers wish us to construe this matter of listening – in the narrowest cultural, theological, and institutional terms possible, skewed ahead of time by their special and curious presuppositions which trump, not least, any and all possible facts. Skewed. Ahead of time. No matter what. Can one avoid thinking, forgone conclusions? But, what sort of world is this, when church life dogmas argue for less peace, less tolerance across varying views and matters of conscience, and less ability to maturely agree to disagree in democracies and related cultural or political contexts – compared to civil society which… Read more »
I understand the ACO have been looking at the viability of spraying the Lambeth Conference next year …..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/homepage/int/pr/no/i1/i/love_bomb/-/news/1/hi/sci/tech/7026150.stm
Richard Kirker of LGCM says “This represents the only hope for Anglicans”.
Well played MJ. Cynthia, I want to reinforce your message that size does not matter. There are some who seem to believe that one can be a street angel and a house devil. Such souls can not heal the world because they don’t have a problem with aggression, just with getting into trouble for displaying it. The world will change when enough souls understand that aggression is not acceptable, whether that be in either public or private arenas. We need to “walk the talk” of saintliness. Those who love to taunt and are indifferent to whether their camp uses aggressive… Read more »
I see that the BBC report didn’t mention the Man in the Street Theology Prize won by the article ‘Investigation into the Subjugation of the Hermeneutic of Suspicion within Nihilist Textualism’, that the Mothers’ Union prize for cookery went to the study into the ‘The Nutritional Benefits of Communion Wafers’, and that the prize for Peace and Diplomacy went to The ‘Impacts of Anglican Primates Meeting in Kent’.
“The Province is small with few resources and does not have the time to do all things and has needed to set its own priorities and agendas rather than ones that seem to have been manufactured for them.”
Old-fashioned Westrogotha Pietism called this sort of thing “the hindrance of the un-ready”.
Another example of Margaret’s “we have no time for this committee” ;=)
+Orombi of Uganda has launched another attack on the TEC HoB statement and the JSC report – http://www.globalsouthanglican.org/index.php/comments/archbishop_of_uganda_on_tec_house_of_bishops_statement/ One does wonder why there has yet to be a response to the report from Jolly Babirukamu, the lay ACC member from Uganda. She said in New Orleans that “she was attending the House of Bishops and JSC meetings as an individual and at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and was not representing the Anglican Province of Uganda” – http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79901_90458_ENG_HTM.htm If she takes +Orombi’s position then surely she would swiftly record a vote of dissent. Which raises the question of… Read more »
http://www.anglican-mainstream.net/index.php/2007/10/06/african-archbishops-respond-to-new-orleans-crisis-is-about-the-nature-of-christ-the-truth-of-the-gospel-and-the-authority-of-the-bible/
More important than the Church Times et al is this response from Primates who represent 70%of Anglicans in the world! (37/53 is about 70%)
L Roberts – American Pie is one of my favourite songs (despite Madonna!)….. “The three men I admire most, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost….” Not so sure about the following line, in light of the bible, of course!
Oh dear – it is not just Reform, Anglican Mainstream or nasty NP who thinks we must have a Primates meeting to assess the response of TEC HOB and it is not just the so called “right” which does not believe the JSC spin on TEC HOB’s doublespeak See Fulcrum (“open”, not conservative evos – very middle of the road, much more committed to the institution of the CofE than me) -they are not fooled by TEC HOB; See CAPA Primates (reprenting 70% ofthe world’s Anglicans) calling for a Primates meeting and saying they have not been fooled either; See… Read more »
Here is an article from Time magazine on the effect of Christianity’s monomaniacal fixation on sexuality on its moral authority in the rest of society and on the allegiance of the young. http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1667639,00.html I do find it very striking that in the USA and the West, the populations of the antigay movements are predominantly late middle aged to elderly, are clergy, and are white and male. The only places where antigay movements seem to be taking off among the young are in Eastern Europe where they have ties to xenophobic, antisemitic, and neofascist movements. Far right movements are very much… Read more »
“”The three men I admire most, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost….” Not so sure about the following line, in light of the bible, of course!”
The bible doesn’t allow trains? Or coasts?
NP, what have you been smoking? Or have you suddenly got the ability to abstract and interpret?
If I were you, I’d be much more concerned with calling the Trinity “men”.
Sorry about that – you did make me giggle. Thanks!
NP:
You keep saying that the primates in question “represent” 70% of the world’s Anglicans. How is that possible unless those Anglicans actually chose those individuals to represent them?
You have said repeatedly that you oppose electing bishops (as TEC does) because it is “unbiblical”. But, unless the bishops are elected by the Anglicans of their dioceses or provinces (including the laity), how can it be said they “represent” them?
Unless, of course, “represent” has some strange new meaning in your dictionary.
I suspect that most of the Primates “represent” their churches in the same way Louis XIV “represented” France.
NP, your grasp of poetry is about par with your grasp of scripture and your grasp of ecclesiology.
“The three men I admire most” is generally accepted to be a reference to the musical group Crosby, Stills and Nash. And Crosby, of course, has been identified as the sperm donor for the lesbian singer-songwriter Mellisa Ethridge.
Counterlight
Actually, I think maybe more Josephine Bonaparte.
When the masses are in uproar that there is no bread, she simply tells them to go eat cake. The whole concept that there is not enough flour to make bread, let alone cake, escapes her complacent self-absorbed consciousness.
Far be it from me to defend NP, but s/he is quoting the lyrics of Don McLean’s “Bye Bye Miss American Pie” (intentionally or otherwise).
and Don Maclean’s song mentions New Orleans style levees……….. this is getting spooky!
(Malcolm – I think Don Maclean has said he was talking about the death of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper when referring to the music dying and three men he admired most…..not sure where you get your “interpretation” from)