ENS has this report:
Private meeting with Williams at convention will address sexuality, ministry
Eight members of the Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies are scheduled meet privately with Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams at General Convention in a session that is intended in part to address lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) issues in the church.
General Convention meets July 8-17 in Anaheim, California, and Williams will be present July 7-9.
The session is not an official convention meeting and thus there has been no announcement of the plans. However, when contacted by Episcopal News Service, the Rev. Canon Michael Barlowe of the Diocese of California confirmed the details.
Barlowe said that he and the other deputies understood the meeting was to be brief and private, but that it was not a secret…
Not a secret? Surely that won’t do…
If, as Duncan, now prelate of ACNA has asserted, ++Rowan has been meeting with him, given the Windsor and Lambeth affirmation of “the listening” process, it would seem appropriate that he would give ear to both sides of this dispute. Duncan has used +Rowan’s willingness to entertain him as somehow giving him and his organization credibility and sanction. ++Cantuar is now, finally doing the same with the other side. His willingness to chat may well be used for PR effect by this side in the same manner. But I take both “conversations” as simply witness to Windsor and Lambeth 1.10… Read more »
He has taken his time – festina lente ?!
I hope he will listen –and spare those good people of load of Williams’ BS.
Given that ++Canterbury will be meeting with these delegates, and Duncan’s use and the right wing blogs of his meetings with +Cantuar to give credibility to their faction, I wondered how the conservative blogs would treat this event. At this writing 9:55 am, Stand Firm which seems to see itself as “press” as well as conservative lobby blog, did not “report” the “news” at all. Kendall Harmon’s blog “Titus One-Nine” referenced the ENS article without comment and only 3 posters have commented. I found this most enlightening for one poster’s “take” on the event: “I don’t know what William’s (sic)… Read more »
I believe there may be a breakthrough move: Let us renounce our involvement in the secular state by refusing to sign marriage licenses. Let the state marry people, as it sees fit, and let us bless those marriages as we see fit. Take the contentious ‘justice’ argument out of the mix. (By signing these licenses we in the States run afoul of the Constitutional requirement for a separation between between Church and State.)
On the one hand, I think it’s important to ‘keep the conversation going’, etc.
On the other hand, the whole thing is absurd. It is completely stupid and shameful that the Church – and above all the Anglican Communion – finds homosexuality problematic. Great column very recently in ‘The Independent’:
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-almost-everywhere-is-touched-by-the-stonewall-riots-now-1726047.html
Gay/queer guys and girls all (I was one once),
I truly believe that most Anglicans are with you.
Love,
John.
If, as Duncan, now prelate of ACNA has asserted, ++Rowan has been meeting with him, given the Windsor and Lambeth affirmation of “the listening” process, it would seem appropriate that he would give ear to both sides of this dispute.
Except that there are at least *three* “sides”.
This is great John.
Many thanks. What a tremendous piece of writing.
On the other hand, the whole thing is absurd. It is completely stupid and shameful that the Church – and above all the Anglican Communion – finds homosexuality problematic. Great column very recently in ‘The Independent’:
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-almost-everywhere-is-touched-by-the-stonewall-riots-now-1726047.html
I suspect that +++Rowan is sympathetic to the plight of the GLBT community but what is more important to him is the AC. My guess is he’ll ask the GLBT community to take it on the chin for the good of the communion (and we will continual to have this injustice for GLBT community for many more generations or until religion is dead).
Maybe the GLBT community can go back in the closet and not rock the boat. Somehow I don’t think so.
Some of are tired of sitting in the back of the bus (to borrow a phrase).
“What many Anglicans around the world seem to forget is that Archbishop Rowan, as Primus inter pares, has to listen to all sides of any debate that has ramifications for the whole Communion. This, he has managed to do so far, but not without inviting the scorn of people of either side of the arguments – simply because his is the role of conciliator. I have no doubt that he will listen to the TEC theologians who have prepared a presentation on behalf of that Church, and will take into serious consideration what they have to say about same-sex blessings… Read more »