So, I am once again involved in another long blog discussion over the recent letter sent by the new Presiding Bishop Jefferts-Shori to the Bishop of San Joaquin in California – one of the diocese that are attempting to move out of The Episcopal Church. Her letter comes after Bishop Schofield’s letter to his diocese as their diocesan convention approached.
Anyway, if you dare, read the comments and help me. Where am I wrong? Seriously. I know that my writing can be better, but I want to know where my inconsistencies are apparent.
The link is here.
Oh, I post under “Bob G+”

A very good interview with Rowan Williams in The Church Times before his visit to Rome. It is rather long, but well worth the read. Via Titusonenine

Bishop Scofield of the Diocese of San Joaquin has issued a letter to his diocese leading up to their diocesan convention. My take on the leader is that the resolutions before convention will remove those in the diocese from The Episcopal Church. Perhaps the presentment against Bishop Scofield by the other bishops of California, which was found to be without merit at the time, was premature. You can read the letter here.
Here is a response by Father Jake Stops the World
There is a lot of discussion of this letter at Titusonenine. I responded to an earlier comment that decried the attitudes typically associated with Californians of a social permissiveness or post-modernist way that says that all beliefs are equal, thusly:
Brain wrote:

So over time, what shapes what? Does the church remain a focal point of faithfulness amid “live and let live” or does a 97% unchurched population influence the church to “believe whatever ya want”? As far as mainline synods and denominations, the data is there for all to see.

Faithfulness to what? A very particular way of interpreting Scripture? A checklist of does and don’ts? A litmus test of theological principles? The two greatest commands given to us by Jesus? From the perspective of the unchurched people around us, I posit that it isn’t what we may think. They want to see people who actually live what they say – like Mother Teresa, like the Amish in Pennsylvania. Like Bishop Scofield? Life you or me? Like liberals or conservatives?
You know, with regard to the “believe what ya want” and the ethos behind post-modernism or its cousin “relativism”, the way we respond to people, the way we engage one another in disagreements, the way we speak and convey our principles and beliefs, the way we DO all these things become paramount. Talk is cheap. “They will know you are Christians by your love…” There ain’t a whole lot of lovin’ goin’ on.
Anyone can say anything and believe anything – Christian or non-Christian, liberal or conservative. It is only when the post-modernist and unchurched people see such a difference in our lives that they cannot deny that there is something profoundly significant in what we proclaim, expressed through our actions so as to not be found to be hypocrites. We can demand that post-modernism be rejected, but it isn’t going away. Our words must match our actions, and most non-Christians believe that we are a bunch of hypocrites in that regard – conservative or liberal, it doesn’t matter.
We as Christians will now have to honestly live lives of significant difference (as the Gospel calls us to do), and that is not just in our profession of beliefs or some demand that people stop behaving in certain ways. The unchurched look and see huge logs sticking out of our eyes. I think this is a problematic point in much of what I read from reasserters over some of the moral issues we are struggling over. I have no doubt that Bishop Scofield is a godly man who seeks after God’s will, but his description of all other Episcopalians who do not agree with his way of living out the Anglican/Christian life is problematic. Again, in a culture where anyone can believe whatever they want with equal regard, it is a demonstratably different life that will attract them and will prove to them that there is something different about THIS Gospel.
An example of this is how the liberal news media was bending over backwards to report on and trying to explain the profoundly different way the Amish responded to the murder of their children in Pennsylvania. In the Amish, they saw lived out the command to forgive and to love without hypocrisy. They look at us in all our pronouncements and infighting and accusations as nothing more than a bunch of hypocrites – ala Ted Haggard.
In a post-modernism world, we have to get off the pot! How often do we step back and really think of how the unchurched see us?

The warning applied to the Anglican Communion and The Episcopal Church:
Galatians 5:14-15 (TNIV)

For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

We are devouring one another. It is a travesty. The distinctive spirit of Anglicanism is under great pressure to give way to the spirit of the world, the devises and desires of men.

Archbishop Peter Akinola, Primate of the Anglican Church in Nigeria, had a big shin-dig in his honor the other day. He has been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world this year by Time magazine, it seems.
Here is a report from an African online news source coving the event with highlights of Akinola’s speech to those assembled.
One quoted part of Akinola’s speech is worth noting, I think:

“The real reason is that the leaders of the Christian faith in the western world have come to realize that Africans can no longer be put under spiritual slavery.
“The Europeans who knew nothing about African origin and background had been trying to impose things on us.
“We have been through physical slavery, we have been through economic slavery, political slavery and now spiritual slavery”, he said.”

Spiritual slavery? The West is now attempting to spiritually enslave Africans?
There is no question that the West has exploited Africa and Africans. Chattel slavery was (and is) a tragedy. Akinola needs to also acknowledge the role of tribal Africans in the enslavement of their own people and the exploitation that occurs within all societies, cultures, and nations through time – Nigeria included.
To cast the consecration of a gay American Bishop, the ordinations of gay priests, or the advocacy in some corners of same-sex unions (the cause of current controversies within world-wide Anglicanism) in the West in a similar light as forced physical slavery is ridiculous and disingenuous. He may honestly perceive things in this way, but it is just plain wrong and profoundly misplaced. Is he being honest, or is he simply making hyperbolic statements for effect?
To posit that what the Western Church has done is an attempt to enslave the African Churches is absurd. They simply do not have to accept Western bishops, priests, deacons, or policies. That is their right as autonomous provinces within Anglicanism. The Western Churches do not have the authority to impose anything on the African Churches. We are not attempting to withhold money to force them to accept our viewpoint. As a matter of fact, Uganda and other diocese have rejected funds freely given by the American Church with no strings attached for medical and poverty relief.
Peter Akinola should be ashamed of himself. He can disagree and passionately advocate for his position, even to the point of breaking fellowship. That is his prerogative, but to claim we are attempting to “spiritually enslave” Africans is beyond the pale.
The website also reports:

Akinola… said the latest attempt to bring in immoral practices into the Anglican Church by some western countries is bound to crumble.
He said our western brothers appeared about to reason with us in this struggle. “They are beginning to say, let’s look at their points of argument, may be these people are right”.

I don’t think Akinola’s opinion is correct. I don’t think he will find the West, at least most of it, agreeing with him. He will see it as further evidence of the West’s apostasy, but he truly does approach these subjects from a very “fundamentalist” position – it is his position and none other.

There is a lot of spin and angst going around concerning ++Rowan William’s interview with a Dutch newspaper – Nederlands Dagblad. The more radical-conservatives are claiming that ++Rowan is now supporting their side and the more radical-liberals are gnashing their teeth.
Both sides are spinning his comments for their own purposes (sometimes I wonder whether they know how to do anything other than spin, spin, spin?).
Here are some good reference sites to read-up-on and for yourself the interview:
Here is the Dutch interview transcript:
http://www.nd.nl/htm/dossier/seksualiteit/artikelen/060819eb.htm
Here are a number of good assessments and commentaries on the interview
from ‘Thinking Anglicans’:

http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/archives/001890.html

Continue reading →

I came across a website/blog dedicated to a “reform of the reform” within Roman Catholicism called “The New Liturgical Movement“. It seems interesting and confirms what I’ve been hearing on many fronts that there is a renewed interest, particularly among younger laity and clergy within the Church of Rome (and within Anglicanism), to re-examine much of the Liturgical Renewal Movement and return to some of the more traditional rituals and piety – the disciple, splendor and beauty of worship rendered unto a glorious and mysterious God.
Considering that I’m now serving as Curate in a “non-fussy, Rite I, Anglo-Catholic” parish (the legacy of the Oxford Movement) with increasing numbers of young people, I think they may be onto something! Of course, we in “High Church” Anglicanism have known this for some time now! 🙂 (To be honest, I’m a relative new-comer, but I’m being trained well!)
I came across this particular website/blog via “Dappled Things” – a blog/website by a Gen-X Roman priest. I’ve been visiting his blog periodically for a while now – interesting guy.
Here is a couple paragraphs of a post on “The New Liturgical Movement” blog:

Two titles relating to the revival of Ritual in Anglican Britain
The scenario faced by the figures of the Oxford Movement presents a remarkable parallel, liturgically speaking, in the case of the Catholic Church today.
We face a variety of variants, with some parishes being liturgically more traditional (in Anglican parlance, “High” or “AngloCatholic”) and then some being more “low” in nature — that is, less traditional, less elaborate in its ceremonial, less ornamented generally. Of course, there is also the matter of theology. In the case of Anglicanism of course, these distinctions were far more hard and fast; in Catholicism, by contrast, it really comes down to what is legitimate liberty and what is simply dissent as compared to Catholic orthodoxy. That is a big difference of course.
Still, the liturgical parallels are interesting. Those Catholics with a keen sense of the need to “reform the reform” or preserve the classical liturgical forms face opposition and a “liturgically low” mentality from a number of quarters, be they some bishops, priests, or laity.
As such, I think it can be interesting to study the approach, trials and tribulations (not to mention the successes) of the likes of the Oxford Movement and Anglican Ritualists, as well as the Cambridge Camden Society who sought to restore an architecture suited toward Catholic liturgics.
In that vein, I wanted to share a couple of interesting titles with you.

The books he recommends are:
+ Anglican Ritualism in Victorian Britain 1830-1910 by Prof. Nigel Yates.
+ A Church As It Should Be edited by Christopher Webster and John Elliott

Fr. Jake comments about this new breed of people who refer to themselves as “conservatives,” yet hardly demonstrate the traditional definition of “conservative” by their actions. He references and posts a short essay by Teresa Mathes, wife of the Bishop of San Diego, who writes of her own experience being raised by true Episcopalian conservatives. She, too, suggests that what we see going on within our Church is not really traditional Anglican conservatism.

From The Very Rev. Alan Jones’ book, Common Prayer on Common Ground, on Anglican orthodoxy:

“Salvation isn’t the ultimate reward fro believing abstract doctrines. Salvation is experienced through grace as our lives are ‘converted,’ and conversion is an ongoing process. Doctrine is practical. It has to do with practice, with what the tradition calls ‘the experimental knowledge of God.’
“To be truly orthodox, doctrine must have an impact on the moral life. I remember some years ago a man screaming at the philosopher Jacob Needleman that to be a Christian you had to believe in the physical resurrection of Jesus. Needleman took the wind out of the young man’s sails and said, ‘Yes, you do. Now tell me, what does it mean? Tell me what difference it makes!’ The young man had nothing to say. An elderly retired priest angrily thundered at me: ‘Do you believe in the homoousian?’ (this is the doctrine that Jesus Christ is of the same substance as the Father). I said, ‘Yes, I do, but the more important question is why don’t you love me?”