The original article is here, and Bishop Bird’s response is in the Letters section of today’s National Post and on Holy Post:

Re: Gaining Respect; St. Hilda’s Parish Is No Longer An Outpost Of Orthodoxy But A More Acceptable Manifestation Of Anglican Faith, Charles Lewis, June 12.

After reading this article I am left asking the question: What criteria did reporter Charles Lewis use in declaring a small group of conservative Christians a “religious revolution”? What he reported on is, in fact, a process of maturation within the world-wide Anglican Communion. It is a lot like adolescence, as people jostle for position in the midst of a debate. Dioceses, like the one I lead, advocate for the full inclusion of gays and lesbians in the life of our Church.

It’s hard to see exactly what point Michael Bird is making here: is he saying that it has taken 2000 years for the Christian Church to reach adolescence, that acts explicitly forbidden in the Bible become acceptable once those engaged in them have “matured”? It seems incoceivable that anyone could really be daft enough to honestly believe this; but, then, Bird does have some pretty strange ideas – see below.

For many of us, the kind of inclusion that Rev. Paul Charbonneau [who opposes same-sex unions, and who led St. Hilda’s Church out of the Anglican Church of Canada] speaks of is not acceptable.

The kind of inclusion that Rev. Paul Charbonneau believes is uncannily similar to the inclusion God advocates: everyone is welcome, but not all activities are equally good or beneficial to those who indulge in them. This is a pretty basic point: man is sinful and the church’s job is not to condone sin but help people turn away from it. Surely that should not be beyond the grasp of a bishop?

What is so ironic is that he is part of a small splinter group that represents less than 2% of Anglicans in North America. They would have us return to a way of thinking that is much closer to the last Reformation that began in the 15th century, as opposed to moving us toward a new Reformation.

The purpose of a Reformation is to return the church to orthodox Christian belief and discard the man-made accretions that tend to accumulate in the institutional church. The Diocese of Niagara is quickly becoming nothing but man-made accretions.

At the heart of our exciting vision for the Diocese of Niagara is a call for prophetic social justice making, a continuous culture of innovation and a strong desire to engage with the people of this generation and walk with them in their search for God and their desire to change the world.

This ends up being little more than leftist political activism.

As Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu has stated: “God just wants us to love each other.” Many, however, say that some kinds of love are better than others. But whether a man loves a woman or another man, or a woman loves a man or another woman, to God it is all love, and God smiles whenever we recognize our need for one another.

I don’t remember God’s injunction for us to love one another including optional genital activity: I must have missed those verses in the Bible.

I will leave it to your readers to decide what a religious revolution really looks like in this day and age.

I’ve decided.

Bishop Michael Bird, Anglican Diocese of Niagara, Hamilton, Ont.