Tag Archives: Anglican Angst

What the Anglican church needs is more bishops

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Bishops galore:

The Church of England needs more bishops not fewer, its governing body heard.

Despite dwindling congregations, worsening finances and a fall in the number of vicars, speakers told the gathering of the General Synod in York that radical plans to cut senior clergy posts were misguided.

They argued that bishops have far more work to do than in years gone by, and that greater expectations are placed upon them.

Prof Glynn Harrison, from Bristol diocese, said: “There may indeed be a case for increasing rather than decreasing senior oversight appointments.”

He said he did not know how diocesan bishops tolerate the growing weight of expectations placed upon them.

This all makes sense: as people “flee from the midst of Babylon” or the CofE, more bishops are needed – to control the traffic congestion created by of the departing hordes, presumably.

In the Western Anglican Church, as the number of members approaches zero, the number of bishops will approach infinity.

TEC General Convention: a Ubuntu party

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Katherine Jefferts-Schori, is in the throws of concocting a new – well, old, really – religion:

Ubuntu. That word doesn’t have any “I”s in it. The I only emerges as we connect – and that is really what the word means: I am because we are, and I can only become a whole person in relationship with others. There is no “I” without “you,” and in our context, you and I are known only as we reflect the image of the one who created us. Some of you will hear a resonance with Martin Buber’s I and Thou and recognize a harmony. You will not be wrong.

Living in Ubuntu implies that selfishness and self-centeredness cannot long survive. We are our siblings’ keepers and their knowers, and we cannot be known without them – we have no meaning, no true existence in isolation. We shall indeed die as we forget or ignore that reality.

Katherine Jefferts-Schori – on the trailing edge of trendiness – has come to a similar conclusion to George Harrison, 40 years late and without the benefit of an LSD induced euphoria:

Within You Without You
We were talking-about the space between us all
And the people-who hide themselves behind a wall of illusion
Never glimpse the truth-then it’s far too late-when they pass away.
We were talking-about the love we all could share-when we find it
To try our best to hold it there-with our love
With our love-we could save the world-if they only knew.
Try to realise it’s all within yourself
No-one else can make you change
And to see you’re really only very small,
And life flows within you and without you.
We were talking-about the love that’s gone so cold and the people,
Who gain the world and lose their soul-
They don’t know-they can’t see-are you one of them?
When you’ve seen beyond yourself-then you may find, peace of mind,
Is waiting there-
And the time will come when you see
we’re all one, and life flows on within you and without you.

Rowan Williams, eager to outdo Katherine’s aging psychedelic miasma, seeks to introduce a Catholic flavour by Venerating the Ubuntu:

“We have lied to ourselves consistently about the possibility of limitless material growth in a limited world. We have denied precisely that ubuntu that this convention seeks to venerate and reinforce,” Williams added, referring to the convention theme that emphasizes the interconnectedness of people in community.

Where will it all end? – in Strawberry Fields, I expect, where Nothing is real and nothing to get hung about.

George Pitcher doesn’t much like the FCA

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Or Chris Sugden:

I hear that Canon Chris Sugden may have somewhat spoilt his chances of a knighthood. The secretary to the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, which is this week busy fanning the embers of Anglican schism, went on Roger Boulton’s BBC Sunday programme and was asked whether it was true that The Queen had written to Canon Sugden and his traditionalist pals to say that “she understood their concerns”. Canon Sugden replied that this was “correct”.

“Sources close to the Palace”, as they say, have coughed lightly and raised an eyebrow to one another. That’s a courtier’s equivalent of being incandescent with rage.

And, I gather, Canon Sugden and his friends will be waiting a very long time indeed for another letter with a royal seal. They should better give up any ideas of bishoprics in the Church of England too – as Foca enthusiast Dr Michael Nazir-Ali wisely already has done in Rochester.

What is interesting about this is not so much whether Chris Sugden has made a faux pas or not, but the maniacal glee that Pitcher displays at discovering it. The extravagant gloating over the disclosure of a fellow priest’s peccadillo is, no doubt, a manifestation of the tolerance that Pitcher has for those with whom he disagrees.

Tolerating the intolerable

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George Pitcher has this to say about Dr. Nazir-Ali’s call for repentance:

But his comments in yesterday’s Sunday Telegraph, which he is expected to repeat today, that homosexuals should “repent and be changed” cannot pass unchallenged. Or rather, they should not go challenged only by homosexual rights campaigners, such as Peter Tatchell, who you would expect to be somewhat antipathetic to the expressed view.

Because Dr Nazir-Ali is wrong in the eyes of a broad swath of kind and tolerant people of differing sexualities, social mores and of the Christian faith, other faiths and no faith at all. Badly, badly wrong.

I say that I didn’t want to have another fight with him because such fights polarise Anglicans, and we’re at our best when we’re talking. I went to a private lunch recently, to which Dr Nazir-Ali was also invited. He didn’t show. The seat next to me went empty. I do hope he didn’t bottle it; it’s important that religious leaders don’t just inhabit comfort zones with friends who share their views.

Dr Nazir-Ali’s friends are the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (Foca), who this week will try to get the Anglican schism over homosexuality going again, while denying that they are doing any such thing. Had he turned up to our lunch, I would have asked him why he and Foca are so convinced that they know the mind of God better than those who disagree with them and that their interpretation of scripture is with absolute certainty the one and only true one.

When I write about the Church and homosexuality, inevitably I receive messages that read simply “Romans 1:26-27” or “1 Corinthians 6:9”, as if that settles something. We can argue scripture until we’re at the pearly gates. But the essential difference between Dr Nazir-Ali and me is this: I accept, disappointing as I would find it in my fiery furnace, that he might be right. By contrast, he and his friends cannot accept that I might be right, claim that I can’t be a proper Christian, and some of them go so far as to suggest that I’ll burn in hell for all eternity.

And there’s the real problem: it’s an issue of intolerance. Anglicanism has long been characterised by a broad tolerance. But my tolerance of Dr Nazir-Ali and his friends, that they are Anglicans with whom I happen vehemently to disagree, doesn’t seem to be reciprocated.

There are a number of problems with what George Pitcher has to say:

The first is that Pitcher’s understanding of tolerance is the characteristically mushy I’m OK, you’re OK, we can all get along wet version. To be tolerant of another’s views used to mean disagreement did not result in violence, being thrown into prison or war. Now it is the wimpy you might be right and an expectation of reciprocation. Just imagine Peter’s first sermon at Pentecost: “Look I know this is really hard to believe, but Jesus rose from the dead. I’m sure most people disagree and I respect your opinion because I could be wrong”. That would have worked well.

Second, Pitcher has set the value of soggy tolerance above that of truth. Ultimately he cares less for whether, from a Christian perspective, blessing homosexual activity is right or wrong than he does for whether those who disagree can still belong to the same institution.

Third, Pitcher is cheerfully discarding 2000 of Christian understanding of human sexuality for the sake of conforming to the culture of effete liberals in which he finds himself. Changing the biblical understanding of human sexuality also changes our understanding of human nature itself; changing that calls into question the God in whose image we are made.

Interestingly, Theo Hobson in the Guardian also takes Pitcher to task from a liberal perspective:

The fact is that conservative evangelicals profess a different version of Christianity from other Anglicans. There are admittedly other divisions within Anglicanism, but this is the really big one. If opposition to homosexuality is a basic component of your idea of Christian truth, then you ought to be clear about this, and not cohabit with those who fudge the issue, or openly express disdain for your position.

Over the past 20 years or so we have seen huge amounts of dishonesty and evasion on this. The church’s leadership has been trying to build a home on the fence. The liberals and the conservatives must both be accommodated, it has said: as long as both sides are still part of the same communion, then there is hope of reconciliation. A pious sentiment, surely? Well, the piety is laced with self-serving evasion and hypocrisy.

The fault lies with the liberals. Their complacency and cowardice have been breathtaking. In the 1990s, liberal Anglicanism ought to have asserted itself, and called for reform on sexual teaching. For the traditional teaching, that sex was for straight marrieds only, was out of sync with liberal opinion. Instead of achieving reform, the liberals allowed the conservatives to tighten the rules. Despite employing disproportionate numbers of homosexuals, the church was now more explicitly discriminatory against homosexuals than ever. But still the liberals shrugged, and assumed that enlightenment would soon prevail. The evangelicals would soon get over their homophobia and reform would come.

Liberal Anglicanism therefore became tainted by an acute hypocrisy. It became defined by open contempt for one of its own rules. The rule that priests should not be actively homosexual is a rule that liberals see as sub-Christian, heretical. Instead of demanding its repeal as a matter of urgency, and daring to pledge to leave the church if it was not repealed, they retreated, smugly superior, full of camp little Oxford jokes about how ghastly the evangelicals are.

My background is liberal Anglican, but I gradually realised that I couldn’t have much respect for these people, whose liberalism was so timid, so political, so self-serving. I do not share the opinions of the evangelicals, but I can see that they are more honest: all they are saying is that this church has decided to proscribe priestly homosexuality, so let it stick by that.

The basic dishonesty of liberal Anglicanism is evident in the Telegraph today, in the form of Rev George Pitcher. Why can’t we all get on, he asks, why can’t the Evangelicals agree to disagree, but stay within the big tent? Why do they have to be so horrid about homosexuals, saying that they must repent? Why are they so sure they know the mind of God on this issue?

If Pitcher were serious about opposing discrimination he would leave a church whose official policy was discriminatory. Liberal priests of course reply that they are seeking reform from within. What a convenient position.

It is the liberals who are arrogant. They are so sure they know the mind of God on this issue that they think it legitimate to ignore the rules of their church, which must surely be on the verge of being reformed, because everyone they ever talk to agrees with them.

Although I disagree with Hobson, at least he has the guts and integrity to clearly say what he thinks: in the face of the barrage of waffling drivel that one has come to expect from liberals from Rowan on down, this is a refreshing change.

Fresh Expressions

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Fresh Expressions has been imported into Canada and seems to have been embraced by such stalwarts of Canadian Anglicanism as Primate Fred Hiltz and Niagara bishop Michael Bird, a fact that would make  even the most gullible suspicious. John Bowen, an evangelical whom I heard speak a week ago, is enthusiastic about Fresh Expressions. This article tends to confirm my initial impression that it is more concerned with delivery than content – a fundamental flaw: when content is mentioned we are given the usual non-gospel, liberal claptrap cause du jour:

The ideas for alternative-style worship are part of an initiative launched by Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to appeal to the younger generation.

They are set out in a new book compiled by the Church’s Fresh Expressions programme, which aims to boost church attendance with more relevant and exciting services.

One Holy Communion service promoted in the book, called Ancient Faith, Future Mission, begins with the congregation being shown a video clip from the YouTube website about a United Nations anti-poverty campaign.

Worshippers are told that “our planet is messed up” and that “things are not right”.

They are then asked to approach the altar and rub sea salt on their fingers to represent tears, before walking around and meditating at eight “prayer stations” representing themes such as “gender equality” and “environmental sustainability”.

A psalm is recited in “beat poetry” style to the accompaniment of African Djembe drums, and prayers are said “for the corporate world, for influential CEOs who oversee billion-dollar industries”.

The prayers continue: “We pray for John Chambers of Cisco Systems, Bill Gates of Microsoft, Dr Eric Schmidt of Google Inc, H Lee Scott Jr of Wal-Mart Stores and others who have already made commitments to justice.”

Speaking for myself, I would prefer to have a root canal without an anaesthetic.

Among the alternative services explored in the book, which is co-edited by the Rt Rev Steven Croft, the new Bishop of Sheffield, are so-called “U2charists”, services in which the congregation receives communion but sings the songs of the Irish rock band U2 instead of traditional hymns.

The services, which include such songs as “Mysterious Ways”, “One”, and “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”, have been pioneered at St Swithin’s church in Lincoln.

This, of course, is proof positive that the Anglican church has deftly managed to emasculate anyone attempting to satirise it: who can compete with the self-ridicule of a church that willingly chooses to sing “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” as a hymn?

In chapter of the book, Archbishop Williams says: “The Bible is full of stories about God communicating through act and sign as well as language … Far from being bound to communication through clear information economically expressed in words, our society is still deeply sensitive to symbols and inclined to express important feelings and perceptions in this way.”

The Fresh Expressions initiative was launched by the Archbishop in 2004 to combat the significant drop in churchgoing that has been seen in Britain over recent decades. In the past few years the decline appears to have steadied.

Church leaders are particularly concerned about the loss of younger people, who are abandoning the pews at a greater rate than their older counterparts.

The Rt Rev Graham Cray, who heads the Fresh Expressions initiative, said that it was vital that the Church explored new ways of engaging with modern culture.

“We have to reconnect with a very large percentage of the population that has no contact or interest in traditional church,” he said.

Sadly, the Anglican church is ignoring something that actually works – expressing the unchanging Gospel with contemporary artistic forms – and prefers to convince itself instead that the medium is the message. The trouble is, it isn’t.

Telling moments in the ANiC vs New Westminster trial

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In the final argument, the diocesan lawyer said this:

If the Solemn Declaration sets up a trust so defined, “Churches would be forced into rigorous conservatism,” Macintosh said. “Adapting their doctrines and practices to changing social realities would bring the risk of schism and dissolution. They would be forced to stick with old practices and old understandings.”

The unstated assumption on the part of the diocese is that adapting church doctrine to contemporary cultural mores is what God calls the church to do. This is at the heart of the disagreement: the diocese believes that culture contributes to the determination of doctrine, whereas ANiC believes doctrine has been revealed by God through the Incarnation and propositionally in the bible; it is not subject to the vagaries of shifting temporal conditions. Orthodox Christians view culture in the light of Scripture, revisionists view Scripture in the light of the contemporary culture.

The day before, the diocesan lawyer had this to say:

Different theological positions within a “big tent” denomination like Anglicans are “hardly surprising,” Macintosh argued. But most Canadian Anglicans—including many conservatives opposed to the blessing of same sex unions—feel they can remain in the Anglican Church of Canada.

The account of the trial on the New Westminster site repeatedly refers to ANiC members as dissidents, a euphemism for troublemakers, one assumes. The diocese contrasts this with conservatives who feel they can remain in the Anglican Church of Canada, a number of whom were named. What we see here is a distasteful parading of tame evangelicals to press home the diocesan attempt to squash orthodox Christians in ANiC.

I know there are faithful and well-meaning Christians who believe they are called to remain in the ACoC and I am not in a position to question what they consider to be their calling. But the fact that they do remain is being used by the ACoC to further its revisionist agenda.

The art of cliché

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What is wrong with this sentence:

As North America’s premier grower and distributor of turnips, we need to be intentional about making healthy and wise choices about our future.

Nothing other than the fact that you could replace North America’s premier grower and distributor of turnips with a Diocesan Church and the sentence would convey no more or less meaning. And that is one of the church’s problems: having abandoned the expression of true meaning found in the Gospel, it has opted for spewing forth the same empty cant espoused by the illiterate inhabitants of every tenth-rate boardroom in North America.

The particular gem in question is from the Diocese of New Westminster.

Duplicity

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I watched the film Duplicity last night. I rather enjoyed it: it was all about who was being “played” and by whom. That is to say, taken for a ride, conned, stung, swindled, double-crossed, duped, suckered, bamboozled; the answer in the film is supposed to be a surprise, so I won’t give it away.

Which brings me to evangelical leaders in the ACoC: I think they are being played. I had the pleasure of attending an Essentials gathering today where the speaker was John Bowen, an evangelical who remains within the ACoC and is the motivating force behind Fresh Expressions in Canada.

I was curious as to how he manages to cope in the ACoC and also whether he had any sense of being paraded as a token evangelical; his answer was that being permitted to preach the true Gospel is what is important and he still has that leeway. An apparently reasonable answer.

But who is really being played here? I suspect that evangelicals who remain in the ACoC preach the gospel only within constraints that the ACoC places on them. As Malcolm Muggeridge used to say: like playing hymns in a whorehouse. There is a game afoot: evangelicals do what they think they can get away with and the ACoC gives them enough latitude to make them think they are a welcome part of the institution. But who is really playing whom?

Consider:
The ACoC is suing and persecuting those who can no longer put up with its antics. Those who remain within the ACoC are helping to finance the lawsuits.

The ACoC has its liberal agenda set, yet it wants to be seen as inclusive so it needs token evangelicals to flaunt at the appropriate moment. It has no interest in what the evangelicals have to say: it pretends to listen and goes its merry way unimpeded.

The ACoC allows programs like Alpha and Fresh Expressions, but its intent is to capitalise on the success of such programs by making use of the techniques while altering the content to something that fits the ACoC’s anfractuous view of reality.

So who is being played?

Crisis in the Anglican Church of Canada? I think not!

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On February 26th, 2008, the Right Rev. Colin R. Johnson, Bishop of Toronto had this to say:

Anglican Church is doing just fine
Crisis in the Anglican Church of Canada? I think not! While it is always a matter of great regret when anyone chooses to leave, surely recent reports of schism in Canada need some context. Of the approximately 2,300 parishes in Canada, about 15 have voted to “walk apart.”

Well, Colin, ANiC now has 3 bishops, 68 priests, 12 deacons, and 30 parishes with average Sunday attendance of around 3500  –  larger than 13 ACoC dioceses.

The Diocese of new Westminster is 2 weeks into the trial that will determine ownership of ANiC parish buildings, the Diocese of Niagara has been awarded $95,000 costs even though they were seeking $320,000, leaving them $225,000 in the hole – a deficit that is conspicuously absent from their published financial statements.

Crisis? What crisis?

Proclaiming the Gospel in Canada by fighting a rearguard action while in full retreat

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As the Diocese of New Westminster continues its court battle to gain possession of ANiC buildings, the decision was made at its synod to limit same-sex blessings to the 8 parishes that currently perform them:

For the foreseeable future, the blessing of the union of gay and lesbian Anglicans will continue to be limited to eight parishes in the diocese.

General Synod meets next year and will again take up the issue. The two archdeacons who proposed continuing the diocesan moratorium, Stephen Rowe and John Struthers, argued the Diocese of New Westminster should wait for the national synod’s action.

Noting that some other Canadian diocesan synods have voted to ask for a same sex blessing from their bishops, Struthers said: “Others have now joined us in running the race. We no longer run alone. The finish line is in sight.”

“I believe that we must stay the course of limiting the number of parishes authorized to bless same sex unions to allow the church beyond our diocesan borders to complete its work,” Struthers said.

The rectors of some parishes that opposed the blessings argued for continuation of the moratorium. The Rev. John Oakes of Holy Trinity Vancouver said the conditions that lead to the 2005 moratorium still apply.

The advocates of SSBs see this as a strategic move – a minor compromise – in the greater battle of making SSBs the norm in the ACoC; they are confident of victory.

It is sad that the withered remnant of Christianity that remains in the diocese New Westminster cannot come up with anything better than argue for the continuation of the moratorium on SSBs. They are in full retreat, seem resigned to eventual defeat and can think of nothing better than to attempt to delay the inevitable: Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to surrender.