Tag Archives: Anglican Angst

The trial between New Westminster and ANiC continues

Posted on by
Reply

Michael Ingham was on the stand yesterday and, according to the report on the diocesan website, he said something rather odd:

The bishop said his own view of homosexuality had been changing at this time. While he had originally been quite conservative on the issue, after 25 years in ministry, having met and counselled homosexual people, “I had come to regard them as normal human beings…

An extraordinary confession since it means that during the previous 25 years of ministry, Ingham must have viewed homosexuals as abnormal human beings. This is not the view of a conservative Christian, who would regard a homosexual urge as a temptation to be resisted not as an indicator that a person less than a normal human being. Ingham’s view for 25 years was – well, homophobic.

This paragraph towards the end is a stark admission of heterodoxy:

Rather, the brief says, Anglican tradition is “dynamic” and the interpretation of doctrine is shaped by the history, society, and culture of the day. “Doctrine cannot be frozen in a single historical form.”

This is a shameless admission that New Westminster has abandoned any pretence of its doctrine adhering to biblical principles: instead it is taken from history, society and the culture of the day. A brazen confession that the diocese is in hot pursuit of the vanities of an increasingly decadent civilisation, never quite catching up, and convincing no-one except a diminishing retinue of salaried help and liberal hangers-on. It is no longer a Christian church.

A list of Anglican Church of Canada clergy who support same-sex blessings

Posted on by
3

In January 2007 a number of ACoC bishops, clergy and lay people signed an open letter exhorting general synod to approve same sex blessings. Take a look at the list of people who signed it to see if your rector is there.

Here is the letter:

Living God’s Blessing

Anglicans of homosexual orientation have formally, by episcopal decision, been accepted as equal members of the Anglican Church of Canada since 1979. However, that acceptance did not include accepting any form of sexual expression for homosexual persons, who therefore have never been treated as equal, embodied persons. Though celibacy is understood in scripture to be a vocation (Matt. 19:12), it has been imposed on gays and lesbians, making it not vocation but compulsion, and denying them any sanctioned form of sexual intimacy.

The affirmation in 2004 by General Synod, the church’s highest governing body, of “the sanctity and integrity of committed, adult same-sex relationships” was a step towards real equality. However, since then, there has been a moratorium on further use of blessings outside New Westminster. In the face of the growing split in the Anglican Communion, General Synod 2004 referred the question of blessing same-sex relationships to the Primate’s Theological Commission. Its St. Michael Report has recommended that such blessings are a question of doctrine, but not of core doctrine. This means that General Synod will be able, in 2007, to affirm the blessing of same-sex relationships.

We believe that:

1. Silence contributes to the injustices experienced by gays and lesbians.

2. Truth, love and justice are biblical imperatives not to be jeopardized by clamours for unanimity disguised as “unity”. Unity in Christ, proclaimed as Lord, requires truth and justice for all.

3. We have the obligation to use reason to interpret scripture in the light of new knowledge and understandings.

4. It is unbiblical, unjust, ethically wrong, and morally unsound to impose celibacy on gay and lesbian clergy.

5. Because the core of the gospel message is covenant with God, with family, and with community, the covenants between same-sex couples should be affirmed and blessed by the church, as is the case for heterosexual couples.

The church has acknowledged the sanctity and integrity of adult committed same-sex relationships. Civil marriage for same-sex couples is now the norm in Canada. Thus it is time for the church to accept as valid all marriages performed in Canada, and to bless the marriages and unions of all who request such a blessing. This can happen while the discussion continues about the possibility of the solemnization of same-sex marriages in the church.

For anyone who doubts that the the Anglican church has abdicated its role of setting moral standards for society, pay attention to the last paragraph: the church defers to culture for ethical inspiration.

Here is a chart of the number of clergy who signed this by diocese:

Add an Image

The next chart is probably more interesting, since it show the percentage of clergy in each diocese that signed the letter. I had to estimate the total number of clergy in some dioceses, so, although it paints an interesting picture,  it isn’t 100% accurate:

Add an Image

As a coincidental twist of irony, Steve Hopkins from Niagara is a signatory of this missive; he is also introducing an Essentials event next Saturday where I am leading the worship. Delicious.

An Anglican Professor of Church History has noticed that the Anglican church is falling apart

Posted on by
2

Alan Hayes is Professor of Church History at Wycliffe, University of Toronto, and he has this to say about the plight of the Anglican Church of Canada (Page 3):

And now, in 2009, the Anglican Communion gives a very good impression of falling to pieces. Some of this gets blamed on debates about sexuality, but, if you’ve followed me so far, you’ll know that I see deeper and more enduring causes than that.

What’s the way forward? If our problem is what I suspect – that we’re depending on a Vatican II theology which was never really ours to begin with and which is now showing signs of age—then the way forward is theological too. We need to rediscover, together, the faith of our Church. We need to agree on what we stand for, and we need to discern our distinctive theologically grounded mission.

I doubt that techniques of church growth or strategies of relevance will move us ahead until we’ve had our own Anglican Vatican II, and that will mean prayer, self-criticism, ressourcement, and aggiornamento.

This is the first time I have seen Alan openly admit that the ACoC is imitating something that is falling to pieces. Of course, for many of us, it is quite clear that the ACoC isn’t doing an imitation, but actually is falling to pieces: just as Bob Dylan observed you don’t need a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows, you don’t need a professor of church history to tell you what the rotten smell is in the ACoC.

His point that we adopted something that isn’t ours – Vatican II – and that we need our own version is interesting but impossible: we don’t have a Vatican. It has become transparently apparent that there is absolutely no working authority structure in the worldwide Anglican communion; someone other than Rowan Williams might have had the guts to impose order, but it is quite clearly beyond Rowan.

When we see this sort of thing:

the Roman Catholic Church’s new and totally unexpected spirit of self-criticism, its re-thinking of Christian basics, its ressourcement (its return to essential sources, especially Scripture), and its aggiornamento (its passion to come to faithful terms with the modern world).

We may persuade ourselves that in this there is a glimmer of hope, in phrases like return to essential sources, especially Scripture; the glimmer is dimmed when we read: passion to come to faithful terms with the modern world. Rather than plainly say that the ACoC has departed from historic orthodox Christianity, we have something sufficiently slippery that it can used by liberals whose view of coming to faithful terms with the culture is to capitulate to it.

Liberals like Michael Burslem, whose article by a stroke of fortuitous irony, appears on the same page:

In Anglicanism we have neither an infallible pope nor an infallible Bible. The Word of God is our supreme authority, not exclusively the Bible. This is the Logos of St. John’s prologue, which he defines as Jesus Christ. However, since his Ascension he is no longer with us in person, but he did promise to send his Holy Spirit, who is the Logos in the world today. The Spirit certainly speaks to us through Holy Scripture, but also through other means, such as our culture and traditions, other people, (especially our spouses) through visions, dreams, through music, poetry, drama and literature; through the wonders of science; yes, and through common sense. He deals with us individually. There is no ‘one size fits all’ which would be if the Bible alone were our supreme authority.

Here we have entered the realm of sanctified subjectivity: contemporary cultural prejudice justified by the rubber stamp of a bogus holy spirit.

Alan’s way forward, We need to rediscover, together, the faith of our Church, is more of a way sideways:  with nothing explicit in mind, it would be used by liberals to conform the church to contemporary preoccupations while making the claim of returning to the church’s roots.

The Anglican Church: finding the middle ground that upsets everyone

Posted on by
1

The Anglican church’s obsession with what it calls “social justice” inevitably translates into making pious political pronouncements rather than actually doing anything for itself. This is largely because, having abandoned its spiritual heritage for trendy pop-culture causes, it has withered into impotence and can do little more than stand on the sidelines and whine.

In keeping with its mealy-mouthed approach to everything, it can’t actually bring itself to come down definitively on one side or the other of an issue, preferring instead to find an ersatz Hegelian no-man’s land from which it can appear to be sympathetic to all and sundry.

The result is not appeasement but universal derision. The latest example is the ACC-14  pontification on the Middle East which has equally upset the left:

Palestinian rights deserve Anglican action

A obsession with even-handedness is stopping Anglicans taking a firm stand on Israel’s disregard for Palestinian rights.

At the 14th Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) meeting, held in Jamaica earlier this month, a resolution on the Middle East was passed, criticising the Israeli occupation. An original version of the resolution was originally submitted by the Anglican Peace and Justice Network (APJN), but as the language was felt by some to be too “strong”, a new resolution was put forward and adopted.

And right:

The Anglicans’ Ritualistic Denunciation

  1. The Anglicans, meeting in Jamaica for their international Consultative Council, ritualistically denounced “current Israeli policies in relation to the West Bank, in contravention of UN Security Council resolutions, [which] have created severe hardship for many Palestinians and have been experienced as a physical form of apartheid.”

Arab League pleas for peace were praised by the Anglicans, of course, while Israel was sternly instructed that it must “end its occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip,” “immediately” freeze all settlement activity in “preparation” for a Palestinian state, remove the “separation barrier,” end Palestinian home demolitions, and close all military checkpoints in the Palestinian territories.

And what did the Anglican elites demand that the Palestinians and their Arab patrons offer in return? Apparently nothing.

Compare all this Anglican fire against Israel with a nearly concurrent Anglican Consultative Committee resolution about Korea, whose regime in the North often makes the West Bank seem like Club Med. It urged Korean “reunification,” commended Anglican relief for the “starving population in North Korea” without explaining why they are starving, lamented that the “political situation” in the Korean peninsula had “worsened” without explaining how, implored that “all countries” “desist from confrontation,” and urged a “permanent peace.”

Is it any wonder, then, that when the Anglican Church makes one of its rare proclamations on spiritual matters, no-one listens.

Anglican Church of Canada: a predictable report on the theological justification of same-sex marriage

Posted on by
1

The entire nonsense it here for those who would like to subject themselves to it.

Interestingly, the preface contains the following:

Faith Worship and Ministry first sought, and then received, clarification from CoGS that the subject is the marriage of same-sex couples, not all legally qualified persons. The church wants to reserve the right to define for itself who the proper subjects of marriage are, rather than leave this to the state.

And buried inside we find this:

Canadian civil law has provided for the marriage of same-sex couples since 2005. The church, in applying the doctrine of marriage in this context, understands the purposes of marriage delineated in Paragraph 1 of the Preface to relate equally, though not identically, to these new circumstances. Such marriages provide for mutual fellowship, support and comfort. They are also open to the care and upbringing of children. For those who understand themselves to be so called, such a relationship provides an environment in which sexuality may serve personal fulfilment in a community of faithful love.

The second quote appeals to the state for creating the context where the ACoC is being nudged to accept all those who are legally married. By the time the preface was written, someone must have caught on to the trap the ACoC had set for itself: polygamy might be next.

So now the ACoC “wants to reserve the right to define for itself who the proper subjects of marriage are”. The reason for this is fairly simple: there are numerous ACoC homosexual clergy, relatives, friends and hangers-on who need to justify their behaviour and they don’t give a fig for future importunate polygamists whom they are quite prepared to leave out in the cold – heartless bunch.

Imagine there’s no Anglican Church

Posted on by
2

Reverse psychology evangelism from Liverpool:

The bells of Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral are to ring out to John Lennon’s anti-religious anthem Imagine.

The bells will play the 1971 song, which begins “Imagine there’s no Heaven”, as part of an arts festival on 16 May at 1200, 1230 and 1330 BST.

A cathedral spokesman said: “Allowing Imagine to be pealed on our bells does not mean we agree with the song lyric.”

The song has drawn criticism from some religious figures as Lennon himself has called the anthem “anti-religious”.

Liverpool Cathedral said it had carefully considered the “sensitivities” surrounding the song’s lyrical content.

“But we recognise its power to make us think. As a cathedral we do not shrink from debate. We recognise the existence of other world views,” added the cathedral spokesman.

This, of course, opens a whole new technique for evangelism in the 21st century: you make the atheist’s case for them instead of the case for Christ – to make people think. I wonder why no-none thought of that before. I expect Liverpool Cathedral helped pay for the atheist bus advertisements.

Who wants to go to a heaven full of clerical flotsam?

Posted on by
1

I disagree with most of this article in the Irish times, but it makes some amusing points.

THERE IS no such thing as a Divine Being. So get a life, Dermot, or at least stop trying to foist your beliefs on everyone else.

I should apologise for that unseemly outburst: I’ve really no fixed view on whether or not there is a God, and neither could I care less one way or the other.

Which means, of course, if there is a Hell then I’m destined for it. And that’s fine by me. Who in their right mind would want to be stuck forever with the religious crowd anyway?

What could possibly be worse than having to spend eternity in the company of ayatollahs, archbishops, pontiffs, preachers, and their legions of glass-eyed, po-faced acolytes?

The big mistake the author is making, of course, is that the place he is happy to be destined for in the next life will probably be chock full of the clerical salmagundi he, understandably, wants to avoid in this.

I have a soft spot for Anglicanism, and not just because I’m a nominal member. It must be the only Christian denomination where, at least until recently, you didn’t even have to believe in God. Try to live up to the teachings of Jesus and nobody within the Anglican Communion cared whether you were a believer or not just so long as you didn’t make too much noise about it.

Anglicanism, the religion for the nominal atheist.

Is anyone listening?

Posted on by
1

I remember in the 1990s I ran a program on my PC for SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence).

The idea was that SETI was listening to electro-magnetic energy from space to find intelligent life outside of earth; the program I ran was also running on many other PCs and analysed the data looking for a pattern.

This search for intelligent life is the origin of Rowan William’s Listening Process:

That the Instruments of Communion commit themselves to a renewal of the Listening Process, and a real seeking of a common mind upon the issues which threaten to divide us.

The problem is the inverse of SETI: anyone saying anything intelligible is ignored. Yet, this is Rowan’s hope for containing the chaos threatening the Anglican Communion. It is in vain: the ACoC and TEC are snakes and they are not listening: Their poison is like the poison of a serpent: they are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear. Ps 58:4.

Why the Anglican Communion Covenant is not going to work

Posted on by
Reply

There may be none left who doubt that, but for those who do, the following is instructive:

Canon Kearon stated that Rev Ashey was not qualified as his membership of the Church of Uganda was as a result of a cross-border intervention by the Church of Uganda in the United States, a practice which had been consistently disapproved of by the instruments of communion since 2004.

So far so clear. However, it was also drawn to Canon Kearon’s attention that another infringement of the requirements of the instruments of communion had been the continuance of the lawsuits against orthodox churches in North America by TEC and the Anglican Church of Canada. The cessation of these lawsuits was a requirement of the Dar-es-Salaam Primates Meeting in 2007 as part of the compliance required of TEC and the ACoC with the Windsor Report and thus a condition for the re-entry of TEC and ACoC delegates to the Councils of the Communion ( they had been asked to withdraw from ACC 13 at Nottingham, but attended as visitors). How was it that TEC and ACoC had not complied with a requirement of the instruments of communion, yet had been readmitted, and that Uganda was not complying with the embargo on cross-border jurisdiction and yet its selected delegate was barred? The answer given that Uganda as a province had not been barred, only its delegate who was a product of cross-border intervention.

What comes across in all this is the lack of fairness and even handedness. TEC and ACoC are in constant breach of Lambeth 1.10, and by the secretary general’s own admission at the Saturday press conference, had in some cases continued to authorize same-sex blessings in defiance of the moratorium. They have not complied with the Primates’ call from Dar-es-Salaam to desist from lawsuits, but instead have increased them. Yet they are readmitted to full membership.

The group that is to decide on whether the covenant is to be adopted has made “cross border interventions” the unforgivable transgression in the mess that bedevils the Anglican Communion. The fact that the ACoC and TEC have not lived up to their part of the bargain by stopping the lawsuits and stopping the authorising of same-sex blessings is glossed over: also missing is the acknowledgement that the latter is what caused orthodox parishes to seek shelter in a different province in the first place.

The bias of the Anglican Consultative Council is clear: the ACoC and TEC receive a get out of jail free card.

Considering the duplicitous and slippery nature of both the ACoC and TEC, what is to stop them signing the Covenant while having no intention whatsoever of adhering to it? After all, that is how they have treated the moratoriums: they break them and attempt to conceal the fact by crouching behind meaningless concepts like “experiential discernment”; and the ACC smiles upon them benignly.

Why would we expect anything different with a signed Covenant? The best response we could hope for from the ACC would be a few tut-tuts, and then back to the main business of eco-justice networking, prophetic gender equality and singing appalling hymns.

Anglican eco-bigotry

Posted on by
2

The Anglican church, ever willing to bend to the latest fad, has declared that the environment is a top Anglican priority:

Secondly, we want to try our best to make sure that all Anglicans see this (the environment) as their primary work because some people don’t think it is.

Oops, forgot about the Gospel – better mention it otherwise people will say we are no longer a church:

They actually think that somehow preaching the Gospel – which, of course, is our number one task – makes this work of a lesser importance. It’s one of the five marks of mission of our church, and safeguarding the integrity of creation is a core Gospel issue.

We all know what this is really about, though – nudge, nudge: Down with Capitalism! Workers of the World Unite! Viva Che!

In addition to that, I’m here to emphasize that the economic crisis the world is facing at the moment is an environmental opportunity because we actually can redirect our priorities. Clearly, the old capitalist system has failed and we don’t need to actually go back to it.

How can I join this Angli-Gaia revolution? You need an Internet connection, even though it was spawned from the evil, carbon belching, capitalist, military-industrial complex ARPANET:

Q: What would membership entail?

A: First, the person has to be able to connect to the Internet. We can’t really communicate with people successfully without using it.

In case anyone has any doubts that this is a totalitarian junta, be aware that, once in control, they will dictate what you sing:

every parish is required to do an environmental audit, which has to do with what they teach, what they preach, what they sing,

What you drive:

what cars they use, whether they could change their cars,

And even when you are singing in the celestial choir, they will be fiddling with your grave:

Graveyards, particularly, can be little oases of the protection of threatened species.