Well, here's an interesting start to the new Church year:
http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/2009/11/ma-clergy-may-marry-same-sex-couples.html
The Diocese of Massachusetts (I think that's how it's spelled) have given permission for their clergy to go ahead with conducting same sex marriages. Yowls of fury will without a doubt be heard from the Global South of the Anglican Communion " They are ignoring the Covenant". Yes, indeed they are, and you've only yourselves to blame. Bishops ordained to minister to conservative congregations, crossing Provincial boundaries and that damnable Ugandan Bill. The sense I have is that ECUSA (the TEC) are finally sickened by it all and, now that the courts have begun to throw out conservative claims for the property and assets, they are going to proceed to do what they believe to be right and not what ++Rowan and the Africans want. Good.
I have to say that the Ugandan situation has absolutely changed my mind on what we do with regard to the Covenant. If the COU and their pals are really going to support legislation the like of which has never been seen since the Nazi era, then I regard them as abhorrent as the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa during Apartheid and we should deal with them in the same way we did with the Afrikaaner Churches who provided theological justification for their evil regime of choice. They are in a state of impaired communion with God and we as the Church must show them that. We do not have communion with them. They have sundered themselves from the fellowship of Christ by their wicked and wilful actions and until such time as they abjure them (and I don't think that saying the death penalty is bad, so just put gays in jail for years counts as abjuration), we ignore and shun them - financially, as well as spiritually. You cannot dialogue with evil and those who support this bill are evil or utterly deluded.
"Oh, but we must maintain dialogue" I hear you say. No, one of my heroes, +Hensley Henson, Bishop of Durham, had no truck with that or the Church that sided with Hitler in Germany in the 30's. He had no hatred for the German people (his beloved step mother was German) but he had nothing but contempt for Nazism and its apologists both at home and abroad. Like Jonathan Swift, he had a "savage indignation" in his heart when faced with injustice and he denounced it uncompromisingly. So should we. The Archbishop of Canterbury was less than impressive against Hitler (Lang, a Glaswegian), so Rowan Williams is in reasonably salubrious company. Then, as now, the case was made that to be openly critical would inflame the situation and quiet , behind the scenes diplomacy would bear fruit. Henson thought that was rot and only shaming the bigotry and inhumanity with the glare of unfriendly publicity would stop it - or at any rate spare the Church from the taint of collaboration. It was a matter of conscience and principle, not of politics, secular or ecclesiastical.
Happy Advent!
http://walkingwithintegrity.blogspot.com/2009/11/ma-clergy-may-marry-same-sex-couples.html
The Diocese of Massachusetts (I think that's how it's spelled) have given permission for their clergy to go ahead with conducting same sex marriages. Yowls of fury will without a doubt be heard from the Global South of the Anglican Communion " They are ignoring the Covenant". Yes, indeed they are, and you've only yourselves to blame. Bishops ordained to minister to conservative congregations, crossing Provincial boundaries and that damnable Ugandan Bill. The sense I have is that ECUSA (the TEC) are finally sickened by it all and, now that the courts have begun to throw out conservative claims for the property and assets, they are going to proceed to do what they believe to be right and not what ++Rowan and the Africans want. Good.
I have to say that the Ugandan situation has absolutely changed my mind on what we do with regard to the Covenant. If the COU and their pals are really going to support legislation the like of which has never been seen since the Nazi era, then I regard them as abhorrent as the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa during Apartheid and we should deal with them in the same way we did with the Afrikaaner Churches who provided theological justification for their evil regime of choice. They are in a state of impaired communion with God and we as the Church must show them that. We do not have communion with them. They have sundered themselves from the fellowship of Christ by their wicked and wilful actions and until such time as they abjure them (and I don't think that saying the death penalty is bad, so just put gays in jail for years counts as abjuration), we ignore and shun them - financially, as well as spiritually. You cannot dialogue with evil and those who support this bill are evil or utterly deluded.
"Oh, but we must maintain dialogue" I hear you say. No, one of my heroes, +Hensley Henson, Bishop of Durham, had no truck with that or the Church that sided with Hitler in Germany in the 30's. He had no hatred for the German people (his beloved step mother was German) but he had nothing but contempt for Nazism and its apologists both at home and abroad. Like Jonathan Swift, he had a "savage indignation" in his heart when faced with injustice and he denounced it uncompromisingly. So should we. The Archbishop of Canterbury was less than impressive against Hitler (Lang, a Glaswegian), so Rowan Williams is in reasonably salubrious company. Then, as now, the case was made that to be openly critical would inflame the situation and quiet , behind the scenes diplomacy would bear fruit. Henson thought that was rot and only shaming the bigotry and inhumanity with the glare of unfriendly publicity would stop it - or at any rate spare the Church from the taint of collaboration. It was a matter of conscience and principle, not of politics, secular or ecclesiastical.
Happy Advent!
