Monday, November 12, 2018

AMAZING SIGHTING

An Episcopal bishop with an actual spine.

An Episcopal bishop in upstate New York says the church has been "hijacked by the 'Gay Rights Agenda'" in a directive barring same-sex marriages in his diocese, the AP reports. The pastoral directive from The Rev. William Love, who is based in Albany, New York, highlights lingering opposition three weeks before a resolution goes into effect setting rules for same-sex marriages in Episcopal churches nationwide. Love's letter sent Saturday said the policy going into effect Dec. 2 "turns upside down over 2000 years of Church teaching" about marriage. "The Episcopal Church and Western Society have been hijacked by the 'Gay Rights Agenda,' which is very well organized, very strategic, very well financed, and very powerful," Love wrote in the eight-page letter. He added: "Satan is having a heyday bringing division into the Church over these issues."

Church leaders in July overwhelmingly passed the same-sex marriage resolution, which gives bishops with theological objections to same-sex marriages the option to have other clergy perform services.

A few things have got to be said here.  Lots of us, Bishop, were saying this exact thing ten years ago and really could have used the pointy-hat support.  I mean, something far stronger than your countless open letters or your tepid enthusiasm for GAFCON and/or ACNA.

For that matter, you could have taken the occasion of the 2008 Lambeth Conference and told my gracious lord of Canterbury that yes you all were all going to discuss The Issue and that if he shot you another Real African WordTM, you were going to immediately head home.

And immediately get in close touch with GAFCON and/or ACNA.

But none of you said anything like that back when it might have made a difference and now it no longer makes a difference at all. 

Because most of us are done with you.

Bishop?  The Episcopal Organization may take action against you personally but I seriously doubt that it will go to the trouble since all it has to do is wait you out.  When you retire, the EO will make sure that Albany's next bishop will have correct opinions. 

"Better late than never" is often the worst expression in the world, Bishop.

3 comments:

unreconstructed rebel said...

Chris, We need to fair to the Bishop. He was not consecrated until 2006 by which time the horse was long gone from the paddock. By that time the EO had consecrated a bishop whose homosexual lover held his miter during the consecration service.

But, your observation is correct - all the EO need do is wait for him to go away.

I am curious. Does Gene's new-thang relationship survive, or did it go the way of all flesh?

Christopher Johnson said...

Point taken, ur. Except the game was officially over when Dr. Williams gamed the 2008 Lambeth Conference and few primates did anything substantive about it. As for Robbie, I'm pretty sure that relationship ended a long time ago.

Katherine said...

Oh, yeah, Robinson's "marriage" ended, as did his real marriage before it. He now hangs out as a bishop in residence at a declining gay church in DuPont Circle in Washington, DC.

Alan Haley, the Anglican Curmudgeon, writes that General Convention authorized an "admonition" which they think might allow +Curry to slap down +Love, although of course it violates ECUSA's constitution and canons. That hasn't stopped them in a couple of decades or more, so it's possible +Curry might not wait and will attack +Love and his diocese directly. It doesn't make much difference for the eventual outcome, as you point out, Chris.

http://accurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2018/11/loves-last-stand.html