One of my fabulous bishops, Sergio Carranza, has again his the nail on the head with his reflection "The Soul of Anglicanism" -- originally distributed in our clergy newsletter and now making the rounds on the blogs. "If the Archbishop of Canterbury allows the conspirators to have their way, they will not only validate an American schism, but alienate the other 21st century Anglican Provinces, and, in effect, render asunder the Anglican Communion by erecting their own ecclesial body where his primacy and moral authority will become superfluous." And let the people say: BINGO!
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Meanwhile, Irene Monroe has been busy being brilliant again: "By pitting marginalized groups like gays and Africans against each other, the Church masks the geopolitics of race and power while bating homophobia." Don't miss her piece "Anglican Communion Fall Guy"
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The Global Center has issued quite a strong statement for holding the Communion together in spite of itself calling the Communion to "the participatory and tolerant character that Anglicanism has always offered as the middle way within Christianity"... Good for them!
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Meanwhile Ephraim My-Way-or-the-Highway/IRD Board Member Radner has written a LENGTHY treatise (which I do not recommend) continues to play his role in attempting to convene the Anglican Tribal Council and challenge them to -- ONCE AND FOR ALL! -- vote the Episcopal Church off the Anglican Island. "TEC’s behavior has been so brazenly destructive of the Communion’s conciliar life on a number of levels, that the entire American church’s college of bishops should not be invited to Lambeth at all." Looks like just because that dog won't hunt doesn't mean he's going to quit taking it out for a walk!
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Fr. Jake has a very thorough overview of "As The Anglican World Turns" -- great for catching up if you've been out of town or dozed off for a few episodes.
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Speaking of the IRD ... which I was above in reference to Brother Radner ... Elizabeth Kaeton has done quite a lovely expose on their recent attack on civil unions in New Hampshire as (stop me if you've heard this before!) the last straw attack-on-marriage-and-the-family-as-we-know-it-with-western-civilization-soon-to-fall-behind-it. Don't miss it ... includes illustrations ... and welcome back Elizabeth to Blogland.
(And may I just say in my decade-plus of parish ministry I've counseled lots of folks with troubled marriages and not a SINGLE DARNED ONE OF THEM ever sat in my office and said, "The trouble with our marriage is the gay couple down the street." Not a single one. I'd have remembered.)
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Finally, the cool news at All Saints Church is that we now have sermons up on itunes ... I'm still trying to figure it all -- someone told me yesterday I needed to just rent a ninth grader for the day and that would get me all set up ... but it seems like a great thing and probably more about that later.
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And now ... off to vestry meeting.
5 comments:
Re: Sermons on I-Tunes
Trinity Cathedral in Sacramento used to print the sermons and have them available either on the web site or at the Welcome Center. Whenever I heard a sermon that I thought warranted further reflection, I got a printed copy and taped it up on the refrigerator to revisit the thoughts and ideas in the midst of everyday life. You can't do that with I-Tunes.
BJ
BJ ... never fear ... we've had sermons in print copies (PDFs online and printed out to pick up at the table on the lawn on Sundays) for YEARS -- and that's not going to quit! The itunes are new ... and a whole new market for younger-than-me folks who get a whole whack of their information from podcast-land. I'm just thrilled to be entering that brave new world!
Susan, you say, "(And may I just say in my decade-plus of parish ministry I've counseled lots of folks with troubled marriages and not a SINGLE DARNED ONE OF THEM ever sat in my office and said, "The trouble with our marriage is the gay couple down the street." Not a single one. I'd have remembered.)"
I do not have time to go into this in detail, but the concern for marriage is not a concern for a particular marriage, but for the institution of marriage, the concept of marriage. I will write more later, but the basic concern is that adding same-sex couples to the concept of marriage, while it is intended to bring the legal benefits and the intangible social benefits of marriage to a new class of people, will actually harm the institution of marriage itself.
Of course, there is already a lot of negative social pressure on marriages, with the acceptance (indeed, the promotion) of sex as simple recreation (or at least an early stage of courtship) and the ease of divorce, so same-sex relationships are not the only difficulty that marriage, as an institution, faces. But if I were a doctor treating a patient, I would not want to expose a patient to another serious disease if I could help it.
Hiram ... I'm pressed for time as well but let me just note that I couldn't POSSIBLY disagree with you more, I believe the institution of marriage will only be STREGTHENED by more couples committed til-death-do-us part sign on (supported by their faith communities) and to label couples who happen to be of the same gender a "serious disease" is almost beyond what I've come to expect from your side of the aisle ... almost.
I apologize; that was a poor metaphor.
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