The Consultation is a coalition of thirteen independent organizations in the Episcopal Church committed to peace with justice. We come to the 2009 General Convention in Anaheim understanding clearly that The Episcopal Church is at a watershed moment in history. Therefore, it is critical that we state the imperatives of what we believe and what we are called to do.
We affirm the goodness of all creation.
We join our voices with God who declared of all Creation “It is very good.”
We honor the image of God in one another and in all of Creation.
We are inextricably linked in an interdependent web of Creation.
We fail to recognize the image of God and the Christ in others and ourselves.
We contribute by our action and inaction to a culture of greed, domination and violence.
We in The Episcopal Church are complicit in this sin.
We reaffirm the promises of our Baptismal Covenant
... to continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in the prayers.
... to persevere in resisting evil and, whenever we fall into sin, to repent and return to the Lord.
... to proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ. `
... to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves.
to strive for justice and peace among all people and to respect the dignity of every human being.
Therefore, we call The Episcopal Church, gathered at this 2009 General Convention, to:
Read the whole platform here.
(En Espanol aqui.)
And give thanks for activists and advocates who work together to live out their baptismal covenant by striving for peace with justice.
11 comments:
"We join our voices with God who declared of all Creation 'It is very good.'"
Your Bibles appear to be lacking several critical chapters, such as Genesis 3, Romans 1-3, Ephesians 2, and some others. It also seems to lack some of Jesus' teachings, such as Matthew 7:15-27 and 15:18, 19. I could go on - the point is that sin is not the result of our ignorance or our being limited; it is because we human beings are in rebellion against our Creator, and our rebellion has affected all of creation, and especially ourselves.
Hiram, if you choose to skip right over the beginning of Genesis, and jump right to the part about original sin, that is certainly your perogative. But to assume because someone else desires to remind us of the original blessing does not mean, as you seem to assume, that they are somehow weak on the issue of our sinfulness.
Did you miss this part, perhaps?
We have sinned and fallen short of the mark.
We fail to recognize the image of God and the Christ in others and ourselves.
We contribute by our action and inaction to a culture of greed, domination and violence.
We in The Episcopal Church are complicit in this sin...
Greed, domination and violence are indeed symptoms of rebellion...sounds to me like a full confession, wouldn't you say?
Just because those in The Consultation don't necessarily endorse your "Total Depravity" interpretation, Hiram, this doesn't mean that their Bibles (or their interpretation!) is "lacking" compared to YOURS, Hiram.
I suppose that anyone who speaks the Calvinist code will nod in agreement, but do you have any idea how arrogant your post looks, to those of us who are merely (trying to be) faithful Episcopalians? Lord have mercy...
And who exactly is listening to this?
You're wrong, Hiram.
I agree with Hiram... it's kind of sloppy Christianity when you say...'We affirm the goodness of All Creation'. (huh?) All creation is not good. You've got it half right. Yes, the original creation in Genesis was 'good', but then Man sinned -- and it was all down hill after that. (Satan & his angels were created by God, I don't think even God would call them 'good'. God created Hell, and he doesn't call that Good either.)
'We have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God' NOW, you're on the right track! I like that you say 'we will proclaim by word and example the Good News of Jesus Christ' -- But, a slight correction, I know you meant to say... 'We will proclaim the Word of God, the Good News of Jesus Christ.'
For JCF: what is 'Total Depravity' interpretation? I don't find Hiram arrogant at all, I think he's just trying to make the post a little more lively... On the contrary, I bet he'd be the first in (this) group to admit his own deficiencies.
Lastly, it's getting dangerously close to pagan 'New Age Speak' when we say...'We honor the image of God in one another and in all of Creation'. Sorry, correctly stated, we should be honoring ONLY GOD. Yes, as Believers we have the Holy Spirit in us, and we recieve the fruits of the Holy Spirit. But-- no Christian would ever accept someone else 'Honoring' them. In every instance in the Bible when man bowed down to a follower of the Lord, they would say, 'Get up! Get up!' It's just so foreign to our real position, a Servant. And Lord knows, we are not to Honor the Creation, God hates it when we do that, you know -- worshipping the creation rather than the Creator.
I am not "skipping over" Genesis 1 at all. The Creation began "very good." I spoke of Gen 3 because the Consultation seems to have overlooked it. Creation is no longer "very good," because we are in rebellion.
All the sins listed in the Consultation's agenda are societal sins. I know from other sites (not this article) that the underlying assumption of the progressives is that we are fallible, limited, and imperfect, and thus the remedy for our sins is better teaching and a reorganization of society. "Falling short of the mark" implies a lack of capacity, not a desire for independence from God. It is a biblical term, but it is not the only biblical term for sin.
Even the title of this blog, "An inch at a time," assumes that by human effort and human organization, we can bring Eden back.
What I, and other conservatives, say is that we are individually in rebellion against God, and that, even though societies can be organized in ways more favorable or less favorable to justice, and even though individuals can learn to behave more responsibly and justly, the human problem is one of sin at the heart of each individual. ("Total depravity" does not mean that every person is as wicked as possible. It means that every faculty of a human being is tainted by sin - there is no aspect of human existence that is unfallen.)
As for various interpretations - well, there are certainly differing interpretations on a number of things (infant baptism or adult believer's baptism, for instance) - but the interpretation of Scripture is not merely words games played without taking context, setting, date, etc into account. Of course, Genesis does present a problem there, since the Documentary Hypothesis came about and describes the Pentateuch as a pasted together series of documents - but even with that idea, if one takes the text as it stands, we cannot have a vast variety of interpretations, each as good as the next as long as it satisfies the person who made it. If words have meaning, there are a limited number of reasonable interpretations, and usually one major interpretation with two or so that are possible but less likely. The interpretation that I uphold is one that has been held for many centuries; it is certainly not an idiosyncratic one.
As for arrogance... I really do not know what to say. To me, if anyone is arrogant, it is the progressives, for turning the Christian faith upside down and inside out, denying the Son of God his glory as the one who took human flesh to live and die among to be the only mediator and advocate, graciously given by a loving Father to redeem a rebellious humanity from their slavery to sin. I am simply upholding mere Christianity, and I do not think that that is arrogant
I am not a believer. Therefore Hiram's preoccupation with the "sin" of man, to the point where he seems to deny any idea of light or hope instrinsic to mankind, strikes me as self-flagellating masochism.
Yet another reminder why I am an atheist.
we cannot have a vast variety of interpretations, each as good as the next as long as it satisfies the person who made it. If words have meaning, there are a limited number of reasonable interpretations, and usually one major interpretation with two or so that are possible but less likely.
Translation: "Obey! Submit! Shaddup!"
The interpretation that I uphold is one that has been held for many centuries; it is certainly not an idiosyncratic one.
So how in the world did Christians ever survive without it, for 3/4ths of the time that there have been Christians?
No thanks: I can do w/o Calvin's revisionist innovation [And so can most Episcopalians---and THAT is who The Consultation's Platform is most immediately directed to: Episcopalians (and maybe IT whom I keep working on *g*). Don't get me wrong: by the Grace of God, I'd like to see YOU converted to the GOOD News of Christ too, Hiram. But the Calvinist nut is harder to crack, and will only come about in God's Good Time---not likely by GC in Anaheim! (But we remain in Hope ;-p)]
And, IT, Hiram and LGMarshall are so unfortunately lacking in the ability to self-examine they actually believe that that means the problem is you, never realizing the destruction they have sown, or how far they are from God.
Hiram, is there any chance that the very human writers of the Bible were guilty of “ignorance” or were “limited?” Has our “rebellion” affected the other 240 billion galaxies in the universe?
What do you think about the concept of myth? Is there a culture in the known or unknown history of the world that did not have a creation myth? Are there any other civilizations who have a Great Flood myth?
You speak of “the text,” as though we have original copies of the Gospels, written by eyewitnesses, and written in English. Were there any other persons in history, before Jesus, referred to as “The Son of God?” Why are the synoptic gospels different than John? What about the non-canonical gospels? Who decided what was and was not canonical? Does the Book of Mormon verify, as another testament of Christ, the reality and divinity of Jesus Christ? Or does it not meet the criteria for truth because it’s too recent?
As for “reasonable interpretations,” Americans are adamantly divided on the meaning of the 2nd Amendment, and the subordinate clause contained within it. We have an original copy, and we have the writings of the men who drafted the document. It was written in our own language not much more than 200 years ago. Yet some can find the meaning of the Bible absolutely clear and infallible, despite thousands of years of commingled myth and history, multiple languages, translations and authors, and no original copies of the Gospels.
Conservatives held many ideas “for centuries.” Slavery, the divine right of kings, voting by male property owners only, no inter-racial marriage, the world is flat, to name a few. “The Rapture” has not been around for centuries, yet it is an idea believed by millions of conservatives. This leads me to believe it is not the age of the idea that is important to conservatives, it is the certainty the explanation provides.
If holding onto beliefs for centuries proved their absolute truth, we wouldn’t have an estimated 38,000 religious denominations in the United States alone, each professing their own version.
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