Letters
from 23 to 30 January 2005
Like
all letters to the editor everywhere, these letters are
the opinions of the letter writers and not Anglicans
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Missing
letters
RIGHT
AFTER YOUR WEEKLY FRONT PAGE, my
favorite section is Letters to AO. I was so
disappointed to find no letters this week (No one
had an opinion last week? How dull and how unAnglican!)
that I vowed to write one myself so I wouldn't be
disappointed next week.
Thanks
for giving voice to Anglicans the world over.
Amy
Phillips Witzke
St. Timothy's Church, Mountain View
Sunnyvale, California, USA
24 January 2005
Last
week we had only a few public letters in our AO
inbox, each of which was a response to an earlier
letter to editor. Rather than continuing the cycle
of publishing letters that would then provoke additional
replies to those letters, we decided not to update
this page last week.
Thanks for writing and letting
us know this section matters to you.
Identity,
maturity,
and histrionics
YOUR
ARTICLE IS RIGHT on
the mark! Humans apparently like to identify themselves
by what they are not and and explain their actions
by what they do not like or, more likely, what they
fear. The Anglican Communion, and especially ECUSA,
has gotten the Church into the current foolishness
because of fear of those who are not like 'us' and
how they might change 'us' or affect 'our' comfort
zones. Fear of those who are different is the Christian's
most pervasive sin and adversively affects any attempt
to expect others to take our witness as truth. This
has always been with us, but one would think that
by the 21st century the Church would be closer to
Christian maturity than adolescent histrionics.
This
identify-fear is derailing Christian witness and
forcing many who believe in inclusion rather than
exclusion to leave their own parishes and literally
become homeless Episcopalians.
Clint
Capers
Church of the Holy Spirit
Waco, Texas, USA
ccapers@hot.rr.com
24 January 2005
'Every
institution has rules on the books that virtually no
one takes seriously'
I'VE
BEEN FOLLOWING AND CONTRIBUTING TO the
sexuality debate in the Episcopal Church for more
than a decade now and I still don't get it.
I
don't think there's anything wrong with homosexuality and
I don't know anyone who does. I know there are lots of Americans
who think homosexuality is seriously evil. But most of them
aren't Episcopalians and aren't going to be impressed by
the Episcopal Church's position on these matters. There are
probably also a few Episcopalians who share these views and
a great many more who are just queasy about homosexuality.
But they aren't going to be impressed either.
I
haven't heard of a single individual, liberal or conservative,
announcing his intention to defer to the authority of the
Church: everyone involved in the sexuality debate bases his
views on his own interpretation of Scripture, Tradition and
Right Reason and is intent on seeing to it that the Church
as an institution supports it. The institutional Church,
in the persons of its clergy, should have the humility to
recognize that no one is listening to them and that, in a "world
come of age" there's no reason why anyone should.
Literate, educated people can figure out these matters for
themselves.
So
why make a fuss about sexuality? Every institution has rules
on the books that virtually no one takes seriously. The Catholic
Church has rules prohibiting artificial contraception and
as far as I know the Episcopal Church and most others still
officially prohibit pre-marital sex. I do not know any Catholics,
lay or ordained, who take the ban on birth control seriously
and if I had to guess I'd bet that the number of virgins
married in the Episcopal Church nationwide during the past
10 years was, at most, in double digits. No one bothers fighting
the good fight about contraception or pre-marital sex --
I do not understand why it's worth bothering with homosexuality.
H.
E. Baber
University of San Diego
San Diego, CA
baber@sandiego.edu
25 January 2005
Light
and love
I
WAS FEELING LOW and
turned on the internet tonight, and pulled up AO.
I check on you guys from time to time. I haven't
been to church much in over a year. I've become too
disaffected by all the angst over gays. I'm gay,
and to have one's personal condition debated endlessly,
by one's brothers and sisters in Christ no less,
is deeply wearying.
It's
comforting to see that you all are still out there,
raising light. I liked that very much. 'Walk in Light'
is one of my favorite mottoes. I wouldn't say the
bishops'
interview was fascinating, but, to
paraphrase a certain Vulcan scientist, it was interesting.
I'm
going back to bed now, where my lover of 20 years
is sleeping. He loves me and I love him. I'm grateful
to be in love, because it lets me know what love
is. And when I'm not feeling torn down too much by
other people, I thank God for being gay, because
it gives me a tremendous perspective on my fellow
human beings, which is a wonderful blessing to me.
Michael
Johnson
St. Stephen's Episcopal Church
Houston, Texas
mjohnson@bcm.tmc.edu
26 January 2005
Earlier
letters
We launched
our 'Letters to AO' section on 11 May 2003. All of our
letters are in our
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