Letters from 18
to 30 September 2007
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The Compass Rose seems to be covering Easter Island
Interesting map [link] of the Anglican Communion. It looks as though it could hang on the wall of a Sunday School classroom in the United States. Appropriate,
since we seem to think we are the center of the Anglican Universe.
Neal Michell
Episcopal Diocese of Dallas
Dallas, Texas, USA
24 September 2007
(Ed: That would be centre,
if you please. But it seems to us as though it's not the US that thinks it is at the centre of the Anglican universe, but its
critics in countries half a planet away who worry so much about what takes place in the US Episcopal Church).
Of course we have to control it: it exists
The claims for novel authority from central church bodies in the various
provinces seem to me to be another manifestation of a general attempt by a variety of central authorities, such as governments
and corporations, to impose themselves and their uniformity on the populace. We see it in the USA and UK in the spurious name
of security, where governments talk of diversity while imposing their own views.
What seems to be happening in the Anglican Communion with claims for
a covenant and other disagreeable innovations, is that conservative and dictatorial elements in the national churches, including
the Church of England, are using very conservative church leaders in the third world as an excuse or surrogate for imposing their
own agendas on more diverse and evolving forms of church.
Of course, the "covenant" is all part of a climate of fear and despair,
opposing itself to hope and imagination.
Fortunately, the authorities in the churches in the UK and USA have
little or no power over their members. I'm more worried about the governments, who have too much power and are grabbing more,
exploiting that same groundswell of fear as an excuse for uniformity.
What the church really needs, like our governments, is more democracy
and binding guarantees of freedom and rights for all.
Revd Canon John Smith
Bredgar with Bicknor and Frinsted with Milstead and Wormshill (Diocese of Canterbury)
Bredgar, Kent, UK
26 September 2007
(Ed: we love the name of your united parish and trust you saw our
letter on that topic a couple of weeks ago. When you get a website, please do tell us about it.)
Immortal, immutable, God only wise?
Thank you for your response to
the the ECUSA House of Bishops meeting. While I am saddened by the acrimony, I too think that part of the disagreement is a power
grab, as well as a difference of interpretation of scripture. I trust that the Anglican/Episcopal Church will survive. It may
well be different but then, only God is unchanging as far as I know.
Fr. Steven Carroll
Trinity Episcopal Church
Newark, Ohio, USA
padrecarroll@windstream.net
26 September 2007
Minor indeed and historical indeed, but thank you
“The troublesome Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States … could
not be established.”
A minor historical quibble, which you will perhaps forgive a lawyer,
a pedant and firm partisan of the Anglican Communion.
It is a latter-day revisionism by the Warren Supreme Court, although
beloved by the likes of Christopher Hitchens, Bill Maher and others, that the framers of the US Constitution categorically ruled
out religion in American public life. (And isn’t it wonderful to live in English common law countries with their constitutionally
protected freedom of expression, where the likes of me and thee can enjoy — as I vastly do — the commentary of such
people while disagreeing with much of what they say.)
“The troublesome Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States … could
not be established,” you write. Not quite entirely so, legally, at least, though doubtless so in practical terms, it having
had an embarrassing association in the immediate post-American Revolution environment with the discredited colonial regime. The
First Amendment to the United States Constitution in fact says this (and no more): “Congress shall make no law respecting
an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof....” Federally, that is. And the Framers of the
US Constitution had no issue at all with the continuing establishment of the Churches of Massachusetts and Connecticut, which
in fact persisted well into the nineteenth century and were ultimately disestablished for quite different reasons. (The official
Church of Massachusetts, in fact, had wandered off in liberal directions far ahead of the folk in the pews, leaving its flock
way behind, a pattern and an outcome which our current Anglican bishops might perhaps take under consideration.)
Indeed, it was only a very recent development, with the decisions
of the US Supreme Court in the 1940s, 50s and 60s which evolved the “incorporation” doctrine, that it was established
that constitutional jurisprudence affecting the federal government of the USA also extended to the several States. For my part,
it is not a wholly unhappy outcome that the religious views of the mainstream in, say, Alabama or Arkansas must be conformed
to a cosmopolitan consensus: those of, say, New York or California are similarly brought to heel.
Is it not indeed a happy result of the English revolution of 1688
that the courts in English common law countries have a tempering jurisdiction as to occasional fancies of the executive and legislative
branches of government? Would that the Anglican Communion had a similar mechanism.
Mac Robb
Holy Trinity, Fortitude Valley (occasionally)
Brisbane, AUSTRALIA
mac.robb@gmail.com
29 September 2007
Must I choose a side?
I've been reading a lot of messages and news items on Anglican websites
in recent weeks. It's very confusing. A lot of messages seem to assume that, if you have a concern, you will belong on one side
or the other. If you're worried about a person having left his wife to live with a same-sex person being a good candidate for
bishop, well, you must belong to Archbishop Akinola's side. If you're worried about the wisdom of parishes in the United States
placing themselves under African bishops, you must belong to the "liberal" side. I must confess that I have both worries, but
that doesn't mean I will join one side or the other - what do I do?
Johannes Huber
St. John the Baptist, Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires, ARGENTINA
29 September 2007
(Ed: Wait, and keep attending church. By the way, Gene Robinson's
ex-wife (Isabella) had already re-married before he ever met his partner Mark Andrew.)
Earlier letters
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