Positive Response to our Open Letter on the Northern Michigan Situation

By email, from a Standing Committee member and past General Convention Deputy:
"Thank you for your letter regarding the approval of the election of the Bishop of Northern Michigan as I too am greatly troubled. Your letter reflects a careful and most accurate consideration of the theology and ordained ministry of the Episcopal Church and our place in the Anglican Communion.

We fought very hard at the last convention to adopt the resolution to abstain from approving the elections and consecrations of Bishops whose lifestyles would pose a problem to the rest of the church. I regard that as a major victory against the type of extremism that would tear the church from its traditional Biblical and Historical roots...

...I also share your objections to the process of Northern Michigan's election as it seems most irregular and suspicious in nature. Mutual Ministry should never be used as an excuse to do away with regularly ordained clergy to save money, or to ordain ill trained, ill equipped, or non-Christian individuals. A self professed practicing Zen Buddhist would most certainly be a direct challenge to the remainder of the Anglican Communion that they could not ignore. I too have read some materials by Thew Forrester and find them very questionable in that they plainly suggest that Jesus Christ is not the way to Salvation and as a result, I can not vote to approve his election as he can't really take the Oath of Conformity and falls into the same category as Anne Redding. I had a problem with the Consecration of the Bishop of Utah a few years ago as she was baptized in the Mormon Church which is not a Christian Church. In the same light, I went on record at the last General Convention as voting against the approval of the Bishop in California who had been married four times. All present a challenge to the church.

The process of Northern Michigan appears to have been "faulty" to say the least and I also question the integrity of anyone who would "engineer" the process to make himself the only candidate in an ordination process for Bishop while being on the nominating committee.

Thank you for your concern and support for the ministry, mission, and future of the Episcopal Church and be assured of my desire to have us remain as true and faithful members of the Anglican Communion, and obedient to the Doctrine and Discipline, of the Episcopal Church and its Worship as is directed in the Book of Common Prayer.

Let us keep the lines of Communication open regarding further developments of this and other issues so we as deputies may make the best decisions possible for the welfare of the church."