Episcopal LGBT activist sends email for group seeking to break up the Anglican Communion

The email floated into my inbox from somebody's e-blast. The language is all sweetness, tradition and kitty kats but this is basically a narrow interest faction breaking up a global Christian witness:

I share this mailing with you at the request of friends in the No Anglican
Covenant Coalition. -- Louie Crew

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Dear Christian concerned for the vitality of the Anglican Communion:

Included in this letter is a news release from an emerging coalition
of Anglicans opposed to the current form of an Anglican Covenant.

We believe that acceptance and approval of the current proposed
Covenant will:

o Bring historic changes to the nature of Anglicanism.
o Trade a vibrant and colorful Anglicanism for drab uniformity.
o Impede local mission and destroy creative evangelism.
o Trade local oversight for centralized decision making.

Thank you for your consideration of this message.

The No Anglican Covenant Coalition
http://noanglicancovenant.org

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[The release below also appears at
http://noanglicancovenant.org/pr1.pdf

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No Anglican Covenant Coalition
Anglicans for Comprehensive Unity
noanglicancovenant.org


NEWS RELEASE
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2010



INTERNATIONAL CAMPAIGN SEEKS TO STOP ANGLICAN COVENANT

LONDON - An international coalition of Anglicans has been created to
campaign against the proposed Anglican Covenant. Campaigners believe the
proposed Covenant constitutes unwarranted interference in the internal
life of the member churches of the Anglican Communion, would narrow the
acceptable range of belief and practice within Anglicanism, and would
prevent further development of Anglican thought. The Coalition's website
(noanglicancovenant.org) will provide resources for Anglicans around the
world to learn about the potential risks of the proposed Anglican
Covenant.

"We believe that the majority of the clergy and laity in the Anglican
Communion would not wish to endorse this document," according to the
Coalition's Moderator, the Revd. Dr. Lesley Fellows, who is also the
Coalition's Convenor for the Church of England. "Apart from church
insiders, very few people are aware of the Covenant. We want to encourage
a wider discussion and to highlight the problems the Covenant will cause."

The idea of an Anglican Covenant was first proposed in 2004 as a means to
address divisions among the member churches of the Anglican Communion on
matters ranging from human sexuality to the role of women. The current
draft of the Covenant, which has been unilaterally designated as the
"final" draft, has been referred to the member churches of the Communion.
The proposed Covenant establishes mechanisms which would have the effect
of forcing member churches to conform to the demands and expectations of
other churches or risk exclusion from the Communion.

Critics of the proposed Anglican Covenant, including members of the new
Coalition, believe that it will fundamentally alter the nature of historic
Anglicanism in several ways, including the narrowing of theological views
deemed acceptable, the erosion of the freedom of the member churches to
govern themselves, and the concentration of authority in the hands of a
small number of bishops. Two English groups, Inclusive Church and Modern
Church, ran anti-Covenant advertisements in last week's Church Times and
the Church of England Newspaper aiming to make more members of the Church
of England aware of the dangers of the proposed Anglican Covenant.

"If the Anglican Communion has a problem, this is not the solution,"
according to former Bishop of Worcester Peter Selby. "Whether those who
originated the Covenant intended it or not, it is already, and will become
even more, a basis for a litigious Communion from which some will seek to
exclude others."

The launch of the No Anglican Covenant Coalition website coincides with
the commemoration of the sixteenth-century theologian Richard Hooker.
"Hooker taught us that God's gifts of scripture, tradition, and reason
will guide us to new insights in every age," according to the Canadian
priest and canon law expert, the Revd. Canon Alan Perry. "The proposed
Anglican Covenant would freeze Anglican theology and Anglican polity at a
particular moment. Anglican polity rejected control by foreign bishops
nearly 500 years ago. The proposed Anglican Covenant reinstates it."

The No Anglican Covenant Coalition began in late October with a series of
informal email conversations among several international Anglican bloggers
concerned that the Covenant was being rushed through the approval process
before most Anglicans had any opportunity to learn how the proposed new
structures would affect them.

noanglicancovenant.org

Revd. Dr Lesley Fellows (England) +44 1844 239268
Dr. Lionel Deimel (USA) +1-412-512-9087
Revd. Malcolm French (Canada) +1-306-550-2277
Revd. Lawrence Kimberley (New Zealand) +64 3 981 7384

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All of which is to say, "We want to do our own rich, White, seniors club thing and don't want to have to sit down to find consensus with a bunch of Africans. We don't care that they are the growing part of the Anglican world and that our churches are in total decline - WE are the "vital" ones because we are better than other people."

Still in the closet. Why?

"Jefferts Schori said that research shows that when the Episcopal Church tells its story well, it attracts young adults for its liturgy, social-justice stances and passion for mission; immigrants and women at transition points in their lives."

Did you notice the missing constituency?

The Episcopal Church has gone out of its way to advance LGBT activists. The very public narrative - TEC's most public story - went into the consecration of LGBT clergy as bishops. This was accomplished, even at the cost of global Christian discord.

So why can't/doesn't the PB (or at least the TEC coverage of her remarks) include the LGBT in the list of those attracted by the TEC "story?"

Might it be that most LGBT people could care less about playing church, and that those who bought into TEC were of the activist fringe caught up in the symbolism and drama of public rituals? In which case, the whole strategy was a massive misread of the culture and a mission failure, one which the PB or someone in the elite needs to own.

Or might it be that the whole LGBT agenda had nothing at all to do with "a new thing of the Holy Spirit," or fostering church growth among waiting masses, or any of the other sundry explanations flung out as needed? Might it be that it had nothing at all to do with the well being of the whole church and everything to do with a very small group's interests?

Worst of all, might it be that TEC leadership is now habituated to obfuscation, deception and manipulation, suiting "the story" to particular audiences to reach particular interest group outcomes?

And speaking of being in the closet, did you read the whole article and notice the conspicuous absense of a significant church figure?

Prayer for Election Day

Almighty God, to whom we must account for all our powers and privileges: Guide the people of the United States (or of this community) in the election of officials and representatives; that, by faithful administration and wise laws, the rights of all may be protected and our nation be enabled to fulfill your purposes; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Book of Common Prayer

Episcopal Life Online reports on groundbreaking South Dakota event (good piece for All Saints' Day!)

Episcopal Life Online - DIOCESAN DIGEST

Several of our parish young people were able to attend the event in Vermillion.

Our state's tourism tag line is "Great Faces, Great Places." I guess the story shows that the Communion of Saints can be described as "all kinds of faces, not bound by places."

"Brother John's visit worked as a catalyst to get different church groups, ages, and cultures together in an unusual and wonderful way, completely in tune with the Taizé mission of reconciliation among Christians," said the Rev. Rita Powell, coordinator for youth and young adult ministry for the Diocese of South Dakota.

Episcopal Church Executive Council Finance Chair: "those who now have the most power and resources in the system" will resist needed changes

The following comments by Del Glover first appeared on a closed House of Bishops & Deputies (HoB/D) listserve, but were subsequently shared with his permission in other venues.

Some of what he says lends to "reading between the lines," especially his last paragraph. But many who hold power and resources in The Episcopal Church perceive themselves as powerless victims, which creates no end of confusion and frustration for efforts to heal the crippled denomination.

While I share some of his analysis of church decline being a decades long trend rather than a sudden emergency, the folks currently holding the denomination's systemic "power and resources" ascended on promises that their agenda would reverse the decline. They were either wrong, misleading or both and have exacerbated the decline. They should not be holding power and resources.

His call for "change of direction" is welcome, but he doesn't put enough flesh and bone on it to tell me what he has in mind. If he is arguing that the Presiding Bishop, or the Executive Council or some other elite should have unaccountable executive authority over the church, he is certainly arguing for "systemic change" but in a form so alien to this church's historic, spiritual, intellectual and organizational identity as to erase them. And authoritarian religion, or cult of personality, or unaccountable bureaucracy are not exciting new models, but old, discredited ones.

See what you think:

"There have been a number of posts concerning the finances and leadership of the Episcopal Church. As the chair of the finance committee and a member of the audit committee, I want to address what I understand to be the key issues and the steps we are taking to address them.

The first issue is the money we have borrowed to pay for the renovations to the Church Center [in New York City] and the purchase of a parking lot [in Austin, Texas] as a future site for the national archives.

When those needs arose, the staff and Executive Council chose to borrow a combined $47 million dollars from our $50 million line of credit. The terms allowed us to pay as much or little principal as we chose - and we have made primarily interest payments and only about $500,000 in principal payments over the past six years. I and other members of finance and audit committees as well as previous members of those committees with extensive financial expertise whom we have asked to advise us, believe that a loan of that amount should not be made with a line of credit. It is not a standard financial practice to use a line of credit for major capital expenditures. The purpose of a line of credit is to cover cash shortfalls for small amounts of time and is normally repaid as soon as possible (generally within a year).

In retrospect, this loan was undertaken at the time when banks encouraged all of us, individual homeowners and organizations, to over-extend ourselves and to take on loans that were not adequately secured. I believe that is what happened to us. But now the time has come for us to put our financial house in order.

It was entirely appropriate and necessary for us to do the renovations at the Church Center and some of the costs were a result of the need for asbestos abatement and not optional. Concerning the proposed future site of the Archives in Texas, (the parking lot), some of us were convinced that the availability of the parking lot was a good purchase at the time, especially since the Archives had been asked to vacate the space to the Seminary of the Southwest, the current home of the Archives. The parking lot is a functioning enterprise and its income is sufficient (at the currently low interest rates) to make interest and some principal payment. If interest rates increase, as well they may, this situation would change. In any case, we need a new site for the Archives and the current parking lot is oneoption for that.

I and others believe we now need to obtain mortgages or private financing, using the properties as collateral, just as most of us use our homes as collateral for our mortgages. With interest rates at record low levels, we believe we should secure loans and make both interest and principal payment to service our debt - preferably paying principal at an accelerated rate, so less of the church's funds goes towards interest payments and we can again be debt-free.

Several posts have suggested a conflict between the Treasurer, Kurt Barnes, and me. That assessment diminishes the importance of the issues before us [and] undermines the commitment both Kurt and I feel for this Church. We simply have a difference of opinion as to how we should address these questions. Kurt, and others, including members of the staff, want to have the maximum amount of flexibility so if there is a shortfall in income from the dioceses, they can use more of the line of credit to fund the operations of the church and Church Center programs and pay less or no principle. That is understandable - the staff of an organization normally wants this kind of flexibility to do the work they have been given to do.

On the other hand, I believe that we should pay our debt first and make whatever cost reductions are necessary to allow us to do so. That is also understandable - he role of the finance committee is to look at the big picture and the long view.

Another recent thread that has been on the HoB/D list is reflections on the decline in members. I share these concerns. If we project the decline in members and income into the future, it is clear that we can not maintain the size of the operations we currently have. We have lost about 1/3 of our members in the last 50years - but we have a structure that has stayed pretty much the same. We need to "right-size" our structures and reduce about 1/3 of our costs. That includes General Convention, Committees/Commissions, as well as Church Center programs. And it probably also will mean combining dioceses, reducing the number of bishops and committees, on the diocesan and parish levels as well. I believe these are the points Bishop Jefferts Schori was making in her comments to Executive Council.

If we begin to make those structural and organizational changes expeditiously now and focus whatever savings we can generate on our true "mission" of building the church (by which I mean, making disciples for Christ), we can turn this matter around. I keep a copy of Claude Paine's book, "Reclaiming the Great Commission" on my desk to remind me of our mission. (after all, my wife is a priest!)

If we all continue to focus on our dwindling resources, we will simply continue down an unhealthy slope. While the most current manifestations of this have focused on declining membership and finances, it is, at the end, really about vision. The system we are now in is producing what it is designed to produce. I believe we need to challenge what we are doing, change direction and ultimately change the system. That will need the hard work of many, so I hope others will do their part.

I expect these comments will generate resistance - especially from those who now have the most power and resources in the system. I hope they and we all can stop, listen to what God is saying to us and refocus on what our Book of Common Prayer says so well about God's church (i.e., God's people) existing to be the arena by which God restores all people to God and each other in Christ. If we are not about doing that, we have truly lost our way!

Del Glover,
Chair of the Finance Committee of Executive Council"